Cul-de-sac, Vaxjo! - 06
Teemu with Feta and the other mystery

Karl back on the driver’s seat and on our way back home still fresh from the shock of Lucas’ story. So, we both kept quiet, really quiet. Karl focused on the road in front of him and I, well I was looking at the leafless trees dreaming for the spring to come.

“I can go and see Teemu.” Karl said after a while, adding, “You can come if you want,”
Teemu, our neighbour and the third marking point to the three bases shape cul-de-sac we live. A very friendly man who had lost both legs to diabetes, with a constantly smiling wife name Eda. I had heard that her full name was Edelina, a beautiful old fashion Swedish name. And finally, their tiny little mixed genes, white dog called Feta, from the Greek white cheese. The couple are in their late sixties early seventies and Feta in her eighth year, according to Teemu.

I liked them from the first time I met them, a couple of days after moving and it took only a look at Eda’s smile and her bright red jacket to make me feel welcome. They don’t speak English but this never stopped them of talking to me adding a lot of hand gestures and smiles to their words. In the beginning, I tried to guess what their pantomime meant but soon after I realized that the only thing I managed with my questions they couldn’t understand was to complicate things more and extent their animated efforts even further.

Teemu is using one of those mobility scooters and the standard picture of him is driving around the neighbourhood and the nearby park with Feta proudly looking on his lap, and of course this how Karl and I met them when we started walking from the parking lot to our houses.

Typical Karl, avoiding any small talk went straight for the kill starting the poor man into a long and fast monologue where the only thing I could recognize was Luca’s name. Man and dog remained silent and motionless while Karl told them whatever he was telling them. However, before Karl finish his narration two things happened stimulatingly; Feta felt that this was a good time to start hollowing and Karl’s wife appeared in their balcony, hands folded on her waist and a look that said, ‘what the hell you doing there?’

In an equal astonishing matter, two things followed. Karl ignored his wife, something that never happened before, and stood there waiting for Teemu’s reply and the dog seen Karl’s wife stopped hollowing and quickly hid between Teemu’s metal legs.

Teemu obviously couldn’t see Karl’s wife, he ignored Feta and started talking just like Karl fast accompanying words with his usual hand-pantomime. Karl nodded often to what Teemu was saying and I felt for one more time stupid trying to pick words here and there.

The exchange lasted for more than ten minutes and in the end Karl turned to me and said, “He knows nothing.”
“Seriously?” I couldn’t hide my surprise something that obviously Teemu noticed and while Karl kept quiet, he let a tsunami of words and hand gestures fly over both of us. “He’s not lying and I think you insulted him,” Karl said in the end of it.
“It was just a surprise reaction Karl, I don’t think he’s lying, Please explain that to him,” I said quickly afraid that I damaged my limited acquaintance with Teemu.
Thankfully, Karl is good in explanations and calming things down, so after a few more exchanges I was awarded with a smile.

“Ask him if he saw anything online. In a forum or something.” That stopped Teemu from what he was going to animate next and obviously understanding the word ‘forum’, he said something to Karl.
“There was some talk in one of the forums.” Karl translated while Teemu kept talking. “But it was not about the 12 year-old girl, it was about something totally different.”
“What different?” I asked surprised that something would have been more shocking that the picture of a crying and barefoot twelve-year-old running in the night. “It’s been a robbery near here.”
“A …WHAT?”

OK, fine. I have a bad experience with house robberies and it shows. A long time ago and living in the city of light, a group of professionals decided that I hold too many memories in my house so a weekend I was away they let me only with my laundering machine and next to it a basket full of dirty clothes, mainly underwear. Everything else including childhood photographs, my childhood flute, my favourite guitar and most of my records and books had been loaded into a truck and moved to unknown location. When the neighbours asked them what’s going on, they told them that I was moving.

They literally emptied my life-hood leaving me with some dirty underwear and no proof of my past. It left me with a devastating feeling that took me a while to shake it. The insurance paid for most of my material belongings including clothes but nothing could replace my stolen photographed memories. Almost three decades later, hearing the words house-robbery something inside me rang like an alarm siren.

My look betrayed my inner battle of fears and anger because they both stopped talking and looked at me. Even Feta gave me a strange look. “I’ve been robbed; long time ago,” I tried to explain. “Bad memories.”

Neither made a comment just kept silently looking at me. “Please Karl, go on. What happened?”
“A group of individuals with masks and knives invaded a house near here, early in the evening and while the family was inside. They demanded money and jewels threatening their lives. It seems that father and son decided to do something in answer so they attacked the invaders and they wounded one of them while they were running out of the house surprised by the reaction. However, it seems that the father was also wounded.” Karl reported telegraphically.

My reaction …escaped out of my mouth wrongly loud, “Oh shit! Where the hell have I moved to!”
Karl’s simultaneous comment, “Well, now we have two mysteries to solve.” So Karl.
Karl’s wife was waving with both hands and a lot of anxiety from the balcony.

Read all the chapters in order, HERE!