John Lennon

It is December again. My birthday. It is also the day when John Lennon was shot. A man went up to him and shot him outside his home in New York, wife next to him. Simply shot him. I can't understand it; won't for days.
"The good die young," says Jenny Penny during our phone conversation.
"Why?" I ask.
But she pretends not to hear me, pretends that the line is bad.
She always does that when she doesn't have an answer.
I go to bed early that night, inconsolable. I don't even blow out the candles on my cake.
"One candle's already gone out in the world," I say. I leave my presents for another day. There is simply nothing to celebrate.

Fra side 131 i When God Was a Rabbit av Sarah Winman.