How come you keep all these photos I asked.

The envelope was in the mail the day after her death.

So she sent them all to you. Just like that.

Yes he said. There was a letter as well. But that I threw away I think.

And you can’t remember what it said.

Yes I can he said. But that doesn’t matter. I heard him doing chores perhaps cooking.

He cleared his throat. Come here he said.

The car turned right instead of left towards ingelahansson’s.

He met me in the doorway. We tore our clothes off or at least the most essential bits. I buried my fingers in his hair. Angrily pulled his misshapen scarred harelipped halfdeaf head close. Trampled my panties off my feet.

His hands smelled of fish. Whitefishinnards slithered along my body as I halflay on the kitchen table. Next to us maria was smiling on a rock by the sea in a photo taken slightly sideways on. I shoved her down on the floor. 114

I think I came but can’t be sure. Perhaps it was just the moment itself that ached its way through my body.

In the silence afterwards leonardcohen played. I can’t forget but I don’t remember what.

I love you he said for the second time in the past twentyfour hours. I breathed in his skin and thought affectionately of him. But audible words I could not find.

When I opened the door at ingelahansson’s I was half an hour late. I sensed immediately that something was wrong. As if all the signals of a human being smells sounds movements thoughts life were absent.

I felt her neck. No pulse. I pulled her eyelids back. No gaze. The nappy was neatly folded on the bed. The sheets were wet. Ingelahansson is dead I told caronika when she answered the phone. I’ve just found her. She has died of grief.

One doesn’t die of grief she corrected me. One dies of illness and old age.

I didn’t have the heart to argue. Only wondered what I was supposed to do. Eight other old people were waiting for an evening visit and ingelahansson was where she was.

You go she said. I’ll be there in half an hour.

I tucked ingelahansson in one last time. There was an open telephone book on the bedside table. The silk ribbon marker was on the h page.

Stefanhansson. Her son. The name had a line through it drawn with a red pencil. I wasn’t sure if acting the messenger would be right or wrong but realised that ingelahansson’s death would complicate my agreement with fredrik. I dialled the number on my mobile.

Stefan he answered and I told him who I was. Right he said. What’s the matter. 115

It’s about your mother ingelahansson. She has just passed away. I am very sorry.