A summer with Kim Novak Read Online Free PDF Page B

night I had a dream. I was at the wildlife park again and the whole class was standing in front of a large green aquarium with dolphins, rays and seals. Sharks, too, I think. None of us moved a muscle or said a word, because Ewa Kaludis was speaking. Behind her, the large torpedo-like bodies continued their endless journey round and round in the green water.
    Then Benny swore. I saw at once what he was pointing at with his dirty index finger.
    My mother was floating by in the aquarium.
    Among the rays and seals. My mother.
    It made me feel awful. She was wearing her worn blue house dress, the one with the bleached-out roses, and she looked swollen and bug-eyed. I rushed toward the glass, gesturing at her to move to the other side, but she just hung there in the water and stared at us with her sad eyes. It seemed impossible to get her to move, so I turned around, pressed myself against the glass and spread out my arms, trying to hide her. Ewa Kaludis fell silent and gave me a curious look. She seemed disappointed, and I wanted to cry and wet myself and be swallowed up by the earth.
    When I woke up it was quarter to five in the morning and I was soaked through with a cold sweat. I thought it must have something to do with the Reval caramels. I got out of bed and sat on the toilet but it was pointless.
    As I sat there I thought about the dream. It was weird. Brumberga Wildlife Park didn’t have an aquarium, and Ewa Kaludis hadn’t even been on the trip with us.
    I didn’t get to sleep again that night.
    Just before I walked into the flat, Edmund said: ‘Do you know what the biggest difference in the world is between?’
    ‘The universe and Åsa Lenner’s brain?’ I said.
    ‘Nope,’ said Edmund. ‘It’s between my dad and my mum. Just so you know.’
    Over the course of the dinner they had invited me to, I saw that he wasn’t wrong. It was a sort of pre-thank you for letting Edmund stay at Gennesaret all summer, I think.
    Albin Wester, Edmund’s father, was short and stocky, with limp arms and a rolling gait. He looked like a silverback. A bit worn-out and resigned, too; even though I was an anti-footballer, I was reminded of a football coach trying to come up with a strategy during half-time when the team was down 6 – 0 . Upbeat, yet resigned. He talked throughout the meal, especially when his mouth was full.
    Mrs. Wester looked as severe as a longcase Mora clock draped in a mourning shroud. She didn’t say a word during dinner, but she tried to muster a smile every so often. And when she did, she seemed on the verge of cracking, and then she’d hiccup and squeeze her eyes shut.
    ‘Have more, boys,’ said Albin Wester. ‘You never know when you’ll get your next meal. Signe’s sausage bake is famous across northern Europe.’
    Both Edmund and I ate heartily, because it was extremely tasty. I thought of the domestic situation facing us that summer and told Edmund to ask his mum to give us the recipe.
    I knew that kind of gesture was considered the height of good manners, and as if on cue the Mora clock cracked open and hiccupped.
    ‘Sausage Bake à la Signe,’ said Albin Wester out of the corner of his mouth. ‘Food fit for the gods.’
    He smiled, too, and a few pieces of sausage fell in his lap.
    ‘She’s an alcoholic,’ Edmund explained afterward. ‘It takes every muscle in her body to get through a dinner like this.’
    I thought that sounded strange and said so. Edmund shrugged.
    ‘Eh,’ he said. ‘It’s not strange at all. She has three sisters. They’re all the same. They’re like Grandpa—that man drank like a fish—but the female body can’t seem to take it.’
    ‘Yeah?’ I said.
    ‘You shouldn’t give womenfolk schnapps. Or put gunpowder in their tobacco. It’s too much for them.’
    ‘You sound like Salasso,’ I said. ‘Do you read lots of Wild West magazines?’
    ‘Sometimes,’ said Edmund. ‘But lately I’ve been reading more books.’
    ‘I like to mix it up,’ I