Let the right one in by John Ajvide Lindqvist Read Free Book Online

you know where I live?"
    "I've seen you in the window before."
    Oskar's cheeks grew hot. While he was trying to think of something to say the girl jumped down from the top of the jungle gym and landed in front of him. A drop of over two meters.
    She must do gymnastics or something like that.
    She was almost as tall as he was, but much thinner. The pink sweater fit tight across her chest, which was still completely flat, without a hint of breasts. Her eyes were black, enormous in her pale little face. She held one hand up in the air in front of him as if she were warding something off that was coming toward her. Her fingers were long and slender as twigs.
    "I can't be friends with you. Just so you know."
    Oskar folded his hands over his chest. He could feel the contours of the knife through his jacket.
    "What?"
    One corner of the girl's mouth pulled up in a half-smile.
    "Do you need a reason? I'm just telling you how it is. So you know."
    "Yeah, yeah."
    The girl turned and walked away from Oskar, toward her front door. After a couple of steps Oskar said, "What makes you think I'd want to be friends with you? You must be pretty stupid."
    The girl stopped. Stood still for a moment. Then she turned and walked back to Oskar, stopped in front of him. Interlaced her fingers and let her arms drop.
    "What did you say?"
    Oskar wrapped his arms more tightly around himself, pressed one hand against his knife, and stared down into the ground.
    "You must be stupid ... to say something like that."
    "Oh, I am, am I?"
    "Yes."
    "I'm sorry. But that's just how it is."
    They stood still, about half a meter between them. Oskar continued staring into the ground. A strange smell was emanating from the girl. About one year ago his dog Bobby had gotten an infection in one paw and in the end they had been forced to have him put down. The last day Oskar had stayed home from school, lain next to the sick dog for several hours, and said good-bye. Bobby had smelled like the girl did. Oskar screwed up his nose.
    "Is that strange smell coming from you?" I guess so. Oskar looked up at her. He regretted having said that. She looked so . . . fragile in her pink top. He unfolded his arms and made a gesture in her direction.
    "Aren't you cold?"
    "No."
    "Why not?"
    The girl frowned, wrinkling up her face, and for a moment she looked much much older than she was. Like an old woman about to cry.
    "I guess I've forgotten how to."
    The girl quickly turned around and walked back to her door. Oskar remained where he was, looking at her. When she reached the heavy front door he fully expected that she would need to use both hands to pull it open. But instead she grasped the door handle with one hand and pulled it open so hard it banged into the wall stop, bounced, and then closed behind her.
    He pushed his hands into his pockets and felt sad. Thought about Bobby and how he had looked in the makeshift coffin Dad had made for him. Thought about the cross he had made in wood shop that had snapped in two as they hammered it into the frozen ground.
    He ought to make a new one.

FRIDAY
    23 OCTOBER

    Hakan was sitting on a subway train again, on his way downtown. Ten thousand kronor bills in his pocket, secured by a rubber band; he was going to do something good with them. He was going to save a life. Ten thousand was a lot of money, and when you thought about the fact that those Save The Children campaigns claimed that "One thousand kronor can feed one family for a whole year" you would think that ten thousand could save a life even in Sweden.
    But whose life? And where?
    You couldn't just walk up and give the money to the first drug addict you bumped into and hope that... no. And it had to be a young person, anyway. He knew it was silly, but ideally it would be a weeping child like in one of those pictures. A child who took the money with tears in his eyes and then . . . and then what?
    He got off at Odenplan and, without knowing why, walked in the direction of the public