The November project 2020, part 8

The blonde girl left after a while and the afternoon continued in a slightly slower tempo. I got a chance to teach Amir other things apart from making batter; how to run the register, what sandwiches we had, the cleaning routine we had when closing for the day. He still seemed a bit muddled about it all, but I could see some progression. Baby steps, you know.    During the night at home I didn’t have more energy than to just lay on my couch alternating watching TV-shows and checking my phone. I googled lady gray, mostly just for fun, but it turned out she had a whole Wikipedia article about herself. It was true that there lived a shoemaker’s daughter here named Johanna Sigurdsdotter during the second half of the 19th century, and it was true that a body was found in the lake and had been identified as hers. It was also true that there were different theories on how she had died, as there were no other witnesses than her fiancée, Erik van Lanken Jr, who had fled the town just weeks later. The rest seemed to be legends and tales. There seemed to be different versions – those who believed that she had thrown herself in the lake either told about how she’d been unhappy and saw a moment when Erik was briefly gone, others claimed that it wasn’t suicide, but an accident; that they had been swimming and reached too deep water, where Erik had made it but not her. The more popular version however, seemed to be what Lisen had told, that he was a man with a strong need for control who had fallen for Johanna’s beauty and wit, but unable to accept her will to be independent, and surely neither her – for him – uncouth working class manners that she refused to unlearn. To break off the engagement was out of the question for him, but he did feel compelled to get rid of her, in some way.    So the two had at least lived in this town, but like all other stories about phantoms, ghosts, elves and trolls, there was no concrete proof of their existence besides testimonies of revelations and cries. People claimed to have seen her if there was a fog over the lake, or hearing her cry during windy nights. Well, it had been windy last night, so that checked out. And both me and Lydia had heard a cry that could not have been a wind that sounded weird. But surely it wasn’t a ghost? I had never believed in such things, not even as a child. I wouldn’t believe in lady gray until I saw her with my own eyes.    I switched over to Facebook instead. There was immediately a post from Missing People: RAMNA/RASPBERRY HILLS: Has anyone seen 29-yearold Adam? Adam was last seen at 7 pm Friday September 9th when he left his workplace at Lincoln road. He was wearing […]   I read it with wide eyes. So the woman from this afternoon had contacted the police after all, but it was probably for the best, she couldn’t just go around wondering forever. Either, he was okay and would come home anyway, or he was in danger and would now get help as soon as it was possible. Or… he was dead, but I did not want to assume that. Sure, I found crimes interesting, but only when I could distance myself to them. If this was a crime – a murder, out of everything – in our woods, on a man whose girlfriend I had personally met… it would come too close.