“Help me with the bags!” she just giggles, and passes one to Maya, as if mere hours rather than months had passed since they last met.

  They walk toward the recycling bins.

  “I’ve missed you.” Maya smiles.

  “What sort of shoes do you call those? Are you going to a ball or something?” Ana replies.

  “What about you, then? Are you homeless or what?”

  Ana raises her eyebrows:

  “I’ve always dressed like this. You’re the one who’s turned into a snob.”

  “A snob? Because I don’t look like an extra in a zombie film?”

  “You look like you put your makeup on in the middle of an earth-quake!”

  They roar with laughter. Roar and roar. Two minutes, and everything is normal. The same jibes, the same laughter, the same tattoos on their arms: guitars and rifles. The musician and the hunter. Never have two girls with so little in common been so inseparable. They talk at the same time, sisterhood’s capacity for simultaneity, neither of them ever has to shut up to hear what the other is saying. Maya is only lost for words when she opens the bag Ana gave her and sees all the bottles.

  “He’s sober today because the funeral is tomorrow and he doesn’t want to miss the wake afterward,” Ana says, because Maya is the only person she never has to apologize to.

  Maya nods sternly and starts to feed the bottles into the recycling bin. The day before the funeral people are sober “out of respect,” then as soon as Ramona is in the ground they’ll be legless for the same reason.

  “I thought your dad had gotten better,” she says quietly.

  “He was for a while. Then I won that competition and called home to tell him, and the only way he knows how to celebrate anything is to drink,” Ana replies, as if it was her fault.

  “I’m sorry… I…,” Maya begins, but Ana sighs:

  “Stop it. It is what it is. Can we talk about something else?”

  She’s become harder, Maya thinks. Unless she’s just grown up. Unless she’s started closing doors and windows around all her feelings, because that’s what adults do, only children can live in emotional cross-winds.

  “I’m sorry I haven’t phoned more. There’s been so much going on with college, but I should still have come to visit more often.”

  “You’re here now,” Ana declares.

  “Yeah, but you know what I mean.”

  Ana laughs out loud and suddenly wraps her arms around Maya’s neck.

  “I love you, you stupid donkey! You’re the only person I know who apologizes for being here while you’re here! Seriously? You can hardly be more here than HERE, can you?”

  Maya holds her best friend so tightly that her lungs hurt.

  “I miss you so damn much.”

  “You’re actually HOLDING me, you donkey!”

  “Shut up!”

  How do other people bear it, Maya wonders, how do they live without an Ana? How the hell do people cope? They walk back along the road, arm in arm. There are still fallen trees here and there, the damage from the storm is still obvious in the yards, it’s so easy for the wind to wreck our illusions that we’re the ones making the decisions.

  “How much do you suppose it’s going to cost to fix all this?” Maya wonders out loud.

  “You must be getting me confused with your new economics professor friends,” Ana smiles.

  Maya smiles too, but the corners of her mouth feel tight.

  “Still not worst here. Have you seen what it’s like in Hed?”

  Ana becomes serious.

  “Yes. I was there this morning. And I heard Dad talking to the old guys on his hunting team. Apparently the ice rink there was completely blown apart so all the teams from Hed are training in our rink instead. Everyone’s really pissed off about it. Dad says it’s only going to get worse.”

  Maya notes that she says “our rink.” That’s another thing that’s changed with Ana, she started to hate Hed more when Vidar died.

  “I saw my dad with Teemu this morning…,” Maya says, just to see if her friend reacts.

  “They’re probably planning Ramona’s funeral,” Ana replies, shrugging her shoulders as if it were nothing.

  “Mmm,” Maya says, as if trying to convince herself.

  She doesn’t know how to move the conversation on, because she gave up the right to judge Ana when she moved away. That left Ana with no one to talk to about Vidar, so she talked to the guys in the Pack instead, because they understood what she was going through. They go to Ana’s competitions now, standing in the crowd in their black jackets while Maya is too busy with her new life.

  “I can imagine Teemu wants to talk to your dad about the rumors about the clubs as well. My dad says the guys on his hunting team talk all the time about how the council wants to close Hed down and just have Beartown.”

  “What?”

  “Well, you know, Hed has, like, no sponsors left, no money, the council’s keeping them afloat. Are they going to use the money from our taxes to rebuild their rink? Come on! Makes much more sense to have just one club!”

  These aren’t her words, they come from her dad and the other guys, Maya can hear that. But she can’t argue with them because this is no longer her town.

  “It’s not that long ago that Beartown didn’t have any sponsors…,” she says quietly.

  “Sure. But that was then and this is now,” Ana says with another shrug.

  “Mmm,” Maya says, and then Ana suddenly shoots her a guilty look and says, to avoid an argument:

  “Are you just going to drag that guitar around like an ornament or are you going to play something for me?”

  So they go inside the house and into Ana’s room and there Maya plays for her best friend and the dogs, as if everything was the same as normal. Afterward they lie side by side on Ana’s bed and look up at the ceiling and Ana asks what she’s thinking, and Maya can’t think of anything to say except the truth:

  “We studied religious sects in school. About radicalization. The same thing as with terrorists. The ‘slippery slope’ and all that. No one starts out crazy, no one is born violent, they just do one little thing, then another. Radicalization is when all the sick shit gets normalized, everyone gets a bit more dangerous, one step at a time. That’s kind of what this town is like, everyone thinks they’re fighting for the right things. Everyone thinks they’re acting in… self-defense.”

  Ana lies there silent, staring up at the ceiling for a long time. Then she takes hold of Maya’s hand without turning toward her, and whispers:

  “What the hell can we do about it, then, if it’s happening every-where?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “So don’t think about it then.”

  “You’re better at not thinking than me.”

  “That’s because I’m so damn smart that I’m done with thinking.”

  “Really? Really?! That seems incredibly likely!”

  Ana giggles.

  “I like your new songs, you idiot.”

  Maya giggles back.

  “Thanks, you tramp.”

  They doze off there on the bed and sleep more soundly than either of them has slept for a long time. Back-to-back, as always.

  39 Shot holes

  The car workshop in Beartown is empty this morning, so the man who owns it is drinking coffee and reading the newspaper for longer than usual in the garage. He’s called “Hog” because that was how he played hockey many years ago, like a wild hog, but when he mends things his pan-sized hands are unexpectedly gentle and delicate. So people don’t just bring their cars here, they turn up with all sorts of things, snow scooters and lawn mowers and espresso machines and the occasional illicit still. Over the past two years they’ve been coming more regularly, after his wife died, that’s how people let a man who isn’t great at hearing that he needs looking after know that they care.

  His son Bobo is down at the ice rink. He’s the assistant coach of the A-team and sometimes his dad has to bend extra deep over a car engine so as not to let on how often he thinks about how proud his wife would have been of that. Bobo’s younger brother and sister have dealt with the grief okay, under the circumstances, they’re laughing again now and no longer asking as many questions. Today they’re playing at some of their friends’ houses.

  Teemu already knows that, he has too much respect for Hog to let the children see him come, they deserve to be allowed to think that their dad has nothing to do with men like him.

  “Are you on holiday or something?” he calls from the yard.

  Hog looks up. They shake hands. Hog is a middle-aged man, he’s never been part of Teemu’s group, but he isn’t ashamed of their friendship either. When his wife passed away, Peter, his childhood friend, was obviously the first to show up and offer his help, but right after him came the men in black jackets. They relaid Hog’s roof, painted the house, and when things were at their most chaotic with the children they took turns coming over to work for him in the garage for several weeks, for free. That sort of thing doesn’t get forgotten. He smiles at Teemu and nods toward the half-empty parking lot.

  “No one around here gets their motor repaired the week before the elk hunt, you know that. Half of them will still end up with shot holes in the roof afterward because they drive around the forest tracks drunk and forget they’re holding their rifles…”

  Teemu bursts out laughing.

  “More birds get shot by accident than elk on purpose in these forests.”

  Hog joins in the laughter. That’s the sort of joke hunters in the area like to tell each other, but would never tolerate from other people. Neither Hog nor Teemu would ever set off into the forest with anyone who couldn’t handle their weapon. Hunters need to be able to trust blindly in the person beside them, but above all in the person behind them.

  “Coffee?”

  “Please.”

  They drink. Exchange small talk about snow scooters and hockey. Hog waits two cups before he says:

  “So. What do you want?”

  Teemu almost looks ashamed, but only almost.

  “A favor. You don’t have to do it if you’d rather not…”

  “Is it your friends asking me to do something, or you?”

  “It’s me.”

  “Then you know that I’ll do it.”

  Teemu nods appreciatively. Then he points at one of the few vehicles that are still parked outside the workshop.

  “I need that.”

  40 Threats

  Lev rents a small house a stone’s throw from the high fence surrounding the scrapyard. The men who work for him live in trailers inside the fence. He’s their boss so he can’t be their friend, they need this slight distance so they can vent any discontent without him overhearing everything. The job he offers isn’t simple, so simple men don’t apply for it.

  “Lev! LEV!” one of them calls from the yard.

  He bangs on the door of the house, Lev opens it, irritated.

  “Yes?”

  “There’s some suit here! Looks like a cop!” the man says in one of the many languages Lev understands the basics of.

  He peers out through the gap in the door, over to the entrance to the scrapyard, and sure enough, a man in a suit is standing there. But he looks terrified.

  “That isn’t a cop,” Lev mutters, then goes and fetches his jacket.

  The man in the suit waits nervously as he approaches. Lev locks the house and takes his time.

  “Yes?” he says, when he’s really close.

  “Yes… erm, I, I think my car is here? It was in for repair at the workshop in Beartown and when I called this morning to ask if it was ready, they said someone had already collected it and that it was going to be dropped off… here.”

  Lev looks around with a degree of wariness.

  “Someone collected your car and dropped it off here?”

  “Yes, yes, that’s what he said.”

  “Who?”

  “The man at the workshop.”

  “In Beartown?”

  “Yes.”

  Lev doesn’t take his eyes off the man in the suit.

  “What sort of car is it?”

  “It’s… black,” the man in the suit says, clearing his throat.

  Lev nods expressionlessly.

  “Okay. We’ll go and look, yes?” he says, showing the man in through the gate.

  “No… no, that’s okay, I can come back, I…,” the man splutters, but Lev insists.

  “Come on. Nothing to worry about. We’re not murderers or thieves, even if that’s what you’ve heard, yes?”

  There’s only one way in, the fence is high and crowned with security cameras, and there’s a smell of burning inside. Lev trudges through the fresh snow, the man in the suit pads after him. They meet a large man with a thick beard and a thin T-shirt and Lev mutters instructions to him in a language the man in the suit can’t place. The T-shirt disappears into a trailer and Lev leads the man in the suit around the edge of the scrapyard, it’s bigger than you’d imagine from the outside but even so the man in the suit only sees a fraction of what’s actually in there.

  “Is it here?” Lev wonders when they’ve followed the fence all the way around, past rows of wrecked cars and unidentifiable piles of scrap metal.

  The man in the suit shakes his head anxiously. Lev’s eyes are narrower now, his neck stiffer. The man in the T-shirt comes back from the trailer.

  “Has anyone been here overnight? Did the alarm go off?” Lev asks him.

  The man in the T-shirt shakes his head grimly. Lev turns toward the man in the suit.

  “What’s your job?”

  “Sorry?”

  “Your job!”

  The man swallows hard.

  “I run the funeral parlor in Beartown.”

  Lev steps closer to him.

  “Tell me what he said, yes? The man you spoke to on the phone. He said you had to pick the car up here?”

  The man flinches at every syllable and shakes his head.

  “No, no, he said… your name. He said: ‘It’s at Lev’s.’ ”

  Lev has already started to walk.

  “Wait here, yes?”

  The man in the suit does as he’s told. Lev leaves the scrapyard and walks the short distance back to his house. The front door is open even though he’s sure he locked it before he left. On the kitchen table is an empty beer glass from the Bearskin pub, and beside it some car keys. Lev looks out through the window at the small yard behind the house. One section of fencing has been removed, it must have taken several men, working extremely fast. This is how they let you know that they’re everywhere, that they can reach you anywhere, that they can get you whenever they want. It isn’t a subtle threat. Teemu isn’t a subtle man.

  * * *

  He’s left the hearse in the middle of Lev’s yard.

  41 Trouble

  Afterward, naturally there are a hundred different versions of what happens now, depending on who you ask, and as usual most of the stories won’t be about what actually happened, but about what people felt happened. It felt as if every conflict between the two towns over the past fifty years exploded at once. For that reason it isn’t possible to determine how much was planned, how much was revenge, and how much was just a coincidence. The stories will eventually become so intertwined that if you tug at one tiny thread at one end, you tear open the stitches holding all our wounds together at the other end. But no matter who tells it, and regardless of which side you’re on, everyone will agree on one thing: the truce between Beartown and Hed, if there has ever really been one, definitely comes to an end today.

  The entrance is crowded when Tess and her brothers walk in, there’s already a murmur of trouble, just as, deep down, she was worried there would be. But if she had told the truth, her dad would have insisted on coming in with them, and then chaos would have been guaranteed. So Tess thought she could deal with it herself. That was stupid.

  She pulls her brothers with her toward the locker rooms. A boys’ team from Beartown has just finished their training and are on their way off the ice down by the boards, another team from Hed are on their way in, and moms and dads from both sides are tugging and pushing their kids and equipment. Tess and her brothers have to elbow their way through, not because people are lining up for anything but because a whole load of people have decided to pick today to mark their territory. As usual, the youngsters aren’t even the worst, that’s their parents, they’re standing in groups all over the place with their thermos flasks and bags of snacks, pretending not to understand that they’re in the way of the children from Hed, even though they’re obviously perfectly aware. “How can anyone behave like this against children when they have children themselves?” Tess thinks just as someone yells something and something hits Ture on the head and he starts to cry. A moment later a gang of players from Hed start singing something, then all the Beartown parents start shouting hysterically.

  “What happened, Ture? What HAPPENED?” Tess shouts over all the noise, grabbing hold of Tobias and Ted so she doesn’t lose them.

  The crush suddenly gets worse, the parents get aggressive, Ture ends up terrified. Tess tries to pick him up, but can’t when she’s already carrying both his and her own bags, adults stumble over her and she cries out when her legs buckle, and in a matter of seconds she’s in full-blown panic. That’s when she sees a fist as large as a snow shovel reach down into the pile of bodies and pick up Ture, the bags, and her.

  “Come on!” the round, carefree face that belongs to the fist says, and pulls first the four siblings after him, then any other red-clad children he can see.

  He parts the crowd of parents as if they were no more than curtains of flesh in front of him and shows them into one of the locker rooms. Once they’re inside, Tess gasps from a mixture of breathlessness and fury and stares at him, and she draws two conclusions: 1. The boy is a giant. 2. He’s wearing a green top.