Author Games: Circle

Task Seven | Saga Ström

 Saga had reached the end.

Across the table from her, Brian sat spread-legged, picking at his ramen bowl with a pair of poorly-held chopsticks. Brian—simple, bleary-eyed, fish-lipped Brian—had no clue why he was present. He thought he knew. He'd only arrived at Strategies the day before, with his portfolio of ideas and his visionary gaze, and so every shining new thing set in his path would seem to make perfect sense. A sudden lunch with a new coworker? Of course. New coworker heading up to the roof to smoke? Fine by him. Saga hadn't fled to the rooftop stairs yet, but she would soon, and Brian would allow it to happen, foolishly. The other employees knew her too well, but Brian was different. Brian was new, and he made mistakes.

"So," said Brian. Saga tensed in her seat; Brian hadn't said a word in the past ten minutes. He was staring up at her from his ramen bowl, glasses glinting in the low light. "You mentioned you're a...what is it, a DJ?"

Saga nodded. "On weekends, yeah," she replied, matching his English. Brian had transferred from somewhere in America—he understood rudimentary Swedish, at least—but he spoke in English, and Saga liked meeting him on his level. When she spoke English to Brian, a sort of cosmopolitan yearning buzzed within her; these days, anything buzzing within her was rare. "I'm usually at Seven-Nine."

"That's neat," said Brian, setting his chopsticks in the ceramic holder beside the bowl. His face didn't change, leading Saga to doubt his sincerity. "I used to go clubbing a lot. I've always admired how you guys do that kind of stuff live. Do you have any originals?"

Saga nearly winced. Somehow, Brian had managed to sniff out the one sore spot of her entire career. "I'm working on it," she said, avoiding his gaze. "I've got demos and stuff on my phone, nothing complete yet."

"Oh, cool." Again, Brian's expression and affect remained flat; again, Saga wondered if there lay any depth of emotion behind that facade. "Can I take a listen?"

Saga fought the surprise off of her face, her right hand curling imperceptibly around her glass. He'd asked so brazenly; none of her coworkers would have sought out unfinished music like that, let alone on her own phone. For the first time, other employees' comments about cultural differences made sense. "I... I guess," she said. "Just a moment."

She'd tucked her phone away in her yellow handbag (a Christmas gift from Tove; "kind of sunny, so you won't frown like that at work"), but she found it easily in the side pocket. As Saga tugged it out, she noted that the screen glowed, as if she'd already turned it on. An instant later, she nearly dropped the phone.

"Missed a call?" said Brian.

There on the screen read the name "Åke Ström."

"No, don't worry about it," said Saga. Her hands were ice. She keyed in her password, movements jerky, and navigated to her music folder, boxing the "missed call" notification out of her vision. In a few seconds, she'd handed the phone to Brian, advising him to turn up the volume if he couldn't hear.

Saga's focus should have been on the music. That would've been only normal, for her. Her flatmates had listened to this song a couple weeks prior, and her eyes had been trained on their pensive faces, the bobbing of their heads when the beat came in, the twitches in their mouths at the introduction of the first theme. But Åke Ström hadn't called then.

Åke Ström. Åke Ström. Pa—

The word sent chills through her whole body. The knots in her chest convulsed; the breaths came crashing out of her lungs, their frozen edges tearing holes in the lining of her chest.

"Yeah, something's missing," said Brian, holding the phone out for Saga to take. "I don't know what—I mean, it's good and all, I liked that weird instrument you used on the melody. You were right, though, I could tell it's unfinished."