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The Maids n 121
one has been unlucky in love oneself, one needn’t
be unsympathetic to others . . . But there are so many people
here . . . I don’t dare speak to you about this, I fear someone
could be spying upon me . . . Listen a moment, my pretty
Marie . . . See, here is the place, on this shady path where the
trees entwine to hide us from the others, here, where we see
no one, hear no human voice, only a faint echo from the
music . . . here I dare speak my secret . . . Isn’t it true, if Jens hadn’t been a bad person you would have walked with him
here, arm in arm, listened to the pleasant music, maybe
enjoyed an even higher . . . Why so upset—forget Jens! . . .
Do you really mean to be unfair to me? . . . It was only in
order to meet you that I came out here . . . Only to see you
have I been coming to the privy councillor’s . . . You must
have noticed . . . every time it was possible I always went to
the kitchen door . . . You must be mine! . . . The banns will be
read from the pulpit . . . Tomorrow evening I shall explain
all . . . Up the kitchen stairs, the door on the left right oppo-
site the kitchen door . . . Goodbye my pretty Marie. No one
must know you have seen me out here, or spoken with me,
you know my secret now — She really is lovely, something
could be made of her. When once I gain a foothold in her
room I shall read the banns myself from the pulpit. I have
always endeavoured to cultivate the noble Greek concept of
autarchia, self-sufficiency, and in particular to dispense
with a priest.
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OUP CORRECTED PROOF – FINAL, 26/8/2014, SPi
The Bra
Jakob Ejersbo
I answered an advert in the free paper, and I had to go for
an interview. I mean, hello?!—I’ve been cleaning for peo-
ple since I was fourteen. I went along—a big two-room
first floor flat in Frederiksberg: KIRSTINE BRODERSEN.
She opened the door: so dead CLEAN, so tastefully
dressed—slacks, T-shirt, blazer, high-heeled sandals with
narrow leather straps over the toes—no strap at the back.
Short blonde hair—beautifully kept—discreet make-up,
barest hint of scent. I stood there feeling like a bag lady.
She was so slim and firm; maybe just two years older
than me, but with the kind of body I can only dream of
now. I mean, once you’ve had a kid, and have to study as
well as work, you might as well kiss your body goodbye for
a year or two. There’s just no time to firm it back up.
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Then I remembered something. If she was ever on TV
she’s the very type my man would call a ‘frigid career
whore’. That was some comfort—she didn’t represent any
competition in the battle for my guy, even if my clothes are
worn and baggy.
Mine and Henrik’s whole flat is the size of Kirstine’s
living room, and her living room is clinically clean—not
one speck of dust. On top of that she has a big bedroom, a
big kitchen and a big bathroom. Everything brand new, no
sign of wear. She showed me round the first time I went
there, all was perfect.
Piet Hein’s ellipsis table and six Arne Jacobsen ant
chairs. Over the table: some kind of map behind glass in
a gold frame. Actually there are just four pictures in the
entire flat, all big and behind glass in the identical gold
frame. No knick-knacks, no family photos or holiday
souvenirs, no personal stuff at all—like she doesn’t have
a past. For me it was a bit of a culture shock. I mean, our
flat is overflowing with stuff—gadgets, knick-knacks, sou-
venirs. Sofie’s toys everywhere, chunks of coral reef from
Bali, Portuguese olive bowls, a big Firestone neon sign
Henrik got from his uncle Torben who deals in car tyres.
How can she live like that?
A Montana bookcase, elegant vases, hand blown fruit
bowls in coloured glass, three gigantic plants—like in a
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The Bra n 125
head office, I imagine. But no flowers in the vases and no
fruit in the bowls.
‘This is how I Iike it’, said Kirstine as she opened the
door to the bedroom. The double bed was made up in a
very special way. The pillows were at the head of the bed—
fair enough—but the two single duvets: they were folded in
half and then turned through 90 degrees, so they sat there
like two rectangular parcels with one edge facing the foot
of the bed and the other finishing halfway up the mattress,
and the covers had different patterns on their two sides, so
with the duvets folded that way the patterns matched up
when you saw the parcels from the side. It looked dead
posh. Above the bed: a reproduction of Claude Monet’s
Water Lilies framed behind glass. I wouldn’t mind trying
to live like that someday—that’s what I was thinking: all
cool clean lines.
After that we sat down on the futon in the living room,
not next to each other and not even at opposite ends, but
with a kind of gap between us. It felt so weird sitting and
talking like that, having to turn your head to see the other
person. I would have preferred a chair so we could have sat
facing each other, only there was no chair; there was just
the futon, a square chrome coffee table with a dark blue
glass top, and that was it. On the table: a neat stack of
glossy magazines lined up with one corner of the table, a
big candle in a shiny stainless steel holder plus a couple of
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coffee-table type books. Over the futon: an Asger Jorn
reproduction.
She sure put me through my paces: Did I have much
experience of cleaning—was I reliable? I delivered on both
scores. You use a dry duster—fine weave so it leaves no
fluff behind—for dusting round. For certain things you
need a well-wrung damp cloth: first dip it in hot water with
just a drop of detergent, then take it in your two hands—
palms up and pressed together, like a beggar. Next, grasp-
ing the cloth firmly between both hands twist it out of that
position with the sides of your hands rubbing against each
other right up until your wrists are crossed and the backs
of your hands are facing upwards—point being that’s the
only way you can wring out a cloth without doing violence
to your wrists. You dust first, then you hoover.
After we’d been sitting there a while I was so gagging
for a cigarette, but I couldn’t see an ashtray anywhere and
didn’t want to ask. Luckily she’s a smoker too—Marlboro
Lights. She went and fetched a little black ashtray, beauti-
fully polished—later I found it’s the only one she pos-
sesses. I’m sitting there thinking: I wonder w
hat kind of
lighter she has? Instead she used matches. I told Henrik
when I got home. Tordenskjold matches, the most com-
mon make in the land.
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The Bra n 127
‘Blow me if she doesn’t show signs of having a person-
ality after all, or at least some form of . . . style!’ he said.
Well, I’m sure it shows something, I thought.
‘There’s just one thing you should check out’, said
Henrik. I should check whether after striking a match
she brought the flame straight up to the cigarette, or if
she let the sulphur burn off first so as not to inhale the
poisonous fumes.
‘I reckon she won’t know about that’, said Henrik—
apparently it’s one of those things men notice. But he was
wrong. She lets the sulphur burn off—calm as anything—
until all the smoke is gone, and then she brings the flame
up to the cigarette.
She only ever wears new clothes. After her clothes have
been washed a few times they get thrown out—the moment
they show the first hint of ever having been worn. She puts
them in a bag she keeps behind a curtain in the corridor.
Behind the curtain is a kind of cubby hole—a messy
corner—where the vacuum cleaner stands; though of
course it’s not the least bit messy. She washes her cast-offs
before putting them behind the curtain, and when I arrive
the following week the bag has gone.
‘Do you think she just chucks them out?’ I ask Henrik
when we’re sprawled on the sofa watching Okay Tone on
DR2 after finally getting Sofie off to sleep.
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128 n Jakob Ejersbo
‘Let’s hope she gives them to the Salvation Army’, he
says, and then reading my thoughts he says: ‘Go on and
ask her!’
‘I can’t do that’, I say.
‘No, you’re right’, he says, ‘and besides it’d seem just
too bloody impoverished. If instead you’d been an illegal
Mexican immigrant in Los Angeles you could have.’
‘How’s that?’ I ask.
‘Because then she would know she’d never bump into
you wearing her old clothes—you’d either sell them or save
them to wear to mass on Sunday.’
‘I just wish we had a bit more money—I could really do
with some new clothes’, I say.
‘Fuck her clothes, and fuck her matches!’ says Henrik,
and pulls me close. ‘We’ve got a life—she’s got nice
clothes,’ he says, and gives me a smacking great kiss on
the cheek. And it’s true—she does come across as leading a
pretty superficial life. But I could still do with some decent
gear.
Whenever I bike over to her flat I’m always a bit keyed
up—all agog to see if anything’s happened. Take for
instance the big candle on the coffee table in that hugely
stylish steel candle holder—I dust it every Friday, the
candle too—it has never once been lit, and I’m certain of
that, for I made a little nick in it with my nail. And it’s been
fully six months since I started cleaning for her.
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The Bra n 129
One day I told Henrik I’d become pretty potty about
cleaning for Kirstine.
‘When I’m up at her place I move around with a kind
of—total concentration.’
‘A bit like you’re paranoid?’ asked Henrik.
‘No’, I said, and then: ‘Yes—in a way. I just so want
everything to be perfect for her’, I said.
‘That sounds a bit sick to my way of thinking’, said
Henrik. So I gave up describing the feeling for him. It isn’t
sick. It’s more because . . . well, if I give her place a good
clean everything ends up perfect, but when we have a good
clean-up at home the paint’s still peeling off the coffee
table legs, Sofie’s squiggles are still on the walls at child
height, there are still food stains on the wood floor, holes
in our clothes, loose wallpaper in the entrance.
‘Try and guess what kind of music she has’, I ask
Henrik. And he guesses right, Elton John, Whitney Hous-
ton, Celine Dion, and masses of Complete Dance CDs—in
fact the only one he misses out is Toni Braxton, who he
doesn’t know.
‘Has she got any nostalgia CDs?’ he asks.
‘Yes’, I say, and again he guesses right: Tøsedrengene,
News, and Dodo and the Dodos. The radio is always tuned
to Voice.
‘So what does she read?’ I ask.
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130 n Jakob Ejersbo
‘Trick question,’ he answers. ‘She doesn’t read—at all!’
And that too is about right. In the bedroom she has two
Danielle Steel books and Peter Hoegh’s Miss Smilla. In the
living room there are only coffee-table type books: Key
Moments in Fashion: The Evolution of Style—Lighting:
Creative Planning for Successful Lighting Solutions—
Making Faces—Kevyn Aacoin reveals how the famous
look their best with the help of make-up. Winona Ryder,
Janet Jackson, all sorts of models—all somehow looking
like hookers in different price ranges—mostly expensive.
Finally, once in a while I find certain manuals to do
with her work, which presumably she has to study in her
spare time—for instance: Marketing for Kids. God, that’s
just so sick! But the worst of it is when women like her
have their own kids. A baby fucks up their entire control
trip. That’s a quote from one of our nursing lecturers at
Bispebjerg Hospital, where I’ve just started; she says local
councils have started taking on extra health care workers
to help out the rich and oh-so-cool first-time mums,
because they can’t get their heads round caring for kids.
They simply don’t get it that a baby can cry after its feed.
Or that a child won’t fall asleep at exactly the same time
every day.
Maybe someday it’ll be me who gets her as a client, and
then I’ll have to sit her down and explain that you can’t
run a baby according to a time manager—they scream and
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The Bra n 131
they yell and you get shit all over your fingers—which
doesn’t smell too nice. It’ll totally freak her out, I’m afraid.
All the same I can’t quite stop myself embroidering the
picture: cleaning lady goes back to former employer, only
now with the authority of chief consultant on all things
pertaining to babies.
Kirstine’s perfumes: Calvin Klein’s Eternity, Gio by
Armani, and Yves Saint Laurent’s Paris. I had a similar
arsenal before Sofie came along. All Kirstine’s creams are
exclusively Clinique, and the same goes for her make-up.
Clothes by Sand, Bruno & Joel, Carli Gry, Bruuns Bazar.
Shoes by Calvin Klein and ONO—around 40 pairs. Bags
by Louis Vuitton. Bras by Marie Jo.
The bra situ
ation is actually a whole separate chapter.
I get to do a wash for her once in a while. Her whites are
white. Her underwear has to be washed separately in a
special net so it won’t spoil. So much for her big environ-
mental worries: two bras and two pairs of knickers in a
single wash!
Personally I have my one and only bra, well worn.
I only take it off to wash it, and then I go about with
dancing boobs like some hippie on the make. A top quality
bra with matching knickers costs 600 kroner; I used to
always go round in that kind of stuff when I was really
young and worked in a cafe and got loads of tips and had
no overheads. Now I’d have to clean for her for a month to
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132 n Jakob Ejersbo
afford a set like that—I go there once a week and make 150
kroner a session; that’s for three hours’ work, though I get
through it in an hour and a half, but that’s also because I’m
now expert at it, seeing I know exactly how she wants
everything.
There’s so many things about her—she’s a source of
endless fascination. I go straight over there from Bispe-
bjerg Hospital where I’m doing my training. I don’t even
need to hurry, as Henrik fetches Sofie from the day nursery
when he finishes at the State Hospital—he’s a porter there.
Kirstine is never around when I’m cleaning—I think she
finds it a bit embarrassing that I need to clean other
people’s houses to make ends meet. She doesn’t have the
time, either; I mean, after secondary school she went on to
commercial school and then to the famous Niels Brock,
and so walked straight into a job with this big market
analysis firm where she works now. Naked careerism:
eight to five every day, lunch at the Café Europa or some-
where equally swanky, then on to tennis or aerobics, or a
body therapist. On the other hand—what total bliss: good
job, loadsa money, super stylish home, time to keep in
trim, get into town—no obligations.
When I get to her place I always find the ‘mess’ from
her breakfast sitting there. Mess in this context means a
toaster with no crumbs at the bottom, a plate with just a
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The Bra n 133
crumb or two, a dirty knife and a perfect teacup with just a
hint of tannin on the inside. She drinks Medova.
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