I Refuse by Per Petterson Read Free Book Online

to do this, it’s not something I can walk away from, and he bent down, his hand on the car door and said through the open window, I’ll take Tommy. What, said the sergeant. You can’t, we’ve already decided on someone else. Who, Jonsen said. The sergeant said a name. He blushed. What, Tommy said from the back seat. No, no, that’s not good, Jonsen said.
    The sergeant stared straight ahead through the windscreen. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. I know, he said. He leaned back and looked up at the ceiling. Has anyone here got a telephone, he said. No, Jonsen said. I mean yes, Høiland has of course, Jonsen said, pointing a few houses further up the road. He just had it installed, there will be more soon, they’re going to dig trenches, he said. The sergeant shook his head, suddenly he was so tired, why was he the one to deal with this. He got out of the car with a groan. Shit, he said under his breath. He left the black Volvo in the middle of the road with the door open and the engine running and walked up to Høiland’s house as he rolled down his shirtsleeves to his wrists and then he looked like someone else, more like someone they knew, more like one of them. After all, Jonsen had been in the same class as his older brother.
    Tommy got out of the car and walked round the back and stood looking down at the house where he had always lived. The carpenter had already boarded up one window and gone on to the next. The house looked quite different already, it looked blind and not the way a home should look. He felt sick. As though he were spinning through the air. As though he were falling. I’m falling, Tommy thought, it’s so strange. I’m so dizzy. He crouched down. He leaned forward with his knuckles on the gravel. Then he threw up. I’m thirteen years old, he thought, I’ll be fourteen in the autumn, but he didn’t feel any age. Then he heard the sergeant returning from Høiland’s house. Shit, the sergeant said as he walked, and he groaned, as he often did, he had a heavy heart and carried it with him wherever he went. Tommy got up and walked back around the car. Jonsen was standing there. I’ve spoken to the police chief, the sergeant said. He looked at Tommy, he didn’t even wink. Then he said to Jonsen, he can stay with you for the time being. Until child welfare can find somewhere else. He can’t live with you, you live alone, he has to be with a family, those are the rules. Do you understand, the sergeant said. Jonsen said nothing. Then he said, that’s fine. You can take your bag, the sergeant told Tommy, and Tommy walked around the car and opened the boot and took out his bag, and then he went back and put his bag on the road and opened the door to the seat where Siri sat in the corner with the diary held tightly to her chest. He leaned in. They looked at each other. Hi, he said, and she smiled. She will stay with me in Jonsen’s house for the time being, right, he said aloud. Goddamn it, the sergeant said, why aren’t you paying attention, of course she’s not staying with you, are you stupid, he said, Jesus Christ. It’s all right, Tommy, Siri said. I’ll be fine. Are you sure, Tommy said. Do you know where you’re going to stay, he said. Yes, Siri said, he told me before you and Jim came. I’m going to Lydersen’s. Right, Tommy said, who’s Lydersen. I don’t know who he is, Siri said. Tommy straightened up and held on to the door frame. See you tomorrow then, Siri, he said. See you tomorrow, Tommy. He closed the door, and the sergeant got in and started the engine, and they moved off.
    Come on, let’s go inside, Jonsen said, and Tommy took his bag and they walked up to the house.

TOMMY ⋅ 1966
    THE THING ABOUT Mørk was that it could have been anywhere. There were hundreds of places in Norway called Mørk, you just had to look in the atlas of Norway, in the index at the back, and they were scattered all across the country. But however many there were, Mørk was where