The Colony

by Annika Norlin

He was a large mutt with heavy breathing, gooey eyes, and one paw torn right off. When you met that dog, you felt both heartsick and scared. You had two feelings at once: you wanted to both hug him and run the other way.

First I stayed late, then I went out. I went to football games, to plays, to parties, to the gym. I drank cocktails at bars, went running, joined book clubs. I dipped my toe in that sense of community, for a few hours I dipped. Then I went home, to my apartment that I had bought myself, the walls that I had painted the color eggshell. I had too many expenses, the mortgage was large, but I loved every square foot of that apartment, which declared to me that I was autonomous. I was prepared to work myself to death to keep it. I was my own ruler. I was so proud of my life. If someone had stood outside looking in, they might even have thought that I knew what I was doing.

And the anxiety is there, and the irritation, and together they have a little meeting, and you have nowhere to go, nowhere at all. You are trapped inside yourself, inside your own disgusting body.

My neighbor’s name is Ánne Helena and she is Sámi. Ánne Helena is so tired of educating Swedes about the traumas of her people that she could puke, but I guess she has given up on us figuring it out for ourselves. From her, I know about how the state took away the Sámi people’s land and culture, and these days the Sámi are just supposed to exist as a colorful, exotic flavor. And how the land available to them keeps shrinking and shrinking. How their way of life is hardly possible anymore.

And you have no control over your nervous system or your tear ducts anymore, so all you do is cry, cry, cry. You stand in the middle of the bus and cry. At first, you lower your head, hoping no one sees—it’s so embarrassing— but then you realized that everyone is just staring at their phone, so you didn’t need to worry about it.

I hated that they were thinking of me, because it meant they thought that they were better than me. I was inadequate, while they were healthy and could sit between meetings and think of their friend unable to cope with everyday life.

I wondered if they were high. Maybe that’s what brought them together? My experience in the media industry told me that if illogical combinations of people were hanging out, it was always because they were doing drugs together.

I had brought along my iPhone, but I noticed that I had become afraid of it. I was afraid of the emails, afraid there would be some question that needed answering. Afraid of the text messages. Afraid of social media, all those READ THIS! When will someone do something? It’s time to act! And if you didn’t feel exactly the same way and didn’t act immediately without thinking, you were evil.

But now: the refugees, the wars, the uprisings, the pandemic, the energy prices, the interest rates, the earthquakes, the shootings, the diseases. Every day something new. All the world’s wounds laid bare in real time, the imbalance of power. And here you are, sitting like some kind of English king with a scepter in hand, snacking on grapes to the sound of the Earth’s demise. I do nothing at all about this. Perhaps I should post something! I think to myself. It’s the first thought that pops into my head! Share a link to some article. Write: Enough is enough! Get a hundred likes from others who feel exactly the same and also can’t be bothered to do anything about it, argue in the comments section with an old colleague, then eat lunch and go home knowing that you have accomplished something important!

I went down to the lake and threw my iPhone out over the glistening water. I felt like a free woman as I watched it sail away. Then I went in and searched for it, but it was water damaged.

They seem to be seven people. A man with a bit of a sad face, around fifty to fifty-five. The tall woman who looks so strong. She is probably also in her fifties. A woman in her forties, kind of Indian-looking, glasses. Another woman in her forties, short, long hair, ample bosom, good posture. The extremely beautiful man, maybe around forty too. Imagine suddenly seeing Jude Law wandering around the inland, if Jude Law was fifteen years younger and Greek. A slightly younger man, maybe my age, around thirty. A proper inland appearance, in a Helly Hansen jacket and trucker hat. And Poor Bastard, of course. How old could he be? Thirteen? Fourteen?

Låke you do know there is another world out there? Yes & in that world people live only for money & they harm each other. Yes, that’s true . . . too. There is also love & friendship & music out there. & books? Yes & books.

But the weather—much like humans—simply is, and it’s best not to go against it. Those who greet the weather with acceptance are spared a lot of grief.

Maybe, I thought, my mum had been reborn as a bird. Now she sat there, calling out to me. “Tuck in your belly!” she called. “Is that really what you’re wearing?” “Why is it that you can never walk three feet without getting filthy.” I glared up at the bird and gave it the finger; yet at the same time, I felt strangely moved and realized that I missed the feeling of someone watching over me and having opinions about me. Even if those opinions weren’t accurate, there was a sense of direction in that care, which was exactly what I missed.

I’ve seen Ocean’s Eleven, of course. I sneaked towards the trailer from the side, so I wouldn’t be seen from the window.

When József was a child, grown-ups would call him melancholic. Grown-ups love to describe children, to put labels on them, like spices. Troubled children, sweet children. Melancholic children. Cumin.

They hadn’t managed to shield him from the weight. Despite trying every day, they hadn’t managed. Everything they had been through, they saw in his eyes. What had happened to them stared back at them every day. Their love had resulted in a wonderful child. But he had that gaze. As if the trauma had materialized and become a face.

József’s parents had grown up during World War II. As Hungarian Jews, they had been taken to a forced labor camp in Austria. These were two facts that József knew. It was not something they talked about. This knowledge floated in the air, like an untethered balloon. The balloon hovered up near the ceiling and, every night at bedtime, you would spot it and know that it had been there all day.

József was a child who knew that the world was cruel, but not exactly what that cruelty looked like, or why. Only that there was a pain so great it couldn’t be comprehended. So great it would swallow you whole if you got too close. He slept with one eye open.

There are some people who make decisions based on desire, and others who make decisions based on fear.

“Here I am!” said Benny, who had a jocular nature, and was one of those people who became a coach of all kinds of things because it gave them the opportunity to speak all day in front of people who had to listen.

Sara only knew one thing about her future, and it was that she absolutely did not want to work with people. It felt like they were devouring her. At night, she would dream of big, gaping mouths approaching with gigantic maws. And they talked, talked, talked. Help me, the mouths cried. See me, the mouths cried. Kiss me, the mouths cried.

József, with his watchful gaze, immediately recognised the type: narrow, insolent eyes; posture like an emperor. He knew he was standing in front of a bully disguised as a fun guy.

The officer shook her head. What was happening to her? She loved hotdogs.

“Dying is a limp-dick thing to do,” his mother said.

Gradually, she went from being strong, ill-tempered, and funny to plain mean. It may have been partly due to her new boring life—imagine what it’s like for someone who has always been told that their worth is tied to the work they do, and then they aren’t able to work anymore—but perhaps even more due to the fall.

Sagne had always longed for something specific. She had been thinking about this thing with ants. Ants were born with different tasks. There was the queen, the workers, the drones. They didn’t have to be everything all at once. Sagne longed for this, to be included without being questioned. If you were a certain way, people shouldn’t interfere and think you ought to be a little of everything else instead.

Sagne wasn’t used to big emotions. You could say that she avoided big emotions. Whenever they arose, they turned to chaos in her mind. She didn’t know what was what. It only caused panic, her head spinning, everything a blur; it was impossible to make quick decisions.

Their strategy was obvious: take all the boring and annoying people, and seat them at one table so that everyone else would be spared. Throw Sara into the mix; she would deal with them.

For a moment, he thought she couldn’t have died, for she didn’t usually, but her breathing had ended.

He went into the bathroom, grabbed a paper towel, and screamed into it. Screamed over how much he had loved her, screamed over who she was and who she had been and what had befallen her, and screamed over now, finally, being free.

His mind hadn’t grasped what had happened yet, but his body had.

When that goes away. The person who thinks you are the most important thing that exists. What that does to a person.

Sex can be as many things as a conversation. A game. A bandage. A shrug. A party. Yoga? Violence. Something purely physical, almost like exercise. Bragging. People seeing each other. One seeing the other. If you are lucky: a bond.

“Næss says that everything in nature has an inherent value,” she quoted. “Everything in nature has the right to self-realisation.” József nodded. “That sounds reasonable,” he said. “Every insect, every flower, every animal, has an agenda—they want something. To grow, or reproduce, or whatever. But in the long run,” she said, “the animals and species can’t do that if humans continue the way we do, living at the expense of animals and plants. So us humans, we’re the ones who need to change.”

He had nothing at all! The framework around him was gone, shattered the moment his mother closed her eyes. Staying here for a while to catch his breath, find solid ground beneath his feet. It wasn’t worse than anything else. In the midst of a hurricane, you have no view of the future or the past. And a person who has no goal can’t chart a direction either.

“I don’t know who I am anymore, Dr. Snuggles,” he would say, fumbling for the words. Then: “You’d think that when your parents die, your focus would be on them as individuals, on how much you miss them.” He hesitated. “But I’ve noticed that I mostly think of myself. I’ve lost my map. I don’t understand anymore. And it’s like I’ve been trying for so long to make them happy that I don’t know what makes me happy.”

Sometimes, there is a bafflingly small difference between romance and assault. Was she comfortable in his presence? No. Did she feel that he was different from everyone else she had met? Yes. Did she find him attractive? Absolutely not. Did she learn something? Everything.

Let’s see, what did I bring? I have three books. I’ve finished this one, if you want to borrow it? It was terribly good. There’s no one on the cover. No. What’s it about? It’s like short stories, a woman talking about the slave trade in Ghana, its consequences and stuff. It’s dark, but also very easy to read. The woman who’s written it is called Yaa Gyasi.

“Sagne works at the university,” Ulrika interjected. “Oh really,” said Sara. “What’s your field?” Sagne looked at Sara, the way scientists always do when trying to assess if the person they are talking to will understand anything they are about to say.

The body needed to do certain things, and it was mostly humanity’s own fault that in our minds we had turned it into something disgusting. That’s what she thought.

Sagne told them that ants live in communities with each other, where everyone helps out. That everyone has a clear role: workers, soldiers, drones, and queens. The workers and soldiers are females, said Sagne. And: the queen mates with the drones. Everyone has a task for the community, said Sagne. Everyone is needed. No one has to know everything.

Before things have happened, it always feels impossible that they would. If you had seen from the beginning which way things would go, you would have pumped the brakes from the start. But one day turns into the next and, without much thought, it becomes a life.

Dr. Snuggles had grown old. They chopped her up and cooked her with sauce.

“Do you know what I think every morning,” she said. “I wake up and I look over at your side, and there you are, snoring away. And you make these sounds in your sleep, not like you aren’t feeling well—but sleep sounds, like you’re telling me about your sleep. And you search for my body in the night, you always keep one body part on me.” She smiled again, turned down her gaze, looking almost shy. “And when I hear that sound, and feel that hand or leg,” she said. “Then it’s like every question inside me dies. “The state of the world? “Your leg. “My anxiety? “Your leg. “The wars and hatred? “Your leg.

When she was alone, she sometimes felt blocked up, like her head was full of fruit and her speech was a juicer that allowed the fruit to be used. There was no room for anything new until the old had been squeezed out, in the form of finished thoughts or opinions.

“Hmm,” said Sara. Quite often, it annoyed her that Sagne knew so much, about everything, and that she didn’t hesitate to show it. She also had a demeanor that always tended very slightly towards the negative, as if the baseline was -0.1.

And what happened now was something Sagne would never, ever forget. She watched Sara transform. It was like she slipped into armor. Her back straightened. Her eyes narrowed, shooting daggers. At the same time, so composed, so incredibly composed. Her mouth tightened; her cheekbones became visible.

“I don’t believe in revenge,” he said. “I believe that if one person hurts another, you have to assume that it’s the first person who deserves pity—that they just don’t get it. Revenge only means digging a deeper hole, not letting go. You won’t feel better because someone else feels worse.”

Then Sagne chose to take the memory of last night and push it away, like she always did. Everything except Sara’s face and the loyalty in the house. Those, she kept.