The men in black jackets shake Adri’s hand and walk toward the cars, but Teemu stays where he is and lights a cigarette. Adri tucks a wad of chewing tobacco the size of a baby’s fist under her lip. She isn’t an idiot either; she knows who the Pack are and what they’re capable of, but she’s a pragmatic person.

One summer a few years ago, Beartown suffered a series of break-ins. A gang showed up at night with vans, and on one occasion an elderly man got beaten up when he tried to stop them. Another time a neighbor called the police while the burglary was in progress. One solitary police car appeared three hours later. Adri remembers how a few months earlier there had been reports of illegal hunting of wolves in the forest not far from here and the police had showed up with helicopters, the National Crime Unit, and a SWAT team. Whatever your views on that, when Adri sees wolves getting better protection than pensioners, she has more faith in the criminal standing beside her than in the criminals in the government and on the council. It has nothing to do with morals. Most people are like her: pragmatic.

When the gang came back, men in black jackets were waiting for them. Everyone else in Beartown closed their doors that night, turned up the volume on their televisions; no one asked any questions afterward. There were no more break-ins. Teemu is a lunatic, Adri won’t argue with anyone about that, but he loves this town the same way she does. And he loves hockey. So now he’s grinning like a fool. “Benji’s playing on the A-team this autumn, isn’t he? You must be so goddamn proud! Have you seen the list of games? Is he stoked?”

Adri nods. She knows that on the ice Benji is everything Teemu wants in a Beartown player: tough, fearless, mean. And he’s from here, a local boy made good, a boy next door. Men like Teemu love that. And yes, Adri’s seen the game schedule, it was posted online that morning. Beartown is playing Hed Hockey in the first game of the autumn.

“He’ll be playing—if there’s a Beartown club for him to play in,” she says with a dry laugh.

Teemu smiles, but the look on his face is increasingly hard to interpret. “We’re relying on Peter Andersson to solve that.”

Adri peers at him. It was the Pack who made sure that Peter won the vote of confidence back in the spring and kept his job as general manager; no one can prove it, but everyone knows. Without their votes, Peter would have been out. Now the club has lost almost all its sponsors to Hed, so the Pack were taking a big risk. Ramona, owner of the Bearskin pub, usually says, “Teemu may not know the difference between right and wrong, but he knows the bloody difference between good and evil.” Perhaps she’s right. The Pack lined up behind a general manager and his daughter against the team’s star player, Kevin. But that could be a dangerous burden for the general manager if he steers the Pack’s club into bankruptcy.

“Are you really relying on Peter? I saw the announcement of his death in the paper,” Adri points out.

Teemu raises an eyebrow. “Perhaps someone was trying to make a joke.”

“Perhaps someone from your part of the stand was trying to send a message?”

Teemu rubs his head with a fake look of concern. “It’s a big stand. I can’t control everything.”

“If Benji gets caught up in any of this, I’ll kill you.”

Teemu suddenly bursts out laughing, and the sound echoes through the trees. “There aren’t many people who talk to me like that, Adri.”

“I’m not many people,” she replies.

Teemu lights another cigarette from the butt of the last one. “It was you who taught your brother to play hockey, wasn’t it?”

“I taught him how to fight.”

The trees echo to the sound of Teemu’s laughter again. “Who wins if you fight now?”

Adri looks down. Her voice becomes thicker. “I do. Because I have an unfair advantage. Benji can’t hurt anyone he loves.”

Teemu nods appreciatively. Then he pats her arm and says, “We only ask one thing of Benji out on the ice. The same thing we ask of everyone.”

“That he should do his best and have fun?” she suggests tartly.

Teemu grins. So does she, eventually. Because she knows what he means. Win. That’s all anyone ever asks of you around here. Teemu hands her an envelope and says, “Ramona heard that you and Sune have started a girls’ team for five-year-olds. This is from the kitty.”

Adri looks up in surprise. “The kitty” is a small box of cash Ramona keeps at the Bearskin for the regulars who lose their jobs and can’t pay their bills. All the tips end up there, and people leave more tips at the Bearskin than you might think. Teemu always pays double for his beer, because once when he was younger and had thrown out another of his mother’s more unpleasant boyfriends, someone came around and gave the family an envelope like this one. Teemu never let anyone hit his mother again, and when he got old enough to build up the Pack, he never forgot the generosity of the Bearskin’s regulars. So now he says, “For sticks and skates. Or whatever the girls need.”

Adri nods gratefully. When Teemu turns to walk back to the car, she calls after him, “Hey! Give Peter Andersson a chance! He might yet find a way to save the club!”

Teemu closes the trunk of the car with the ax still inside. “I am giving Peter a chance. If I wasn’t, he wouldn’t still be in town.”

* * *

Peter stands outside his house but lets go of the door handle, takes the key out of the lock, and turns anxiously toward the street. Richard Theo is walking toward him, dressed in a black suit even though it’s the middle of the summer. They’ve never spoken to each other as far as Peter can remember, but obviously he’s well aware of who Richard Theo is. He knows what sort of politics Theo represents, and he doesn’t like it. It’s aggressive, it sets people against each other, and—above all—Richard Theo has given Peter the impression several times that he really hates hockey.

“Good evening, Peter, I hope I’m not intruding,” Theo says.

There’s something ominous in his friendly manner.

“Can I help you?” Peter asks, rather confused.

“No, but I can help you,” Theo replies.

“With what?”

The politician’s mouth cracks into a smile. “I can save your hockey club, Peter. I can give you one last chance to be a winner.”

12

I Am Prepared to Burn in Here

Anyone who devotes his life to being the best at one single thing will be asked, sooner or later, the same question: “Why?” Because if you want to become the best at something, you have to sacrifice everything else. So the very first time Kira met Peter, that evening in the capital when Peter had just lost the biggest hockey game of his life and stumbled dejectedly into Kira’s parents’ restaurant, that was what she asked him: Why?

He could never answer it properly, and that drove her mad, but many years later, when they were married and had kids and a whole life together, she read a hundred-year-old quote from a mountaineer. He was asked, “Why do you want to climb Mount Everest?” The mountaineer replied in bemusement, as if the question was ridiculous and the answer obvious, “Because it’s there.”

Kira understood then, because why had she wanted to go to university when no one else in her family had been? Why had she chosen law when everyone had told her it would be too hard? Why? To find out if she could do it. Because she wanted to climb that damn mountain. Because it was there.

So she knows what’s happening now, possibly before Peter understands it himself. She stands behind the front door and hears enough of his conversation with Richard Theo. Her husband is going to find a way to save his club and make himself indispensible again. The way he always does. Kira sits in the hallway until she hears the Volvo start up and watches through the window as Peter drives off. The bottle of wine remains unopened. She puts the glasses back into the cupboard, and the skin beneath her wedding ring is cold when she goes to bed. A night will pass, and tomorrow she will wake up and try to pretend that everything is fine, even though she knows that each day that passes now means it will be even longer to next year.

* * *

Peter drives aimlessly for hours, alone. Constantly asking himself the same questions: “How much is a hockey club worth? Who is it for? How much is it allowed to cost?” And somewhere beneath those are other questions: “What can I do apart from hockey? What sort of man would I be without it?”

He’s never loved anyone but Kira, and he knows she’d be delighted if he gave up ice hockey, but deep down: Would she really? She fell in love with a man with dreams and ambitions, so how will she look at him if the years just keep passing and he never amounts to anything?