I sighed and looked at her. She was playing a game with Tobias; they were laughing and teasing Dad who laughed happily. Julie had been so tough, so strong through all of this. I had no idea how she managed to be like that. I knew I had almost reached my limit. At least that was what the doctor had told me.
"No one is supernatural and can do everything. You have to face that you have limits as well. You have to know these limits and learn to respect them. Otherwise you might burn out."
His words had scared me like crazy. I had seen numerous colleagues break down from the pressure of the job and never come back. Being a journalist wasn't for the weak, but even the strong had limits, I had learned. I was stressed all the time and felt like I was never good enough.
Probably hadn't helped that I had to fight for my reputation ever since I helped overthrow the government six months ago by writing a story about the Prime Minister who allowed lobotomies performed into the Nineties on criminal teenagers that no one knew where to place or to do with since they were too young to go to prison, but kept getting themselves in trouble.
It all occurred before she was elected Prime Minister, yes, but she had been Minister of the Health Department and that was enough for the opposition to claim that she should step down. Now a new election was on its way and I had faced everything from threats of a lawsuit filed against me to attacks on me as a person in the media exhibiting me as a bad mother leaving my sick husband when he needed me most and having an affair with my photographer who was also a criminal.
Luckily they had left my daughter alone so far, but I was terrified that they would approach her again like they had when they tried to force me to not run the story. She had been the one persuading me to run it. I would never have done it if she hadn't wanted me to. But she was so right. If you don't stand up to a bully, they will bully someone else. I had no idea exactly who was behind all of these media attacks but I knew that it wore on my strength having to disavow all those rumors they kept writing about me. I wasn't going to let them discredit me but I was just about to say that I'd had enough by now. It was so childish and wouldn't change a thing in the end.
I didn't understand why they kept doing this, since the Prime Minister had already stepped down. There was no more to save. It was over. So it had to be all about getting revenge or something, I thought while Sune put his hand on my leg with a smile. I put my hand on top of his. He had been my rock in this. We had been together for almost six months now and every day seemed to get better and better. I guess I was falling for him really seriously. And it scared me like nothing else in this world. Last time I had let myself fall hopelessly in love it had ended so wrong, so bad. I never wanted to go down that road again. Would it be different this time? Sure. But it could still go terribly wrong. There was always the risk. Then everything would be destroyed. Our kids loved each other almost as much as we did. They would be devastated if we were to split up. And since Sune and I worked closely together, it would make it impossible for us to work together again. I was afraid to risk that since he was the best photographer I knew. I had realized that he was as much a part of the stories as I was. I couldn't be this good without him. He made me good.
Sune grabbed my hand and squeezed it lightly. "No thinking about work," he said. "That was the deal here. We are on vacation."
I smiled and exhaled deeply. "I know," I said and closed my eyes for a second. "I'm going to enjoy every second of it."
"Good."
Sune took a turn and we went even deeper into the pine forest. We passed a sign in front of a closed gate.
"Keep out!" it said. "Private property."
I remembered having seen the gate before in the news on TV. This was where the oft-discussed religious sect "The Way" had their headquarters in some old abandoned camp area where there used to be a children's school camp. I remembered pictures of the old wooden log cabins taken by a news photographer for a paper, someone who had crossed the heavy gates and fences somehow in an attempt to take pictures of what was going on in there. Rumors had circulated about exorcism rituals and other stuff that no one knew if it was true.
They were widely known to recruit confused young people by drawing on their weaknesses. Their leader who called himself “The Priest” had appeared in the media a few times some years ago before they clammed up and refused to talk to anyone anymore. He was quite charismatic as far as I remembered. Called himself the reincarnation of Isaiah. But other than being severely delusional he seemed quite harmless.
The sect was big in the Nineties but I couldn't remember having heard about it in the last fifteen years, maybe even longer. I wondered if they were in there as we drove by and turned left onto a dirt road where piles of snow made it hard to drive. Sune cursed and hit the gas pedal. The car moved again slowly, going straight up the hill. Soon a few houses, mostly small cabins appeared between the trees. I could spot the fjord in the distance. The view was spectacular. The white snowy landscape was so calm in the cold. Sune stopped the car in front of a small wooden cabin. I got out and inhaled the fresh air. The kids tumbled out on top of each other and threw themselves in the snow.
"Put on your winter jackets first," I said.
But it was too late. They were soaking wet, throwing snow in the air and letting it fall on their faces, making snow angels in their sweaters and jeans. I threw their jackets at them and they got up dusted off the snow from their shoulders and hair, laughing. Then they put on their jackets and ran into the yard of the cabin while we unpacked the car.
I looked at the wooden cabin just before I went through the red painted door. Yes this was going to be a relaxing vacation. Then I pulled out my phone and turned it off.
CHAPTER 2
MAYBE HE WAS just being jumpy, the Priest thought to himself as the silence again lingered over the cabin. He listened for more sounds coming from the hallway, but it was quiet now. It was nothing but a bad dream, he kept telling himself. A very bad dream, but nothing to worry about. It had been years since the Priest had last thought about the girl. Not that he had forgotten about her that simply wasn't possible. Who could ever forget someone like that?
The Priest sat up in the bed and pulled the curtain slightly. It was full moon outside. That was probably why he felt so strange inside. He always slept badly when it was full moon.
"Nothing to worry about," he mumbled to himself.
But he couldn't escape the feeling that someone was walking around outside his door. Could it be some of the other church members? Maybe someone was lost. They had just recruited a group of four young people. They always a hard time sleeping the first couple of days. The guilt towards their parents or friends that they had left to follow the Priest into that warm embracing hands of their God, the fear of something new. It was always hard to overcome in the beginning. But they would eventually. The Priest and his disciples would make them strong enough to resist their parent’s approach, strong enough to face them once they tried to get in contact with them and try to get them to come back. Some would cave in, and the Priest would help them fight it, get over it and persuade them that their family was here now, that those parents never did them any good.
Most of the young people that they recruited had run away from home several months ago. His disciples found them in the streets or maybe outside a shelter nearby where they spent the night but always went outside to smoke. Then his disciples would approach them with promises of a better life. Most would run or laugh in their faces, but every now and then someone would ask to know more and then his disciples would take good care of them. Tell them they were loved. Tell them they didn't need their parents anymore or anyone else for that matter.
Yes, that had to be the answer. If there was someone out there it had to be one of the young ones who were lost, maybe got out of bed to get a drink of water or maybe looking for someone to talk to. It happened every now and then that they sought comfort in the middle of the night, when the nightmares and bad dreams became too overwhelming. These kid
s had often been through a lot, too much for such a young person. That was the mission for the Priest and The Way. To help these young people get rid of all these evil thought patterns and bad behavior. And the Priest knew exactly how to do that. First they had to accept that they had evil inside of them. That it wasn't their fault, but evil was holding them down, destroying them with wrong thoughts, telling them to do things, evil things. Once the demon was detected in the person it had to be commanded to leave, it had to be driven out. Evil had such a stronghold upon our youngsters today. Well it always had, he thought to himself as he found a bathrobe and put it on. It wasn't like being possessed with evil demons was anything new. People on the outside just didn't understand. They didn't see things the way the Priest did. He could spot an evil demon in any person at any time just by looking at the person. And he had the power to make it leave. God had granted him that power.
He had come to him in his bedroom more than thirty years ago. He had shown himself in a strong light and told the Priest that he should leave his Catholic church and start a new one. He showed him faces of people who had been possessed by demons and had died without the demon being exorcised. The hell of pain and agony they lived in now had made the Priest fall to his knees and cry before the Mighty God. He had screamed: "Please let me help those people, please teach me to help them."
So He had done. The next day the Priest quit as a pastor at his church and started reading about demons and exorcism. God had guided him on a trip where he visited churches all over the world that used exorcism to treat people from all sorts of deviltry that possessed them and caused them to live a life in pain. He had brought back his new knowledge to Denmark where he started his church and written a book about it. A book the church members were told to memorize and always keep close to them. This was their Bible now. Soon people came to him from all over the country wanting to be set free and he had helped them. He had helped thousands of people so far. That made him happy, so very happy. The agony of the faces burning in that awful way he had seen the night when God had spoken to him wouldn't leave his mind and he was driven by the desire to prevent more people from ending up like them. That was his goal, at any cost.
There had only been one he couldn't help. One soul whose demon had been too strong. From his readings the Priest knew that once you've lost to a demon it was going to run loose. It would eventually try and take over. Death was its only weapon. Nothing could settle a dispute like death. Nothing could display who was more powerful in this world like death's sting. He particularly remembered a story from a book about a demon that a priest hadn't managed to cast out in Vietnam many years ago. Afterwards the entire town had been killed, children, women, burned alive or cut to pieces. Like some special viciousness had been let loose.
In the years after the Priest had given up on the girl he had expected the demon in her to come back somehow. He expected the demon to come back after him and his disciples, eventually turning the lands into a slaughterhouse. But nothing had happened. Not yet.
The Priest walked towards the door leading to the hallway with all the rooms where the other members of the church slept heavily. If anyone was out there, lost or looking for a shoulder to cry on, then he would be there to help him. As long as they worshipped him - and believed what he believed - he would help them.
Just as the Priest reached for the handle it turned on its own.
CHAPTER 3
THE FIRE IN the fireplace was slowly growing and soon crackling in front of us. We had played all afternoon in the snow outside. Our cheeks were red and I ached all over but in a wonderful way. In the way that you knew that you had used your body and been outside. Now my cheeks were burning from the heat in the fireplace. I had put on warm, dry clothes while Sune prepared dinner with Dad. They were both whistling and humming along while they cut vegetables and prepared a nice roast beef for us. I looked forward to a good meal now. Being outside for hours always made me build up an appetite.
I was poking the fire and trying to make it burn more. Then I threw in some more wood. I dusted off my fingers while Sune called the kids to the table.
"Time for dinner!"
The kids were giggling as they walked down the stairs. Sune smiled at me when he placed the meat in the middle of the table. It smelled heavenly.
"Did you wash up?" I asked the children.
They looked at each other. Then they nodded. I stared at them in disbelief. "Try again," I said and pointed at the downstairs bathroom.
They raced towards it. Julie won. Then they laughed. I sat at the table next to Sune. Dad carved the meat.
"So what about a game of Scrabble once we're done?" Sune asked.
That had become our favorite game ever since we started hanging out a lot more during the weekends with our kids. I looked at him and took a piece of meat.
"Sure. But don't weep when I beat you," I said with a grin.
"Ha!" Sune exclaimed.
I laughed and looked at him. He looked great. I loved the Mohawk. It looked nice on him. Even if I knew he probably wouldn't keep it like that once he passed thirty-five, I still hoped that he would. It made him so different from anyone else I had ever been with. Different was good.
The food was - as expected - just as heavenly as it smelled. I ate till I was about to burst. So did the rest of us. The cold fresh air had made us famished. After dinner I cleaned up while Sune and Dad chatted in the living room by the fire. I enjoyed watching them from a distance. They seemed to really hit it off. Even if Sune wasn't quite the kind of type my dad had ever pictured me with, he wasn't one to judge a person by his or hers looks. He liked Sune. He liked him even before we became an item. But I did have a hard time telling him about us. He had liked my ex-husband Peter as well. He had liked him a lot. I could tell it was hard for him to accept that I wasn't going to go back to him even if he hadn't treated me very well in the end.
"He was sick, Rebekka," Dad would say whenever his name was somehow brought up in our conversation. "One of these days he will be back for you, feeling much better and then what?"
"He won't be back," I kept saying. "He's too embarrassed. Plus I'm pretty sure he has moved on with his life by now. It's been two and a half years. And so have I."
Sune laughed loudly while the kids found Scrabble in a suitcase and put it on the table. I prepared coffee and found the box of chocolate I had brought. I kept it in a safe place since I was trying hard to watch Dad's diet. He had a stroke a couple of years ago and after the last doctor's visit he was told to try and lose some weight and lay off the salt. His blood pressure was too high.
"Yeah! Chocolate," Julie exclaimed when she saw me bring it in.
"Wait for everybody to sit at the table," I said and put it in the middle so everybody could reach.
I won the game as usual. Sune was grumbling while we packed up. He really couldn't stand to lose. Dad brought the kids upstairs and put them to bed. Then he told us he would turn in as well. I looked at Sune and smiled. He smiled back. We had learned to cherish the few moments we had to ourselves.
We walked into the kitchen and found a bottle of red wine. Sune opened it and I found two glasses in the cupboard. Sune poured the wine.
"Let's go outside," I whispered while showing him a packet of cigarettes I had smuggled with me in my suitcase so neither Julie nor my dad would see it. Sune nodded and went to get our jackets. He liked to smoke now and then just like I did. It had become sort of our thing, like kids in school sneaking off somewhere to have a cigarette.
Sune brought me my jacket and had already put on his own. The wind was freezing as we walked onto the porch. We found a bench and wiped off the snow before we sat down. I sipped my wine while Sune lit a cigarette. It was a beautiful night. So incredibly peaceful. The sky was clear and being away from the city and all its lights we could now see all the stars. It seemed like they continued for eternity, making me feel so small and insignificant. The full moon was right above our heads shining down on us making the snow gli
tter. Sune handed me the cigarette and I took it. I smoked and drank some more wine which made me feel warm inside even if the cold felt like needles on the skin outside.
"This is really nice," I said exhaling. "I feel really relaxed."
Sune looked at me. "That's good," he said. "That's really good."
The forest surrounding us was as quiet as death. Not a single branch moved. It was like everything was frozen.
While enjoying the silence I killed the cigarette in an ashtray. Then I drank some more wine. Neither of us wanted to speak. We enjoyed this calmness, this complicity. All day with kids yelling, screaming, fighting, laughing does that to you. Once it was gone you just had to keep quiet and enjoy the silence. Sune put down his glass on a table and leaned over me. Then he grabbed my glass and put it next to his. His breath smelled good as he approached my face. I felt a chill of excitement. My heart was beating faster. It was always like that with Sune. We never had much time to be intimate so it was always like the first time with him; it was always new, exciting. His lips were warm as they covered mine. He held my head between his hands while he kissed me intensely, demanding. Soon his hands were all over me. While he was kissing my neck and nibbling my ear I felt his hand on my thigh climbing up along the jeans, stopping at the top, finding the button and opening them. Soon his hand slid down and he started touching me. I felt an arousing excitement like shock waves through my body. Sune was moaning. His sex was hard against my leg.