We stopped off at Kongens Nytorv.
‘How much is fifteen biggies?’ she said.
‘Fifteen thousand,’ I said.
‘Stig Nissen wants to give you fifteen thousand for a talk. Can’t you make sure he does?’
Nikolaj Krogh had shaped the Dusk logo in wood, the lettering was a metre and a half tall and coated in piano varnish. The door handles were black and looked like oversized claves, and the front facing out to Østergade was all glass. Inside the large, airy store, the flooring was matt black, and all the organically rounded shelves were as glossy as mirrors. In the far corner was Nikolaj Krogh’s signature chair, the Black Egg, surrounded by black Eames chairs and a primly designed black leather sofa. All the clothes racks were transparent plexiglas. Diana’s cunts had been blown up into giant photostats.
‘Is this spitzenklasse or what?’ said Stig Nissen.
He was in a narrow black suit that accentuated his stubbornly bandy legs, and on his feet were a pair of silly designer sneakers. Black-clad waiters served champagne from trays, and on the great glass counter a deconstructed brunch had been laid out, foie gras, crème brulée, millefeuille of slow-baked pancetta with whisked egg whites, melon shots with freeze-dried crumbs of ham, and black blintz with caviar.
Lisa was on mineral water and standing on her own.
‘He’s ruined my design!’
She took a boiler suit off a rack and held it out in front of us.
‘Do you remember what this looked like in the sketches, Diana?’
‘Is it the one that was tight at the top and baggy at the bottom?’
‘Look at it now,’ said Lisa. ‘It’s just a catsuit.’
‘What happened?’ said Diana.
‘He’s had his bollocksing-up team in Brande editing my styles.’
She picked up a sunshine-yellow blouse from a shelf.
‘This was mustard before.’
‘I was wondering about those colours,’ said Diana.
The label at the neck said Dusk by Lisa Zöllner.
Stig Nissen tapped his glass.
‘Yeehah, Duskies! In a minute we’re going to be opening the doors to the public and the story of Dusk will be under way.’
The queue outside the store was several hundred strong.
‘Let’s get set for an amazing day and a bloody gobsmacking night. In a bit, the bus’ll be here to pick us up and it’ll be showtime and party over at Custom House. Then once we’re all fired up and dancing, it’s on to Jazz House to rip the place apart!’
The black-clad doorman opened the doors and took the coupons all the teenage girls had cut out of their fashion mag. Free Brunch with the Dusk Team. Stig Nissen waylaid Diana.
‘Cunt counter!’ he said, steering her towards a big pile of white T-shirts with Diana’s cunts on the front. He pressed a black marker pen into her hand, and for the next half-hour she was signing T-shirts. The quality was so poor she had to be careful not to tear through the material.
At twelve o’clock, a black bus with tinted windows drew up outside the store to take us on to the next phase of the party.
Stig Nissen went speed-talking from seat to seat. I looked out at the cyclists pedalling along in the bike lanes, noting firstly how footwear lost its dignity as soon as there was a child seat on the back, and secondly that I was plainly in more trouble than I realised if thoughts like that had begun to occupy me. No one wanted to be the ordinary guy with the child seat anymore. We were only what our lust made of us. When the luxury hippies of sixties California developed a taste for Zen meditation they sent for a Japanese master.
His instruction was simple:
‘Sit down on a chair and close your eyes.’
‘Okay, and then what?’
‘Just sit there.’
‘What do I get out of it?’
‘You get sitting on a chair with your eyes closed.’
Stig Nissen danced his way up and down the aisle with two serving girls.
Nikolaj Krogh took Lisa’s hand and they still looked like a pair of besotted teenagers.
‘I’ve spoken to my solicitor,’ he said.
‘Stig Nissen is in breach of your copyright by altering your designs without permission. All we have to do is compare your sketches with the clothes in the store.’
‘I haven’t got the sketches.’
‘Where are they?’
‘Stig’s got them, of course.’
The bus pulled up outside Custom House and Diana, who had spent the journey gazing out of the window absorbed in thought, put her hand on mine and looked me in the eye for the first time since she’d come back from Budapest. I wiped a tear from the corner of my eye after we kissed.
I wandered about backstage with a smile on my face. Flocks of small-breasted teenage girls were getting their make-up done and having their hair arranged, people with headsets and bewilderment in their eyes kept bumping into each other, and any attempt at communication was drowned immediately by the deafening onslaught of house music. No one loses their head as efficiently as the fashion business. On the big terrace facing the harbour, rental chairs had been lined up in rows, and Nikolaj Krogh and I were right at the front.
‘Andreas has found a property for Next Love,’ he said.
‘Look at all this,’ I said. ‘Isn’t it great?’
The pleb celebs were pouring in, girls with dead hair attachments, hideous designer handbags and inflated boobs, guys with shiny waxed hair, locked hips and excessively pumped biceps.
‘We were talking about going up to have a look at the place next week,’ said Nikolaj Krogh. ‘It’s an army barracks.’
I waved one of the girls over and took yet another glass of champagne from her tray. There was too much resilience in me to get drunk, it was that kind of day. Mille and two guys in sloppy muso attire stepped up on to a small stage. She had sunglasses on, a straight up-and-down pink dress from the collection and tall boots.
‘Do you want to come along?’
Two bimbos with neat holes in their jeans and little dogs in their shoulder bags sat down next to us. The harbour was at our feet, the spire of Vor Frelser Kirke glittered in the sunshine across the water, and of course I wanted to go with them to see the barracks. A tight chord was struck and remained suspended in the gentle breeze, followed by a heavy, dragging beat, banjo and bass. Mille took the mic and sang:
This is the day. This is the day. This is the day we were longing for.
A large schooner came drifting in towards the quayside. Seven fashion models stood posing at the gunwale, and the audience rose from their gold-coloured chairs and applauded. This is the day. This is the day we were longing for. Not a bad tune, actually, a lot of minor key. Repeating a lyric over and over can be quite effective, it lends something ominous. Another wooden ship came sailing in with another seven models. The music stopped, a drum roll sounded, and out on the water five speedboats approached in formation. Mille switched from the airy flutter of before and sang from her chest, shifting an octave higher. This is the day. She screamed out the words and the beat returned, only in double time now. People got to their feet again and started dancing all around us. There were three models on each of the boats, arranged according to clothes and colour, and after they passed by, one of the musicians switched to accordion and picked up the theme while the other played the chords on the banjo. Mille leaned towards her audience. This is the day. A gondola came sailing some ten metres out in the harbour, and in the bow stood Diana in a fishing net like Kráka. This is the day we were longing for. Dusk!
The music stopped. People whooped and yelled, and Mille bowed.
‘No expense spared,’ said Nikolaj Krogh.
Stig Nissen was jumping up and down with excitement.
‘Congratulations,’ I said. ‘They’ve never seen that before.’
He threw his arms round my neck.
‘We bloody well showed them how to do it there, didn’t we, eh? Bloody hell! Your missus, the bride in a fishing net
! Are you proud or what?’
I wondered whether I should take advantage of the buoyant mood to confirm my fifteen-thousand-kroner talk in Brande, but decided it would be inappropriate to distract him in his moment of triumph.
‘Come over here and give us a hug, Nikolaj Krogh!’ Stig Nissen cried, and roughed him about.
‘Who’d have thought a stuck-up city snob and a backwoodsman like Nissen here could get together and make miracles!’
Lisa clearly wasn’t on the wagon anymore and stood propping up the far end of the bar. Mille had slipped into something black. ‘Here she is, the lady herself!’ Stig Nissen cried. ‘You tell her to write a song called “Dusk” and what do you get? A smash hit off another planet. If that’s not going to get your career going again, I don’t know what is!’
I went inside to the restaurant arm in arm with Diana. Lisa was dancing on her own now, and she smiled a distant smile when anyone tried to compliment her. Waiters came and went with dishes of seafood and the crowd thinned out. Stig Nissen called the assembled guests to order. ‘It’s only the superstars left now! And do you know what? We’re going to give ourselves a bloody great pat on the back and get stuck in to all this good bubbly, that’s what!’
The bartender opened three bottles of Dom Perignon.
‘We’ll be popping off,’ said Nikolaj Krogh. ‘Vibskov’s got a party on.’
It was a quarter to ten and I was sitting in a taxi heading for Jazz House, a stomach-churning slalom through the city: Skt. Annæ Plads, Bredgade, Dronningens Tværgade, Borgergade, Gothersgade. Something repeated on me. It tasted like the tarragon from the mussel soup and I tried not to dwell on it.
‘Did you ask Stig Nissen?’ said Diana. My cheeks were cold and I didn’t know where to look. Diana was too close up, and why did the driver have so much heat on? I opened my jacket. Store Regnegade, Bremerholm, Antonigade, Pilestræde. Every time he made a turn I got thrown against the door.
‘About what?’
I felt a rush of nausea. Kronprinsensgade, Valkendorfsgade. Don’t read the signs.
‘About your talk, Mikkel!’
And then at long last Niels Hemmingsensgade. Air, for Christ’s sake. Air!
‘I’ll ask him later,’ I said, plonking myself on the wall of the Helligåndskirke. ‘You go on in, Diana.’
There was a huge queue for the Dusk after-party and as far as I could see, no one was over eighteen. I lay down on the wall and looked up at the stars. They swayed like the Viking ship in the Tivoli Gardens. I jumped down to the other side, bent forward, stuck a finger down my throat and emptied my stomach of lobster, oysters, mussels and champagne, and since I could hardly just go in stinking of vomit I staggered over to the kiosk on Klosterstræde to get some chewing gum but it was closed, so I had to go all the way up to Gammel Torv.
Luckily, Søren T-shirt was at Floss.
‘Where have you been all this time?’ he said, and I told him the truth, that I was turning into Diana’s puppy dog, and he said she was mad about me, but he knew the feeling, and even if I didn’t believe him it was a tonic running into a friend who was so unconditionally on my side.
‘I’m wasted,’ I said. ‘Have you got any hard drugs?’
‘No, but I can get some,’ he said.
‘Lovers come and go,’ I said. ‘Friends remain.’
‘I’ll need seven hundred,’ he said.
By the time I got back to Jazz House the queue had disappeared. The bouncers were sitting around in their black coats drinking coffee.
‘Is the party finished?’ I asked.
‘What party?’ said one.
‘Everyone’s gone to Vibskov’s,’ said another, looking the other way.
A couple sat snogging on the long sofa against the far wall and the two bartenders stood arsing about behind the bar. Music thumped up from downstairs. On my way down I ran into Rie Becker.
‘Diana never went to Magyar Képzőművészeti Egyetem.’
‘Are you talking backwards?’ I said.
‘The Academy of Fine Arts in Budapest.’
‘So what?’ I said.
‘It says in her CV on Moritz’s website that she went there from 1999 to 2002, but they’ve never had any student by the name of Diana Kiss.’
‘Clear the front page,’ I said, and carried on down the stairs.
‘How much did she get for destroying her name?’ Rie Becker called after me.
Stig Nissen had his own little VIP area sorted out; it was even roped off and there was a tablecloth on the table, whole bottles of booze and ice buckets. He was immersed in conference with a couple of his people, and Lisa sat slouched in the corner asleep. A crowd of drunken sixteen-year-olds were dancing an improvised routine to a sugary beat, and the bar seemed to be far too long. Diana was seated at its far end.
‘How nice of you to come,’ she said.
‘Time to talk business,’ I said.
‘Wipe your mouth first,’ said Diana. ‘There’s something white on your lip.’
Waves of warmth passed through me and I put my hand on her shoulder.
‘It’s such a release when things don’t get complicated,’ I said.
Things? Ladles, tennis balls, paper clips. Things?
‘I mean, you not getting annoyed,’ I said.
‘What would I get annoyed about?’
‘About me going off like that.’
‘Go off any time,’ she said.
My eyes clouded with tears and I wanted to cast myself into the dirt, to sink down before her feet and propose to her, but then the last bit of coke I’d done wore off, and my mood descended suddenly through a deep and filthy shaft. The DJ did a clumsy mix of ‘The Power’ by Snap and at once it became all too obvious that there were sixteen of us inside a discotheque with a capacity of four hundred.
‘I wonder if they’ve still got Galliano shots here?’ I said.
Diana came with me to the VIP table.
‘Did we kick ass, or did we kick ass?’ said Stig Nissen.
‘We couldn’t have asked for more,’ I said.
‘Total impact, am I right?’ he said.
‘Do you still want me to do that talk?’ I said.
‘Here we go!’ he said. ‘First write-up, Berlingske.dk,’
He read the headline out loud from his mobile:
‘New high-street label falls short,’ he said. ‘What do they know? Brilliant photo! You’ve a right to be proud of her, Mikkel.’
He handed me the phone, and of course it was Diana as Kráka.
‘Dusk is Berlin,’ said Stig Nissen. ‘Berlingske is Rungsted.’
‘No one takes Berlingske seriously anymore,’ I said.
‘I don’t understand this country, said Stig Nissen. ‘When were you last in Singapore or Rio? Innovation is king! Why are those markets out there all booming? Because they believe in people like me who think outside the box, that’s why!’
The bartender shouted out last orders.
‘What sort of bubbly have you got?’ said Stig Nissen.
It was a hostile crémant from Alsace.
‘That talk you mentioned,’ I said.
‘The one you turned down?’ he said.
‘That was a mistake,’ said Diana.
‘Isn’t he supposed to be writing a book?’ said Stig Nissen.
‘I’d be more than happy to come over and talk a bit about Copenhagen,’ I said.
‘What’s the book about?’ said Stig Nissen.
‘It’s a rallying call against coupledom,’ I said.
‘What does Diana say about it?’
‘Mikkel has some very entertaining theories,’ she said.
‘All right, listen here,’ said Stig Nissen. ‘We’ve got this little arts society in Brande for the town’s bigwigs, you know: the mayor, the chairman of the retailers’ association, the magistrate, Chopper the butcher. The wife’s just texted me, that lifestyle fella with the wavy hair can’t make it tomorrow. Shall I put you on instead?’
I
couldn’t find my legs when the alarm rang. Diana had to throw water in my face and I’ve absolutely no idea how I managed to get through the necessary procedures and on to the right train.
The first swig was horrendous, the second was okay, and when we got to Roskilde after half an hour I bought two more beers, got my notepad out and began to draw up an outline of my presentation, with my relationship to Helene as the main example. Best to draw pictures rather than try to be subtle.
I suddenly found myself thinking about Helene’s hand on my hip, and the thought of it precipitated an erection of the insistent kind and so I went to the toilet with a jumper round my waist. I stood there feverishly tossing away until someone knocked on the door. I got off at Brande with a talk ready on my notepad, and Stig Nissen was waiting for me on the platform.
‘Tax-free beer on the ferry, thank God,’ I said.
‘Very funny. Welcome to the mainland,’ he said, and we drove off in his black Audi.
We pulled up outside the Hotel Dalgas. There were fifty people in the hotel restaurant. The men were drinking beer, the women white wine, and all of them looked like couples.
The host couple showed me to a little room at the back.
‘I’ll introduce you in ten minutes,’ said Stig Nissen.
I took my notepad out of my bag and made a couple of last-minute adjustments to my outline.
The paper trembled in my hand and I could hear them laughing on the other side of the door. There was a copying machine in the corner, a whiteboard and an overhead projector with its cord neatly wrapped around one leg. The notes from the last meeting could still be picked out on the whiteboard, a circle drawn in thick blue marker pen and inside it the words Where we are now, then an arrow pointing to another circle: Where we are going.
Thud, thud. Stig Nissen tapped on the microphone.
‘Good evening and welcome once again to the Brande Arts Society. Now, I can see most of you have brought your better halves along with you, and I can tell you now you’d better keep tight hold of them, because tonight we’ve got with us a writer from Copenhagen who questions what all of us here have to get up and face in the mornings, and I’m talking about good old-fashioned coupledom. So please give a nice round of applause for Mikkel Vallin!’
Am I Cold Page 23