Let the Right One In

by John Ajvide Lindqvist

You were beyond the grasp of the mysteries of the past; there wasn’t even a church. Nine thousand inhabitants and no church. That tells you something about the modernity of the place, its rationality. It tells you something of how free they were from the ghosts of history and of terror. It explains in part how unprepared they were.

Theirs was the intoxication of the hunter, his the terror of the prey. Once they had actually captured him the fun was over and the punishment more of a duty that had to be carried out. If he gave up too early there was a chance they would put more energy into the punishment instead of the hunt. That would be worse.

Real love is to offer your life at the feet of another, and that’s what people today are incapable of.

In Dostoevsky illness and death were almost always dirty, impoverished affairs. Crushed beneath wagon wheels, mud, typhus, blood-stained handkerchiefs. And so on. But damned if that weren’t preferable to this. Slow disintegration in a polished machine.

‘Spontaneous combustion’ Larry had said, and Morgan had asked him to spell it. Except for the fact that the case for spontaneous combustion is about as well-documented and scientifically proven as vampires. That is to say, not at all. But of two equally implausible scenarios you probably choose to believe the one that demands the least amount of action on your part.

For a few seconds Oskar saw through Eli’s eyes. And what he saw was … himself. Only much better, more handsome, stronger than what he thought of himself. Seen with love. For a few seconds.