My Birthday Present
Pale yellow finches were perched on flimsy birch branches that rustled in the warm dry breeze, and the calm water in the port of Oslo was rippling quietly, reflecting the opaque blue sky. If I squinted, I could almost make out the low rolling hills across the water studded with pines and the lazy cumulous clouds forming on the horizon. This had been mom’s favorite view from the house. Sullenly, I slumped back into the smooth brown leather sofa and resumed my staring at the soot markings where previous winter fires had licked the stone archway above the fireplace.
It was late summer, and I hadn’t budged from the couch all day, even though the weather was perfect, which was a rarity in Norway, especially so far north. I slid down the back of the sofa and stretched my leg out, trying to jab at the fake gold World Cup soccer ball that was tempting me by the magazine rack. I hated that magazine rack; it was always crammed with books, newsletters, and magazines of my dad’s, exclusively about American cars, leaving no room for my one meager soccer magazine.
My dad, Per, and his friends devoted all their free time to anything related to cars, especially American ones. They were what one calls “obsessed.” Even as a nineteen year old boy, I couldn’t find cars any less boring, which is why I had always been surprised that Erik and I were still best friends, considering he too lived for cleaning, polishing, showing off, and speeding around in his old fixed up Chrysler. When Per and I lost my mom to cancer, I was sure that being surrounded solely by car-lovers would eventually convert me into one, but instead, I became even less interested, and my dad in turn became less interested in me. Thinking back, this was possibly because my father had always preferred to spend time puttering around in the garage or lingering jealously around others.’ He would drool over their latest installment, instead of giving me a second thought, and this caused me to even resent the thought of cars. It was only my mom who had made him come home and pretend to be a father figure. She was the one who gave me love and support. With her gone, I was constantly trying to win his approval, but no accomplishment in school or impressive goal on the soccer field seemed to capture his attention.
I had finally succeeded in tediously rolling the gold ball over towards the couch when my Australian Shepherd came bounding over, nosing the ball out from under my foot, sending it rolling back to the magazine rack.
The phone began to ring, but I had no intention of answering it just yet, so I stood up, motionless, swaying slightly with my eyes closed. I knew it was my dad and I knew what he was going to say.
“Hey, Stephen, this is Dad. I just wanted to let you know that I might be a little late coming home from work today because I’m going to stop by the Helgusons’ to see the new mahogany inlay in the dash. I won’t be too long at—”
I dashed over to the phone and picked it up; it was now Friday, and he had “made a quick stop” every day for the past two weeks, despite my request for one dinner together since last Monday. He was too predictable; I had even predicted that he would buy me a car for my eighteenth birthday to make up for all the lost love and attention he was supposed to be giving me, and sure enough, there it was, on the morning of my birthday, a restored black Chrysler Barracuda, sitting there dejectedly as though it already knew I despised it, and everything it represented.
“You there Dad?”
“Yeah. Hey, Stephan, change in plans: I’m going over to the Helgusons’ tonight to check out their—”
“I know, you told me. You were just there last night. And I thought you said you would have dinner with me. I miss you. When mom was around you used to hang out with me. Remember when we would play soccer in the street and you would teach me how to do rainbows over the neighbor’s car? I miss that. Ever since mom left you never want to see me.”
“Well, Stephan, this is important to me, you know that. Plus we can have dinner some other time. And oh, and on the note of soccer—I can’t make it to your championship in three weeks because I’m driving the Chevrolet down to Rattvïk for the Antique American car rally. So sorry.” Click.
I could feel the heat rise in my face and the sting of tears were burning in the back of my eyes. I ripped the phone from the cord and threw it down the hallway. I had been looking forward to that championship for months. I had thought it meant that Per would come and see me play for once, see me make goal after goal for the team, and become the supportive and proud parent I had always wanted him to be.
A complete sense of rejection flooded me and I reached for the answering machine where the red light was blinking from Per’s unfinished message and angrily punched at the “erase” button until it went black. I moseyed over to the couch once more, and fell asleep.
Thud. Thud. Thud. I awoke, startled, and cracked my eyes open, watching my dog hit his tail against the fireplace. I buried my head in the sofa and rolled over. Music started blaring and I could make out someone doing a crude imitation of the robot to “Around the World” by Daft Punk in the kitchen. Erik. How the hell had he gotten in? Right, I forgot, I had made the grave mistake of giving him a key to our house, something for which I would never forgive myself.
“Heyyyy! What up Steph-Steph?! You’re finally up! I’ve been waiting forever and I’m starved. Let’s go downtown,” he called out.
“Dude. Erik. Stop calling me ‘Steph Steph,’ I don’t know what the hell your problem is…Er Er,” I grumbled, still half asleep.
“What was that?” Erik mumbled from the other room. He rarely listened and became distracted easily, which was a bad combination.
“Nothing,” I replied, rolling off the couch and tugging my favorite white Adidas soccer jersey straight.
The café was unusually crowded and after five whole minutes of waiting Erik was already on edge. I was tired of him fidgeting, tapping on the nearest surfaces, and jabbing me in the ribs every time some girl would glance in our direction, so I decided to bring up his stupid car. I knew he would fall for that and retain focus for at least another ten minutes.
“Sooo… when are your new rims coming in?” I asked without looking at him.
“Not for another two weeks, but hey, forget that, we should totally play Tag tonight! Apparently, the Olson brothers have a record time of one minute and twenty-six seconds from the turn-off to Rôros to the lake. Dude we HAVE to beat them. Let’s DO IT.”
“Are you out of your mind? I’ve never even played,” I said incredulously.
Tag was the most popular activity that all the older boys played during the summer since it stayed light so long. One person would drive ahead in a winding section of a forested road, and when there were no cars in sight, they would radio back to a first car, which would then start off, and reach a chosen destination in as little time as possible. This was done by cutting all the sharp corners and zooming ahead at dangerous speeds on the straight-away—probably not the smartest thing to do, but hey, it was thrilling and was supposed to give you an adrenaline rush. Best of all, it guaranteed you respect from the others if you broke time records, but in my case, hopefully it would earn respect from my dad, Per.
“DUDE, you have a Barracuda!! We’ll kick the Olsens’ ASSES!! We have to, man, come on…” Erik pleaded.
I sighed and realized that I had nothing better to do than sit at home, and get angry at my dad or eat my way through the bag of stale wheat crackers in the kitchen, so I decided, against my better judgment, to give in and make Erik’s day. I was worried enough that Erik would lose interest in me as a best friend if I didn’t take interest in cars, so I thought maybe this would be a good compromise. Most importantly though, it had the potential to even impress my dad and make him want to devote more attention to me.
“Fine. But only because I have nothing better to do. And you’re the one who’s going to drive ahead and tell me when the coast is clear. There’s no way you’re driving my car.”
“YES! They’re going dowwwwnnn,” Erik practically yelled, accidentally spraying me with spit.
“Eww! Calm down you spaz,” I said with exasperation.
* * *
I rolled up next to Erik’s old American car where the road split off to the small mining town of Rôros; it was still light out at nine o’clock at night, and the mosquitoes were relentless. Ambushes of mosquitoes were the last thing on my mind right now though. I wanted to secure my friendship with Erik and earn the love from my dad so badly, it blinded me; I didn’t even think about the danger that I would be putting myself in.
“Alright, I’m heading up to the lake now…just wait for my call, and you’ll be set to go. Remember, break 1:26 and you’re golden,” Erik said excitedly.
He zoomed off, and I was left all alone, staring down the road lined by nothing but masses of pine trees. Just to my right was the lonely road to Rôros and a “moose crossing” sign in a bright, reflective yellow. My phone buzzed a few minutes later and I revved the engine.
I rounded the first bend at thirty km/hour, and was picking up speed as I shifted into second for a straight 200 meter portion of the road, with my hands sweating profusely out of anticipation. My foot pushed down-seventy-five, eighty, ninety km/hour—another curve approached, but it looked wide and I floored the pedal and felt the engine’s vibrations from the hood reverberate into my seat and up into my spine. The pine trees that seemed to be pushing in from all sides were whipping by faster and faster, and with each looming tree my heart beat sped up until it was thudding loudly in my ears. My eyes were trained to the road, hypnotically watching the hood of the car eat up the flying yellow dashed line, and just as expected, adrenaline kicked in. I rounded the curve and instead found myself on a sharp hair pin turn that snaked down the hillside. I made a sharp intake, knocking the wind out of me and I slammed on the brakes. The back wheels drifted across the yellow line and spun the car’s front towards the middle of the narrow road. Another bolt of adrenaline surged through me and I managed to spin the car straight on the road again, and stepped on the gas once more.
Just as my heart began to slow down and I stopped shaking, I saw a dark shape out of the corner of my eye. Thinking it was a figment of my imagination, I brazenly sped towards it. But it was too late; a moose had stepped out into the road, only meters ahead. In the blink of an eye, I violently swung the steering wheel around and found myself peacefully gliding in the air.
A beautiful lake glistened calmly below, and all that ran through my mind was how nice it would be to go for a swim, to cool off, to relax in daydreams on the shore and leave everything behind. Time was crawling even slower but the water was growing nearer and nearer, and I could have sworn I almost felt the sensation of cool water rushing over me. Instead of water, blackness engulfed me as I met the surface of the placid lake.
I could hear faint murmuring coming from my right, but I didn’t open my eyes. My entire body felt as though there was an iron clamp pressing in from all sides and a wrecking ball rhythmically hit my head as I lay perfectly still. I kept catching glimpses of a white, blissful light, and a woman’s soft voice, and then the darkness of my eyelids. Whatever the white light was, it was soothing and made all the pain disappear instantly. I could sense the blackness of my closed eyes once more, and was aware of my dad’s voice.
“I can’t BELIEVE he totaled that car! He is so ungrateful, and to be so reckless as to go joy riding…God, Stephen is going to be in so much trouble when he comes to.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. He was supposed to be concerned about me, his only son, not the car. A nurse’s voice came from my left.
“Mr. Eriksson, you should give Stephan a break, help him get through this. I’m sure he’s going to be very traumatized by the whole incident, not to mention his slow recovery. He is going to need you to be there for him.”
“Oh, he’ll deal, I’ll make him deal. He has to get himself out of what he got himself into. It’s just that I put so much time and effort into fixing up that damn car for him, that I feel he owes me work, or money to make up for the loss. That car was my baby,” Per scoffed.
A cold chill emulated from the side of the bed where Per was still standing, and the invisible clamps pressing in tightened. I could barely breathe. Per didn’t love me. Fixing up the car for me? More like fixing up the car for me so he could just have another toy to play with without seeming self-indulgent. He didn’t love me, and never would. I had to accept that I would never be the son he wanted me to be. I closed my eyes and the white light grew brighter and brighter until it slowly started to pull me in. The woman’s voice grew clearer and I recognized it to be my mom’s. She now stood before me, wrapping her arms around me, and held tight. Love and relief overcame me; I was tired and exhausted of fighting a battle I would never win. White bliss soared through my entire body and I was finally free.