None of them have red hair.
~ ~ ~
I give Mom the slip in town. I run into a yard and climb far up a tree. She finds me. She tells me to come down right this minute. She can’t climb. She doesn’t speak loudly because there are people watching. But she is firm and she whispers as loudly as she can.
— Will you come down right now!
Suddenly I feel like I’m Tarzan. I’ve seen heaps of Tarzan films: Tarzan and the Dwarves, Tarzan and the Lost City. Tarzan travels by swinging between trees. He jumps between the branches or swings across by hand. He’s very strong. I’m strong, too. I’m stronger than all the boys in my year. There’s only one boy in the whole school who’s stronger than me.
Everyone is looking at me. It’s great. It’s like the gathering crowd is the audience at the cinema watching a Tarzan film. I’m Tarzan. A man walks up to the tree.
— Why don’t I fetch your boy down?
Mom smiles awkwardly.
— I’m at a loss what to do.
He’s going to come get me. There’s another tree at the same height as this tree I’m in. I climb higher. The man climbs the tree.
— Come on, kid. Enough messing around.
Without thinking about it, I jump away from my spot towards a branch. I’m Tarzan. I’m going to leap over to the other tree and swing between the branches.
But I’m not able to get a hold. The branch is soft and bends under my weight. I’m slipping. I try to grab the branch above me but I can’t reach it. I grope about in the air. I hear my mother calling.
— Jón Gunnar!
I slam onto my back. It’s bad. I can’t breathe. I try to cry but I can’t do that, either. People come running.
— Is he all right?
— I’ve never seen anything like it!
Mom gets me to my feet. I’m relieved to find that I’m okay. Mom thanks the man for trying to rescue me. Then she hurries me away.
— What on earth were you thinking, playing around like that?
— I don’t know.
— No, you don’t know. I can’t think for you. I can’t run everywhere right behind you. I’m exhausted.
She puts me to bed as soon as we get home. Even though it’s still daytime. She puts me in my pajamas and takes away my Legos.
— Do you know why I’m doing this? she asks.
I don’t know.
— Because you were naughty. I told you that if you were naughty then I would put you straight to bed.
— But I’ve finished being naughty.
— But because you were, you have to go to bed.
When I come back out to watch Bonanza she chases me back in.
— I’m not naughty.
— You were naughty, so you’ve got to stay inside your room!
— I’ve stopped that now.
— Stay in your room.
— But, Mom! Bonanza!
— You should have thought about that before you decided to be naughty.
Mom was very determined. I’d finished being naughty. I was really calm. I didn’t understand why I couldn’t watch Bonanza. So I snuck out. I was trying to sneak past Mom and into the TV room. She saw me and she had this really angry expression. I ran back into my room. I didn’t understand why she was so pissed. I couldn’t watch Bonanza and it wasn’t fair. I opened the door and called out.
— I promise I’ll behave.
Mom didn’t answer. She was angry. I started to wail.
— I’ll never do it again, Mom. I’ll never do it again!
~ ~ ~
The mother is heavy-set and lumbering; she often sighs sadly and has difficulty explaining why she is so tired, or in fully discussing her depressive condition. Her skin has sallowed, especially visible in the dark circles under her eyes. She has a limited vocabulary, speaks in short sentences, and often seems like she doesn’t know how to match words and things, which made it especially tricky to get the story of their daily lives or indeed to get her to list specific aspects or symptoms of the boy’s behavior. She asked in each interview about the outcome of the study, and then seemed wholly concerned about her own anxiety and impatience.
(National Hospital, Psychiatric Ward,
Children’s Hospital Trust, 08/02/1972)
~ ~ ~
Mom gives the women beer in brown bottles. She makes it herself. It has a very strange smell to it, sweet and bitter at the same time. They smoke.
— Have Olla and Stebbi moved? asks Mom.
— Yes, they moved over the weekend, answers Salla.
— It’s a really great apartment, says Mom. I hope it goes well for them, she adds.
— He’s a very hard-working man, says Salla.
— Shame about her, adds Gunna.
— She’s not a bad person, says Mom.
Gunna shakes her head, and takes a big drag of her cigarette.
— I don’t give a toss whether she’s good or bad; she’s a drunkard!
— She’s always been delicate, Salla says.
— An emotional person, adds Mom.
— I think she’s just a waste of space, Gunna declares.
— Don’t say that, Gunna, says Salla.
— I’ll say it if I want to! She’s a drunken wretch.
— That’s true, Mom says. She does drink a lot, often. But she’s never been addicted to pills.
Salla agrees, wholeheartedly. Gunna tuts, and moves the conversation on Mom closes the curtain over the kitchen window. The sisters head over to the oven; they’re only wearing their bras. They wash their hair in the kitchen sink. Then they sit back down at the kitchen table, comb each other’s hair and put rollers in.
After that, they move to the living room to dry their hair. They sit next to one another on the couch, each with their own hairdryer. The hairdryers are white and called Rowenta. Coming out of each hairdryer is a little pipe with a colorful plastic cap they put over their hair. When they turn on the hairdryer, hot air flows through the pipe and into the plastic cap, which expands. The caps have small holes so they don’t explode. Mom has a yellow cap with flowers on it. Gunna has a monochrome brown cap, and Salla’s is pink, decorated with pink flowers. The sound of the hair dryers is like the sound of the vacuum cleaner.
I watch them with affection and respect. These women are the most perfect and intriguing people I know. They know everything, and have all the answers.
I go back to my room. I feel good. It’s nice to see my mom so happy.
Inside the living room, the sisters are sitting side by side on the couch with their colorful air-helmets on their heads, smoking and drinking coffee, yelling to each other so they’re not drowned out by the noisy roar.
~ ~ ~
My school is called Foxvox School. I don’t really enjoy school and I find it hard to sit still. I can sit for a while but then I have to move or change position. I also find it difficult when I can’t talk the way I want to.
But I like homeroom. Each class goes to their own room. We sit on a soft rug while the teacher talks to us and asks us questions. I get to talk a lot. I like talking and telling funny stories. Sometimes I can’t control myself and simply have to talk. Those times, I interrupt. I also like to repeat words someone else has said. But I’ll say them a bit different. I think it’s fun to rhyme words, too. If someone says a strange word then I’ll rhyme it with another word. For example, if someone says “stapler,” I’ll say “mapler.”