The Circle (Hammer) - By Elfgren, Sara B.,Strandberg, Mats Page 0,66

something at school?’

‘That was where Elias and Rebecka died,’ says Linnéa.

‘I suppose we’ll just have to wait and see which of us it is on Monday,’ Vanessa says.

Perhaps it was an attempt at a joke, but nobody laughs.

24

ON MONDAY MORNING, Vanessa briefly considers not going to school. The events of Saturday scared her, but the prospect of sitting alone at home and waiting for something terrible to happen seems far worse.

She hasn’t heard Nicke mention any break-ins at Lilla Lugnet. If the police had been called out for something that exciting he would definitely have talked about it at the dinner table. Of course, that doesn’t mean they’re in the clear. Vanessa can’t imagine that a person who’s in league with demons would bother calling the police if someone broke into her secret torture chamber.

Her mother is reading a thick book about how to cast your horoscope. It’s her day off and she’s humming as she sits there, taking notes while flipping through the book. Her face is calm, which makes her look younger. She was only seventeen when she had Vanessa, and thirty-three is still pretty young. Sometimes Vanessa thinks her mother has thrown away her life. She wears herself out, and for what? Mother of two and a care assistant at an old people’s home. Is that all she’s going to do with her life? Doesn’t she have any ambition? Vanessa isn’t going to make the same mistake. She’s going to be young for as long as possible. She wants to savour life. Real life. The one that exists away from Engelsfors. If she survives long enough.

‘I’m going now,’ she says.

Her mother smiles. For someone who’s thrown away her life, she looks very content. ‘Hey, I almost forgot,’ she said. ‘How did it go at Mona’s?’

Why does her mother have such a knack for bringing up the very thing Vanessa doesn’t want to talk about? ‘Good,’ she mumbles.

‘I was really impressed,’ her mother says. ‘What did she say to you?’

‘It’s private.’

‘That’s okay, Nessa. I understand if you don’t want to tell me everything. Maybe I don’t want to know.’

She says it with a knowing smile, as if she knows what Vanessa’s going through, that she understands what it’s like to be a teenager. But her mother has no idea what Vanessa is going through. And Vanessa can never tell her.

‘No, you don’t,’ she says quietly, and gives her mother a quick hug.

The first thing Vanessa sees when she arrives at school is Jari. He’s standing with Anna-Karin, who is tossing her hair and laughing exaggeratedly.

‘You’re mad.’ Anna-Karin giggles at something Jari has said, and Vanessa quickens her pace so she doesn’t have to hear any more.

She sits through her morning classes on tenterhooks, flinching at every movement in the classroom. Evelina and Michelle look at her as if she should be strapped into a straitjacket and pumped full of tranquillisers. They’re probably right.

When she comes down to the cafeteria she sees the principal at the salad bar. Adriana Lopez is piling a mountain of grated carrot on to her plate. All of a sudden everything seems silly and unreal.

Maybe the principal is a demon. But an entire morning marks the upper limit of how long Vanessa can feel afraid – especially of a demon who loves carrots.

Monday drags on into Tuesday, then Wednesday, Thursday and finally Friday. Nothing happens. They meet at the fairground once to decide on a strategy. Linnéa wants them to use Anna-Karin’s powers to get the principal to expose herself. Minoo objects: Rebecka had some pretty potent powers, which didn’t save her.

Vanessa wants to scream with frustration. There’s nobody they can ask for help or advice. Now they’re just waiting their turn to die, like animals to the slaughter, without even trying to fight back. One afternoon when she watched the principal getting into her car, she felt like running up, yanking open the door and shouting, ‘Go on, do it! What are you waiting for?’

She had intended to spend the weekend with Wille, to try to forget everything, but he’d said he had to help Jonte with ‘this thing’. Michelle and Evelina are in Köping for a concert, and Vanessa can’t afford to go too.

On Saturday the storm hits. The last of the autumn leaves are torn from the trees, and there’s a howling wind that pummels the town with rain.

Vanessa is a prisoner at home. By the afternoon claustrophobia is creeping in. It feels as though Nicke is everywhere. If she goes