‘Could you fetch a pallet of beer, Göran?’
‘No!’
…which was not what he said, of course. But he would have liked to.
At this stage Arvid was five and Olof seven. They weren’t particularly interested in their little sister, but they put up with her. Teresa didn’t make much noise except when someone tried to get her to do something she didn’t want to do. Then it was No! and No! again, until she very occasionally had a complete temper tantrum. She had a limit, and when she was pushed beyond that limit, she was horrendous.
Her favourite soft toy was a little green snake they had bought at Kolmården; she called it Bambam. One day when Teresa was eighteen months old, Arvid started teasing her, trying to take the snake off her by pulling its tail.
Teresa clung to the snake’s head and said, ‘Avvi, no!’, but Arvid carried on pulling. Teresa resisted with all her might and ended up tipping over forwards as she clutched the head and screamed, ‘Avvi, no-no!’ Arvid gave the snake a tug and it flew out of Teresa’s hands as she lay on the floor shaking with rage.
Arvid waved the snake in front of her face, but when she didn’t even reach out to try and take it, he got bored and threw it back to her. She cradled the snake in her arms, whispering, ‘Bambam…’ with tears in her voice.
So far, so good. Arvid forgot about his sister and started rummaging around under the bed for a bucket of Lego. But with a grudge-bearing capacity unusual in such a small child, Teresa hauled herself to her feet and toddled over to the shelf by her bed, where she picked up a glass snowdome with an angel inside.
A blizzard whirled up around the angel as Teresa went over to Arvid and waited by his side until he sat up. Then she slammed it against his head. The globe broke and cut open both Teresa’s hand and Arvid’s temple. When Maria heard the screams and came running into the room, she found Arvid lying in a pool of water, blood and bits of plastic, yelling along with Teresa, whose hand was bleeding quite badly.
Arvid’s summary of the incident was, ‘I took her snake and she hit me over the head.’ He omitted the detail that at least a minute had passed between the two events. Perhaps he had forgotten, perhaps he didn’t see it as being of any significance.
By the time Teresa turned four, it was obvious that it was Daddy who mattered. Not that she distanced herself from Maria, but it was Göran she turned to in all essential matters. With the boys, the situation was reversed. For example it was Maria who drove them to football training. No actual decision had ever been taken, it was just the way things were.
Maria wanted to do things, while Göran was perfectly happy to sit quietly with Teresa while she was drawing or pottering about. If she asked a question he answered her, if she wanted help with something he helped her, but without making a fuss about it.
Her favourite activity was making necklaces with plastic beads. Göran had acquired every plastic bead in the toy shop in Rimsta, in every imaginable shape and colour, and had even got the assistant to go down to the storeroom and dig out some boxes they had taken off display. Teresa had an entire shelf stocked with at least sixty little plastic containers into which she had sorted the beads according to a system only she understood. Sometimes she would spend days altering the system.
The beads were threaded onto coloured wool or fishing line, and after patient instruction Teresa had learned to tie the knots herself. It was a constant production line; the only problem was the product.
Maria’s parents had been given theirs. Göran’s parents had been given theirs. Family and friends and relatives of friends had been given theirs. Anyone who might possibly deserve a necklace made of plastic beads had been given one. Or two. Göran’s father was the only one who wore his. Probably to annoy Göran’s mother more than anything.
But it would have taken a family of biblical proportions to generate a demand to meet the supply. Teresa made at least three necklaces a day. Göran had put up lots of tacks above her bed to hang the necklaces on. The wall was now more or less full.
One Wednesday afternoon in the middle of October, Göran picked his daughter up from the childminder as usual. She got out her beads and thread as usual and put them on the kitchen table, and Göran sat opposite her with his usual evening paper. Concentrating hard, Teresa tied a stop-knot at one end of a length of fishing line. Then she made a selection from among her containers, and started threading.
When Göran had finished looking for news about the EU decision on Sweden’s state monopoly on alcohol sales and found nothing but more misery from Hallandsås, he lowered the paper and looked at his daughter. She seemed to have decided on a necklace in red, yellow and blue. Using her fingers as tweezers, she skilfully picked up one bead at a time, threading them onto the line as she breathed audibly through her nose.
‘Sweetheart?’
‘Mm?’
‘Couldn’t you make something other than necklaces with your beads? It’s just that you’ve got such a lot.’
‘I want a lot.’
‘But what for?’
Teresa stopped dead, a bright yellow bead between her fingers. She looked at Göran with a frown. ‘I collect them.’
She held his gaze, as if she were challenging him to question her. His eyes flickered down to the newspaper, open at a picture of some lake somewhere. Pollution. Dead fish. Local population up in arms.
‘Daddy?’ Teresa was studying the yellow bead, her eyes narrowed. ‘Why do things exist?’
‘What do you mean?’
Teresa’s eyebrows moved even closer together, and she looked as if she were in pain. She took a few breaths through her nose as she always did when she was concentrating. Eventually she said, ‘Well, if this bead didn’t exist, I wouldn’t be holding it.’
‘No.’
‘And if I didn’t exist, then nobody would be holding this bead.’
‘No.’
Göran sat there as if he had been hypnotised, staring at the bright yellow dot between his daughter’s fingers. The grey October day outside the window had gone. Only the yellow dot existed, and Göran felt as if something was pressing against his eardrums, like when you’re sinking towards the bottom of the swimming pool.
Teresa shook her head. ‘Why is it like that?’ Her gaze swept over the containers on the table, their multi-coloured contents. ‘I mean, all these beads might not exist and there might not be anybody to make necklaces with them.’
‘But the beads do exist. And so do you. That’s just the way things are.’
Teresa put the yellow bead back in its container and crossed her arms tightly over her chest as she continued to look at the kaleidoscope of coloured dots in front of her. Gently Göran asked, ‘Have you all been talking about this at Lollo’s?’
Teresa shook her head.
‘So what made you think about it, then?’
Teresa didn’t reply, but stared at her array of beads with an expression that could best be described as furious. Göran leaned forward with his chin resting on his hand so that he was closer to her level, and said, ‘There is actually one person who hasn’t had a necklace; do you know who that is?’ Teresa didn’t react, but Göran gave her the answer anyway, ‘It’s me. I’ve never had a necklace.’
Teresa bent her head so that her nose was pointing at the floor, and her voice broke as she said, ‘You can have them all if you want.’
Göran got up from his chair. ‘But sweetheart…’
He knelt down next to his daughter’s chair and she fell into his arms, rested her forehead on his collarbone and wept. Göran stroked her head and said, ‘Sssh…’ but Teresa just carried on weeping.
When Göran said, ‘Couldn’t you make me a necklace? I’d like a yellow one. All yellow,’ she banged her forehead against his collarbone so hard that it hurt both of them, and kept on weeping.