‘Leyla, me and my brother and her other cousins. Also, two uncles who are still in Iran. But they are on their way, probably with Turkish passports. We haven’t decided yet. Altogether we will be eleven part-owners.’
‘And what is this institute? Is it really so easy to emigrate to Sweden? Don’t they check the passports?’
‘The institute is for dieting. And yes, it is very hard to gain residence visas for Sweden. You have to know what to do, then it’s easy.’
‘And you know what to do?’
‘Everyone knows.’
‘How do you do it?’
‘You should come here first. Either they let you in, or they deport you. If you are in, you’re in. But if you are deported you are also okay.’
‘How is that?’
‘You refuse to leave.’
‘And that works?’
‘It works very well. You can escape from the refugee camp, for example. Maybe you change names with someone. Or else you disappear. There are churches that harbour refugees.’
‘That sounds too good to be true,’ Humlin protested. ‘I feel like I read articles every day about people with desperate stories who fight their deportation. Some of them try to kill themselves and they are still deported.’
‘It is unfortunate that the Swedish authorities have not yet understood the way things work. We have tried to tell them how refugees think, but they don’t want to listen.’
Humlin was starting to feel like an enraged conservative. In his mind he saw a Sweden with completely porous borders over which people from all over the world cheerfully crossed at will.
‘I thought our government was supposed to set rules for immigration, not the other way around.’
‘You don’t think that is undemocratic? Refugees know so much more about their situation than any public servant. Like what it is like to travel through Europe in a locked container, for example.’
Humlin thought about this in silence, not only what the driver had told him about immigration, but also Leyla’s real motives for learning to write. He had the feeling there was more to the story. Was her desire to write really motivated by superficial motives? Was there no deeper reason, a need to find a form of self-expression? Humlin simply couldn’t believe that all she wanted to do was make money and run a diet institute with her relatives.
The taxi slowed down in front of the boxing club. The windows and outside lights were dark.
‘They have probably gone home. It’s half past eleven.’
Humlin leaned forward to pay. He still didn’t know what had made him change his mind and ask to be driven out here, nor did he have a phone with him to order another taxi and get back. I never know why I do things, he thought despondently. It’s that damned foothold again, I’ve lost my foothold. The best thing I could do would be to go back to the hotel. But I’m determined to get out here.
‘Are you sure you want to be dropped off here?’ the taxi driver asked.
‘Yes, I’m sure.’
Humlin stepped out of the car and watched it drive off at breakneck speed in the snow. What the hell am I doing here, he thought angrily as he pulled at the locked door. Then he flinched and turned around. He saw someone come out of the shadows at him. I’m going to be robbed, he thought. Robbed, stabbed and left for dead in this slush. Then he realised it was Tanya. Her long hair was wet and she was shivering. But unlike last time she was not staring off at the horizon, she was looking into his eyes. And she smiled. It suddenly dawned on Humlin that she had been waiting for him all this time. When everyone else had given up on him and gone home, she had stayed there in the cold.
‘I’m so sorry I’m late,’ he said. ‘There was a problem with the train. And Tea-Bag disappeared. Do you know where she lives?’
Tanya did not reply. I wonder if she even understands what I’m saying, he thought. But she must speak some Swedish. Does she just not want to talk about Tea-Bag?
‘It’s locked,’ he continued. ‘We can’t get in. Everyone has gone home, it appears. I can’t blame them since I’m so late.’
The next moment Humlin realised Tanya understood him very well. She took out a collection of skeleton keys and a small torch and went to work on Törnblom’s door. After a while she gave up, pulled out a small crowbar that had been hidden in her boot and forced it into the door. Before he had a chance to react, Humlin found himself pulled into the dark hallway while Tanya closed the broken door behind them.
‘This is breaking and entering!’ Humlin hissed.
Tanya did not answer. She was already on her way to the room where they had met before, the one with the boarded-up windows. The light from her torch danced over the walls with their old boxing posters. He followed her in. She found the light switch and turned it on.
‘Someone will see the light,’ he said.
‘Even in Sweden light cannot pass through boarded-up windows,’ she said.
She spoke slowly, searching for each word like a blind person trying to find their way down an unknown path. He thought her voice sounded something like a small clear bell, delicate and definite at the same time.
