The Double Silence (Andas Knutas 7)

smiled or laughed.
    The only time I remember her ever being truly happy was when she petted animals, especially the puppy that she received on her sixteenth birthday. She loved that dog with all her heart. More than she loved any people. Definitely more than Pappa, but me and Mamma too. I’m very sure about that. She said that deep inside people were evil. I didn’t like it when she talked that way. Emilia often talked about death. She claimed not to be afraid of dying; she said she viewed death as a friend that could set her free whenever she chose. Her words scared me. I didn’t understand. She noticed and would always try to reassure me. It made me happy when she showed that she cared about me, but that rarely happened. Yet in her heart I’m sure that she was fond of me. At least it makes me feel good to think so. Now. After the fact.
    She was four years older than me. The age difference was probablythe reason why we were never really close. I looked up to her, the way a little sister usually does. Emilia could do everything better than I could. Skating, riding, cycling. She could bake sponge cakes and blow-dry her hair. She did better at school too; she was more diligent. Emilia loved school. She almost always got all the answers right in exams. She used to sit in the kitchen and do her homework while Mamma cooked dinner. She often asked me to test her, and she could answer all the questions. Sometimes it felt as if she just wanted to show off in front of me, to let me know how much she knew. Sometimes I wonder why she felt the need to do that. Maybe she was trying to prove something to herself. Emilia never stayed home from school, no matter how sick she might be. Even when she had a fever and Mamma said she should stay in bed, she would refuse. I really didn’t understand what attracted her to school. She was four years ahead of me, but when we were still going to the same school, I would sometimes see her at break, and she was usually alone. Occasionally I would go to the cafeteria when she was there, and she would be sitting on her own at a table. I pretended not to see her so as not to embarrass her or myself. I was always surrounded by friends; you might even say that I was terribly popular, but nobody ever sought out my sister. I don’t recall that ever happening the entire time she was in school. So I felt sorry for her, but also powerless to do anything. I wanted to help her, invite her to come with me and my friends. But it was hard for me to do anything, since I was so much younger. I didn’t want to upset her. And now, when I think back on it, I sometimes wonder whether her loneliness was of her own making. She deliberately withdrew. She seemed to have no interest in being with other people. And after Mamma gave her that puppy as a birthday present, it seemed as if she didn’t need anyone else. The dog followed her everywhere she went and slept in her bed every night.
    That was probably the only period when I saw my sister really happy.

ON THE FOLLOWING Sunday morning Karin awoke with a jolt. She’d been dreaming that she’d met Hanna, but when she told her daughter who she was, Hanna had run off. Karin tried to follow, but never managed to catch up with her.
    She lay in bed, staring at the ceiling and unable to go back to sleep. She was thinking about all those lost years.
    She wondered what sort of upbringing her daughter’s adoptive parents had given her. At least it seemed likely that they’d had plenty of money, considering their upper-class surname, so Hanna probably hadn’t wanted for anything in that sense. Karin hoped that she’d received as much love as she had material things. She wondered whether Hanna knew that she was adopted and, if so, why she hadn’t made an effort to look for her biological parents. Was it because she was afraid of what she might find? That they might be drug addicts or criminals? That she was the produce of incest or some form of sexual assault? And the latter assumption was actually the truth of the matter.
    Karin was terrified by the idea of telling her what happened, and she’d been considering other options in order to spare her daughter the truth. Would it be possible to lessen the trauma of the event in some way?
    She still broke out in a cold sweat whenever she thought back on that moment. How long did the rape actually last? Ten minutes? Maybe fifteen? Fifteen minutes out of a whole lifetime.
    The riding teacher’s assault had caused