Some Kind of Peace (16 page)

“Such as what?”

“She had cuts on her arms.”

“Sara always cuts her arms,” I say, and think before I continue. “Were the wounds fatal in themselves?”

“I can’t answer that. We have to wait for the coroner’s report.”

“The fact that she cut herself is nothing new in any case. That doesn’t have to mean she committed suicide.”

“Hmm. There’s more. We found a suicide note. It was on the rocks next to her clothes.”

“A suicide note?”

“Yes. I’m sorry I can’t show it to you now, but in the letter she writes that you are…” Sonja hesitates again, glancing quickly at Markus.

“She writes,” Sonja starts again, “that the therapy is one reason she has chosen to end her life.”

“I don’t understand…” My voice is just a whisper.

Markus gets up and sits tentatively beside me on the old lumpy couch. Suddenly he looks tired. Police-tired. Seen-too-much-misery tired. Despite his age. Carefully, he pulls the blanket up over my shoulders.

Sonja continues without further hesitation and without softening the truth. She speaks quickly. The words fire like machine-gun bullets through the room—unforeseeable and painful, impossible to defend against.

“She writes that her therapy made her realize how sick she is. That she can never be healthy and that she has harmed too many people. The fact is she writes quite a bit about your conversations, what you talked about in detail and when you met. She even gives the dates for certain conversations.”

Sonja stops for a second and rubs her temples but seems to decide that I can bear to hear what comes next.

“She ends the letter by writing that she is taking her life out of consideration for her family and because she now understands that her life lacks meaning, and that she wants to thank you for helping her realize this.”

Darkness
.

Suddenly everything goes black. It takes awhile before I realize that I am crying and have burrowed my face deep in the blanket, blocking out all the light. In the distance I can hear Markus awkwardly ask whether there is anyone he can call, and I think I give him Aina’s phone number.

She wants to thank me for helping her realize that her life lacks meaning
. The words ring in my head as I lie on the couch and desperately clutch a pillow. I remember an article I read in the
Svenska Dagbladet
about subway drivers in Stockholm and how difficult it is for them with all the suicides who jump in front of trains. The toughest of all, the article said, was when the jumper makes eye contact with the driver, sometimes even
smiles. As if creating a wordless understanding between the victim and the unwilling executioner.

She wants to thank me for helping her realize that her life lacks meaning
.

Aina arrives. I can hear her speaking with Markus outside. They talk quietly and quickly, as if they don’t want me to hear. Markus’s voice is calm, Aina’s shriller. Then I feel Aina’s cheek against mine and she says that everything’s going to be okay. I so desperately want to believe her.

No guilt
.

No shame
.

No regret
.

But no real satisfaction either. Not the relief I had expected and perhaps hoped for. Only the aching sorrow in my chest
.

But despite that, another step toward the goal, a piece of the puzzle in the grand plan I have so carefully orchestrated is accomplished
.

I look around the little room that is mine. At the bare walls and the tasteful furniture. He is lying on the floor under the table. I imagine the roundness of the body under the old blanket I covered him with. On the table the books, complete with detailed instructions. It’s crazy what you can find in the library
.

I have laid out everything else that I require on the table. Set in a neat row on top of the plastic tablecloth. Plastic bottles, cans, tools—the shiny steel reflects the cold glow of the ceiling lamp
.

I suspect this will not bring me the peace I am seeking either, but that no longer matters
.

The plan has acquired a life of its own; it already replaced the final goal a long time ago
.

My colleagues sit around the table in silence. Aina stares vacantly into the middle distance and Marianne lowers her eyes to her lap, nervously clenching her hands. Clenches and releases them, clenches and releases. It’s like an incantation.

Sven takes my hand and looks me straight in the eyes.

“Siri, you
know
it wasn’t your fault. Sara was sick. It happens to all of us sooner or later. Losing a patient isn’t unusual.”

There is no trace of flirty Sven in his eyes, only a safe, friendly, older colleague. And his gaze does not waver. Suddenly I feel infinitely grateful that he is here. I squeeze his dry, warm hand and try to smile back, but it doesn’t work. I just can’t tell him that this has happened to me once before. One time is no time—but two?

“Have another cookie,” Marianne offers in vain. The lemon bars from the bakery on Folkungagatan remain on the plate.

“I’ll see my patients as usual this week,” I say, looking at Marianne with feigned calm, but it doesn’t sound convincing. I can hear my voice quivering.

Marianne nods and looks hastily at Sven, as if seeking his approval, but Sven is looking doubtfully at me.

“Are you sure? You don’t need to play the hero with us. Take some time off instead,” Sven suggests.

“No. I really think the best thing for everyone right now is if I continue as usual.”

I get up, go to the sink, and rinse my coffee cup to show that I have decided and try to look calm and collected as I set the cup in the dish drainer and turn back toward the table, leaning against the sink.

As if in response to an invisible signal, Marianne gets up, brushes the crumbs from her wide hips, and leaves the room. Only Aina, Sven, and I are left.

A rather uncomfortable silence follows. Aina looks at Sven and then down at the table. Sven clears his throat, rubs his palms against his rust-brown corduroy trousers, and looks at me.

“Listen, Siri, I don’t want to beat around the bush: I think you drink too much. Aina told me about your DUI.”

I open my eyes wide and glare at Aina, but she does not meet my gaze. She pushes the crumbs around on the little table with her finger instead. From left to right. From right to left.

“Siri, I know what I’m talking about. Many years ago, yes, long before I came here, I had the same problem myself. Sometimes I wasn’t entirely sober when I went to work. Well, I mean, no one is saying that you’re drunk at work, but—”

I interrupt him. “This is totally absurd. Damn it, I’m not an alcoholic and YOU ought to know that, Aina. YOU’RE the one who gets loaded every weekend. And screws everything and everyone. How did you get the brilliant idea, by the way, to spread this rumor here in the office? And you, Sven, if there’s anyone who has problems with alcohol, it’s you!”

“Siri,” Sven says in a lowered voice, “it’s in the nature of things for you to deny it. It’s not strange either for you to try to justify your behavior to the police. And Aina told me out of pure concern for you. For your sake. And for the patients. Whatever, we both think it would be good if you took a break. To think through this thing about your drinking. To get over Sara’s death. We can take your patients for a couple of weeks. Come on, it’s not a big deal.”

“NO,” I yell far too shrill and loudly. “NO, I have to continue working. Don’t you get it? That’s just what this is all about.
He wants me to stop working
.”

Aina and Sven exchange worried glances when I mention the man who has no name. The man who perhaps doesn’t exist. I can tell from their expressions that they are wondering whether I’ve gone completely crazy, or if, with a fool’s stubbornness, I am simply refusing to let go of the lie they believe I have created as a protective shield.

Keep working.

There is so much that needs to be done, so many practical things that
have to be arranged. Sara’s relatives. I ought to ask the police whether they were informed and if they eventually want to talk to me. A broken family. I know that Sara was only sporadically in touch with her parents in recent years. They had divorced soon after she ran away from the foster home. Her dad moved to Malmö, where he quickly met a new woman and together they had two children. According to Sara, they were happily living in one of the nicer suburbs, and an older half sister, a failure with zigzag scars on her arms and legs, was not welcome to visit and jeopardize their marital bliss.

Sara’s mother lives in a small apartment in Vällingby. Sara told me that she started drinking pretty seriously in recent years but has still managed to keep her job at an insurance company. I know her mom loaned Sara money now and then, but otherwise their visits had been rare, to say the least, with the exception of the failed attempt to celebrate Midsummer together.

At best, a therapist can help people. Help them feel better, get over difficult events, abandon destructive behaviors and ideas. But the first and most fundamental requirement of a therapist is to do no harm.

Shouldn’t I have understood, shouldn’t I have done something to stop her? Does my inability to foresee Sara’s death make me a bad therapist? Does my lack of insight make me an accessory, an unwilling executioner?
She wants to thank me for helping her realize that her life lacks meaning
.

With a single rapid movement I sweep the cookie plate off the table. It crashes to the floor. At Sven’s and Aina’s feet, shards of porcelain are mixed with crushed pieces of lemon bars.

Charlotte clears her throat discreetly, and I realize I’ve been sitting in silence for far too long. She is expecting my comments regarding her entries, and I mumble something positive and laudatory. Because Charlotte truly has made progress. She has managed to retain control over her food and reduced the manic physical exercise she previously subjected her body to.

She is sitting with her slender, manicured hands clasped casually over the purse in her lap, but all I can see is Sara’s skinny dead body slowly being rocked by the waves. Aina and Sven were right. I should take time off. All my energy goes into trying to be present for Charlotte, and yet I can’t seem to muster any real engagement.

“I’ve been thinking,” she says tentatively. “For the first time in my life I feel that I truly question how I’m perceived, how I’m treated.”

Charlotte drums her fingernails against her purse.

“I’m proud that I’ve chosen to focus on my career. I’m proud of my competence. But I only function in my role as a woman. In line with the demands that are placed on women in our society.”

Charlotte looks distressed, and it becomes clear to me that she has suddenly started to question things that she had previously simply rationalized away.

“I am the most qualified marketing manager at our company. I work incredibly hard. But even so, it’s like it’s not enough. My male colleagues have higher salaries and louder voices, and I’m sick and tired of always having to shout to make myself heard.” She interrupts herself, and I see
that she is blinking in rapid succession. Her throat is red again, which always happens when she is agitated, and her fingers are drumming faster and faster.