A Nearly Normal Family(10)

Why don’t we ever think about how quickly time passes, while it is passing?

Stella’s first word was “abba.” She used it for both me and Ulrika. These days, most Swedes associate the word with pop music, but in Jesus’s language, Aramaic, it means “father.”

I had four lovely autumn months of paternity leave with Stella, and I watched her personality emerge day by day. The other parents at our congregation’s children’s group often remarked that she was the very definition of a daddy’s girl. I don’t think I understood the significance of this until it was too late. To some extent, my whole life has been one big esprit d’escalier. I haven’t managed to capture a single moment. I’ve always had terrible timing.

I am doomed to yearn.





10


We were standing in the entryway. My hand on the lock. Ulrika’s whole body was shaking.

Why had Michael Blomberg called? What was Stella doing at the police station?

“Tell me,” I said to Ulrika.

“All I know is what Michael said.”

Michael Blomberg. It had been several years since I’d heard his name. Blomberg was well-known in more than just legal circles. He had made a career as one of the country’s foremost defense attorneys and had represented defendants in a great many high-profile cases. His picture had been in the evening papers and he was called upon as an expert on TV. He was also the man who had once taken Ulrika under his wing and paved the way for her success as a defense attorney.

Ulrika was breathing hard. Her eyes were darting like frightened birds.

She tried to squeeze past me and out the door, but I caught her, held her in place between my arms.

“Stella is in police custody.”

I heard what she said, the words reached me, but they were impossible to comprehend.

“There must be some mistake,” I said.

Ulrika shook her head. A moment later, she collapsed against my chest and her phone crashed to the floor.

“She’s suspected of murder,” Ulrika whispered.

I stiffened.

The first thing I thought of was Stella’s stained top.





* * *



Ulrika called a taxi as we hurried to the street. Outside the recycling station she dropped my hand.

“Hold on,” she said, stumbling in among the recycling bins and containers.

I stayed put on the sidewalk and heard her coughing and throwing up. Soon a black taxi appeared.

“How are you feeling?” I whispered as we put on our seatbelts in the back.

“Like shit,” Ulrika said, coughing into her hand.

Then she typed on her phone with both thumbs as I rolled down the window and bathed my face in the fresh air.

“Can you go a little faster?” Ulrika asked the driver, who grumbled a little before stepping on the gas.

My mind turned to Job. Was this my trial?

Ulrika explained that Michael Blomberg was waiting for us at the police station.

“Why him?” I asked. “Isn’t that an awfully big coincidence?”

“He’s an extraordinarily talented attorney.”

“Sure, but what are the chances?”

“Sometimes things just happen, honey. You can’t control everything.”

I don’t want to say I disliked Blomberg. I don’t like speaking badly of others that way. Experience tells me that when you dislike someone on such vague grounds, the problem often rests with you.

I tipped the driver and then had to jog up the stairs to the police station, where Ulrika was already pulling open the door.

Blomberg met us in the lobby. I’d almost forgotten what a big man he is. He came lumbering over to us like a bear, his jacket flapping around his stomach. He was tanned and wearing a blue shirt and an expensive suit, and his slicked-back hair curled at the back of his neck.

“Ulrika,” he said, but he stepped right up to me and shook my hand before he embraced my wife.

“What’s going on, Michael?”

“Take it easy,” he said. “We just concluded the interrogation and this nightmare will be over soon. The police have come to an extremely hasty conclusion.”

Ulrika sighed heavily.

“Stella was identified by a young woman,” Blomberg said.

“Identified?”

“Perhaps you heard that a body was found on a playground over by Pilegatan?”

“And Stella was supposedly there? On Pilegatan?” I said. “There must be some mistake.”

“That’s exactly what it is. But this girl lives in the same building as the man who was murdered and claims to have seen Stella there last night. She thinks she recognizes Stella from H&M. That seems to be all the investigators have.”

“That’s ridiculous. Can she really be in custody on such flimsy grounds?”

I thought back to the night before and tried to remember the details. How I had lain awake, unable to sleep, waiting for her; how Stella finally came home and showered before slipping into her room.

“Is she detained?” Ulrika asked.

“What’s the difference?” I asked.

“The police have the right to take someone into custody, but in order to keep them there a prosecutor must order detention,” Blomberg said. “The lead interrogator just has to brief the prosecutor on duty and then Stella will be released. I assure you. This is all a mistake.”