Through the Night by Stig Saeterbakken

Author:Stig Saeterbakken [Saeterbakken, Stig]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Tags: Psychological, General, Family Life, Fiction
ISBN: 9781564788740
Publisher: Dalkey Archive Press
Published: 2013-06-17T23:00:00+00:00

That evening, I sat looking out the window once again. I felt like one of the characters in a fairy tale. At the same time I felt I was already beginning to look at Christmastown with new eyes; that, without thinking about it, I’d begun the hunt for something whatever little thing wasn’t quite right about this place. Whatever showed the place up as too good to be true. And I knew it was only a matter of time till I discovered the detail that gave the game away.

A young man came walking down the street, visibly intoxicated. For a moment, as he swayed, it looked like he was going to fall over. But he managed, with great effort, to keep going; walking heavily, as if in slow motion. I’d seen Ole-Jakob drunk, once. He’d gone to a class party together with a friend who was supposed to come back with him afterward and sleep over at our place, they were fourteen or fifteen years old, and all of a sudden they were back, it wasn’t even eleven yet, and Ole-Jakob’s friend was so drunk that he could hardly stand; I tried talking to him, but only got a few gurgling grunts in reply, and I could see Ole-Jakob was very drunk as well, but lucid all the same, as if the deterioration in his friend’s condition had rendered him just as sober as he needed to be in order to get him to safety. He must have been so frightened, and it must have been such an effort hauling his half-conscious friend, it was the middle of winter, it had been snowing all day, the worst of the drunkenness had probably drained away over the course of the strenuous journey home; I pictured them as having been equally drunk when they set out and then step by step, boon companions in danger, the alcohol had evaporated from Ole-Jakob and collected in his friend, one the more sober and one the more sloshed for every meter they struggled forward through the flurry of snow. When we’d gotten his friend into bed and made sure he was sound asleep, Ole-Jakob was shown to the armchair in the living room, right across from the sofa where Eva and I sat down to face the boy. But as I was about to begin lecturing him, I suddenly didn’t know what to say, nor whether we should restrict ourselves to admonishment or also mix in a little praise, taking into consideration the heroic act he’d performed for his best friend, which had made him choose exposure and censure at home rather than trying to ride out in secret the intoxication that had unexpectedly overpowered them, wherever it was the party was being held (and the following day his friend sat in the same chair, green in the face, and begged us not to say anything to his parents, a plea delivered so tearfully that eventually, albeit with strong reservations, we agreed to comply with it).

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