Free Britt-Marie Was Here by Fredrik Backman Page A

credit, huh, Britt-Marie. Maybe shame where you come from, but no shame in Borg.”
    Britt-Marie takes the bag without knowing what to do with her eyes.
    Somebody takes a slug of vodka and nods at the yellow jersey on the wall.
    “Best player in Borg. Called ‘Bank,’ you know, because when Bank play for Borg it was like, what’s-it-called? Like money in the bank! Long time ago. Before financial crisis. Then, you know: Bank got ill, huh. Like another sort of crisis. Bank moved away. Gone now, huh.”
    She nods out of the door. A ball thumps against the fence.
    “Bank’s old man trained all the brats, huh. Kept them going. Kept all of Borg going, huh? Everyone’s friend! But God, you know, God got a shit head for numbers, huh. The sod gives both profitable and unprofitable person heart attack. Bank’s dad died a month ago.”
    The wooden walls creak and groan around them, as old houses do, and old people. One of the men with papers and cups of coffee fetches more coffee from the counter. Britt-Marie notes that you get a free top-up here.
    “They found him on the, what’s-it-called? Kitchen floor!”
    “Pardon me?”
    Somebody points at the yellow jersey. Shrugs.
    “Bank’s old man. On the kitchen floor. One morning. Just dead.”
    She snaps her fingers. Britt-Marie jumps. She thinks of Kent’sheart attack. He had always been very profitable. She takes an even firmer grip on her bag of Faxin and baking soda. Stands in silence for so long that Somebody starts to look concerned.
    “Hey, you need something else? I have that, what’s-it-called? Baileys! Chocolate spirit! You know, it’s a copy, but you can put O’boy and vodka in it, and then, it’s okay to drink, if you drink it, you know . . . fast!”
    Britt-Marie shakes her head briskly. She walks towards the door, but something about that kitchen floor may possibly cause her some hesitation. So she cautiously turns around, before she changes her mind, and then turns around again.
    Britt-Marie is not a very spontaneous person, one certainly needs to be clear about that. “Spontaneous” is a synonym for “irrational”—that’s Britt-Marie’s firm view, and if there’s one thing Britt-Marie isn’t, it’s irrational. This is not so very easy for her, in other words. But at last she turns around, then changes her mind and turns around another time, so that by the end she’s facing the door when she lowers her voice and asks, with all the spontaneity that she can muster:
    “Do you possibly stock Snickers chocolate bars?”

    Darkness falls early in Borg in January. Britt-Marie goes back to the recreation center and sits by herself on one of the kitchen stools, with the front door open. The chill doesn’t concern her. Not the waiting either. She is used to it. You do get used to it. She has plenty of time to think about whether what she is going through now is a sort of life crisis. She has read about them. People have life crises all the time.
    The rat comes in through the open door at twenty past six. It settles on the threshold and focuses a very watchful gaze on theSnickers bar, which is on a plate on top of a little towel. Britt-Marie gives the rat a stern look and cups one hand firmly in the other.
    “From now on we have dinner at six o’clock. Like civilized people.”
    After thinking this over for a certain amount of time, she adds:
    “Or rats.”
    The rat looks at the Snickers. Britt-Marie has removed the wrapper and placed the chocolate in the middle of the plate, with a neatly folded napkin next to it. She looks at the rat. Clears her throat.
    “Ha. I’m not especially good at starting these types of conversations. I’m socially incompetent, you see, that’s what my husband says. He’s very socially gifted, everyone says that. An entrepreneur, you see.”
    When the rat doesn’t answer, she adds:
    “Very successful. Very, very successful.”
    She briefly considers telling the rat about her life crisis. She imagines she’d like to