‘Can’t I do it from behind then!’ I once burst out in my desperation, without quite knowing what that involved. Line snuggled up to me with her supple body and smothered me in kisses. Not many seconds later I felt the hated spasm from down below as my underpants filled with semen and I discreetly moved away from her; fired still by a driving passion, she didn’t realise that my mood had changed completely from one moment to the next.
On the station platform she stood beside me, hands in her rear pockets and a little rucksack on her back. There were six minutes to go before the train was due to leave. People were still getting on board.
‘I’m just going to nip over to the kiosk,’ she said, eyeing me. ‘Anything you need?’
I shook my head.
‘Oh, yes, a Coke.’
She dashed over to the Narvesen kiosk. Hilde looked at me and smiled. Lars’s eyes were wandering. Eirik was gazing in the direction of the harbour.
‘Now that you’re venturing out into the big wide world, I’ll give you a piece of advice,’ he said, turning to me.
‘Oh yes?’ I said.
‘Think before you act. Make sure you’re never caught with your pants down. And you’ll survive. If, for example, you want some of your pupils to suck you off, for God’s sake do it behind the teacher’s desk. Not in front. OK?’
‘Isn’t that double standards?’ I said.
He laughed.
‘And if, while you’re up north, you’ve got to slap a girlfriend around, do it so the bruises don’t show,’ Hilde said. ‘Never the face, however much you might feel like it.’
‘Do you think I should have two, then? One down here and one up there?’
‘Why not?’ she said.
‘One you hit and one you don’t,’ Eirik said. ‘Can’t get a better balance than that.’
‘Any more advice?’ I said.
‘I saw an interview with an old actor on TV once,’ Lars said. ‘He was asked whether there was anything he’d learned over the course of a long life he’d like to pass on to the viewers. He said yes, there was. The shower curtain. Make sure it was inside the bath, not outside. Otherwise when you turned the water on it would go all over the floor.’
We laughed. Lars, pleased with himself, looked around.
Behind him, Line came back empty-handed.
‘The queue was too long,’ she said. ‘But I suppose they’ll have a bar on board.’
‘They do,’ I said.
‘Shall we go?’
‘OK,’ I said. ‘Thet was thet, as Fleksnes used to say. No more Kristiansand!’
They hugged me in turn. That was something I had started doing in the second class: whenever we met we hugged.
Then I slung my kitbag over my back, grabbed my case and followed Line onto the train. They waved a few times, the train set off and they strolled down to the car park.
It was unbelievable that was only two days ago.
I put down the book and, while rolling another cigarette and taking a swig of lukewarm coffee, read the three sentences I had written.
Down the hill the shop was less busy. I went for an apple from the kitchen and sat down at the typewriter again. In the course of the next hour I wrote three pages. About two boys on an estate, and it was good as far as I could judge. Perhaps three more pages and it would be finished. And that wasn’t bad, finishing a short story on the first whole day up here. At that rate I could have a collection ready by Christmas!
As I was rinsing the dregs from the coffee pot I saw a car coming up the road from the shop. It stopped outside the caretaker’s house and two men, who looked to be in their mid-twenties, got out. Both were well built, one was tall, the other smaller and rounder. I held the pot under the tap until it was full and put it on the hotplate. The two men were walking up the hill. I stepped to the side so that they couldn’t see me through the window.
Their footsteps stopped outside the porch.
Were they coming to see me?
One of them said something to the other. The ring of the doorbell pierced the silence of the flat.
I wiped my hands on my thighs, went into the hall and opened the door.
The smaller of the two stretched out a hand. His face was square, his chin curved and jutting, his mouth small, his eyes were alert. He had a black moustache and stubble on his jaw. A heavy gold chain around his neck.
‘I’m Remi,’ he said.
Embarrassed, I shook his hand.
‘Karl Ove Knausgaard,’ I said.
’Frank,’ the tall guy said, reaching out a hand, which was enormous. His face was as round as the other man’s was square. Round and fleshy. His lips were thick, the skin was delicate, pink almost. Hair blond and thinning. He looked like an oversized child. His eyes were kind, also like a child’s.
‘Can we come in?’ the one called Remi said. ‘We heard you were on your own up here and thought you might like some company. I suppose you don’t know anyone in the village yet.’
‘Oh,’ I said. ‘That was kind of you. Do come in!’
I took a step back. Kind! Do come in! Where the hell did that come from? Was I fifty?
They stopped in the sitting room and looked around. Remi nodded a few times.
‘Harrison lived here last year,’ he said.
I looked at him.
‘The previous temporary teacher,’ he said. ‘We often sat here. He was a great guy.’
‘A good guy,’ Frank said.
‘No wasn’t a word in his vocabulary,’ Remi said.
‘He’s already deeply missed,’ Frank said. ‘Can we sit down?’
‘Yes, of course,’ I said. ‘Would you like a cup of coffee? I’ve got some on the go.’
‘Coffee? Yes, please.’
They took off their jackets, laid them across the arm of the sofa and sat down. Their bodies were like barrels. The upper arms of the one called Frank were as wide as my thighs. Even with my back to them, in front of the worktop, I could feel their presence, it filled the whole flat and made me feel weak and girly.
That was kind of you. Would you like a cup of coffee?
For Christ’s sake, I didn’t have any cups! Only the one I had brought with me.
I opened the cupboards above the worktop. Empty, of course. Then I opened the lower ones. And there, next to the downpipe from the sink, was a glass. I rinsed it, sprinkled some coffee in the jug, banged it on the tabletop a few times, carried it into the sitting room and looked around for something to put it on.
It had to be The Garden of Eden.
‘Well?’ Remi said. ‘What do you reckon, Karl Ove?’
I was uncomfortable at hearing my name used so familiarly by a man I had never seen before and felt my cheeks flush.
‘Don’t really know,’ I said.
‘We’re going to a party tonight,’ Frank said. ‘Over in Gryllefjord. Fancy coming along?’
‘There’s a place free in the car, and we know you won’t have had time to go to the Vinmonopol, so we’ve got some booze for you too. What do you think?’
‘Not sure,’ I said.
‘What? Would you rather mope around here in this empty flat?’
‘Let the man make his own mind up!’ Frank said.
‘Yeah, right.’
‘I’d planned to do some work,’ I said.
‘Work? What on?’ Remi said. But his eyes were already fixed on the typewriter. ‘Do you write?’
I flushed again.