Chapter Text
Everyone always says they love spring, but they never mean the spring rains, or the spring mires. The driveway is more bare ground than gravel these days and the latest shower has turned it to slush. Øystein cuts the engine, swings his legs out of the car, and ruins his boots immediately. They're patent leather Doc Martins and he's only had them a week. He stole them, but if you think about it, finessing top-quality footwear when every security guard in Ski has your facial features memorised costs way more than just paying for them. The price of these boots was twenty-five stomach-cramping minutes of pretending to be interested in slippers while he waited for the store attendant to get distracted, a crazy dash across the parking lot with what felt like everybody in the building on his tail, and an entire shopping centre he can never go in again unless he gets plastic surgery. And now they're soaked with mud that looks and smells like liquid shit.
He slams the car door shut so hard that the vehicle rocks and leaps across to drier ground to inspect the damage. If he gets them off quickly and stuffs them full of tissues, maybe he can save them, but it's going to take a fuckload of work and a miracle. Not much room in the budget for very many miracles lately. Not much room in the budget for anything at all, to be truthful. He hadn't envisaged himself doing emergency cobbling when he got home. He'd been looking forward to sitting around in his underwear and figuring out a riff he's tentatively assigned to a set of lyrics that Jørn gave him before he went home. Of course, it's an exercise in futility, seeing as how Jan put their recording space on the market and spilt beer in his good amp, but sometimes when he does album stuff it dampens the dread that's been gnawing his throat since the new year.
For the last couple of days, though, he's had to be careful. Something about him noodling around with chords on his Les Paul draws the attention of his housemate, and Pelle's attention is the last thing he wants. Especially since their little bust-up two weeks ago. There's a special humiliation in having to lie to medical personnel about a puncture wound. Dodging questions like a battered wife and trying not to scream as they clean the torn flesh with what feels like sandpaper.
No, he could really do without Pelle sitting on the stairs like a ghost while he tries to salvage their ailing band.
Cursing and cringing at the awful freezing feeling of wet socks, he goes to open the door - and finds it locked. That fucker, he thinks, and bangs the wood with his fist.
'Pelle!' he roars. 'Open up!'
No answer. He goes to the kitchen window and rubs his sleeve against the dirty glass, trying to see if he can spot him moping about. The only things he can see moving in there are the flies dancing over the dishes in the sink.
'Well, shit,' he mutters, and steps back to size up his options. He sees a window open on the first floor, where Pelle's room is. He goes and fetches the ladder from the side of the carriage house and leans it against the shingles.
'Dead!' he shouts. 'Listen, if you're pissed off at me, fine, I don't care, but if you hear me fall, I need you to ring an ambulance, okay?'
Nothing. Not even that peculiar feeling you get when someone you can't see is listening to you. Øystein chews his lower lip. He wedges his end of the ladder into the soft ground and stomps on the lower rung to plant it in. Then, his stomach bouncing, he climbs up to the balcony.
He peers through the window and doesn't see anything, but the smell knocks him back. It's like walking around a corner and slamming nose-first into a brick wall. It reminds him of something stupid he used to do as a kid - licking frozen lampposts in winter to see if his tongue would stick. And stick it would, without fail, and he would be glommed to the pole smelling the cold metal until he got up the courage to rip himself loose.
His heart goes flat. Not wanting to, but knowing he must, he swings his leg over the windowsill and squeezes himself through.
He sees Pelle as soon as he straightens up. He's lying on his futon, slumped on his side with his legs jammed underneath him like he started off kneeling and couldn't hold himself up anymore. The knife he used lies beside one limp blue hand. Both arms are slashed up, lengthways for results, worse even than Leipzig. Even that wasn't enough; there's a neat little nick at the hinge of his jaw, crusted black like the strap of a riding helmet. Øystein's shotgun is stood upright against the far wall - Pelle was covering all his bases. You would think that he would have tried the shotgun first - quick and certain. You don't even hear the bang. Then again, Pelle's always been a glutton for punishment.
'Oh, God,' Øystein croaks. His knees turn to water. He falls down onto all fours and retches. 'Oh my f-fucking Jesus. Oh please God.' No athetists in foxholes, no Satanists at suicides. Nobody's listening, anyway. Pelle doesn't move. There's no Hail Mary finger-twitch, no flutter of his bruise-coloured eyelids. His mouth is slightly open, as though he died talking, or singing.
Singing. How much did Øystein get from him, in the end? He can't think of anything other than the concert recordings from last year and the songs that ended up on Projections of a Stained Mind. There'll never be anything else. Not after today. He looks at Pelle's long throat, at where he sawed at it. If he were to put his fingers into it he would touch the greatest voicebox black metal ever heard and won't ever hear again.
No album. No more rehearsals. No more of that distinctive bullrush-swaying-in-the-breeze style of headbanging, so different from anything Øystein had seen before. No more watching him clown around like a child, the way he was when they all played together for the first time back in 1988, happy beyond reason just to be there making music.
But that Pelle died months before today, killed off slowly by the weeks and weeks of nothing happening and all the plans that never went anywhere and their disastrous tour to Turkey, whose fucking idea was it to go by train, Øystein can't remember but it was probably him, it sounds like him, everything he touches turns to shit, life took pity on him just once and gave him this perfect black angel and he wasn't even grateful so back he goes, forever, and Øystein has no-one to blame but himself.
Get up, he thinks to himself. Sitting here blubbering won't bring him back. You didn't cry over him when he was alive, so why start now?
He gets to his feet. The dead are supposed to look peaceful, but Pelle doesn't. He looks flat, like he's been embalmed already, his veins pumped full of formaldehyde, his skull packed with sawdust. Øystein doesn't like to see him all crumpled like this, but the thought of touching him makes him panic. If he touches him, then this is real, and he's not ready for it to be real yet. If Jørn were here, he would do normal things, like scream and cry and call an ambulance, but that thought is just as unbearable. They won't let Øystein keep him; they'll take him away to rot underground somewhere in Sweden, packed down beneath the stony soil that starved and buried Pelle's ancestors. This can't be the end, not just yet. This is a sentence without a full stop, cut off in the middle the way a spade goes through a worm, with no mind paid to grammar or intelligibility.
He can't just fuck off like this and leave Øystein with nothing. That wasn't the deal. There was never a contract, he's no good at those, neither of them are businessmen, it was always only about the music and the wild ferocious joy of being onstage together, but three years ago Øystein called a boy on the phone and said make it brutal and the boy laughed and said yes he would, and this is not what he meant. At all.
Down the stairs. Unlock the front door. Get back in the car. Start it up. Drive into Kråkstad village. Park outside the tourist shop where they sell maps and German-language fridge magnets. The elderly man who runs the place eyes his straggly black hair and doesn't make small talk - thank Satan for small mercies. Make your purchase. Back to the car. Drive back to the house with the needle shivering just above the speed limit.
In the driveway, he braces himself against the roof of the car and takes a few gulping breaths, his head hanging between his shoulders. A thick string of phlegm oozes between his lips and falls - plap - into the mud. His empty stomach churns and boils, but there's nothing in it to puke up. In maybe an hour's time, his current life, the life with Pelle in it, will end, and then he will have to keep moving forward forever while Pelle stays where he is. His final memories of him are about to settle into his neurons. It won't do to waste time spewing everywhere or crying.
Only when he's sure he can handle it does he push open the door and step over the threshold. Everything is so awfully quiet, like an empty barn after the livestock have been shipped for slaughter. He makes his way up the stairs, wincing when the floorboards creak, as though the dead man is a light sleeper.
Inside the room, nothing has changed. Pelle is still slumped like an abandoned doll. Øystein stands over him, considering the staging. After a moment of deliberation, he picks up the knife and places it beside Pelle's face. He considers trying to pry open his eyes to make it seem like he's looking at it, but decides to abide by his no-touching rule for the moment. When he was a child, his parents made him kiss his dead grandfather at the funeral home, and the freezing plasticky feel of his forehead showed up in his nightmares for months afterwards. Pelle will probably feel even worse - soft and heatless, like a slug. Better to avoid it. Seeing is bad enough.
He takes the disposable camera he bought out of its bag - Thank You for Shopping Local! - and takes a few shots. It's not a bad scene; Pelle looks very evocative all contorted like this. He leans in close and takes another. The composition has future album cover written all over. Encouraged, he walks backwards and shoots wide, snapping eight pictures in rapid succession.
These are going to be incredible on posters and in fanzines. It's the best thing Pelle has done for the band in a long while. Øystein looks down to wipe a finger-smudge off the viewer. When he raises it to his eye again, he frowns in annoyance. That's the trouble with photography: sometimes the model moves. Oh, well. He can work with -
The camera slips from his nerveless grip and falls onto the floorboards with a clatter. Øystein's legs fold underneath him. He scrambles across to the futon. Pelle makes a dreadful hissing noise and kicks himself loose from the quilt. His eyes roll back in his head. Fresh blood wells from his slashed throat and trickles down the side of his neck.
Øystein grabs at his t-shirt and hauls him across the sheets. He gathers him into his arms and cradles him on his lap like a demented black metal Pietà. 'Pelle! Oh, God. Pelle, can you hear me? You've done something stupid.'
But the hissing goes on and on. Øystein fists his hand in Pelle's greasy blond hair and pushes his head up so that his open windpipe seals shut. The hissing stops, and words begin to gurgle out: 'Mamma, jag ljög, barnen i skolan slog mig....'
'Pelle, it's me! It's Øystein! Look at me!' But whatever Pelle is seeing, it isn't him. His pupils are blown out black, sucking in the light. Pink spittle drools down his chin. He starts to choke.
'Ah, Christ. What do I do, what do I do, what do I do....' He takes Pelle underneath the armpits and drags him out to the landing. A scrap of a one-day first aid course he took back in ninth grade floats across his brain: put him in the recovery position. He rolls Pelle onto his side with the bad side of his neck facing down, folding up his hands beneath his head in a sick parody of sleep. The choking stops, but the blood is really flowing now. It seeps into the carpet, making a stain that deepens and spreads by the second.
He flies back down the stairs and snatches the phone out of its cradle. His fingers are trembling and his eyes can't focus but somehow he manages to punch in 113. The lines rings once, and then the operator picks up.
'Emergency services, how may I direct - '
'Sørumveien 18, 1408 Kråkstad!'
'Pardon, sir?'
'Sørumveien 18, 1408 Kråkstad, come quickly, he's dying - '
'Slow down, I can't hear you. Is there an injured person on the premises?'
Øystein thumps the wall. 'Yes! My friend slit his throat, the stupid dumb fuck, he's bleeding everywhere, he's going to die, can you please send somebody!'
'I'm dispatching an ambulance, sir. Where's your friend?'
'Upstairs.' His voice wobbles and cracks. He massages his throat viciously. You can cry later. Hold it together. 'I laid him down, but then the bleeding got worse - '
'Go back and lift him so that he's sitting up. Find something soft and put pressure on the wound. Can you take the phone with you?'
'N-no, I - '
'That's alright. The ambulance will be there in five minutes. Try and get the bleeding under control.'
He leaves the receiver spinning madly on the end of its cord and takes the stairs two at a time. He strips Pelle's denim jacket from his skinny shoulders, yanks him upright, and jams it against the hole in his neck.
Pelle's head flops forward. 'Øystein,' he rasps. 'You're....home.'
Oh thank you God, Jesus, Satan, thank you everybody. 'That's right, Pelle. I'm home. You really fucked up this time.'
Pelle wheezes. The denim starts to feel warm and damp. 'You....need....to shoot....me.'
'What?! No! The ambulance is coming, everything'll be alright - '
Pelle's bloodshot eyes swivel in their sockets. 'Shouldn't....have called....wanna die....'
'Not today. Some other day. Get old first. Have ten children.' Øystein has no fucking idea what he's saying. Pelle is looking at him like he's the one who went at himself with a knife.
'You....should....do it,' he hisses. 'You....hate me.'
'Don't be stupid. If I hated you I would've walked right back out the door and let you bleed out.' Which is exactly what you did.
'You said....it....would be....better....'
'Shh, shh, shh, shh.' Øystein jogs him in his arms like a gangly baby and presses the ungainly bundle of head and jacket to his chest. His Venom shirt will be speckled with bloodstains. That's fine. He'll wear it to their next gig. Assuming there is a next gig, considering that their vocalist is exsanguinating in his lap.
Outside, he hears a siren whoop. Tires crunch in the gravel. 'Alright,' he says, 'time for a road trip.' He scoops up Pelle's shaking body and carries him bridal-style down the stairs. The denim jacket peels away and falls to the floor with a wet thud. Blood sprinkles the steps.
Øystein navigates the door handle one-handed and steps out into the April sunshine. It's an absurdly beautiful day all of a sudden, and their front yard is full of paramedics.
Pelle clutches at him with his right hand; his left hangs limp. 'There's....still time. Get the....shotgun.'
'I'm throwing the shotgun in the creek. You had your chance. Not my fault you planned this badly.' Two of the ambulance men rush forward with a stretcher. Øystein gives Pelle a gloating kiss on his clammy forehead, and lays him gently down.
Pelle vanishes in a welter of white uniforms, like a cow carcass in a piranha tank. Øystein steps back and rubs his shoulders. All that fucker's talk about starving himself and he still weighs a tonne.
One of the paramedics looks at him. 'Are you coming with us to the hospital?'
Øystein flaps his hand at him. 'Nah, I gotta stay here and make some calls. You can take him away.' He raises his voice: 'Have fun, Per!'
He turns his back on them all and heads back into the house. From the window, he watches the ambulance crunch across the gravel and speed away, siren at full blast. He wishes he'd had the time to sample it.
The house really is empty now. Peace, quiet, and no idiot frontmen playing dead - just the way he likes things around here.
He skips back up the stairs and retrieves his camera. The casing cracked in the fall, but he's able to extract the roll of film. He tosses it from hand to hand, thinking about the possibilities.
There's blood absolutely everywhere, but he doesn't feel like dealing with it, and he doesn't know how to get it out of the carpet anyway. He'll let it dry into the woodwork, and by the time he comes back from his parents' place it'll be just another feature of the house.
Humming the tricky riff he's been working on, he fetches his guitar and amp and heads back out to the car. The roll of film bounces in his pocket like a funfair prize.