Deep End

LUKAS’S NAME SOUNDS DIFFERENT IN HIS BROTHER’S MOUTH.

Jan’s English is more accented, the grammar a bit stiffer, as though he began learning it too late to hit the perfect window of opportunity. I listen to their bickering—You’re a reckless driver. I’m not, Jan. Scarlett, is he not a reckless driver? I’m just glad he didn’t get a vanity plate.— and don’t bother hiding my smile. Every once in a while, when they’re talking about practical matters that don’t involve me, they break into Swedish.

It’s lovely to hear. Pitchy, melodic. An interesting combination of pillows and sharp edges. Sounds I could never reproduce, not even if I took daily classes on tongue positioning for the rest of my life. Peaks and dips. Songlike and calm.

The difference between Jan’s Lukas and mine is mostly in the u and s, and it makes me almost morbidly eager to find out how Lukas pronounces his own name. Is it weird, the way we all twist it into something else? What’s it like, living in a second language? Maybe I’ll ask, if it ever comes up. If we ever talk again.

And perhaps we will, because as awkward as being here is, he seems genuinely happy to have me along for the ride. It’s nice to be off campus in the middle of the week, in a place that’s never been touched by chlorine. On Wednesdays, I usually catch up on schoolwork, but the rolling hills and chaparral of the City of Palo Alto parks department couldn’t care less about my outstanding MCAT scores and inward dives.

I needed this break. A moment to recalibrate my perspective. I used to come here all the time as a freshman. When did I stop?

“Turn back,” I order from the bottom of a hill. Jan and Lukas do—two almost identical handsome, sweaty, freckled faces—and I snap a pic with my phone. “I’ll send it, and you can forward it to the rest of your family.”

Lukas snorts. “You think Dad’s gonna cry, Jan?”

Jan laughs. “He’s gonna send us a four-paragraph autocorrected wall of text about how proud he is of us. Because we went for a walk.”

“He sounds nice,” I say, hurrying behind them. When a misstep almost has me tripping, Lukas’s fingers are suddenly under my arm. They stay long after I’ve regained my footing.

“Dad’s great,” Jan agrees. His eyes stay on Lukas’s hand, and I hastily free myself. “But . . .”

“But?” I ask.

“We think he read too many parenting books,” Lukas explains. He trails right after me, as if keeping tabs. Making sure I don’t slip again. “Especially too many stressing the importance of praising your children for their smallest accomplishments.”

“And doting on all of them equally. Oskar’s a woodcutter, and Leif’s a human rights lawyer. Dad performs the same enthusiasm for a finished Adirondack chair and a granted asylum.”

“We should really have a talk with him.”

Jan scoffs. “Not until you win another Olympic medal and he equates it to me publishing a blog post.” During the drive he explained that he’s a Victorianist. He’s visiting Lukas after attending a conference down in LA, and tomorrow will return to Paris, where he lives with his partner and four cats.

“How many of you are based in Sweden?” I ask.

“Only Oskar.”

“Source of big pain for Dad,” Lukas adds.

“Biiiiig pain. But he’ll never admit it.”

Lukas nods. “If you love something, set it free.”

“He sounds kinda . . . perfect?”

“He is,” Jan says. We stop at the top of the hill and turn around. The Dish is there, ready to be plucked. “Decent and caring. None of us will ever measure up.”

“Might as well not even try,” Lukas adds, wiping his brow with the side of his T-shirt. When he drops it, it’s wet and nearly see-through.

“Sorry the weather is so unseasonably warm while you visit,” I tell Jan. “The heat is rough.”

“Oh, not at all. We’re Swedish. There’s no such thing as bad weather—”

“—just bad clothes,” he and Lukas finish together.

They exchange a grin above my head.

After, Jan insists on buying us food.

“We can have dinner for free at the cafeteria later,” I point out, but he waves me off and leads us to a quaint coffee shop.

“Let him pay,” Lukas tells me. “He still owes me six thousand kronor from when he broke my Xbox in a fit of rage.”

“That was, like, eight years ago.”

“Good point.” Lukas pulls back a chair, and waits patiently until I lower myself into it. “I’ll calculate the accrued interests while you buy us coffee.”

Lukas and I are briefly left alone. I take my phone out of my pocket and pretend to check my messages as I brainstorm a topic of conversation with a low land mine density. Jan returns with three coffees and an assortment of pastries.

“Are you divers the kind of athletes who need tens of thousands of calories per day?” he asks.

I laugh. “I’m not sure anyone is?”

“This one eats as much as all of Luxembourg.” He points at Lukas with his thumb. “We have this tradition, in Sweden. Every afternoon we sit down for coffee and snacks. We relax.”

“Oh, yes. Fika, right?” I flush the instant the words are out. Because I’m probably butchering the pronunciation, and because . . .

Jan turns to his brother. “Did you teach her?”

“I don’t believe so.” Lukas sits back in his chair and casually drapes a long arm around the back of mine, somehow managing not to touch me. He stares over the rim of his cup, like he caught me with a hand in the stalking jar. “She must have learned about it all by herself.”

I lower my gaze to my lap, trying to look less mortified than I feel. But—why? Why should I be mortified? Maybe I did open up Google and look up Swedish customs. Maybe I turned on the close captions and watched a couple of YouTube videos while brushing my teeth. Maybe I discovered that Swedish people have real ice hotels, and their cheesecake is completely different from ours.

I lift my chin and meet Lukas’s eyes, a little combative. Maybe I thought about you after what we did. Maybe I find you interesting. Maybe I like you without being liked back. I refuse to be ashamed.

“Fika is usually with sweet things,” Jan says, oblivious to the two-sided argument inside my head. “But Lukas”—so Scandinavian—“refuses to eat sweets, so . . .” He gestures toward a pretzel.

“I don’t refuse to eat them,” Lukas counters, tearing off a piece. “I don’t like them.”

Jan’s pshhh is very older-brotherly. “He does like them. He just lies to himself about it.”

Lukas rolls his eyes. “Not this again.”

“Please, Jan.” I prop my chin over my palm. “Tell me everything about his self-deception.”

“Well, I’m sure you already know how good he is at denying himself. The more he wants something, the less he’ll let himself have it.” My curiosity must come through, because he continues, “Like when he was twelve, and he slept on the wooden floor for three months.”

I glance at Lukas, who’s drinking his coffee with a put-upon air. “Why?”

“No reason whatsoever.” Jan throws a hand up. “He’d gotten a new bed, and it was really comfortable, and he liked sleeping in it, and he needed to prove to himself that he could do without it. When he was eleven? Only cold showers. For a whole year.”

Lukas sighs. “Jan, could you tone it down with the whole ‘grandma pulling out a photo album’ bit? I doubt Scarlett cares.”

“Oh, Scarlett cares,” I counter.

“See? She’s a rapt audience. For two whole years he didn’t season his food. Not even salt. Before that, he would wake up an hour earlier than he needed to.”

“Jan,” Lukas warns.

“It’s his thing. His way of feeling in control. But it’s foolish—we are humans. We are not in control. Self-determination is a myth.”

An icy, heavy weight sinks to the bottom of my stomach. I turn to Lukas. “Do you still do that?” I ask, as if from a distance.

“Well,” Jan interjects, “by now he’s successfully proven that he is capable of divesting himself of aaall worldly attachments—”

Lukas snaps something in Swedish. It doesn’t sound melodic or soft, and it has Jan falling silent, then replying in the same language. A short back-and-forth ensues, but Jan’s eyes remain calm, and he looks at Lukas with something that can only be affection.

When Jan turns to me again, his voice is kind, and the topic is over. “Eat up,” he tells me.

I don’t put a single bite in my mouth.