"Aren't you supposed to stay in the clinic until the doctor says you're better?"
The MultiTranslate app translates the Swedish synonym for «what a pleasant surprise, I'm so happy to see you, dear» into English and sends it to my earplug. As Åsa, Frieda's mother, doesn't speak nor understand English, I keep my mouth shut and let Frieda do the talking.
"I'm glad to see you too, mum. This is Benny. His company wants Agneta for a photoshoot, but she's not at home and we can't find her. Do you have any idea where she might be?"
I get a hand, I get a smile, I get three kisses on the cheeks, and I get dragged inside: "Agneta? For a photoshoot? Yes, she's such a gorgeous girl. Do you want her to wear evening dresses? She's spectacular in an evening dress. But she's also spectacular in a bathing suit or a summer dress."
Agneta is even spectacular when she's wearing a garbage bag and a motor helmet, I think, but I don't say that, of course, as I don't speak Swedish.
Frieda tries again while Mum pushes me onto the couch, and orders her husband to interrupt his urgent business of watching the news to make tea or coffee or perhaps Mister Benny would like a beer. She sits next to me with an album full of photos of her successful daughter Agneta: "This is when she won the Miss Sweden competition. But that was quite some time ago. This is a better photo."
Frieda interrupts: "MUM! I asked you a question. When was the last time you spoke with Agneta?"
Mum explains to me: "Oh, please don't feel annoyed by Frieda's behaviour, Mister Benny. She's in therapy and they feed her drugs. She has these frequent anger attacks. If we don't pay attention, it will pass soon enough."
"I'm NOT taking drugs. I have enough problems without them. You know I refused to let the doctors turn me into a junkie.", Frieda insists.
Åsa turns to her now, annoyed: "I was just joking, dear. When you enter that clinic, do they remove your sense of humour with a surgical procedure? Or do they kill it chemically with pills and x-rays?"
She grabs my arm like a greedy bachelor would hold the wrist of a rich widow: "I haven't spoken with Agneta for over a week, but she's always busy, you know, everybody wants something from her, and sometimes she doesn't even have time to call her mother, but it's alright because we love her and we understand. She has this contract with Fishion Fashion in Gothenburg, and those people are so demanding, they keep her busy day and night, but they pay well, so you know how it goes. Ah, there's the tea. Do you take milk and sugar?"
When he hands me a cup of tea (an expensive cup of hand-painted china), I have a closer look at Stieg, Agneta's father. Blue eyes, light blond hair, a small nose and full lips, an athletic body and still in good shape although he's 61 years old. He's a more-than-average handsome man who seems quiet and friendly. Mum Åsa has the same good-looking looks, but she has the energy of a tropical hurricane, whereas her husband acts more like a polar breeze.
"Would you like some cake, Mister Benny? Bring the man a slice of cake, Stieg. Would you like to stay for lunch? We have caterers, so it's no problem at all, we just call them and ask if they bring herring filets and egg salad for one more, I mean two, if Frieda wants to stay for lunch too. Did you see those photos for Abbash Make-up? Agneta was in every magazine. They repeated the commercial over 3.000 times on Swedish TV…"
Suddenly, I realise Frieda is no longer in the room. Without a sound, she slipped away. I close the album and ask: "Frieda?"
"Oh, she must be puking around in the bathroom or something. Don't you want to see more photos of Agneta? This album is from the time when she was eight years old. It was Christmas, and she was playing Mary, the mother of Jesus, in a school play. It was a tremendous success…"
I stand up, excuse myself and go looking for Frieda. She's not in the bathroom, not in either of the bedrooms, not in the kitchen. A sudden cold shivers down my spine. She came to her parent's house, the place where she was born, where she lived her entire life, the place she loves…
Why did she run away? Doesn't she feel at home here? Where did she go to? She didn't leave by the front door; I would have noticed. I open the back door and step into the garden. Without a sound, I walk all the way to the back, where I find Frieda, sitting on a bench, looking at the trunk of a tree.
"What are you looking at?"
"Ants."
I look at the tree, at the ants. They're black, small, and fascinating, running up and down the tree like traffic during rush hour. They have no boss who tells them what to do, no paycheck or end-of-year bonus to motivate them, no marketing plan or social network, no pension or healthcare, no unemployment or food stamps… They just work and seem happy.
I join Frieda on the wooden bank. We watch the March of the Ants, how they ignore the speed limits, without stopping for coffee or a chat about the weather. I follow one of them while I count seconds… 18, 19, 20. About 80 centimetres in 20 seconds, that's 2,4 metres in a minute or 160 metres per hour. For a 1,75mm ant, compared with a 1,75mtr human, that would be like us, running 160 kilometres per hour, 24/7, uphill, at work. Usain Bolt has the world record, around 40 kilometres per hour, and he could only maintain that speed for 10 seconds and 100 metres, 20 times per year.
"Fascinating…", I smile, and our eyes meet, and Frieda smiles back, a smile of genuine joy, an unexpected meeting with happiness, brought to us by some tiny creatures that are just doing their job.
"I like it when you smile.", I say.
Frieda doesn't say anything. Her smile disappears like it was an indecent proposal. She studies the ants again. Her thoughts are elsewhere. After a few minutes, she says: "I also like it when I smile. It's been a while."
A tear escapes her eye. I catch it on her cheek with my finger and taste it: "Sweet. It's a tear of joy. Tears of sadness taste bitter. Tears of pain taste salty. Tears of cutting onions taste sharp; you can use your tears as a dressing for your salad if you run out of vinaigrette. We used to have a neighbour who was so poor that on Sundays, she asked us if she could cut our onions, so she could use her tears to spice up her salad of dandelions and wild roses, which she picked in the fields. She had fourteen children. That's a lot of tears and for us a lot of cut onions to eat. So we gave her the onions and a box of hamburgers, with lettuce and tomatoes to go with it, to make her cry some more, sweet tears of happiness to put into her coffee instead of sugar."
Frieda laughs her bitter tears away: "You're making that up. You never had such a neighbour."
I try to put a serious face: "Do you think I'd lie to you? Didn't I promise I'd never lie to you? Trust, respect and commitment; that's what I promised, and that's what you get. Do you want me to call Fraulein Morgenwasser so she can confirm my story?"
There's that smile again, a little naughty this time: "Fraulein Morgenwasser? Miss Morningwater? I thought her name would be Miss Moneypenny?"
"Miss Moneypenny, Fraulein Reichsmarkpfennig, was the close-fisted rich bitch who lived on the other side, but that's another story. I'll tell that one later."
I shouldn't make up silly stories about neighbours I never had. Who am I helping here? Not Frieda. I'm just helping myself. I can't stand a woman crying, but I can't resist Frieda's smile either: "Let's go. Your parents have things to do, and we have a ferry to catch and a sister to find."
Frieda looks away: "I don't want to cry. You must hate seeing me cry."
"I do. Use my shoulder to cry on. That way, I don't have to see it."
To grab her attention, I grab her hand. I want her to look at me: "I'm serious. I'm not the one who caused your tears, and I'm not the one who can take those tears away, but you don't have to hide your emotions from me, either. Like your fears and your nightmares: share them with me. I can handle them. Then, with time and patience, you'll handle them too. You're a strong woman. You've just killed your fears and burnt your nightmares. Your tears are putting out the flames and washing away the stains. The darkness, hiding in your soul, still has a purpose to serve. Don't feel ashamed. Use me, my shoulder, to help you through this moment. I know it's hard for you to trust anyone, but you can trust me. I promise. And I don't think you're awful. I think you are brave and I think we have a better chance of finding your sister if we do this together."
We get up and leave after an impersonal "goodbye" to Frieda's parents.
* * *
"Do you trust me with your secrets?"
Frieda raises an eyebrow: "Why?"
We hang on the railing of the ferry back to the city centre. I've had some time to think about this. So far, I told her to trust me, but all I did was give her words. I want to give her some proof of what I'm capable of. For women, words are important, they use them all the time, but I'm a man, the «Show, Don't Tell»-half of humanity, and I like to show she can count on me. I'm not sure. With my eyes closed and the salty wind blowing, I can feel Frieda through the weather, her doubts, her fears, and her sadness, but stronger are my own fears, caused by my ignorance; I don't want to hurt her by saying the wrong words. I want to know her and I want her to know that I know.
"I have this theory. We've met… four hours ago. I've met your parents for about ten or fifteen minutes, and I've never met your sister; I've just read some information about her and I've seen some photos. Is it enough to discover a secret, something you wouldn't tell anyone?"
"Why is it important to know that secret?"
"It's not important to me. It might be important to you, knowing we share a secret, knowing you can trust me to keep it. It might be important for me to show you I'm a spy. It's my daily work to discover secrets, to collect information and use it to find people and places. But it's okay. It's nothing but a theory, just a story of fiction I made up. It would make me feel silly if you told me how mistaken I am."
Frieda looks at the islands and the fast-moving clouds, that promise of old rain falling down this afternoon. Stormy. Grey. Like her moods.
"I like stories of fiction. Is it an entertaining secret? Is it exciting? Does it make me laugh?"
"No. It's a drama-kind of story. I'm not sure if I should tell it. In fact, I'm afraid it will make you cry again. I don't like seeing you cry."
She takes her time to think before she says something. I like that.
"I don't like to cry either. So let's make a deal. You tell the story about the secret, and when I start to cry, you tell jokes until you've made me laugh again. Okay?"
She's making this hard for me. I'm not funny. But for Frieda, it's important to have someone who can make her laugh. Since her sister went missing, she has nobody that she can depend on. She's been crying far too much. I can always try to dance, slip on the painted deck, and fall on my butt. It will make all the other passengers on this ferry laugh, and perhaps it infects Frieda too.
"Okay. Deal. We start with the secret. When I look at your parents, I see your sister: two happy people with a big house and a caterer who takes care of their meals, rich and successful, good-looking, with no problems at all. Their physics are also like your sister's: all three have the same light blond hair, the same small nose, the same full lips and the same well-built bodies. Your father is eight or nine years older than your mother, and… let's call it 'reserved'. Your mother has lots of energy. When she became a mother, she was twenty-two, which is rather young. She has always been an attractive woman, as I've seen in photos of the Christmas play, and… I think she got bored after eight years of marriage. She found a secret way to make her quiet life with her quiet husband a bit more exciting. In Sweden, women enjoyed sexual liberty long before other countries did. I think your mother had a lover. He made her pregnant. I think your father isn't your father. I think your parents had a matrimonial crisis when you arrived, and both blame you for it. When your father sees you, you remind him of that other man. When your mother sees you, you remind her of her stupidity to risk everything she had: a reliable husband, a perfect daughter, and a rich and successful life."
I'm happy we're looking at the sea and not at each other. I'm afraid to look at Frieda, to look into her eyes, one blue like her mother's and one green like her biological father's. Her thin lips, her long nose, her burgundy chestnut dark hair… Most of the boys have a lot in common with their mothers, while most girls have a lot in common with their fathers…
"When you told me «I'm not good enough», it wasn't your opinion about yourself; it was your parents' opinion. They repeated it so often that you believed it was true. They made you feel inferior. If you were on fire, your parents wouldn't even piss on you to put the flames out. The only one who understood was the one who always protected you and took care of you: your big sister, Agneta. She paid for your treatment. You called each other every day. On the other hand, you couldn't stand being with your parents in the same room for more than five minutes."
"You only needed four hours to discover that? I needed eighteen years for it.", Frieda says. Her voice is flat. It's something she managed to digest for quite some time. It still makes her sad, though.
I turn my head and look at her: "It doesn't matter who your parents are. People make children all the time. It matters who the grown-up will be, and that's mainly in your own hands. Your parents tried to feed their own errors to you. That's why you feel inferior. I try to tell you that your parents made a mistake. You have nothing to feel secondary about. I try to tell you that I think you're superior. I look up at you."
"That's because I'm five centimetres taller than you are."
"That's because I accept that parents aren't perfect by definition. My parents taught me to respect others and accept their mistakes. I admire people like you, who don't get everything for free but don't give up. I like you a lot more than I like your parents. You are an amazing woman, Frieda."
Frieda looks back: "And that's the joke you promised to make me laugh?"
"No. The joke is about football. The Swedish national team played an important match against Germany and won 6 – 0. After the game, the German coach congratulated his Swedish colleague and asked: «We are the Number One on the FIFA ranking and the current World Champion. Sweden is only number 65 on the ranking and it has eight times fewer inhabitants than we have. What's the secret of your success?» The Swedish coach smiled and said: «It's the intelligence of the Swedish players. I'll give you a demonstration. Zlatan, come here, please.» The striker of the Swedish team joined the party and his coach asked him: «It's a son of your father, but it's not your brother. Who is it?» Zlatan Ibrahimovic smiled and answered: «That's easy, coach. That's me.» The German coach was surprised but not defeated yet. He called his captain, Dieter Hoeneß, and asked him: «Tell me, Dieter. It's a son of your father, but it's not your brother. Who is it?» Dieter thought and thought, and thought a little more, and finally lifted his shoulders: «I'm sorry, coach, but I have no idea.» The German coach got furious and shouted: «You know NOTHING. That's why we lost the match. It's Zlatan Ibrahimovic!»"
I love it when Frieda smiles.