Infected

Note for Swedish readers: This is the English translation. You can also find the original Swedish version called Smittade on this site.

This piece of fan fiction is based on John Ajvide Lindqvist’s novel Låt den rätte komma in. Features that have been fetched from the novel are his work, however, he is in no way responsible for the work below.

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They called themselves The Swedish Thunder. They were a bunch of young people who had decided to try their luck as street musicians in Spain. The choice was dictated mainly by the fact that they though contacts had been able to borrow an apartment in Barcelona a few weeks during their summer vacation, they would live cheaply there. Their repertoire was well-known songs of popular music, but their arrangement were novel, with elements from all corners of the world, and with plenty of percussion. All the members played multiple instruments, and they would shift them for between and during songs, to create tension and contrast to the well-known songs that was the base. Their ambition was to have fun, and to create joy for their audience.
    Thus, they now had played a week at a place they have been recommended by people who were familiar with the city. They had become tight by now, and their performance was approved by many, they always had a crowd in front of them. They were just playing one of their more furious pieces, when a couple of kids forced their way between those who stood foremost in the audience and began a frenzied dance. The dancers bounced on the ground like popcorn in a hot pan, they didn’t stand still for a moment, but always kept eye contact with each other. Sometimes they took each other's hands in a sort of jitterbug, which would then change into a tight embrace a few bars, just to be dissolved again, without them ever stopping. They seemed to exist in their own world, where was only them and the music. And they had fun, their faces competed with the street lights, they laughed out loud at times.
    Cecilia played the violin, she studied as the others at the Malmö Academy of Music. She had followed the other to get a fun experience, her regular repertoire was classical music rather than what she was playing now, but that made little difference. Any music with soul is worth listening to, she would say, and it’s the performance that matters. So she put her heart into every song they played, and she was happy when she saw those kids dancing, they seemed so captivated by the music, just what she wanted to achieve.
But the song ended, the music stopped and the kids disappeared into the crowd, hand in hand. But just before they disappeared, they had looked at her, and they had smiled sympathetically, her joy of music was also theirs.

The kids came back several times every night for the next few days, but as soon as we finished playing, they were gone again. Cecilia started to get curious about them, they had caught her. She wondered why, it wasn’t unusual for kids to get in and dance, but these kids’ dancing hadn’t looked like other children’s, or any else’s. They had been so coordinated, and so absorbed by the dance and of each other. When they now had turned up again, she went out to them, continuously playing. She made contact with them, they didn’t stop dancing, but they would happily look up at her occasionally.
    When the music had died down they stayed, they stood hand in hand tightly together and looked at her, waiting for her to say something. Cecilia didn’t know Spanish, so she did what most Swedes do, she tried with English.
    “Hi! You like dancing, don’t you?”
    “Sure. It's fun!” The reply had been in Swedish.
    Cecilia was surprised, she pointed out the obvious. ”You speak Swedish!” She heard herself how silly it sounded, she giggled about it.
    The kids grinned broadly. “No, this is Spanish, don’t you hear?”
    Cecilia hung on. “Sure. A northern dialect, then.”
    “Absolutely, quite northern!”
    Cecilia now had a better look at the kids. They were in middle school age, their bodies were quite even, as if they cut out of straight planks, just their shoulders were sticking out. And their legs were a little too long, it looked a little as if they walked on stilts. They had half long hair both of them, arranged in a myriad of braids. The blonde was clearly a boy, despite his haircut, but Cecilia was uncertain about the dark one, he - or she - had no apparent gender.
    “But you like to dance, anyway.”
    “Yes, it's fun. We like your music, you’re good!”
    Cecilia was happy about the praise, the kids were so childishly honest.
    “Thank you. It's nice when people appreciate what we do!”
    “We do it, a lot. Will you be here long?”
    “No, just a few days, the we’ll return to school.”
    “School? Do you go to school?”
    “Sure, we attend a music college, we learn to play and sing and write music and stuff.”
    “It seems fun going to such a school.”
    “You might apply there. Well, later, when you’ve become older, of course.”
    The music started again, so Cecilia didn’t catch what they said. She afterwards thought that they said they wouldn’t become old enough, she wondered what that meant.

Cecilia was eating breakfast with the others in the apartment, they were squeezed together around the table which was really too small for all of them. She was thinking of the kids from yesterday, when Linus said something.
    “Those kids you talked to yesterday, there’s something mysterious about them.”
    Cecilia was surprised that Linus also had noticed them. “How so? Do you mean that they were so pale?”
    “Yes, that too, I have never seen that pale people before. There must be something wrong with them.”
    “Yes, that's not natural. And there was one thing they said, they didn’t believe they would become old enough to go to music college.” Cecilia felt sorry for their sake, they were so full of life.
    Linus saw that Cecilia seemed sad, he wanted to comfort her. “You probably misheard them, they just seem so lively, don’t they?” He reached out towards her, she didn’t disagree, she even looked a little happier.
    Then he continued. “Though that wasn’t what I meant, that they are so pale, that is.”
    “It wasn’t?”
    “No, they were so ... what should I say ... they existed just for each other, somehow.”     He looked towards Cecilia, had he made himself clear?
    Cecilia was beaming at him. “You saw it too!”

Cecilia and Linus had left the others and gone out for a walk. They had received some questioning glances from their mates, this had come suddenly. As they were walking Cecilia got an idea; she wanted to try something. She groped for Linus' hand, found it and took it. But it took a while before it had become right.
    “How do you want it?” Linus felt confused, Cecilia had first taken his hand, then she had started to fuss.
    “like this.” Their hands now were intertwined. “I wanted to try this.”
    “Its the way the kids use to hold hands, isn’t it?”
    “Exactly.” Cecilia smiled, she was glad that Linus had noticed it also.
    “Okay.” Linus gladly would walk holding hands this way, he felt.

When the kids showed up that night Cecilia and Linus want up to them, hand in hand. The kids saw it and grinned cheerfully at them.
    Cecilia returned the smile. “You have infected us, it seems.” She lifted her and Linus' intertwined hands a little.
    The kids lost their composure a few seconds, then they got it.
    “It’s nice to infect someone that way.”
    Cecilia and Linus wanted to know the kids, but they and the other musicians were about return to Sweden tomorrow.
    “Can we offer you something? Ice cream, perhaps?”
    The kids looked dejected.
    “No, alas, we’re allergic.”
    “So sorry, we would like to talk to you.”
    “We can drink water.”
    “That's not much to offer.”
    “Yes it is, we'd love to have a glass of water, if you want to offer us some.” Both the kids smiled encouragingly.
    So after a while they were sitting around a table at a restaurant’s outdoor seating, the kids with their glasses of mineral water and Cecilia and Linus with wine. They had introduced themselves to each other and learnt the kid's names, the blond kid was Oskar and the dark one Eli. The kids were looking interestedly at Cecilia and Linus, they were waiting for them to tell what they wanted.
    Linus started. “You walk hand in hand, kids your age usually don’t do that”
    Oskar answered. “They probably have no good reason to.”
    “And you have one?”
    “Exactly. Haven’t you got one?”
    Cecilia and Linus looked at each other, though the answer was innocent, it was so scathing that they burst out laughing.
    “As you ask you get answers, they use to say.”
    The kids smiled broadly. Then Oskar had a question.
    “When you made up you minds, how did you know it was you two?”
    Cecilia’s mouth dropped open in surprise. Made up our minds? Have we? It sounded so final. She glanced toward Linus, he seemed to think the same thing, he looked equally dumbstruck. How did Oskar know, when we didn’t know it ourselves?
    Linus replied. “We realised that we had noticed the same things when we were talking about you.”
    He looked toward Cecilia. “Right?”
    Cecilia nodded. “Yeah, we thought the same things were important.”
    “Exactly.”
    Oskar seemed satisfied with the answer, he had nothing more to ask. They sat in silence for a while, until Cecilia tried to resume the conversation.
    “You’re here on vacation with your parents, aren’t you?”
    “No, not on vacation, exactly, but we say here right now. This is a good place, there’s lots of people here.”
    “But you run around the streets alone at night. What do your parents say about that?”
    “We’re not alone.”
    “So your parents are around here? May we meet them?”
    “No, they're not here, but we are not alone, we have not been so for a long time.”
    “You don’t mean that you’re here in Barcelona on your own?”
    “No, we are here together, we are always together.”
    “But your parents are not here?” Something occurred to Cecilia. “You haven’t run away from home?”
    The kids didn’t respond, they just smiled.
    “So you have. Can we help you some way?”
    The kids shook their heads. “No, we manage by ourselves.”
    Cecilia felt skeptical. “Is that true?”
    Oskar looked into her eyes.”Yes, that's for sure. We have managed by ourselves a long time.” He held her gaze for a moment, he looked serious, then he smiled a bit. She had a vague feeling that 'long' really was that, even for her, but she kept it from her, she didn’t want to continue on that path. She ought to be almost twice as old as him. Then the other musicians began to play again.
    “Thanks for the chat. We have to return to our friends now, we’re going play a few more hours.”
    “Okay, we’ll come along!”

They continued to play as before, and the kids were there all the time. But when they stopped and started to pack their things, the kids came up to them again. They wanted to ask something.
    “You’re returning to Sweden tomorrow, right?”
    “Yes?”
    “How are you going there?”
    “We drive, we have two regular cars and a delivery van. How so?”
    The kids looked at each other, this seemed like good news.
    “We would like to ask if we could go with you.”
    Linus thought for a bit. Yes, there would be room. “I think it’ll be okay, we have some free seats, and you're not that big. But I have to ask the others first, of course.”
    “We’ll be happy in the van.”
    “No, there’s no need, we’ve got seats, I'll just talk to the others. Wait a minute!”
    It proved to be no problem, they did have room, after all.
    “We’ll start tomorrow morning, so you might as well of course come to us now and stay with us tonight, so we are ready to start tomorrow morning.”
    “Okay, we just got to get our stuff.”
    The kids took off running. Cecilia and Linus watched the kids, they want to a tree some distance away. It was dark over there and it was hard to see much, but the kids climbed up the tree, they seemed to flow up along the stem. The kids had hung their backpacks hight up in the tree, they put them on. But then they did something astounding, Cecilia and Linus felt giddy when they saw it.
    “I’ll be... They jumped!”
    “I saw it. It must have been at least four metres!”
    After a few moments the kids where back, they looked happy. “We’re ready to go!”
    Cecilia and Linus stared at them, there was silence for a moment, then Oskar queried:     “What’s wrong?”
    “You jumped...” Linus had begun a sentence, but he seemed not able to finish it.
    “Yes. It’s quicker, right?” Oskar looked as if this would explain everything.
    “But...”
    “You'd jump, too, if you could, wouldn’t you?” Oskar looked at Linus a few moments, then he changed the topic. “Shouldn’t we be going now?”
    Linus looked confused towards Cecilia, but she seemed to have understood, she smiled, almost laughed.
    “Yes.” She picked up her things. “This way!”
    Linus was still standing. “What..?”
    Cecilia interrupted. “We’ll talk about that later. Come on, now!”

They had arrived at the apartment, but Oskar and Eli didn’t want to enter.
    “You have to invite us.”
    Linus looked puzzled. “But we've taken you here, ins’t it obvious that you can go inside?”
    “We mustn’t enter if we don’t get invited. You have to say it. Clearly. Otherwise we’re not allowed to.”
    “Who would prohibit that?”
    “I don’t know, it just is that way.”
    Cecilia intercepted. “Okay, there’s no need arguing about this. You’re welcome in here, both of them. Good enough?”
    “Sure, thanks.”

They had stopped playing earlier than they had used to, they were supposed to travel next morning and they needed to sleep properly, but it still was late. There was already a queue for the bathroom to get ready for the night. The apartment was filled with people. All beds were occupied, and half of the musicians would sleep on sleeping pads or air mattresses on the floor here and there. Additionally, there were instruments and luggage about everywhere.
    Cecilia stood and watched the mess. “Well, where should we put you, now?”
    Eli looked up at her. “It will be okay, we’ll find a corner later.”
    “We have no more mattresses, but we can probably find some blankets so it gets a little softer.”
    “That will be fine, we’ll manage. But there’s another thing.”
    “Yes?”
    “We can’t stand sunshine, we would like to ride in the van, in the back.”
    “Is it that bad? You cannot tolerate sunlight at all? Not even a few seconds?”
    “No, we'll get a rash right away. Couldn’t we get to ride in there?”
    Cecilia wondered if they really could be so very sensitive, but she said nothing more. If they thought so she wouldn’t fuss. They were so incredibly pale, maybe it was true. And they had jumped... But there was another problem.
    “You’re not allowed to, really... Oh, we’ll just ignore that, who would ever know about it?” Cecilia made up her mind. “Okay, you may well ride there. But it’s not very comfortable, it’s a long way to ride.”
    “It's okay. But when are you going to start tomorrow?”
    “We have not decided upon any particular time. Once we are done. Why?”
    “We have to be in the van before sunrise.”
    “Ah, I understand. I usually wake up early, I can let you in tomorrow morning. Otherwise, you can wake me up. Is that okay?”
    “Sure. Great! Thank you!” The kids looked so relieved that Cecilia was touched.

Later in the evening Cecilia and Linus were talking about the kids.
    “You saw how they jumped, didn’t you?”
    “Well, that was weird.”
    “Yeah, but do you see why?”
    “Why? What do you mean? I don’t understand how they could do that!”
    “They had a reason to do it, I think.”
    “What would that be?”
    “They wanted to test us. If we were to accept it.”
    “But they jumped! We saw it!” Then Linus understood what Cecilia meant. He gazed surprised at Cecilia. “You mean that not everybody would have seen it, even if it happened right in front of them?”
    “Exactly. One would see only what one is inclined to believe.”
    “And we were already prepared to believe that they can do extraordinary things...”
    “As dancing in that super tempo without tiring.”
    “And making us to open our eyes for each other.”
    “That, too, particularly that.”

Oskar and Eli was getting worried that Cecilia would not wake up on time, and had just stood up to go to wake her up when she came over to them. She whispered to them to follow her, then they went down to the van. There were already many boxes and bags with instruments.
    “I brought my air mattress and sleeping bag, so it will be a bit more comfortable for you.”
    They shuffled the stuff there around a bit, and put the air mattress and sleeping bag against the front wall.
    “We will put some more stuff here, so we must open the doors again later. Will that a problem?”
    “No, we’ll hide in the sleeping bag, it will protect us. And the door is not facing the sun, so it's okay.”
    “Good. See you later.”

The other musicians had looked surprised when Cecilia told them that Oskar and Eli would ride in the van, but they accepted her explanation that the kids had an unusually severe sun eczema. Everyone had seen how pale they were, they couldn’t have been in the sun for years.
    The trip was just as uneventful and boring as those long car trips tend to be. They were driving in shifts, they stopped for changing the driver and navigator every two hours, and took the opportunity to shop and do other pressing matters then. Then they would eat in the car while driving, fast food and candy. The miles were rolling past and the day went on. But the sun finally set when the had reached northern Germany, and Oskar and Eli was able to step out. They were greeted with happy shouts by the other musicians, and the occasional humorous comment about shady stowaways and the like. Then they shuffled around a little in the cars, so that Oskar and Eli were to ride in the same car as Cecilia, Linus and Emma; they would sit in the back seat with Cecilia.
    Emma proved to be particularly interested in old folk songs, she had a huge repertoire which she gladly let them hear. Thus they soon were sitting in the car, singing folk songs. Emma would sing the lead and the others fell into the refrains. Just before Puttgarden Eli turned silent after a while, he seemed to be contemplating something. When the sing had ended he started singing a variation of the song they just had sung. The others sat silent and listened, especially Emma seemed interested, she had turned on the seat and was looking over the seat back towards Eli. After a while Oskar saw tears running down Eli’s cheeks, there were many verses, but he continued singing.
    When Eli had stopped singing Oskar leaned towards Eli. “Why are you crying?”
    Eli replied in a low voice. “My mother used to sing this song, I had forgotten about it.”
    “Is it a sad memory?”
    Eli silently shook his head.
    Oskar held out his hand and wiped away a tear from Eli’s cheek. “Then it's good.”
    Cecilia had heard Eli, she looked sad. “Did your mother... is she..?”
    “Yes, but it was long ago.”
    “Poor you.” Cecilia put her arm around Eli and hugged him.
    Emma was still facing backwards. “Did you say you learned it from your mother?”
    Eli nodded affirmatively.
    “Where did she learn it?”
    “From Grandmother, perhaps, I don’t know.”
    “It's fantastic!” Emma was excited. “I have to record it! Would you like to sing it again, when we have stopped?”
    Eli still looked bleak, Cecilia turned to Emma. “Calm down a bit, will you?”
    “What? ... Oops! Sorry...” Emma had become quite flushed. “I didn’t mean to...”

They were lucky at the ferry in Puttgarden and could board it almost immediately. The musicians all went to the restaurant, they wanted real food after a day of junk food. Oskar and Eli went on deck and were looking out over the railing, it was nice with fresh air for a while. But the ferry ride was soon over, and just the last leg up by Denmark remained.
    Oskar and Eli were impressed by the bridge over Öresund, they hadn’t seen it before.
    Emma protested. “But it has been here for over ten years, you surely cannot be that much older.”
    Cecilia wanted to help. “You probably went some other way when you left Sweden.”
    Oskar agreed. “Yes, we did.”
    It was several hours past midnight when they rolled in to Malmoe. The car they were riding in was Emma’s, so she dropped them all at Cecilia's apartment, Linus would spend the night there, and Cecilia had asked Oskar and Eli to stay there too. Oskar and Eli helped to carry Cecilia's and Linus' things to the apartment, and they were invited inside without having to ask for it. Cecilia and Linus were tired and wanted to go to bed immediately. Cecilia offered Oskar and Eli to sleep on a mattress she had, and they lay down on it.

When Cecilia and Linus woke up towards midday, Oskar and Eli were not on the mattress, but there was a note. Cecilia read it.
    We are in the cabinet over the large closet. Excuse the mess. Don’t wake us up. Oskar and Eli.
    Cecilia went to the closet in the hall, there were a lot of things on the floor that used to be in the cabinet. She stepped onto a stool, opened the door and peered inside. There was a bundle, Oskar and Eli had wrapped themselves completely in blankets.
    She whispered to Linus. “They're here.” Then she shut the door and stepped down from the stool.
    Linus looked up at the doors. “I wonder how they managed to get up there?”
    “We’ll ask later. Come on, we must go shopping for breakfast, the fridge is empty.”

Cecilia and Linus had had things to do in the afternoon, but they were back in the apartment at night. They had eaten dinner and were watching television when they heard a couple of thuds from the hall. Shortly afterwards Oskar and Eli came to them.
    Cecilia greeted them. “Good morning, or what to say.”
    Eli smiled broadly. “Good evening, rather, but the same to you.”
    “Did you sleep well?”
    “Yes, thanks. We’re happy that we could to stay here today, but we have to leave tonight.”
    “But you have time to properly sit down and talk a while?”
    Yes, they could manage that; Oskar and Eli sat down.
    “What are your plans?”
    “We're going to Stockholm. We’ve got a thing we promised to do there.”
    “It's nice in Stockholm in the summer, with all the water and all that.”
    “Yes, we lived there once. We met there.”
    “Tell me! I'd love to hear about how you met!”
    Linus agreed, he also wanted to hear it, they were both leaning forward on the sofa.
    Oskar began. “Okay. I was going to school, and it wasn’t very fun. I had no friends. They were mean to me in school.”
    Eli took over. “I moved around a lot, I also had no friends. It was so boring.”
    Oskar continued. “But Eli moved into the apartment next to where I lived, and so we met there on the courtyard.”
    Eli tabbed in: “Oskar had a Rubik’s cube that he let me borrow.”
    “A what?”
    “Wait, I’ll get one.” Eli rushed out into the hallway and picked up their backpacks. He sat down again and rooted for a moment in one of them, then he got something that was wrapped in a piece of cloth. He laid it on the table and carefully opened the package, inside was a black cube of plastic, there were traces of paint here and there.
    “One like this, be careful with it, it’s so worn.”
    Eli handed it over to Cecilia and Linus. They recognised it, they were fore sale. But this was really worn out, it felt floppy, the pieces just barely stayed together.
    “It seems very old, how long have you had this?”
    “For ages, Oskar gave it to me. He wanted to give me his one, but I thought that one was his. Then I got this instead.”
    Eli got back the cube, and wrapped it again in cloth, carefully, almost lovingly.
    “It was all new and shiny when I got it.”
    Cecilia wanted to hear more: “So you were alone, each in your own way, but then you met?”
    Oskar continued their story: “Yeah, we met and had fun, and I if we cold go steady because I thought Eli was a girl, and then we became together.”
    “So you have been together a long time, then?”
    “For ages. But sometimes it feels like it was yesterday.”
    “But then you ran away from home?”
    “In a way, Eli helped me, we entered into a covenant.”
    “A covenant?”
    “Yes, so that we could be together forever.”
    “So you got married, kind of?”
    Oskar wrinkled his nose. “Nah, that’s the kind of thing that adults do.”
    Cecilia smiled. “Yes, of course. What did you do, then?”
    “We mixed blood, you cut your hands and hold them together, and then the blood is mixed.”
    Linus muttered: “How romantic...”
    Cecilia drove an elbow into the side of him, he grunted silently. Oskar and Eli saw it, they grinned happily.
    But it was time for Oskar and Eli to leave. Cecilia and Linus hugged them farewell at the door, then they went to a window and looked after the kids when they came out through the entrance and disappeared down the street, walking hand in hand.
    “What do you think, were they a pair of ordinary kids who had run away from home and embarked on an adventure?”
    “I don’t know. They jumped, didn’t they?”
    “Yes, they did, indeed.”
    “They infected us, anyway.” Cecilia hugged Linus' hand. “That’s sufficiently remarkable.”