The End Read online

  I pull Tilda into a side street. There are fewer people here. Most of them are completely silent and seem as shaken as I am.

  “I have to smoke,” Tilda says, and stops abruptly.

  She leans against a power box, taking out a packet of cigarettes with Russian health warnings. Her dirty hands tremble. I have to help her light her cigarette. It’s already dotted with tiny pinpricks of rain. She pulls on the cigarette so hard it crackles as she sucks the smoke deep into her lungs. Tilda, who used to be so obsessed with her oxygen intake.

  People shoot us suspicious looks as they pass by. Tilda doesn’t even seem to notice. She’s rocking back and forth.

  “What have you taken tonight?” I ask her again.

  “None of your fucking business.”

  “You have to stop.”

  “Shut up, Simon. You’re not exactly a saint yourself nowadays.”

  “It’s not the same thing. Do you even know what you’re taking?”

  Tilda smiles mockingly. “Are you worried about me, Simon?”

  “Of course I am!”

  “Everyone is. Everyone wants to tell me what I should be doing. Little Tilda, who can be such a good girl when she wants to be.” She gives me a disgusted look. “You’re all such fucking hypocrites.”

  “We just want to help you.”

  v“Sure.”

  She stumbles, bracing herself against the power box, then takes another drag on her cigarette and squints against the smoke.

  “I’m leaving now,” she announces.

  “Where are you going?”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  “To Sait?”

  “Stop it. Sait is nothing.”

  “Tilda . . . If you’re going to get more of that shit . . . don’t. Please.”

  She throws her cigarette aside; it hisses against the wet pavement. But she doesn’t move, turning her gaze up to the sky, blinking against the rain. Tiny droplets sparkle in her hair.

  “Do you know what I’ve realized?” she says. “Everyone who says they know what’s best for me . . . and think they’re that much fucking better than me . . . they’re the worst ones. And I’m not putting up with it anymore.”

  “Tilda,” I say. “I don’t think I’m better than you.”

  She starts crying and shakes her head. I try to put my arm around her, but she pulls away.

  “You don’t get it. There’s only one person who could, but she’s . . .” Tilda goes silent, angrily rubbing her cheeks dry.

  “I’d get it if you talked to me,” I say. “We used to talk about everything.”

  “No. We didn’t.”

  Does she even know what she’s saying? Is she deliberately trying to hurt me? I can’t read this Tilda. I don’t know who she is.

  “You should go home,” I say. “I’ll come with you. I promise I won’t try to stay. I just need to know that you’re—”

  “I can’t go home. I can’t stand it.”

  She wipes away fresh tears. I want to tell her that I know about Klas and the True Church. And I want to tell her that I can’t stand being at home, either. That I don’t feel at home anywhere since she left me.

  But Tilda’s spotted something behind my back. Her face changes, as if she’s put on a mask. Her smile is huge. Fake. A poor imitation of her old self. I turn around just as Amanda and Elin throw their arms around us. Hampus and Ali are with them.

  “Shit, it’s so good to see you. That was super scary,” Amanda says, kissing Tilda on the cheek before shooting me a look.

  “What happened to your eyebrow?” Elin asks.

  I raise my hand, touching the wound gently. “Someone accidentally brained me.”

  “Afteeer-paaarty,” Hampus hollers, and does a pirouette that makes him stumble off the curb. “Come on. We’re going back to Ali’s.”

  “We’ll be right there,” I say.

  “Simon will be right there,” Tilda says quickly. “I have to go and talk to someone.”

  Elin and Amanda exchange a look.

  “Come with us instead,” Amanda says.

  But Tilda shakes her head.

  Hampus is getting antsy, and finally, Elin and Amanda give up. Tilda and I stay on the corner watching the others as they disappear toward the apartment complex on the other side of the tracks.

  Tilda takes out a new cigarette. This time, she manages to light it herself. Her hands have stopped trembling.

  “I’ll walk with you, wherever you’re going,” I say. “You shouldn’t be alone in the city when—”

  “Leave me alone, Simon. I’ve got my own life now. It’s got nothing to do with you.” She starts to walk away. I follow her, and she whirls around.

  “If you don’t leave me alone, I’ll scream.”

  I look up toward Storgatan, wondering if the men in windbreakers are still there, still eager to rush to her rescue.

  I don’t say anything. I stay where I am. I let her go.

  4 WEEKS, 2 DAYS LEFT

  SIMON

  Boomer starts howling as soon as I get the key into the lock. The entire stairwell shakes when I open the door. I quickly pull the door shut behind me, shushing him until he stops barking, but a hundred and fifty pounds of dog running around in circles in the hall still makes a lot of noise.

  “Take it easy, boy,” I croak, and fall over as I try to pull my shoes off.

  A wet tongue squelches at me before I manage to get back up again. I stagger into the bathroom and look at myself in the mirror. The Band-Aid I got from Ali at the after-party came off on the way home. There are spots of blood on my cheek. My eyebrow is swollen and tender.

  I brush my teeth, nearly vomiting when my toothbrush slips toward the back of tongue. Afterward, I rinse my mouth with water straight from the tap, then stay slumped over the sink.

  The mood was odd at Ali’s place. I think we were all shocked by the chaos in the city—it was like walking through a war zone. I kept hoping Tilda would show up, and drank way too much while I waited for her.

  Your ex is a fucking whore!

  The bleach-blonde girl screamed it at me. I still don’t know her name. We made out again, but I was too drunk to hide the fact that I was texting Tilda at the same time. I tried to explain that I was worried about her, that I wanted to know she’d arrived safely wherever she was going. But then I got moonshine poured over me. Everyone stared. And Tilda still hasn’t replied to the message.

  I’m so tired. More tired than I’ve ever been. If I turned the lights off, I could curl up on the bathroom rug and sleep until the comet hits and everything’s over. Instead, I pull myself together and straighten up. Dry my mouth.

  When I step out of the bathroom, Judette is waiting for me in the low light. She’s wearing her robe. Her eyes are bloodshot.

  “Sorry if I woke you,” I say.

  “You think I could sleep? You promised to get home early.”

  She practically pushes me into the kitchen. I cautiously take a seat. The window is ajar, and birds are chirping like crazy outside. It’s stopped raining. The sky is brighter.

  “What happened to your face?” Judette says, placing a glass of water in front of me. “Did you go down to the square?”

  “We didn’t plan to do it. It just happened.”

  Judette’s eyes are burning with rage. I look away, toward the expensive and beautiful orchids that nestle together on the windowsill—Venus slipper, pink and yellow Paphiopedilum Pinocchio. Judette brought them with her from the flower shop when it closed down. When I was a kid, I knew the name of every flower in that place. Now it’s just an abandoned building on Storgatan with its windows smashed in.

  “Sorry,” I say.

  “Have you been in a fight?”

  “Someone just bumped into me. It was an accident.”

  “And then what?”

  “And then?”

  “What did you do after the game?”

  “We just sat and talked for a while at Ali’s place.”

  Judette wat
ches me in silence. I know that this is a trick. She waits until I start talking, letting me dig my own grave. And I still can’t resist picking up the spade and starting to shovel.

  “I thought that since you’d already gone to bed, it wouldn’t matter when—”

  “Bullshit,” she interrupts. “You weren’t thinking about us at all.”

  She’s wrong. I did think about them. I just decided I didn’t care.

  A headache comes creeping up on me, a warm, throbbing glow inside my skull. “Do you realize how worried I’ve been?” Judette says. “Don’t you think I’ve heard how crazy it was out there?”

  “I just wanted to be with my friends. They’re important to me, too.”

  “Simon.” Judette sighs. “This is destructive.”

  “So? What does it matter? It’s almost over, anyway.”

  “I get that it feels that way, but are you actually having fun? Because this doesn’t look like fun.”

  Now the headache presses against the backs of my eyes. I carefully sip the water Judette gave me. It barely reaches my stomach before it threatens to come back up again.

  “I’m having loads of fun,” I say. “I’m having the time of my life.”

  “And how are you going to feel tomorrow?” she says, but cuts me off me before I can respond. “And don’t say it doesn’t matter.”

  I shut my mouth again.

  “We have to do the best we can with the time we have left,” Judette says.

  I look at her dark eyes, her skin glowing in the light from the ceiling lamp. I miss her so much. I miss my old life. And all those things I don’t want to think about are threatening to catch up with me.

  “I don’t know how to do that,” I say quietly.

  She leans across the table. “It isn’t easy for any of us. But you can’t figure it out like this.”

  Judette’s voice is warm, so warm she could melt something inside me, make the feelings rush out. I don’t want to cry right now. I’m so sick of crying.

  I clear my throat to rid myself of the lump in there. “Where’s Stina?”

  “She’s doing a home visit.”

  The way Judette says it tells me all I need to know. Another suicide. Stina takes care of the loved ones left behind by those who can’t bear waiting around for the comet. Some people prefer to take matters into their own hands. Get it over with. I had a hard time understanding it at first. It seemed so contradictory, killing yourself because you were afraid to die. But sometimes, I feel like I understand it all too well—only occasionally and briefly. I could never really hurt myself.

  At least, I don’t think so.

  “When did she leave?”

  “Ten thirty. I haven’t told her you didn’t come home, if that’s what you’re asking.”

  “Thank you.”

  “It’s for her sake, not yours. I didn’t want her to worry. But I’m going to tell her tomorrow.”

  “Great.”

  Judette’s eyes narrow.

  “I’m going to get my shit together,” I say. “I promise.” My words hang in the air, sounding empty and false.

  “I’m going to hit the shower before work,” Judette finally says before stretching.

  “Why shower before work?”

  Judette has gone from working at the flower shop to volunteering with garbage disposal. The comet has pushed her to the other end of the olfactory spectrum.

  “I have to wake myself up somehow,” she says. “God, let it be Thursday soon so we can get new coffee rations.”

  She rubs her face and gets to her feet. Boomer raises his head expectantly, but she just pats him distractedly and heads out of the kitchen.

  “Set the alarm,” she yells. “You’re taking him out for his morning walk.”

  NAME: LUCINDA

  TELLUS #0392811002

  POST 0005

  The garbage truck woke me up around ten. Miranda’s knees were shoved against my back, and her scrawny body emitted snores louder than seemed physically possible. When Dad came home a little later, I gave up on going back to sleep and joined him for breakfast.

  He seemed so tired that I suddenly envisioned what he would have looked like if he had the chance to grow old. He looked more like grandpa than ever.

  Dad asked me how I was feeling, and I replied, “All right. I just have a touch of cancer,” and he said, “You’d do anything for attention, wouldn’t you?” It’s not a super normal way to talk, but we’ve been doing it since I got my diagnosis. It’s how we deal with it.

  I told him about Miranda’s questions about the comet, but didn’t mention my own anxiety. It wasn’t the right time. And what was he supposed to do about it? He would’ve just worried about me, and he’s already done enough of that. I made us oatmeal, noticing how happy he was when I went back for another half-serving.

  We watched the morning news. The same inferno has been raging throughout the country, throughout every square and city park where the game was screened. Dad told me about his night in the ER. Lacerations were sutured. Skulls were x-rayed. Stomachs were pumped.

  Fights. Rapes. Overdoses. Manslaughter. Vandalism. It was almost as bad as when we first heard about the comet and people lost their minds. If I have a hard time remembering the goodness in the world, it must be even harder for Dad. He has to see the results of humanity’s worst instincts and impulses. (Then again, I think Dad is a better person than I am. He thinks the best of everyone until he’s proven wrong. Sometimes, I’m afraid I’m the exact opposite.) Anyone who’s ever had a secret urge is satisfying it now. Seize the day. The chance of being caught and held accountable is slim to none. There aren’t enough police officers left, no time for investigations or trials, not to mention prison sentences.

  There aren’t enough people at the hospital, either. No time for long-term treatments. Dad keeps going in to work. He says he has to because so many people need doctors right now, but I think he does it for his own sake, too. It’s his way of feeling like himself again, despite the world changing. I would do the same thing if I could.

  I need to get out of the house. Maybe take a walk down to the lake. If I cut through the woods, I probably won’t risk meeting anyone.

  Write more later.

  SIMON

  The air is hot and humid. There’s no breeze as I run along the rolling hills on the other side of the lake. I’m dripping with sweat. Boomer looks up at me with a huge doggy smile, thrilled to be off-leash. Now and then he stops, sniffing around a bush or at some interesting spot in the grass. His tail points straight up like a white plume.

  When the forest starts to get thicker around the trail, I pull my phone out of my pocket. Still no response from Tilda to the message I sent last night. I promise myself not to check again before I get home.

  Not that I want to go home. Stina was so angry at me for going into town last night she cried.

  I speed up, even though the hangover pounds through my body, and it feels like my heart is going to burst inside my chest. Loud music pulses in my ears. I keep my arms tight against my sides, focusing on my feet hitting the ground, which is strewn with woodchips and bark.

  Soon it’ll all be gone, Tilda said the morning when we’d heard about the comet.

  The ground beneath my feet. And the lake. And the birch trees. And Boomer.

  A sudden feeling of vertigo almost trips me up, but I force myself to keep going. Now I can glimpse the old waterslide between the trees, once turquoise, now bleached to some noncolor. A tarp covers the pool. The ice cream stand is shut. The mini golf courses haven’t been used for a long time. I push myself harder for the final stretch, run to the beach, then stop and put my hands on my knees, breathing hard, the taste of blood in my mouth. New beads of sweat push through my skin.

  Boomer splashes around the water’s edge and gets hold of an old plastic bag.

  “Let go of that!” I shout, and yank my headphones out.

  He looks up at me. Laps some water. Snorts. Frolics clumsily. Comes back up o
n the beach and shakes himself off.

  Someone is sitting at the edge of the swimming dock, her black hat pulled down low. When I look at her, she turns away, but not before I recognize her.

  Lucinda. The girl who used to be Tilda’s best friend. The girl who features in so many photos on Tilda’s wall of inspiration—they’re sleeping in a bus or hugging each other at the edge of a pool. In some pictures, they’re surrounded by other people from the swim team, but there’s always an invisible bubble around the two of them. It’s like they belong together.

  I only met Lucinda a couple of times at the hospital. By then, she’d already started pulling away from everyone. Even from Tilda. How many times did I console her after a call or a message went unanswered?

  I look away, too, relieved that Lucinda clearly wants to ignore me. I have no idea what I’d even say to her.

  Sweat drips from my head to the sand as I stretch the backs of my thighs.

  When Tilda and I got together last fall, everyone was talking about Lucinda, “the cancer girl.” She had just gotten her diagnosis. The entire swim team went to visit her in the hospital. Amanda and Elin posted photos of themselves at her bedside. They called her strong and brave. Tilda hated it. She said it was like Lucinda wasn’t a real person to them, just some kind of character. The lovely, wonderful friend with the tragic destiny. Lucinda, whose mother had died of cancer. Lucinda, whose father the doctor couldn’t save either his wife or his daughter. But the months passed, and the prognoses were unclear and contradictory. Everything was so complicated, not at all like in the movies.

  It’s been a long time since anyone talked about Lucinda.

  I straighten slowly, shake the lactic acid out of my legs. Hear Boomer bark. When I look over, he’s already halfway along the swimming dock.

  “Boomer! Come here!”

  He pretends not to hear me. His tail wags as he burrows his giant head in under Lucinda’s arm. Panic rushes through me as I remember having to wear a mask when I visited her in the hospital. The slightest cold or infection could kill her.