The Circle (Hammer) - By Elfgren, Sara B.,Strandberg, Mats Page 0,62

to the bed where it bounces. She wishes she was the kind of person who could rip down curtains, throw glasses and plates, topple bookshelves, tear down entire houses to vent her anger.

She was trying to hold the group together for Rebecka’s sake, and instead she had said the worst thing she could possibly say. Not even Linnéa or Anna-Karin, both of whom has much more reason to hate Ida, has said anything like that to her: the one thing no one should ever say to another person.

22

MINOO’S BODY IS pumping with adrenalin as she makes her way to Adriana Lopez’s house, which is about ten minutes’ walk from school in an area known as Lilla Lugnet.

Here, the houses are spaced further apart and there are more empty plots. The blackened ruin of a burned-down house is waiting to be demolished. It looks eerie in the moonlight. Rumour has it that there was an underground swinger’s club in the basement. Supposedly married couples used to meet up there at night to share partners and bodily fluids. A jealous woman was said to have set the place on fire. Apparently a few people had died in the flames, and their spirits can be heard some nights, moaning and sighing with pleasure and pain.

Minoo shivers and zips her jacket to her chin. When she passes the charred remains of the house, she realises she’s pricked up her ears but she can’t hear any randy ghosts.

Her heart nearly stops when a black-clad figure steps out of the shadows at the edge of the property. Minoo is about to run when the figure raises its hand in greeting.

It’s Linnéa.

They walk down the street together. Minoo is painfully conscious of each and every window they pass, the curious eyes that might follow them. She’s starting to regret having agreed to break into the house with invisible Vanessa.

The general understanding was that Minoo would come along since she’s the ‘cleverest’ of them. Flattery had won over fear. How desperate for affirmation can you get? she wonders. She becomes aware that Linnéa is smiling. ‘What’s so funny?’ she whispers.

‘I was just thinking that this probably isn’t your kind of weekend activity.’

Minoo knows she’s a bit of a goodie-two-shoes, but she hates other people to point it out. ‘Is it yours?’

‘Relax – we know she won’t be back until tomorrow,’ Linnéa whispers. She looks excited. As if she were on an adventure.

They turn on to another road and glimpse Ida crouching in the bushes as look-out. If she sees anyone coming she’ll warn Anna-Karin, who is standing guard closer to the house. Anna-Karin is invaluable since she can get passers-by to choose a different route. But they hadn’t dared count on Ida, which is why she’s been given a task that’s somewhat redundant.

Minoo is relieved she can’t see Ida’s face in the shadows. She hasn’t been able to look her in the eye since the phone call.

‘Couldn’t she have stayed at home?’ Linnéa mumbles.

‘We have to do this together,’ Minoo says, and feels like a massive hypocrite.

The street they walk along is narrow, the houses fewer and older. Anna-Karin is standing on a little stretch of public land between two high fences. She looks at Minoo and Linnéa nervously as they pass.

‘Look,’ Linnéa murmurs, nodding at Nicolaus’s car, which is hidden in the shadow of a big tree.

He’s waiting there in case they have to make a quick getaway. He doesn’t like the plan, but he knows there’s no other way.

They continue for another ten metres and there, at the end of the street, is the principal’s house.

The property is surrounded by a freshly painted white wooden fence, which almost glows in the dark. The garden is overgrown in a way that seems intentional. A flagstone path starts at the gate, continues under a tall birch tree and leads up to the front door. The white wooden house has two floors and is adorned with elaborately carved cornices. Two of the upstairs windows are set with an abstract pattern of stained glass, like church windows.

The handle on the gate presses down and the gate opens by itself. Minoo’s heart nearly stops before she realises Vanessa is standing beside it, invisible.

‘Can you hear me?’ Vanessa whispers. She’s trained herself to be heard but not seen for tonight. Minoo nods, facing the spot where she thinks Vanessa is standing.

They stop at the front door and Minoo pulls on a thin pair of latex gloves she stole from her mother’s office.