Oskar is twelve years old and lives with his mother. His parents are divorced and his father is somewhat of an intolerable drunk. He has longer blonde hair and isn't fat, but isn't skinny. Oskar is insecure and is always harassed by kids at school. He literally has no friends before he meets Eli. Also, He is very book smart and he enjoys reading comic books. Oskar has small job where he delivers papers for a small amount of money. His strangest quality however, is his morbid passion for following the paths of famous murderers throughout his area of Sweden. He has a book which he hides from his mother, with newspaper clippings of murders and executions. Oskar is harboring a lot of pain and anger inside of himself and one day when he goes out to release his frustration on a tree with his brand new knife he meets Eli. To him she is weird and smells bad, but he has no friends so he doesn't care. Oskar just thinks it would be nice to have someone to talk to. When he starts to fall in love with Eli he doesn't care what she is. He never once shows any concern in the fact that she's a vampire. Eli teaches him that it's alright to stand up for yourself and he learns from her. However, when he goes to finally stand up against Jonny, the boy that bullies him constantly, he sets himself up for what could be the biggest downfall of his life. Trying to become more fit and able to defend himself, Oskar takes classes at the swimming pool with his gym teacher. During his class one day, the teacher is called out and knocked out by Jonny's brother, Jimmy's friends. Because Oskar beat Jonny in side of the head with a branch in defense he is going to be threatened with his life. Jimmy says that Oskar has to stay underwater for a certain amount of minutes. If he comes up before time is up, he will loose one of his eyes, but if stays down then he will just be cut somewhere. He is underwater for awhile when something pulls him up. It's Eli, covered in blood. She had saved his life. From this point on they don't leave each other, but they leave on a train together to some unknown destination.
