The Ballad of a Broken Nose by Arne Svingen

Author:Arne Svingen
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Margaret K. McElderry Books

My ninth chapter

“Sorry, kid, tried to get as many here as I could. People do all kinds of weird things on a Sunday, you know. You wouldn’t believe . . . shit, it wasn’t easy.”

Geir looks at me uncertainly. I should say something soon.

“It’s . . . ,” I start. “It’s . . .”

“I know. Sorry.”

I look from one person to the other. Like I’m worried that something has happened to my eyes. Maybe I’m seeing double after the punch on my nose.

“That’s . . . great,” I say.

“Oh, maybe it is. D’you mean it?”

I count twelve people. Twelve people who’ve come to help tidy up. My cleanup. And just when I’ve finished counting, two more show up. Sixteen including Grandma and me. I think that’s a good turnout, not that I know much about it.

“And . . . it’s your birthday and things, so we thought we’d get you this . . . Or I did, anyway. But it’s from us all.”

He gives me a present wrapped in newspaper.

“Sorry, kid, couldn’t find the wrapping paper,” he explains. “Go on, open it.”

As I unwrap the present, they sing the most out-of-tune happy birthday ever. It’s a bike lock. With a key.

“Thank you. That’s so kind of you,” I say, and can’t bring myself to tell them that I don’t have a bike.

“Thought it might come in handy, living here and all that,” Geir explains. “People don’t leave your stuff alone.”

“It’s really nice.”

“Yeah, and then . . . well, it’s outside.”

“What’s outside?”

“You’re not just getting the lock.”

We go out, and there’s a bike standing there. It doesn’t look brand-new, but almost.

“I filed off the bike frame number myself,” Geir whispers. “But I bought the lock in a shop.”

I don’t know whether to shake his hand or give him a hug, so I don’t do either. Someone has lost their bike. And I’ve gained a bike. Suddenly I realize that I’m standing there hugging the lock.

“You deserve it,” Geir says. “No one else in the building has done anything about tidying the place up. Well, we’d better get started. Plenty to do.”

“Um, yes. This is my grandma, Lillian. She’s going to be the boss,” I say, pointing at Grandma, who is standing in the doorway looking a bit nervous.

It doesn’t take long before she’s gotten over her nerves and is ordering everyone around. Some are sent down into the cellar, others up to the attic, and three people are given the stairs. We should really have a Dumpster, but we put all the trash in the cans instead. I’ll call the city council from my new phone on Monday and ask if they can come and pick it up.

“People can be real pigs,” Geir says, as he holds out a bucketful of whole and broken syringes for me to see.

Just to be clear, it’s not only drug addicts who live here. There’s a woman from Somalia helping us clean up, and two Kurdish boys, and a man who must be about the same age as Grandma who tells us he’s lived here since he was twenty.

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