Centralen

By Linda Eketoft

The reader is brought on a timeless journey together with a girl without a name - through the barren landscape of Siberia on a train, destination unknown.

Exposed to situations that urge her to gradually come out of her existence as an automaton, the girl is forced to make some critical decisions even if they appear frightening and at times alien.

An enigmatic fiddler at the train station, a criminal Icelandic entrepreneur and a young Philosopher in the woods together with what turns out to be a rather mysterious meeting on the Siberian tundra, are only meetings along the girls way to exploring herself. A series of events leads her back to the Central station where she once began her journey. As she returns she is ready to reunite with her deepest fears.

In this intriguing debut, the author energetically builds a bridge between dream and reality, individual and universal perception, in a beautifully naked and rare language which combines expressive dialogue with poetry that remind us of Japanese literature and Nordic playwrights.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Nov 16, 2009
• ISBN: 9781467005777

Linda Eketoft

Linda Eketoft grew up in Sweden and she has lived abroad in various countries since. Her extensive travels in the Himalayas, South America, Antarctica and the Middle East alongside her passion for the arts and ancient trade routes has inspired her writing. Eketoft brings her readers on a thriller of a journey filled with unexpected encounters and situations shared in a stylistically captivating way, bringing a cinematic minimalist experience filled with passion and perspective.

Book preview

Contents

Chapter I

Chapter II

Chapter III

Chapter IV

Chapter V

Chapter VI

Chapter VII

Chapter VIII

Chapter IX

Chapter X

Chapter XI

Chapter XII

Chapter XIII

Chapter XIV

Chapter XV

Chapter XVI

Chapter XVII

Chapter XVIII

Chapter XIX

Chapter XX

Chapter XXI

Chapter XXII

Chapter I

JUST LIKE THE STREET she never walked, or the stage she never entered, they were longings of a wandering mind.

It had been a memory, a fleeting sensation which life formed into new guises every time she found herself there.

The pain wore different masks, but it was always familiar. It hung in the Universe like a puppet on a string; an essential element. He tempted and teased in the tangled brush. He played peek-a-boo among the city skyscrapers. Even in the depth of the waters, he owned the place of unquenchable longing. In the fire, he became flames playing clever shadow games on the walls and the ceiling, devouring everything in their inviting warmth.

Her joy was explosive and immediate during moments trampled by harsh realities marching in jackboots, ready to fight the battle of budding hope. But after it rested, the same joy began etching itself into screaming and growing wings which carried her high above the rooftops of the city. It gave a bird’s eye view of everything worldly on the ground. Never would another cause her joy to shatter; she would land upon someone else’s emergency, only because she could, and only because she had the gift of understanding.

When she inhaled, it was the air of the world. When she spoke, she heard herself say what had been said by someone else when she was not there to say it. Still, she knew precisely how and what would be said; what was unique about her and another was that they were one and the same.

She saw a dandelion grow out of the asphalt one summer day. That is when she began to know. Some years before, her grandfather had shown her a pine tree which split a mountain rock in half. Then she had known a little more. And the tadpoles in the overgrown pond of the country place, together with the tiny pikes caught too early in the sea that were released back into the blue waters; they said something more about what she already knew.

One night when she woke up inside the wooden boat in the harbor and the boat cover was heavy with dew, she heard a gentle lapping in the hull from the moving boats nearby. The water was still in a horizontal line when she gazed into the distance.

Yet some more time had passed. She had begun to discern what she thought were air molecules in the mornings, when her lashes filtered the first rays of the day. She began to experience curiosity which propelled her to recreate whatever she saw, time after another. Slowly, eyes opened: there they were, tiny, whirling around like snowflakes in drifting winds. They were never still; always floating, whirling, flying like tiny bubbles slowed down by the resistance of air after having been set free.

She was a child and she knew everything. At least everything in her reality. The one she created herself. With her senses laid bare, everything was possible. If she had seen anything different, it would have been just as real and valid. Now she saw air molecules which supposedly were impossible. Would this affect other dimensions within her? Would the pain feel as icily sharp? Would happiness be as joyous? She knew yet a little more than yesterday.

It was a balmy summer day on the lawn. She sat perched on the rain-filled blue plastic swing suspended in front of an untamed bush of lilacs. Her feet were moist from the heavy peat moss growing on the path. The moss was only patchy under the swing where her eager feet had stamped off to lift her into the air. Each time she swung, she weakened the tree branch whose leaves whispered and sighed with her every leap. Her feet touched the sand and she was free. Forwards and then back again. The force of her back hitting the blooming lilacs below released an intoxicating scent. The moss, the sand, the air, the lilacs…The tree.

They sat in the sun on a grassy slope surrounded by weeds. Spring flowers circled their blanket in the glade. It was someone’s birthday. Another’s longing for death. They were boisterous and talked distantly about things, but they only came nearer. They drank sour wine and chain smoked to forget. But everything became all the more intense. They searched for explanations and tried to understand, but everything turned more diffuse. They intended to abandon the topic, but it would become a lifelong persecution.

Why had she promised herself never to forget the moment on the motor coach after traveling for two days? It was not the beginning of the trip. It was not the end either. Still, the moment became so memorable and meaningful. The thought had sliced straight through her: life is so much more than this. This must have been happiness. She had been on a journey.

-Why?

-Because I must leave.

-Where will you go?

-Where I already am. You are not there.

Therefore he was without equal, therefore she was. One had remained the other while searching to be someone else.

The complication had escalated and now it had won their fascination. They held on to it because it had become more beautiful than they were together. The more they tried to be another, the more they had been themselves. It was something whose genesis was difficult to explain.

She was on her way. She was traveling toward the unique to find her happiness. It was not a fugue, only a new fairy tale.

There was a suitcase next to a pair of black lace-up boots on the sidewalk one cold October morning. The taxi filled her driveway with acrid clouds of exhaust. Inside the car, the radio invited her and the silent driver to the same monotonous tunes which always would end with a lengthy round-off before the final note, like the end of a miserably drawn sigh.

She had not even decided where she would go. Must she know? Everything became so much more real when she found herself staring at the neon signs at the station. Life swirled around her in an unbroken circle of noise. She stood in the middle as if in a cocoon. Her ears grew used to the sounds after some time. The signs offered so many destinations. One was not more interesting than the other. Without a plan, anything could happen. But it was not her decision to be without. She could not remember when she had one last. Tones from a string instrument found their way through the throngs: through the din and through her cocoon.

(Song from the Central Station)

-I am not a stranger here. Longing holds me…love grows…envelops me. Write down everything you want to say….but do not send the letter. Words heard in the wind…you are not a stranger. I can feel you in the wind…it carries over the graveyard, through rain-shrouded skies to me behind white curtains. You are one of the many where you rest…you were in life too…I chose you, Tori. Why did you have to go?…

The song was drawn out like a dying breath, filled with sorrow. People scattered, and now she noticed the man in the corner of her eye. He sang and played the strings of a lute. His tones were a feline plaint for a springtime mate, and pain filled the platform where only she stood still. She turned around quickly in his direction. His gaze held her with such power that she felt obliged to take a step forward. He smiled with brazen dishonor and fear tore through her chest. She wanted to dismiss him for the grim fool he appeared, but it would have been too simple. He was illuminated by misery. It had lived his time. She took a few steps further to give what his upturned cap demanded. He laughed with a sneer.

-No missy, save your change for a coffee. He nodded toward the corner bar, bathed in the dull castoff sheen from the neon lights across the way.

-There isn’t a whole lot you know about me, she replied decisively.

-Maybe not, maybe..

There was something unpredictable about the man she had never met before. Unease and confusion whirled inside her like hellish fireflies. She was about to utter something in her defense, but the man already knew it. He began to play his lute again, without the accompaniment of his voice this time. She was interrupted. His eyes averted her, and he displayed an intense fascination with the old Central Station clock which hung over the resting railroad cars. But he did not watch for the time. She gazed at the clock, its unpolished golden bezel, its glass work which framed it so beautifully, just like the radiating and blinding light which seems to hover around the core of the sun. She had made a mistake. Time had no room in his life, since it was filled with endless misfortune.

She decided to drink a cup of coffee.

The suitcase was unwieldy and heavy. It demanded some effort to drag it from the neon lights to the bar. The dusk of the interior enveloped her. She knew she could stay in there without being seen by those passing outside. After a while of thoughts, a glass of coffee was served; dark, steaming, black. She let it stand, but allowed for the unrefined rounded sugar-cubes to fall into its depth. She saw them dissolving at the bottom of the glass and form little peaks, which in turn became flattened mounds; they turned to sweet dust for some time, and then disappeared. They were invisible to the eye, but had become part of the entire glass. Soon she would drink it.

It was twilight. Dripping overcoats of those entering told of rain in the streets. The door opened again. A man with an umbrella shook off his wet belongings. She finished her coffee. The man wore a bowler hat and his clothes bespoke an office job, she thought. His face remained obscured by his lowered head. She heard him order brandy and whiskey at the bar. He quickly proffered some wrinkled bills to the bartender who was not able to return the change. The man put up his palm with a decisive gesture signaling for the barman to keep whatever was left. He turned toward the passing crowd in the Central Station arrival hall and she had an opportunity to observe his profile. His cheekbones appeared impossibly high for a man’s face. His nose was very elegantly carved. All in all, he gave the impression of being somewhat of a ruffian, which was confirmed by those sitting nearby when he dragged himself forward with his shabby luggage. She did not try to get his attention, but kept staring out toward the commotion of the arrival hall. Perhaps that was why he so calmly and confidently sat down right in front of her. Without asking her permission, he began to surround her with his bags as if trying to bring her nearer to him in a circle. While he was dispersing his belongings, he never gave her as much as a glance; he continued to look over his worn belongings without making even one single attempt to remove his bowler hat. Suddenly, he grabbed his whiskey glass and drank half its contents. With a dramatic gesture as if letting the glass become one with the table, he changed his mind and put his lips to the rim to finish his drink. He wiped his forehead from one temple to the other as if trying to clear it from some invisible perspiration. She turned her face toward him and met his gaze through a small crack in the shadows draping his eyes. A shiver went straight through her. Five seconds of inland ice fired down her spine. She found herself staring. The man froze at the encounter. Maybe it was her sense of wonder or her desire to understand that her eyes were never able to hide. Or maybe it was because she was fellow human being who sometimes found herself in the right place at the right time. She did not know, but the man would speak to her. He would speak about everything. But first he would rid himself of the bowler hat. He already sat there in front of her, indelibly etched into a very uncomfortable, irresolute position which told her: run for your life if you value it dearly. But she did not move. Within a few seconds, she experienced total stillness. The sound of the passengers in the hall, the clinking glasses of the bartender and the din from the voices in the bar; everything died. The man pulled her hand toward him in a desperate attempt to seek her confidence. With his other hand, he lifted off the bowler hat and placed it on the table. His hair was stringy and unkempt. His eyes, now fully visible, darted like those of a hunted animal in the direction of the bar. With his hand grasping hers, their eyes met. She wanted to tremble, but she remained frozen.

-I will tell you why you are here and why I am here. It is a story of truth that will never leave you. I can trust in it, because there is no future in man. I am one, and God knows I have betrayed my own kind. I have left my own flesh and blood for good to the vastness of the north. And my heart, ha! It should be wrought out of my chest! He regained his breath. Removing the bowler had dusted off the remains of any civilized appearance in the man. Now he was in full view. His eyes began to shine from the desire to share what he found to be true. There was nothing she could do to prevent what was about to happen. That was why he had come.

He ordered two doubles for them from the bartender and allowed himself to eye her with curiosity.

-I have betrayed. I deserve to perish. So in the end, which is nearing, I still do not have the honor to bring myself to what I desire: to atone for my crimes.

-This is no apology or defense. I could not care less….but to those I have hurt: it is toward them I wish to turn. I want for them what I never could give, but I am not even able to say it. Does it make me into a lesser human being? I do not know.

He became full of fervor again; pulled her arm with great effort toward him.

-You are the one. You know.

His peering eyes fastened on her. She shivered again. The whiskey came. He poured half of it down his throat.

-I come from the northern part of Iceland, he began. My village is first and foremost a fisherman’s place. My father was a fisherman, his father, and his father before him. I lived in a cabin built from rustic timber. I guess we were poor, but we never talked about it. When I was about 17, cod prices skyrocketed in Europe. It was the result of stringent fishing quotas. But my father knew the supply of fish like no other. For him, it was like knowing his own family. Every time I went with him on one of his old trawlers which he cared for like his own children, I would hear him talk to the fish. If they understood him or not, no one will ever be able to prove, but they would stop struggling as if they understood the message and the blessing to surrender to their life’s calling. I was proud of my father. Through his steady voice, he cared for that which we all are part of: Nature, our Mother. But my father did not value words as such. They were merely messengers for what I would soon learn. Fish stop struggling because they are reminded to do so. Since that day, I no longer felt sorry for fish. They were my family. At that age, I started taking more of an active part within the fishery. Even if the quota was fixed, our part of the island fed off this livelihood. After some negotiations, my father managed to raise the quota for all in the village in an honorable manner. He became everyone’s hero. One day in the cabin, after a good meal of cod, he sat ramrod straight in the seat of honor, cleared his throat and declared in a solemn voice: My son, since I feel you have become a man, the time has come for our family tree to go outside of our dialogue with the fish. I would like to offer you the possibility to travel to the mainland to begin your studies. I want you to become the first businessman in our family and make a name of Gudmundsson. You have a head worthy of education. The fish supply has been good the last years. Now I want to give it room to grow and to multiply.

My father had spoken. The family agreed. I did not quite know what to make of it all, but I felt clearly excited by the idea. You see: we had no television, for the most part no newspaper, and I had, until that day, never seen another country other than Iceland. For me, the world during winter was white, with endless flatlands, a powerful striking sea, and life on the trawler. During summertime, the world became one of infinite green plains, billowing waves and a somewhat milder wind. Some time during my childhood, we had gone across the island and into the capital. On the way there, we had stopped at Gullfoss, the cascade which was wild like a volcano when it rushed down from above. It reminded me what our country was made of. We had also traveled to the capital many times by boat when the roads were blocked by snow. I remember the brisk trade and how overwhelmed I became at the sight of all the hustle and bustle. We unloaded all the fish and filled trucks which would go to the airport. I still had not seen it.

After my father had spoken that evening at the table and solemnly declared his offer, he sat quietly by the fire and smiled during his enjoyment of some home-distilled vodka. I smiled along with him but did not know why.

The days before my departure, the sea was completely still. I walked along the beach for one last look. I experienced a sense of relief which I could only explain as a feeling of hope. Not for myself, not about the future, but for my family, for the village and for the sea. Someone was holding his breath.

I found myself in my new home which was just a little ways from the university. The silence was gone. The