"As you know I'm on disability and-"

"Yeah, yeah. But do you have any money?"

"Why? I'm not going to lend you any if that's-"

"No, no, no. But I was thinking: Lacke. What if we were to treat him to a real... you know."

Larry coughed, looked accusingly at the cigarette.

"What... to cheer him up, you mean?"

"Yes."

"No ... I don't know."

"What? Because you don't think it'll make him feel better or because you don't have any money or because you're too cheap to put out?" Larry sighed, took another puff, coughing, then made a face and put the cigarette out with his foot. Then picked up the b.u.t.t and put it in a sandfilled receptacle, looked at his clock.

"Morgan .. . it's half past eight in the morning."

"Yes, I know. But in a couple of hours. When stuff opens."

"No, I have to think about it."

"So you have money?"

"Should we go in, or what?"

They walked in through the revolving door. Morgan pulled his hands through his hair and walked up to the woman at the reception desk to find out where Virginia was, while Larry went and looked at some fish that were swimming sleepily through a large bubbling cylindrical tank. After a minute Morgan came back, rubbed his hands over his leather vest to wipe off something that had stuck to him, said: "d.a.m.n b.i.t.c.h. Didn't want to tell."

"Oh well. Must be in intensive care."

"Can you get in there?"

"Sometimes."

"You seem like you know what you're doing."

"I do."

They moved in the direction of the Intensive Care Unit. Larry knew the way.

Many of Larry's "acquaintances" were in or had been in the hospital. At the moment there were two here at Sabb, excluding Virginia. Morgan suspected that people that Larry had only met briefly became acquaintances or even friends only at that moment that they landed in the hospital. Then he sought them out, went for visits. Why he did this, Morgan had just been about to ask when they reached the swinging doors of the ICU, pushed them open, and caught sight of Lacke at the far end of the corridor. He was sitting in an armchair, in only his underpants. His hands were clutching the arms of the chair while he stared into a room in front of him that people were hurrying in and out of.

Morgan sniffed: "What the h.e.l.l, are they cremating someone or what?" He laughed. "d.a.m.n conservatives. Budget cuts, you know. Let the hospitals take over the . . ."

He stopped talking when they reached Lacke, whose face was ashen, his eyes red and unseeing. Morgan sensed what must have happened, let Larry take the lead. Wasn't good at this kind of thing.

Larry walked over to Lacke, put a hand on his arm.

"Hey there, Lacke. How's it going?"

Chaos in the room closest to them. The windows visible from the door were wide open but despite this the sour smell of ash drifted out into the corridor. A thick cloud of dust was floating through the air, people were standing in its midst talking loudly, gesturing. Morgan caught the words "hospital's responsibility" and "we have to try . . ." What they had to try he didn't hear because Lacke turned to them, staring at them like they were two strangers, said: ". .. should have realized . . ."

Larry leaned over him.

"Should have realized what?"

"That it would happen."

"What's happened?"

Lacke's eyes cleared and he looked toward the foggy, dreamlike room, said simply: "She burned."

"Virginia?"

"Yes. She went up in flames."

Morgan took a couple of steps toward the room, peeked in. An older man with an air of authority came over to him.

"Excuse me, this is not a public exhibition."

"No, no. I was just. . ."

Morgan was about to say something witty about looking for his boa constrictor, but dropped it. At least he had had time to see. Two beds. One with wrinkled sheets and a blanket thrown to one side as if someone had gotten out of it in a hurry.

The other was covered with a thick gray blanket that stretched from the foot end to the pillow. The wood of the headrest was covered with soot. Under the blanket he could see the outline of an unbelievably thin person. Head, chest, pelvis were the only details he could make out. The rest could just as well be folds, irregularities in the blanket cloth. Morgan rubbed his eyes so hard that his eyeb.a.l.l.s were pressed a centimeter or so into his head. It's true. It's f.u.c.king true. He looked around the corridor, looking for someone to work through his confusion on. Caught sight of an older man leaning against a walker, an IV stand next to him, trying to get a glimpse into the room.

"What are you looking at, you old fool? Want me to kick your walker out from under you too?"

The man started to retreat, in tiny intervals. Morgan balled his hands into fists, tried to control himself. Remembered something he had seen in the room, turned abruptly and went back.

The man who had spoken to him was on his way out.

"Excuse me, but what..." me, but what..."

"Yes, yes, yes .. ." Morgan shoved him out of the way,". . . just getting my friend's clothes for him, if that's alright. Or do you think he should keep sitting out there in the buff?"

The man crossed his arms over his chest, let Morgan pa.s.s.

He grabbed Lacke's clothes from the chair next to the unmade bed, threw another glance at the other bed. A charred hand with outstretched fingers poked out from under the sheet. The hand was unrecognizable; the ring that sat on the middle finger was not. Gold, with a blue stone, Virginia's ring. Before Morgan turned away he also noted that a leather strap was fastened across the wrist.

The man was still standing in the door, his arms crossed.

"Happy now?"

"No. But why the h.e.l.l was she restrained like that?" The man shook his head.

"You can let your friend know the police will be here shortly and they will no doubt want to talk to him."

"What for?"

"How should I know? I'm not the police."

"No, of course not. Easy to make that mistake, though, isn't it." Out in the corridor, they helped Lacke get into his clothes, and had just finished when two police officers arrived. Lacke was completely s.p.a.ced out, but the nurse who had pulled the blinds up had enough presence of mind to be able to vouch for the fact that he had had nothing to do with it. That he had still been sleeping when the whole thing . . . began. She was comforted by one of her colleagues. Larry and Morgan led Lacke out of the hospital.

When they had gone through the revolving front door Morgan drew a deep breath of the cold air and said: "Sorry, have to barf," leaned over the flower beds and deposited the remains of yesterday's dinner mixed with green slime over the bare bushes.

When he was done he wiped his mouth with his hand and dried his hand on his pant leg. Then held up the hand as if it were exhibit A and said to Larry: "Now look here, you're f.u.c.king going to have to cough up."

They made their way back to Blackeberg and Morgan was given one hundred and fifty to spend at the alcohol shop while Larry took Lacke back to his place.

Lacke allowed himself to be led. He had not said a single word the whole time they were on the subway.

In the elevator up to Larry's apartment on the sixth floor he started to cry. Not quietly, no, he wailed like a kid, but worse, more. When Larry opened the elevator door and pushed him out onto the landing the cry deepened, started to reverberate against the concrete walls. Lacke's scream of primal, bottomless sorrow filled the stairwell from top to bottom, streamed through the mail slots, keyholes, transformed the highrise into one big tomb erected in the memory of love, hope. Larry shivered; he had never heard anything like it before. You don't cry like this. You're not allowed to cry like this. You die if you cry like this. The neighbors. They're going to think I'm killing him. The neighbors. They're going to think I'm killing him.

Larry fumbled with his keys while thousands of years of human suffering, of helplessness and disappointments, that for the moment had found an outlet in Lacke's frail body continued to pour out of him. The key finally made it into the lock and, with a strength he had not believed he possessed, Larry basically carried carried Lacke into the apartment and closed the door. Lacke continued to scream; the air never seemed to give out. Sweat was starting to form on Larry's brow. Lacke into the apartment and closed the door. Lacke continued to scream; the air never seemed to give out. Sweat was starting to form on Larry's brow.

What the h.e.l.l should I.. . should I. ..

In his panic he did what he had seen in the movies. With an open hand he slapped Lacke's cheek, was startled by the sharp slapping sound and regretted it in the same moment that he did it. But it worked. Lacke stopped screaming, stared at Larry with wild eyes, and Larry thought he was going to get hit back. Then something softened in Lacke's eyes, he opened and closed his mouth like he was trying to get some air, said: "Larry, I. .."

Larry put his arms around him. Lacke leaned his cheek against his shoulder and cried so hard he was shaking. After a while Larry's legs started to feel weak. He tried to untangle himself from the embrace so he could sit down on the hall chair, but Lacke hung onto him and followed him down. Larry landed on the chair and Lacke's legs buckled under him, his head sank down onto Larry's lap.

Larry stroked his hair, didn't know what to say. Just whispered: "There, there ... there, there ..."

Larry's legs had fallen asleep when a change occurred. The crying had died down, and given way to a soft whimpering, when he felt Lacke's jaws tense up against his thigh. Lacke lifted his head, wiped away the snot with his sleeve and said: "I'm going to kill it."

"What?"

Lacke lowered his gaze, stared right through Larry's chest and nodded.

"I'm going to kill it. I'm not going to let it live."

During the long recess at half past nine both Staffs and Johan came over to Oskar and said "great job" and "f.u.c.king awesome." Staffe offered him chewy candy cars and Johan asked if Oskar wanted to come with them and collect empty bottles one day.

No one shoved him or held his nose when he walked past. Even Micke Siskov smiled, nodding encouragingly as if Oskar had told him a funny story when they met in the corridor outside the cafeteria.

As if everyone had been waiting for him to do exactly what he did, and now that it was done he was one of them.

The problem was that he couldn't enjoy it. He noted it, but it didn't affect him. Great not to be picked on anymore, yes. If someone tried to hit him, he would hit back. But he didn't belong here anymore.

During math cla.s.s he raised his head and looked at the cla.s.smates he had been with for six years. They sat with their heads bent over their work, chewing on pens, sending notes to each other, giggling. And he thought: But they're just. . . kids. But they're just. . . kids.

And he was also a kid, but...

He doodled a cross in his book, changed it to a kind of gallows with a noose.

I am am a child, hut... a child, hut...

He drew a train. A car. A boat.

A house. With an open door.

His anxiety grew. At the end of math cla.s.s he couldn't sit still, his feet banged on the floor, his hands drummed against his desk. The teacher asked him, with a surprised turn of her head, to be quiet. He tried, but soon the restlessness was there again, pulling in the marionette threads and his legs started to move on their own.

When it was time for the last cla.s.s of the day, gym cla.s.s, he couldn't stand it any longer. In the corridor he said to Johan: "Tell Avila I'm sick, OK?"

"Are you taking off, or what?"

"Don't have my gym clothes."

This was actually true; he had forgotten to pack his gym clothes this morning, but that was not why he had to cut cla.s.s. On the way to the subway he saw the cla.s.s line up in straight rows. Tomas shouted "buuuuu!" at him.

Would probably tell on him. Didn't matter. Not in the least.

The pigeons fluttered up in gray flocks as he hurried across Vallingby square. A woman with a stroller wrinkled up her nose in judgement at him; someone who doesn't care about animals. But he was in a hurry, and all the things that lay between him and his goal were mere objects, were simply in the way.

He stopped outside the toy store. Smurfs were arranged in a sugary cute landscape. Too old for stuff like that. In a box at home he had a couple of Big Jim dolls that he had played with quite a bit when he was younger.

About a year or so ago.

An electronic doorbell sounded as he opened the door. He walked through a narrow aisle where plastic dolls, krixa-men, and boxes of building models filled the shelves. Closest to the register were the packages with molds for tin soldiers. You had to ask for the blocks of tin at the counter.

What he was looking for was stacked on the counter itself.

Yes, the imitations imitations were stacked under the plastic dolls, but the originals, with the Rubik's logo on the packaging, they were more careful with. They cost were stacked under the plastic dolls, but the originals, with the Rubik's logo on the packaging, they were more careful with. They cost ninety-eight kronor ninety-eight kronor apiece. apiece.

A short pudgy man stood behind the counter with a smile that Oskar would have described as "ingratiating" if he had known the word.

"h.e.l.lo ... are you looking for anything special today?" Oskar had known the Cubes would be stacked on the counter, had his plan figured out.

"Yes. I was wondering ... about the paints. For tin."

"Yes?"

The man gestured to the tiny pots of enamel paint arranged behind him. Oskar leaned over, putting the fingers of one hand on the counter just in front of the Rubik's Cubes while the other hand held his bag, hanging open underneath. He pretended to search among the colors.

"Gold. Do you have that?"

"Gold. Of course."

When the man turned around Oskar took one of the Cubes, popped it into his bag, and had just managed to return his hand to the same place when the man came back with two pots of paint and placed them on the counter. Oskar's heart was beating heat up into his cheeks, across his ears.