30. Helena's returning home

I have to admit that this is not the first time I hear similar stories but till now it was always from men and that somehow makes it different, coming from a woman especially a woman who carried a young baby made much difference and the first time I heard all the details I got really angry. Thankfully Antti was just as angry as his family and especially the sister that seemed to lead the campaign that targeted Helena.

In the beginning they had a lot of family fights and later Antti isolated his family and I mean Helena and their daughter from his family and especially his neighbouring sister but of course this just made things more difficult. The same time Helena’s family was exactly the opposite, even though Helena is coming from a very small village in northern Greece and married a foreigner is not exactly the trendy thing in that area they really embraced the new son and during the first two years they visited often their daughter in Finland trying to do everything possible to help including a big financial help and all that not been able to communicate straight with their son who didn’t speak Greek and they didn’t speak English or any other foreign language. You see Helena was their only child and her living so far away was a very strong hit for them.

So when Helena said that they had decided to head back home I had no doubt that she meant it and that it was for good. You see all these small details in life can make you never feel home and Antti’s family attitude never let her feel that she was home, her home remained somewhere, anywhere in Greece as long she was far away from the situation she had to deal with for so long in Finland. “Two months, and dad has a job for Antti, he actually thinking to make him partner!” Helena’s father owns a car mechanics place and I suppose an engineer with Antti’s experience could fix anything however simplistic I might sound this minute. But most of all they both would have the peace and quiet they wanted so much.

Antti had fallen in love with Helena’s village in Greece and I suppose the sense of the worm summers near the sea and the mild winters made his decision even easier. I could see it in Helena’s eyes how relieved she was, somehow all the frustration of the last years had come out and the decision had worked with her. So I told her everything about Leena and the blood ring man! I had to talk about it with somebody and that moment Helena seemed to be the perfect person. Her coming change of life had obviously cleared her mind of everything negative and perhaps she could add something to the puzzle I had in front of me!

“He’s bullshitting all the way!” that was her comment when I finished! “You better stop bothering because he’s bullshitting her and she’s obviously going for it, asking for it!” my wanker-magnet theory! “Oh come now, you can sense that there is something wrong with the whole thing, but not the mysteries you suspect, I think things are much simpler and after he will use her for a bit she will find out and everything will return to normal until the next wanker of course!” Helena sounded reasonable and the coffee was good so I tried to forget the whole thing and we returned to her plans for the big return. Helena’s parents were in seven clouds with the news, they told them the night before, and they were already looking for a house for them not very close to their own after Helena’s instructions. The same time she told them that she was expecting another member for the family which made them absolutely thrilled with the opportunity to have their grandkids around them.

Three hours after I had forgotten the whole blood ring case, I kissed Helena goodbye wishing to see her and Antti before they leave for Greece and started heading back home, Marc had long gone from the centre and as usual I sat in the metro reading my book and isolating myself into my little world the book was leading me in. I was reading a book about self awareness of a post punk guru! Ok the things I read are weird and I have this strange thing not be able to read one book but reading three or four the same time. To answer the question if I get confused, the answer is never and the very few times I had only one book it caused me a problem because I found it …boring doesn’t matter how interesting it really was. That period I was reading as usual four books, one was a thriller, the second a history book about WWII, the guru book and an essay about kids with psychological problems! And it has always been like that, me reading a couple of non fiction book, a fiction and then an adventure or thriller. In this case the non fiction ones were winning but that had to do with Elias’ insisting that this guru’s book was a must read one!

And everything went fine till I got to the mall stop in the east side of Helsinki when a group of drunks entered the metro making a lot of noise and obviously smelling disgustingly. I have talked before about this alcohol culture in Finland and I have said it before that it never stops shocking me especially when it somehow invades a place where there are kids around like a public transportation especially this time of the day when a lot of kids return home from school.

All characters and events depicted are fictional, and any resemblance to persons living, dead, or fictional or situations past, present, or fictional is purely and completely coincidental.