She didn’t come back on Thursday like she said she would. Anton didn’t leave her apartment like she asked him to, because he doesn’t have anywhere to go. He doesn’t know that after he left Leah at Bekkebu, she felt liquid and unsettled, as if Anton’s voice were still hollering inside her head, so she decided to go home. Only she couldn’t, because Eirik Moss had slashed the tires of her car while Anton was at the cabin. He doesn’t know that she slipped on a wet root looping from the earth on her way back up to the cabin, or that she fell hard to the ground and while she was able to get back up and return to the cabin, the impact caused a small rupture in the developing placenta. He doesn’t know that she began to bleed that evening.

Anton doesn’t know any of this. It’s been a week and he is growing increasingly restless. Maybe he really was right about there being someone else; maybe they weren’t just empty accusations to undermine and humiliate her.

He’s sitting on Leah’s sofa, looking out into the living room at her possessions, wishing for her presence. He wants to stay here and to make a life with her. He can do better, be a better man for Leah, he knows he’s capable of it. He tries to call her yet again, but like every other time he’s tried, it goes straight to voicemail. He goes into the bathroom and splashes cold water on his face. He looks at himself in the mirror and wishes it was Leah’s warm, hazel eyes that were looking back at him. He opens the bathroom cabinet and rummages around for a painkiller; a vicious headache sits at the base of his skull, like a claw. He finally finds some in an old washbag at the back of the cupboard and in addition to the paracetamol, there’s an elongated white object at the bottom. A pregnancy test. Anton’s heart leaps in his chest and he holds it up to the light; it reveals two clear, strong lines.

It’s his natural instinct to smash something, to wield destruction on physical objects in response to his feelings; whatever they are, he can’t tell. A baby. Leah is carrying his baby. Anton bursts from the bathroom into the apartment’s corridor. It feels as though his mind is on fire. He stands there for a long while as if paralyzed. Then he tears some clothes from his single shelf in Leah’s closet and puts them on quickly. He glances around the apartment one last time, shellshocked, before grabbing his car key and rushing through the door.

Five months later

Dagsposten, article by Selma Eriksen.