Knots

by Gunnhild Øyehaug

  * * *

  “The lightbulb in my bathroom has blown,” he says after a while, and lights a cigarette. “At night it’s dark there in a really weird way, I can stand for ages looking at everything in there, the towels hanging from the hooks, the toothbrush in the glass, the toothpaste, the razor, the shower curtain, and it’s like I’m not in the room, like I shouldn’t be there, like I’m seeing things how they are when I’m not there, do you understand what I mean? And that I shouldn’t be, that somehow I’m a hindrance, but that’s almost why I stay there.” I nod, feel frightened, he’s talking about it now, and I want him to stop. “And I like it,” he says. He looks at me. “Are you feeling horny, or what?” he asks, tilting his head. “What?” I say. “You’re stroking yourself on the thigh. You always do that when you’ve had a drink,” he says, and I have to look out the window again. “It’s just nature,” I mumble, “and nature is cynical.” He laughs. “Do you remember the time I hit you with some plastic tubing I found behind the house?” he asks, and I say what I always say, that I can’t remember, that I must have suppressed it, that it must have been so awful that I’ve decided to obliterate it, and what kind of kinky association is this anyway—“And I got ill,” Roar says, “after, it was the guilt, I had to stay in bed for two days and eat glucose tablets. And you came to visit me, but couldn’t sit on the edge of the bed.” We laugh. It starts to rain. Roar opens the window. “Come and hear,” he says. I go over to him, look out at the garden and the apple tree, the white bench, and listen to the rain falling on the copper beech. Murmuring. Tingling. My neck is tingling. He puts his arms around me, pulls me in, my cheek against his chest. This is more than I can bear. This is the drop that makes me run over. I ask if he can run his hand through my hair, from the neck up. “Hmm?” he says. I ask if he can run his hand through my hair, from the neck up. “Hell, no,” he says. “But as it’s you…” And then he does it, he puts his hand in my hair and pulls it through from the neck up. Leans his forehead against mine. This is the closest he’s been. He has his hand in my hair. But all I can feel is my throat burning, burning. “He’s got the whole world,” he sings. “Idiot,” I say in a hoarse voice, but then laugh a little, so he knows I don’t mean it.

  Compulsion

  The audience has settled in the auditorium. A voice over the loudspeaker asks everyone to turn off their mobile phones. The darkness descends slowly over their heads and shoulders. Sinks over arms that touch here and there, spreads down over the red plush seats and bags that have been placed between feet, over shoelaces, then someone coughs, someone clears their throat as though they may never get another chance. They are here to listen to a one-hour monologue, Andreas is about to take the stage. He is sitting on the steps behind the thick curtains, he looks onto the stage, which is completely bare except for a pair of shoes that are glued to the floor. The shoes and a small area around them will be illuminated by a pool of light in a few seconds. Andreas will slip his bare feet into the shoes and stand for an hour without moving, and talk. A great physical challenge awaits him; after a while he will start to feel dizzy and possibly lose all feeling in his legs. But he’ll cope; he’s spoken to the Royal Guards at the palace and learned a few smart tricks for how to deal with it.

  * * *

  The curtains open, a spotlight focuses on the shoes in the middle of the stage. Andreas is still sitting hidden on the stairs, or, to be more precise, he is sitting curled around his own body, he’s holding his knees, someone comes over and whispers, Now, but Andreas shows no sign of having heard what was said to him. He holds on to his own body on the stairs.* The person gives up, shrugs to someone else who is standing farther away clasping his brow, to show that it’s impossible. The person holding his brow takes a couple of resolute steps toward Andreas, who is sitting curled around his own body, and silently shakes Andreas’s arms, trying to open a gap between Andreas’s upper body and thighs, but doesn’t succeed. He makes an obscene gesture in front of Andreas’s eyes, which are probably looking down at a step. Then he does a kind of pirouette around himself, silently throws up his hands, goes over to the other person, who has watched this performance with a rather disinterested look on his face. They walk away.

  * * *

  In the meantime, people have started to titter about the pair of shoes in the middle of the stage that have not been filled by anyone. The fact that it’s taken so long, and is still taking time, that nothing has happened yet, seems to amuse them, they probably see it as an allusion to other plays, largely from the postwar period. And after the first wave of laughter comes the first silence, Andreas knows the pattern; the uncertainty spreads; something is not right after all, maybe it’s not supposed to be like this, maybe we laughed too soon. They rummage for sweets, they check that they HAVE turned off their mobile phones, which they have of course done. Ragnhild has even taken out the battery! Then, after about ten minutes, the first person gets up and leaves, which then makes the most intellectual member of the audience burst into a loud solo laughter that echoes around the auditorium, to show everyone that he has understood. (And this is what he has understood, or rather, these are the associations that now make him laugh: He sees the performance as a commentary on the futility of existence. There is a pair of empty shoes on the stage, they don’t move, no one moves, the stage has been empty for ten minutes now, which has provoked the audience to start moving, in other words THE AUDIENCE IS NOW GETTING TO ITS FEET, and in a while the auditorium will be as empty as the shoes, but precisely BECAUSE the stage has not been able to produce a movement, a being; a pair of legs, a person. In other words, in some strange and paradoxical way, art has interfered with life and done something to it. In other words, art has conveyed a moral, and my goodness, it’s been a long time since there was evidence of the will to do that, and if he, a member of the audience, were to call this form of theater anything, he would absolutely and without a doubt call it action theater. He’s enjoying the obvious paradox!) And the others think about it and decide that it’s actually quite funny, and deeply tragic. In the meantime, another person has gone over to Andreas and asked him in as quiet a hiss as possible if Andreas could PLEASE get a GRIP on himself, that this can’t carry on much longer, that he’ll get the boot if he doesn’t pull himself together. Andreas sits curled around his body and doesn’t move, thinks if they just wait for fifteen minutes. But there is no way for Andreas to communicate this to the person, because if he does, terrible things will happen, the world as we know it will collapse. He can’t say a word until fifteen minutes are up. The person walks away. Makes a movement with his hands, and the curtains close. Before fifteen minutes have passed. As usual. A thunderous applause erupts. Finally, Andreas stands up and goes out onto the stage to receive his applause, as if it’s something he has to do. He shrugs apologetically, opens the curtains just enough, puts his big toe into the shoe as if he were dipping it in water, quickly pulls his foot back as though the water were cold, laughs a little, then gives another apologetic shrug, the audience applauds, Andreas bows, exits left in twelve long strides and steps on the last gap between the planks perfectly, he has to hit it in such a way that the gap divides the sole of his foot in two.

  Oh, Life

  Innovation

  Eve is the name of a woman who has opened her legs for a man. His name is Frank. Frank has a nice cock, Eve thinks. His cock goes in and out of her and she thinks it’s very nice.

  * * *

  Three days ago, Frank’s cock was going in and out of a woman called Gerd; Gerd had big, round breasts that Frank cupped while he stood behind her, moving his cock in and out.

  * * *

  Three days before that, Gerd was kneeling on her bed letting another man’s cock go in and out of her; his name was Adam. Adam held her hips rather than her breasts and said, Oh God, Oh God. All aquiver he asked Gerd if she could reach her hand back, if she could get hold of his balls, if she could stroke them. Twelve hours earlier, he had been standing behind a woman who was calle
d Eve, saying, Oh God, Oh God, while Eve supported herself with one hand and stroked his balls that were slapping against her buttocks with the other.

  * * *

  Now Eve is doing the same for Frank, and with great success. Oh God, he says.

  * * *

  God listens, he thinks. Then he makes everything apart from this disappear. The weather, time, the economy, those pointless conversations in the line at the deli, rose-growing, umbrella-buying, waiting in banks, all professions, all train departures and bus routes, bumping into someone unexpected around the corner, watching someone eat breakfast and suddenly being overwhelmed by love, by the feeling that one wants to remain here forever, in this ridiculously decorated room with large windows where someone is eating their breakfast, and one only has to reach out a hand to stroke the other person’s hair and not say a thing, in short, to love someone, etc.—all the usual pillars that in their own unremarkable and impressive ways have held everything together. They vanish. The practical consequences are that the world is now different, more horizontal, men and women have to have sex with each other all the time.* It’s a bit like a relay, or musical chairs, but everyone gets one and no one is left out. In a way, society has never been more intertwined even though all the usual pillars have fallen.

  Echo

  Arild Eivind Bryn was a demon at selling encyclopedias.

  * * *

  Arild Eivind Bryn was success in its purest and rawest form. Put it this way, Bjarte Bø said, the man’s handshake leaves its mark. He was young, free, had it all. A job with a salary that fed itself fat on the way to heaven, a nippy little Italian model with four idolized wheels, and a huge flat in one of the best parts of town. He had a legendary serve that had helped him smash his way to the top of the company’s tennis tournament, in summer he went climbing in Switzerland with the boys’ club, Conquistadors of the Mound of Venus, and if someone had decided to tap Arild Eivind Bryn’s heart, it would have pumped out the finest chateau wine. The only thing that might detract from the Bryn phenomenon was his first name, a somewhat unusual combination that was the result of a fierce patriarchal fight. But even the name Arild Eivind was a success, it was a personal gimmick. His friends liked to hear themselves say it. It was as if they were part of something then. Part of it. There.

  * * *

  And what’s more, Arild Eivind was nice, damn nice, Bjarte Bø said. Bjarte Bø looked up to Arild Eivind Bryn. Damn, he thought, when he thought of Arild Eivind. Tone didn’t like him swearing so much, you never did before, she often said, and Bjarte would reply: I don’t swear that often, damn it, and so got Tone to laugh it all off.

  * * *

  Tone was the one area where he felt he had the better of Arild Eivind. It was an area that Arild Eivind had not yet explored. Not even surveyed. Where he had not yet become chairman of the board, no distinctions here, no trophies. Bjarte, on the other hand, would soon have the papers ready, and gold around his finger to prove it. That is, until the moment when Arild Eivind had looked over his shoulder at him, on his way to a lunch meeting, file tucked under his arm, swinging out through the office door, his hair flopping slightly to the right as he turned toward Bjarte:

  “Better to have a girl on every floor than to be stuck with one in the elevator.”

  After that, Bjarte always took the stairs.

  * * *

  “Damn,” Bjarte muttered, savoring the sight of Arild Eivind’s nippy little Italian parked by the curb.

  “The man muttered under his breath,” Tone said, half irritated, half to the wind, which partly swallowed her voice that took off, took flight toward the end of the sentence. “Hmm?” said Bjarte.

  “Just a quote,” said Tone. “Joyce,” she added, but she knew it was needless, pointless, hopeless. A sense of duty, perhaps, on her part, maybe, to tell him something he didn’t know, and that he didn’t care he didn’t know.

  “You and your quotes,” Bjarte said, and for a moment was proud, she could impress with her quotes, he thought, at the table. He looked at the car again. When his wallet was fat enough, he was going to get a car like that, just like that: a lively, little lean machine. He couldn’t think of anything he wanted more.

  “Bad parking,” Tone said and pointed at the front wheel that was on the curb. “Looks like a dead-drunk man propping himself up with his elbow.” She laughed. Bjarte decided not to be offended. Nothing was going to ruin his state of elation. Today his friendship with Arild Eivind would climb another level. They had been invited for a Sunday meal. Arild Eivind was going to make it himself, he was a master at Italian, he said. And he wanted to meet Tone. Bjarte was ecstatic. “Wear the black dress, you look great in that,” he said, as Tone stood in front of the mirror, studying her face, with two lipsticks in her hand. He put on the blue shirt he’d just bought, which he was particularly pleased with. Curled his toes against the floor.

  * * *

  Tone walked beside him, she looked great and annoyed. She had a headache, there was northerly wind blowing, it licked her neck with its icy, greedy tongue. She didn’t like that kind of wind. She didn’t like that kind of car. That kind of parking. It symbolized something she couldn’t stand. Attitude. A way of being. She saw Bjarte’s face tense in anticipation as they got closer to the door, it was five o’clock, and the wind was blowing up the split, the long split in her dress, up and around her knees. “Damn,” Bjarte said and rang the bell.

  * * *

  No response.

  * * *

  “We’re not too early, are we?” Bjarte said, and Tone could see on her watch that they weren’t. They were on time. “Must be something keeping him at the stove,” he said, and liked what he’d said, Tone would think this man was a conscientious cook, a man who didn’t just leave his pots at the most important point in the process, a good quality, he thought, and put his arm around her, he was friends with a man of good qualities, it had to rub off, make him even better in her eyes, Bjarte would never leave his pots at the most important point in the process either, just to open the door. He stroked his thumb over her shoulders.

  * * *

  Still no reaction.

  * * *

  “Damn,” Bjarte muttered, starting to feel uneasy, and he forced himself to ring the bell several times in succession, which he immediately regretted, so finished off with a long, reasonable, and manly ring. Suddenly the door opened, and a pair of eyes squinted out from under a mop of blond hair. Arild Eivind was in his underpants and scratched his chest, he couldn’t see anything, he said, his eyes were full of sand: he rubbed them, opened them, saw them, and said, “Fuck.”

  “Is it Sunday today?” he asked, then noticed Tone, and nodded and smiled: “Hi!”

  “Yes,” Bjarte said, as Tone mumbled hi.

  “Late night last night,” Arild Eivind said, and shook his head, and Bjarte said, “Ah,” in an understanding way. “Ah,” Bjarte said again, and Arild Eivind nodded, then slapped his forehead as he turned.

  “Sorry, welcome, dear guests, come in,” Arild Eivind said.

  When their host was dressed, Tone saw where Bjarte had gotten the idea of blue shirts. And following a trip to the bathroom: the clean-shaven jaw. “Oh, that won’t do,” Arild Eivind said when he realized that both he and Bjarte were standing there in blue shirts, with fair hair cut in more or less the same style—Bjarte had more gel in his. Then he laughed and clapped Bjarte on the arm. “I’ll go and put a white one on.” Bjarte curled his toes against the floor.

  * * *

  They sat in the living room for a while, and Arild Eivind apologized and Bjarte said that it was fine, and a new plan was hatched: Arild Eivind would take them out to a restaurant. He had given them a glass of mineral water, shared a painkiller with Tone, and let them listen to a new recording of Satie’s three Gymnopédies that he’d just bought, and that he was particularly pleased with. Tone remembered one of the pieces from a series that had been shown on children’s TV in the summer, it made her sad. “Yes,” Arild Eivin
d said, “so deliciously melancholy.”

  * * *

  “I’ll call for a taxi,” Arild Eivind said, “the car’s parked about half an hour away.”

  Bjarte was taken aback. “But your car’s parked right outside.”

  “Huh?” Arild Eivind exclaimed. “Are you sure?” He went over to the window, looked down, and started to laugh. “Did I drive it? I can’t remember that at all, at all, fucking hell,” he laughed, and Bjarte laughed with him. “Jesus, Arild Eivind,” he laughed, and slapped him on the back. “Jeeez-sus,” and Tone thought to herself in exasperation that Bjarte was taking in Arild Eivind like a leaking boat and she wasn’t sure she wanted to carry on bailing.

  * * *

  “Yes, really good,” Bjarte repeated.

  The lighting in the restaurant was dim, the small tea lights in the tea light holders made of glass cast a warm flickering glow over the small-check tablecloths whenever someone spoke or laughed. They had talked a little more about Satie, and then Tone had said something about “poetry,” and Arild Eivind had pointed at the tea lights in the glass holders and said: “I remember reading somewhere that someone said poetry was like the glow of a flame under glass.”