Her husband coughed in the next room, and his bed creaked as he turned over. She pondered how they once had been happy together, how they used to love one another. It had been over six months since he had held her in his arms, and that last embrace had been different from all the others. Now she thought even that evening it had been obvious, it had been a kind of goodbye. It was as if with all his strength, but in vain, he had tried to force the old feelings to appear, and afterward he had looked at her for a long time with a mute, reproachful stare.

Helene felt a taste like dust in her mouth, and noticed the aroma of sweat and sleep from her body. It had become as unfamiliar to her as it had to him. She couldn’t stand herself when others couldn’t either. She closed her eyes and heard Hanne’s voice from the kitchen. She was sitting drinking coffee with the children, fresh and in good moods, while the record player from her son’s bedroom babbled some vacuous pop melody. All day long there was a cacophony around this difficult young woman, whom Helene was constantly on the brink of firing, though it hadn’t amounted to anything yet. She told herself it didn’t really matter, which had no effect as she lay there curled up under her comforter, dully angered by the girl’s existence. When she complained about Hanne, her husband laughed and said that she should look at it from a comedic point of view. ‘Hanne isn’t a person,’ he declared jovially, ‘she’s a phenomenon.’ He was in such a good mood lately, so upbeat and busy with his work. Helene wasn’t working anymore. She was a child psychologist and had enjoyed her job in a psychiatric ward, but then their life had been turned upside down when Henrik explained to her that it would be a tax advantage if she stopped working. It now felt like a big mistake to have given in to his irrefutable arguments. All day long, all she could do was nurse her despondency. She couldn’t even gather herself to read. She wasn’t interested in the company of her friends anymore. It was as if a zone of loneliness had appeared around her, and perhaps somehow she had created it herself.

It was eight o’clock, and Hanne was expecting her to get out of bed after the kids were off to school, so she could clean. Hanne didn’t waste any effort on the accommodating side of her personality. Helene was sure the girl knew she was unhappy, and maybe why as well.