2004
A short short-story about time travel.
Once upon a time, 2004 was my year of the future. Stockholm had applied to host the Olympics and started building a new district to house the athletes. I was in middle school at the time and couldn’t even imagine that far ahead. The Games went to Athens, but the district was built — everything except the Victoria Arena on Hammarbybacken, which is still used for skiing. The real 2004 would turn out to be important to me in other ways. This short story is about that.
Welcome away ꩜
Jörgen Löwenfeldt
✦ 2004 ✧
1.
To be honest, I hadn’t given 2004 much thought, and 2004 hadn’t thought of me either. But in 2025, I suddenly couldn’t think of anything else after spotting our flat in the newspaper. It was up for sale, and I thought: Why not?
2.
I bought the flat. I could afford it now, because I had worked. Since 2004, I had more or less worked continuously. In 2004, I didn’t work at all.
3.
The flat was on Näckrosvägen in Solna, one flight up. Once, the cat had climbed up a tree. We coaxed it for a long time, but without success. We never did find out how it got down. Another time, we sat on the balcony eating pasta salad. Your signature dish. I discovered that I actually liked olives.
4.
I ended up decorating the flat according to a 2004 template. There was a short, grainy film I used for reference. Acquiring the right chunky TV and outdated IKEA furniture took time. So did painting the wall that particular shade of turquoise and brushing Edith Södergran’s line in brown across half of it: You searched for a woman and found a soul. You are disappointed.
5.
I turned off my phone, because it didn’t belong here. I didn’t want to mix things up. Spending so much time in 2004 felt awkward. But after a while, it became natural, as if I’d returned to my original state. I could sit at the breakfast table without worry and eat fried caviar toast with leek. It was only you who were missing. And the cat, though I didn’t miss the cat.
6.
I started to mix up the days of the week, just like I had done in 2004. Or wherever I was now. I soon ran out of food and needed to go shopping, so I stepped out into the stairwell. From the stairwell, I stepped out onto Näckrosvägen. From Näckrosvägen, I walked to Konsum. I read the label on the milk carton. Best before: 05/05/04.
7.
I walked over to the newspaper rack and grabbed a copy of Dagens Nyheter. Every story was about the Stockholm Olympics. There were photos from the arena on Hammarbybacken, the one named after the Crown Princess. The construction had been expensive. Unnecessarily so, according to someone. But I was just pleased we got the Olympics in the end. 2004 was the year of the future, and the Olympics were 2004.
8.
It was a new era. I learnt that Robbie Williams was dead and Hammarby had won the Swedish championship again. I bought a Nokia phone from the shop on the corner. With it, I could call myself, but I only picked up after seven or eight rings. Hello? I said: It’s me, I’m back. I said: Is there anything you want to tell me? I thought for a moment. Yes, there is, but I can’t recall it right now.
9.
The only numbers I knew by heart were from 2004. I called them, one by one. Some didn’t answer, but others did. Their voices sounded different in 2004. They bounced up and down with an intense melody. Not like in 2025, when they kept a more even tone. My mother asked if I was ill. No, I just sound like this in 2025. She asked again if I was ill.
10.
Then I went home. I began to miss the cat, thought about finding a new one but that it wouldn’t be the same. Then I realised it was too tidy. It hadn’t been this tidy in 2004. I needed to live a little and let it remain lived-in. I made paella. It didn’t taste good, but it got messy.
11.
A letter arrived. It was addressed to you. Your department wondered why you weren’t attending your lectures. You risked losing your place at university. I realised I might be causing serious disruption with my experiment, so I went there and explained that you had disappeared. I said I would search for you on their behalf.
12.
I went to the places where we had met. I searched at Råsunda football stadium, where we once sneaked in one night, but you weren’t there. I combed through the tunnels at Slussen, where we’d kissed while the metro rumbled past below us. But you weren’t there either. Nor were you in the flat, and I began to miss you the same way I had once missed 2004.
13.
I wasn’t used to living alone. I had never actually lived by myself, not for any extended period, just half-weeks here and there, but that only happened in 2007 and 2008, not in 2004. I couldn’t bring myself to do anything. That was something you always helped me with: getting started. Getting us going. Once, I wrote a list of things to do when it got dull. But I didn’t do any of those things afterwards.
14.
I found the list behind the piano. It must have fallen down there. I read from the sheet, which was dusty and folded. One of the items was to take a walk to an unknown suburb. But I had already done that. It also said I could go to the cinema. But I’d done that too. I could play a game. I had tried that a few times, but didn’t really enjoy it, so I let it be.
15.
The morning paper started arriving at 4:30 every night. We appeared to have a student subscription. TV4 Film had just launched, it said, but it wasn’t part of our package. France’s last coal mine was to close. 161 people had died in a train accident in North Korea. In May, the EU would gain ten new member states. Anna Lindh was Sweden’s Prime Minister.
16.
You didn’t seem to be in 2004. I couldn’t find you here. You seemed to have moved on. But how could you, when I was still stuck in 2004? I knew you existed in some version of 2004. Stephen Hawking had explained it. Somewhere, there was a universe where you remained in 2004. And where I existed in the same place. But clearly this wasn’t the one, because you never got in touch.
17.
During my walks through Näckrosen, I remembered things that were meant to be happening just now. It was a peculiar feeling. But they didn’t happen. Right now, we were supposed to be walking to the video shop and chatting with the eccentric owner. Right now, we had just watched Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, and I had tears in my eyes and felt deeply moved. But we never went to see that film. I know because I stood outside the cinema, trying to find us.
18.
Spring and summer came. During those warm weeks, we were in Ingarö and Norway, so I stopped searching for you, sat on the balcony drinking homemade sangria with lots of ice and colourful straws. That’s when someone started tugging at the door. Hopefully a burglar, I thought. I opened it, and there I stood. I didn’t recognise myself.
19.
Hello? I’m just here to get my jacket, I said, looking truly youthful. I replied that I would look for it. May I ask who you are? my younger self asked, staring at me in surprise. I’m you, I said, gently and with a courteous tone. I thought so, I said laconically. Are you disappointed to see me? I asked. No, not at all, it just feels a bit like seeing the ending, takes away the suspense. A fair point. My younger self had put the jacket on, and before I left, I asked: But surely there’s a sequel even to me. Do you know anything about it? And I answered: No, not at all. I replied: Aren’t you going to find out?
20.
After I had gone, I crouched down on the hall floor. I felt unreal somehow. Things like this didn’t happen to people in real life, that much I understood. But what was I supposed to do? I was stuck in 2004 when I should have been in 2018. That was where the cells in my body were supposed to be renewed, not here, where I was still almost a child. Here, I had not yet tasted Indian food. Nor Thai.
21.
I placed an ad in the paper. A two-liner that read: Can you help me return to 2025? Reward offered. A retired physicist sent several text messages describing an interesting project involving carrier pigeons, but it only worked in theory and seemed too dangerous altogether. Then he suggested I open and close the front door repeatedly. It was as good an idea as any.
22.
I spent several hours in the stairwell, opening and closing the front door, hoping that one attempt might take me into 2025. That this was how the time travel had occurred. Like a wingbeat. But it probably wasn’t. I read the paper again. The Scream had been damaged by thieves. I felt like the painting.
23.
September came, and October and November. I walked to Bergsgatan 8 to check if we had moved in there, but the flat was empty. Claes hadn’t found a new tenant. Lucky that, considering the smoking neighbours. I first considered breaking in, but to what end? To sit in the wings of 2004 and 2005 and inhale smoke? I realised at once I couldn’t return to Näckrosvägen.
24.
I went to the library down on Stationsgatan. There was a phone booth there. I fed coins into the machine while dialling number after number from the Pink Pages. In the calls, I described myself as a 42-year-old with an unclear CV. I could hold my own in conversation and wasn’t entirely unskilled when it came to writing. I can handle your brochures and your websites, I said. Eventually, I had rung through the entire directory.
25.
On the final number, you answered. Your voice was clear. It cut through all of 2004. You said: It’s time for you to come back. My whole body and all my thoughts trembled: Do you really think so? Do you miss me? You said, again clearly, as if from a higher dimension: I’m not the one who left. I began darting my eyes in all directions, but I couldn’t see anything, everything was sound. I said: What do you mean? And you said: You know.
Thank you for reading.
– Jörgen Löwenfeldt ✦ jorgenlowenfeldt.se ✧ bagatellerna.se ✦
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Pretty wild stuff, Jörgen! I liken it to the category of stories that comprises everything from the Chronicles of Narnia to 1Q84--some mysterious threshold has been crossed; return is itself uncertain, but even if return is possible, life has changed. Passage 19 was my favorite; the surreal can be hilariously absurd and yet somehow completely mundane.
Thanks for sharing as always!
I love how this story is written in numbered notes like this. It's very effective. I've always thought of going back to the old days, but it seems it would be bad place to be stuck in. Excellent story, Jorgen.