Part 13 (2/2)

I was playing Xbox constantly in those days. I went completely overboard. It was like a drug. I couldn't stop, and I'd often sit with little Maxi on my lap and play.

We were living in a hotel in Milan then while we waited for our own apartment to be ready, and when we rang the kitchen to order food, we could tell they were tired of us, and we were tired of them. The hotel was getting on our nerves, so we moved to the Hotel Nhow on the Via Tortona, and that was better, but still chaotic.

Everything was new with Maxi, and we noticed that he was vomiting a lot and wasn't putting on weight the opposite, in fact. He was getting thinner. But neither of us knew how things were supposed to be. Maybe that was normal. Somebody said that infants sometimes lose weight for a while after they're born, and he seemed strong, didn't he? But the milk came back up, and his vomit seemed really thick and looked strange. He was sicking up all the time. Was it supposed to be like that? We didn't have a clue, and I phoned my family and my friends, and they all rea.s.sured me, saying they were sure it was nothing serious, and that's what I thought too or at least that's what I wanted to think, and I tried to come up with explanations for it.

It's all right. He's my lad. What could go wrong? But my worry didn't go away, it just became increasingly obvious that he couldn't keep anything down, and he lost even more weight. He'd weighed six pounds and ten ounces when he was born. Now he was down to six pounds and two ounces, and I felt it in my gut that this was not good, not at all, and I couldn't keep it inside any longer.

”Something's not right, Helena!”

”I think so, too,” she replied, and how can I explain it?

What had previously been a suspicion, a hunch, I was now totally convinced of, and the room started to sway. My whole body was in knots. I'd never felt anything like it, not even close. Before I had a kid I was Mr Untouchable. I could get angry and furious, have every emotion possible. But everything could be solved if I just fought harder. Now there was nothing like that. Now I was powerless. I couldn't even make him healthy by training. I couldn't do anything.

Maxi got weaker and weaker, and he was so small you could really see it, he was just skin and bones. It was as if the life force was leaving him, and we phoned round in a panic, and a doctor, this woman, came up to our hotel room. I wasn't there at the time. I was supposed to be playing a match. But I think we were lucky.

The doctor smelled his vomit. She looked at it and recognised the symptoms and said immediately, ”You've got to get him to hospital right now,” and I remember it very clearly. I was with the team. We were up against Messina at home, and my mobile rang. Helena was hysterical. ”They're going to operate on Maxi,” she said, ”it's urgent.” And I thought: are we going to lose him? Is that really possible? My head was buzzing with every conceivable question and worry, and I told Mancini about it. Like so many others, he was a former player, and he'd begun his coaching career under Sven-Gran Eriksson at Lazio. He understood, he had a heart.

”My boy is sick,” I said, and he could see in my eyes that I was feeling like s.h.i.+t.

I no longer had only winning on my mind. I had Maxi there, nothing else, my little boy, my beloved son, and I had to decide for myself: was I going to play or not? I'd scored six goals so far that season, and I'd been awesome in a lot of matches. But now... what to do? It wouldn't make anything better with Maxi if I sat on the bench, that much was true. But would I be able to perform? I didn't know. My brain was fizzing.

I got reports from Helena every so often. She'd rushed to the hospital and apparently everybody was screaming around her and n.o.body spoke English, and Helena barely knew a word of Italian. She was totally lost. She didn't understand anything, other than it was urgent, and that a doctor was asking her to sign some doc.u.ment. What kind of doc.u.ment? She didn't have a clue. But there was no time to think. She signed. In situations like that people will sign anything, I guess. Then there were more doc.u.ments. She signed them as well and Maxi was taken away from her, and that hurt, I can really understand that.

It was like, what's happening? What's going on? She was in an absolute state, and Maxi was getting weaker and weaker. But Helena gritted her teeth. There was nothing else she could do. She had to deal with it and hope, while Maxi was taken away into another room with doctors and nurses and all that stuff, and only gradually she started to grasp what was wrong. His stomach wasn't working properly, and he had to have surgery.

As for me, I was there at the San Siro Stadium with all the crazy fans, and it wasn't easy to focus on anything. But I'd decided to play. I was in from the start. At least I think so. Everything's a little vague, and I guess I wasn't playing too well. How could I? And I remember Mancini was standing on the sidelines and he gestured to me: I'm taking you out in five, and I nodded. Definitely, I'll go out. I'm no use here.

But a minute later I scored a goal, and I thought, to h.e.l.l with you, Mancini! Try and take me out now! I played on, and we won big. I was playing on pure rage and worry, and afterwards I cleared off. I didn't say a single word in the changing room, and I barely remember the drive. My heart was pounding. But I do remember the hospital corridor and the smell in there, and how I rushed up and asked, where, where, and how I finally found my way to a big ward where Maxi was lying alongside a load of other children in an incubator. He was smaller than ever, like a tiny bird. He had tubes going into his body and his nose. My heart was ripped out of my chest, and I looked at him and then at Helena, and what do you think I did? Was I the tough guy from Rosengrd?

”I love you two,” I said. ”You're everything to me. But I can't handle this. I'm gonna freak out. Phone me, the tiniest little thing that happens,” and then I got out of there.

That wasn't a nice thing to do to Helena. She was on her own with him. But I couldn't deal with it. I started to panic. I hated hospitals more than ever, and I went back to the hotel and probably I played on my Xbox. It usually calms me down in that type of situation, and the whole night I lay with my mobile right next to me, and sometimes I woke up with a start, as if I were expecting something terrible.

But it went well. The operation was a success, and Maxi is doing great these days. He's got a scar on his tummy. Otherwise he's just as healthy as all the other kids, and sometimes I think about that episode. It gives me a little perspective, to be honest.

We actually won the Scudetto that first year at Inter Milan, and later in Sweden I was nominated for the Jerring Prize. There's no panel of judges to select the winner. It's chosen by the Swedish public. People in Sweden vote for the Swedish athlete or sports team they think has performed the best that year, and sure, that type of prize almost always goes to figures in individual sports, like Ingemar Stenmark in alpine skiing, Stefan Holm in athletics or Annika Srenstam in golf, although I should say, a couple of times an entire team has won it as well. The Swedish national football squad got in in 1994. But back then in 2007, I was nominated for the award on my own. It was at the gala award ceremony. Helena and I were there together, I was in a tuxedo and bow tie, and before the prize was announced I was working the room a little and b.u.mped into Martin Dahlin.

Martin Dahlin is a former player, one of the greats. He was in the national side that won third place in the World Cup and got the Jerring Prize in 1994, and he'd been a pro with Roma and Borussia Mnchengladbach and scored tons of goals. But it's the same as ever, it's one generation against another. The older ones want to be the greatest of all time. So do the younger ones. We don't want to have the old stars waved in our faces, and we really don't want to hear things like, you should've been there in our day, and rubbish like that. We want football to be at its best right now, and I remember hearing a sneer in Martin's voice: ”Oh, are you here?”

Why wouldn't I be there?

”And you too?” I said with the same sneer, as if I was amazed he of all people had been let in.

”We did win the prize in ninety-four.”

”As a team, yeah. I'm nominated as an individual,” I replied and smiled. It was nothing, just a bit of c.o.c.ky banter.

But at that moment a sensation went through my whole body, like, I want that award, and I said to Helena when I got back to my table, ”Please, cross your fingers for me!” I've never said anything like that, not even about the league or cup t.i.tles. But it just came out. That award was suddenly important, as if something really depended on it. I can't really explain it. I'd got every kind of award and prize, but I'd never been affected in that way, and maybe, I dunno, I realised it could be a confirmation, a sign that I was really accepted, not just as a footballer but as a person, in spite of all my outbursts and my background. So I was completely on edge while they were up on stage going through the nominees.

There was me and that girl who does the hurdles, Susanna Kallur, and the skier, Anja Prson. I had no idea how things would turn out. Before my Guldbollen awards I usually find out in advance, I don't want to go up there for no reason. But now I knew nothing, and the seconds ticked away. b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l, say it. And the winner is ...

My name was announced, and I almost welled up, and believe me, I don't start crying easily. I never got much practice in that sort of thing when I was growing up, but now I got all emotional, and I stood up. Everybody was yelling and applauding. There was a roar surrounding me, and I pa.s.sed Martin Dahlin again, and this time I couldn't stop myself from saying to him: ”Pardon me, Martin, I'm just going to go up and collect an award.”

Up on the stage I received the award from Prince Carl Philip and took hold of the microphone. I'm not someone who prepares acceptance speeches ahead of time, not at all. I just start talking, and suddenly I started thinking about Maxi and everything we'd been through with him, and I started to wonder... really strange, in fact. But I'd got the award for helping Inter bring home their first Scudetto in 17 years, and I asked myself whether Maxi had been born during that season, so not that same year but during the actual season we'd won the t.i.tle. It was like I suddenly didn't know, and I asked Helena: ”Was that the season Maxi was born?” and I looked at her, and she could barely manage a nod.

She had tears in her eyes, and believe me, I will never forget that.

17.

MAYBE I WAS GROWING UP and becoming an adult or maybe not. I've talked about getting a buzz. I need buzzes. I've needed them ever since I was a kid, and sometimes I go off the rails. It still happens. I've got an old mate who used to own a pizzeria in Malm. He weighs about 19 stone, and I'd driven from Bstad on the west coast of Sweden down to Malm in my Porsche with him, and to be honest, a lot of people don't like to ride along with me. Not because I'm a bad driver, not at all. I'm awesome. But I've got a lot of adrenaline, and that time I got it up to 300 km/hr. It felt slow, so I stepped on the gas: 301, 302, and after a while the road narrowed. But I just kept on, and when the speedometer read 325 my mate burst out: ”Zlatan, slow down for Christ's sake, I've got a family!”

”And what about me, you fat b.a.s.t.a.r.d, what have I got?” I replied.

Then I slowed down, probably reluctantly, and we gave a sigh of relief and smiled at each other. We did have to look after ourselves, after all. But it wasn't easy to be sensible. I got a buzz out of stuff like that, and even though I've never taken drugs maybe I've got something of an addictive personality. I get wrapped up in certain things. These days it's hunting. Back then it was my Xbox, and that November there was a new game out.

It was called Gears of War, and I was completely obsessed. I locked myself in. I turned one of our rooms into a gaming room and sat there for hours on end, it could be three or four in the morning, and I really should have been sleeping and looking after myself and making sure I wasn't a wreck in training sessions. But I kept going. Gears of War was like a drug Gears of War and Call of Duty. I was playing them all the time.

I needed more and more. I couldn't stop, and I'd often play online with other people Brits, Italians, Swedes, anybody, six or seven hours a day, and I had a Gamertag. I couldn't be known as Zlatan online. So of course, n.o.body knew who was concealed behind my online tag.

But I promise you, I impressed people even under a false name. I'd been playing video games my whole life, and I'm an extremely compet.i.tive person. I'm focused. I crushed everybody. But sure, there was another guy who was good as well and he was online constantly, all night long, just like me. His Gamertag was D-something, and I'd hear him talking sometimes. We all had headsets on, and people would talk between and during rounds of play.

I tried to hold my tongue. I wanted to be anonymous. It wasn't always easy. I had adrenaline flowing through my body, and one day people were talking about their cars. D had a Porsche 911 Turbo, he said, and I couldn't stop myself. I'd given away one of those to Mino after that lunch at Okura in Amsterdam. So I started to talk, and people noticed straight away. They were suspicious. You sound like Zlatan, somebody said. Nah, nah, I'm not. Come on, they went, and they started asking different questions. But I wriggled out of it and then we got talking about Ferraris instead, but that was no better, to be honest.

”I've got one,” I said. ”A really special one, in fact.”

”What model?”

”You wouldn't believe me if I told you,” I replied, and of course that made D curious.

”Ah, come on! What is it?”

”It's an Enzo.”

He was silent.

”You're making that up.”

”No, I'm not!”

”An Enzo?”

”An Enzo!”

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