He had neglected her; he knew it. Been away too much, too busy with his career, trying to avoid the defeats and difficulties at home. But everything will be different now. He had taken her hand. I’m going to spend the new year focused on our future family, I’m going to put all my energy into it. We’re going to succeed! There’s nothing more important in my life than us.
She had gently pulled away and asked the driver to turn up the music before she looked back out the window. He had turned from her to watch the melting droplets on the glass while Tina Turner filled the car with positive affirmations.
The New Year’s Eve party had been Kafkaesque from the get-go. He stood there with his champagne and looked at the woman he loved right next to him, his wife. But somehow she wasn’t his wife anymore. He couldn’t remember how he had gotten through the evening, but by the time the clock struck midnight, he hadn’t touched her even once. The kiss she gave him tasted of duty. He knew it was over.
He wasn’t even surprised when she came to him a little after twelve with a story about a girlfriend who was spending New Year’s Eve alone, how she felt sorry for her. She was going to visit and comfort her; it wouldn’t take long. People were surprised when she left, but they were too drunk to be concerned.
He put on his coat and went after her. Followed her slender back all through downtown, like an actor in a bad melodrama, at the same time falling apart and amped up on adrenaline. When she walked through an unfamiliar door, which he knew didn’t belong to the girlfriend, he counted to ten and then rang the bell. Niels, it said next to the doorbell. Niels. She opened the door without the least trace of remorse and asked him to leave. That had been the worst part—that she wasn’t embarrassed, conciliatory, or worried about him. You should go now, Jeppe! Walk away!
Then she shut the door.
He had walked through the partying city to the apartment of his best friend, Johannes, and his husband, Rodrigo, and knocked on the door. Uncomprehending, spurned, decimated. He stayed on their sofa for two weeks, calling in sick at work, wrapping himself up in a cave of wool blankets. Johannes and Rodrigo looked after him like you would a child and cried the tears he was too paralyzed to cry. They listened to the story a thousand times and supported him, until he was able to stand up again and to some extent face the world.
All of her things and most of their furniture had disappeared from the house when he finally went home. The walls were empty but for sad outlines where shelves had been removed. The only thing left in the living room was their worn-out sofa. On that he lay down, unmoving, like a sponge in a brine of unhappiness, sucking until not a drop was left.
Eventually Johannes came and knocked at the door. When it didn’t open, Johannes broke a basement window, came in and pulled him up and into the shower.
Winter and spring had come and gone. Now it was August and Jeppe had gone back to work. He had just received the divorce decree in the mail. It was on the coffee table as a humiliating reminder that she had moved on, and he was alone.
CHAPTER 7
Esther de Laurenti kicked off her shoes and poured herself a glass of red with the dogs jumping around her feet. If only she had a good bottle of Syrah. Today seemed too horrible for her regular everyday cabernet. Standing at the kitchen table, cashmere jacket still on, she took a big gulp, closed her eyes, and let the blissful sensation spread through her whole body. Ahh!
Kristoffer was peeling vegetables at the sink. He had waved when she came home but had not asked about the hospital visit. He knew her. She needed a little while to get settled.
In the living room, she sat heavily on the sofa. The dogs instantly jumped up, licking her face and putting fur all over her jacket. The apartment smelled of freshly baked bread—probably one of the skillet breads Kristoffer had been experimenting with lately. The aroma was so comforting that Esther started to cry. Heavyhearted is the most incisive expression, she thought. That’s exactly how I feel. A gravestone in my chest. She drank again, petted Epistéme until the dog mellowed out on the sofa and leaned her head against the backrest.
In the taxi on her way home, the radio news had mentioned the murder of a young woman downtown. She couldn’t wrap her head around the fact they were talking about her building, her tenant. Her Julie. Because it was Julie who had been killed. No one had said so yet, but Esther knew it with the same certainty one knows that a Swiss train will depart on time. The cabdriver had turned down the volume and tutted at the world gone wrong. She sat in the back seat, feeling guilty.
“We’re having rack of lamb and a warm fava bean salad. Is that all right?” Kristoffer stood in the doorway to the kitchen, wiping his hands on a worn kitchen towel, his gaze averted self-consciously as always when he spoke.
“That sounds lovely, dear. Thank you!”
He went back to the kitchen, and she heard clattering pots and dishes. The pampering didn’t feel right. She shouldn’t sit there amid the smell of food and freshly baked bread, feeling relaxed when there had just been a murder two floors below. Today was for wallowing in loneliness, binge drinking, and crying all night. That would be infinitely more appropriate.
Could it really be Julie? She had been such a nice tenant, calmer and tidier than Caroline. Not as pretty, perhaps, but charming in a way that wasn’t only due to her youth. Rebellion and hidden sensuality lurked at the corner of her girlish smile. Julie had been a repressed rebel, a quiet sea full of secrets and creepy-crawlies. Esther had recognized it and felt an urge to take her under her wing and help her on in life, give her a better start than she herself had had. Not as an ersatz mother, but as a fellow sufferer, one who had been beaten down by life and moved on.
Julie had often sat on the kitchen windowsill and chatted or listened while Esther practiced her scales. Once in a while she had helped serve and do the dishes when Esther was entertaining guests.
Kristoffer turned on the blender, startling Epistéme, who jumped down off the sofa. He was probably making dukkah to go with the lamb. Or maybe a pesto? Esther emptied her glass just when it occurred to her that Julie and Kristoffer had helped in the kitchen together at several of her dinner parties.
She had to ask Kristoffer how well he actually knew Julie. She had to reevaluate her whole project. She had to decide if she was going to tell the police that she had murdered Julie.
She takes a walk in the evening. Has fun staring right in the eyes of men passing her. Especially the ones who are with women. It is the easiest way in the world to make a man lose his composure. You just have to look at him without casting down your eyes. To a man, a direct gaze means that you want to either fuck him or kill him. She loves seeing how uncomfortable it makes them. She’s in control; it’s free fun. But she’s the one who goes home alone.
One evening she passes a man on the narrow sidewalk. He has broad shoulders, wears glasses, and walks by himself, with a secretive smile. She tries to catch his eye, but he doesn’t notice her, just keeps moving. She catches herself glancing after him.
The next day she sees him again on the opposite sidewalk and recognizes him straight off. He still doesn’t see her. It annoys her. She heads home, her feet throbbing in the high-heeled sandals. Happy summer couples are all around her; the city is full of love. She senses a warm hand on her shoulder, turns around, and sees the man standing close. Smiling. All of a sudden she feels shy and has to look down.