Читать книгу The Red Address Book - Sofia Lundberg - Страница 21

“Are you crying?”

The temp comes over to where Doris is sitting with her elbows on the table and her head in her hands. She jumps and quickly wipes her cheeks.

“No, no,” she replies, but the tremble in her voice gives her away. She pushes a couple of black-and-white pictures to one side, turns them upside-down.

“Could I have a look?”

Sara, that’s her name, has been to see her a few times now. Doris shakes her head.

“They’re nothing special. Just old pictures. Old friends who are no longer with us. Everyone dies. People try to live for as long as possible, but do you know what? Being the oldest is no fun. There’s no point in living. Not when everyone else is dead.”

“Do you want to show me? Show me a few of the people who meant something to you?”

Doris’s fingers brush the stack of images. Then she pauses, her hand still.

Sara tries again. “Maybe you have a picture of your mother?”

Doris pulls a picture from the pile. Studies it for a moment.

“I didn’t know her very well. Only my first thirteen years.”

“What happened then? Did she die?”

“No, but it’s a long story. Too long to be interesting.”

“You don’t need to tell me if you don’t want to. Pick someone else instead.”

Doris turns over a picture of a young man. He is leaning against a tree trunk, his feet crossed and one hand in his pocket. He’s smiling, his white teeth lighting up his entire face. She quickly turns it upside-down again.

“Handsome. Who is he? Your husband?”

“No. Just a friend.”

“Is he still alive?”

“I don’t actually know. I don’t think so. It’s a long time since we last met. But it would be wonderful if he was.” Doris smiles shrewdly and gently strokes the photograph with the tip of her index finger.

Sara puts an arm around Doris’s shoulders, doesn’t say anything. She is so different from Ulrika. Gentler and much kinder.

“Do you have to stop coming when Ulrika gets back? Can’t you stay longer?”

“I can’t, sadly. Once Ulrika is back, we’re on the usual schedule again. But until then, we’ll make sure we have a good time, you and I. Are you hungry?”

Doris nods. Sara takes out the foil carton and dishes the food onto a plate. She carefully separates the vegetables, meat, and mashed potato, which she smooths with a spoon. Once the food is warm, she slices a tomato and places the pieces in a pretty half-moon.

“There now. Looks good, doesn’t it?” she exclaims happily, putting down the plate.

“Thanks, it’s nice of you to dish it up like that.”

Sara pauses and gives her a questioning look. “What do you mean, like that?”

“You know, so nicely. Not all mixed together.”

“Is your food usually mixed up? Doesn’t sound so good.” She wrinkles her nose. “We’ll have to change that.”

Doris smiles cautiously and takes a bite. The food really does taste better today.

“Pictures are so handy, though.” Sara nods towards the pile of photographs on the table, next to two empty tin boxes. “They help us remember everything we might have forgotten otherwise.”

“And everything we should have forgotten a long time ago.”

“Was that why you were sad when I got here?”

She nods. Her hands are resting on the kitchen table. She brings them together, interlaces the fingers. They’re dry and wrinkled, and her dark-blue veins almost seem to sit on top of the skin. She holds out a photo of a woman and a small child for Sara to look at.

“My mother and my sister,” she says with a sigh, wiping away yet another tear.

Sara takes the picture, studies the two figures for a moment.

“You look like your mother; you have the same twinkle in your eye. It’s the most beautiful thing when you can see the life in people’s eyes.”

Doris nods. “But they’re all dead now. So far away. It hurts.”

“Maybe you should sort them into two piles, then? One for the pictures that give you positive feelings, and one for the negative.”

Sara gets up and starts rifling through the kitchen drawers.

“Here!” she shouts when she finds what she is looking for: a thick roll of tape. “We’ll put all the negative pictures in one box. And then we’ll wrap it in tape until there’s no more left.”

“You’re full of ideas, you are!” Doris’s eyes light up.

“Let’s just do it!” Sara laughs. Once Doris has finished eating, Sara takes command of the stack of pictures. Holds them up one by one, and lets Doris point to the box where each should go. Sara doesn’t ask questions, though her face reveals some curiosity about the people and places from the past who go flickering by. She calmly places the pictures in the boxes, upside-down so that Doris doesn’t have to look at them. Many of the older black-and-white images end up in the negative pile. The modern colour photographs, showing sweet giggling children, land in the positive. Sara studies Doris’s face as she makes her decisions, gently strokes her back.

The stack is soon sorted. Sara winds the transparent tape round and round the tin box. Then she rummages through the drawer again, finds more rolls. She continues with the beige masking tape, then finishes with a few layers of silver tape. She giggles in satisfaction when she places the box in front of Doris.

“Try to get into that now!” Sara is beaming, and she raps the box with her knuckles.