‘You’ll have to walk from here,’ the driver said. ‘We’re going on to Hellevika.’
‘Isn’t that a hell of a distance?’ I said.
‘No, it’ll take you an hour max,’ he said. ‘If you walk quickly you’ll make it in three-quarters of an hour.’
I kissed Irene one last time, opened the door and stepped out.
In the car they were laughing, I turned, she stuck her head out of the window.
‘We were just kidding. Jump in. Of course we’ll drive you all the way home.’
Through the tunnel, along the fjord. The sea and the mountains lay quite still, wrapped in the grey, equally still, night air.
‘Would you like to sleep here?’ I whispered to Irene as we approached.
‘Love to,’ she whispered back. ‘But I can’t. I have to go home. But I can next weekend. Are you here then?’
‘Yes,’ I said.
‘Then I’ll come,’ she said.
On Mondays I had got into the habit of walking up to the school an hour before lessons started, I ran my eye over what had to be done that day, and when the bell rang I was more often than not sitting at my desk waiting for the pupils to come in. I would talk to them about what they had done since I last saw them.
On this Monday something was brewing, I could sense it as soon as they entered the room. They sat down on their seats in their usual clumsy way. Andrea looked at Vivian, who put her hand up.
‘Is it true you’re going out with Irene from Hellevika?’ she said.
The other girls giggled. Kai Roald rolled his eyes, but he was grinning too.
‘What I do when I’m not at school is none of your business,’ I said.
‘But you normally ask us what we did at the weekend,’ Andrea said.
‘Yes, I do,’ I said. ‘And you may ask me what I did. I’ll tell you.’
‘What did you do?’ Kai Roald said.
‘On Saturday I was at home all day. In the evening I was in Finnsnes. On Sunday I was at home.’
‘Ooh!’ said Vivian. ‘And who were you with in Finnsnes then?’
‘That’s got nothing to do with you,’ I said. ‘Shall we make a start?’
‘No!’
I raised my arms in mock frustration.
‘Have you got any more to tell me then?’
‘Are you going out with Irene?’ Andrea said.
I smiled, didn’t answer, put the box I had brought in on the desk and handed out the books. We had Norwegian now, the novel they were going to read was Poison by Alexander Kielland, one of the few class sets we had. I had started on it the previous Monday, their reading was so bad, I had told the mentor about this in the session I had with her, she advised me to read a book with the class, and that was what we were doing.
‘Oh no,’ they said when they saw the green 1970s cover. ‘Not that one! We don’t understand a word!’
‘It’s in Norwegian,’ I said. ‘Don’t you understand Norwegian?’
‘But it’s so old-fashioned! We really don’t understand it.’
‘Kai Roald, you set the ball rolling.’
Oh, how painful it was to listen to. First of all, he was a bad reader anyway, but Kielland’s style and the dated language destroyed any flow there was and reduced everything to single syllables, hesitation, coughing and stammering. None of them had any idea about the plot. I regretted having chosen this book, but it wouldn’t look good if I just gave up, so I continued to torment them right the way through the lesson, and would do the same the following Monday.
I was on playground duty in the break, so I went to the vestibule in the staffroom to fetch my coat while the pupils ran into the yard behind me.
‘Your father phoned, Karl Ove,’ Hege said, coming towards me with a note in her hand. ‘He said to ring him back. Here’s the number.’
She passed me the note, I hesitated for a moment. The pupils shouldn’t be outside unsupervised. On the other hand, dad was a teacher himself, and if he rang during working hours it was bound to be important.
Oh, of course. The baby must have been born.
I went in and dialled the number.
‘Hello?’ he said.
‘Hi, Dad, this is Karl Ove. I was told you’d rung.’
‘Yes, you’re a big brother now,’ he said.
‘Oh great!’ I said. ‘Boy or girl?’
‘A little girl,’ he said.
Was he drunk or just very happy?
‘Congratulations,’ I said. ‘That’s wonderful.’
‘Yes, it’s wonderful. We’ve just come home. I’d better look after them now.’
‘Everything OK with Unni?’
‘Oh yes. Talk later. Bye.’
‘Bye. And congratulations once again!’
I put down the phone and went out, smiled at Hege, who sent me a look, buttoned up my coat and hurried through the vestibule into the playground. I had hardly emerged before Reidar slunk up to me. He could be unbearably clingy and exploited every situation to make sure he was the centre of attention. In the classroom he would answer everything, comment on everything, always know better, always want to be the best. With me and the other teachers he was always ingratiating. He was a particularly detestable boy. He reminded me of myself when I was younger. I took every opportunity to try to eradicate this behaviour as it would make his life difficult later, but there was scant reward for my efforts, after every harsh word there he was, back like a bouncing ball.
When I found out that he was the brother of Andrea in my class I felt slightly better disposed towards him, she was my favourite student, and their being siblings touched me in a way, although I didn’t really understand why it should.
‘Karl Ove, Karl Ove,’ he said, tugging at my coat.
‘Yes, what is it?’ I said. ‘And don’t pull at my coat!’
‘Can I go back into the classroom?’
‘What do you want to do?’
‘I forgot my flubber. I just want to get it. Please, please, please!’
‘No,’ I said, walking towards the football pitch.
He followed me.
‘If Torill had been on playground duty she would have let me,’ he said.
‘Do I look like Torill?’ I said.
He laughed. ‘No!’
‘Run along now,’ I said. ‘Scram!’
He ran off, slowed to a walk and stopped by five other children in his class, who were skipping just beyond the school wall.
A gust of wind blew across the pitch, whirled up sand and dust from the road, I blinked a few times to clear my eyes.
It was strange to think that dad had become a father again.
I turned and looked towards the school building. Two ninth-year girls came out of the door and set off down the hill. Both wearing tight blue jeans, white trainers and big jackets. One with dark hair pinned up at the back, the other with light brown permed hair and big curls that kept falling in front of her eyes and making her toss her head. She had such an elegant neck, long and white and slender. And such a fantastic bum.
No, I couldn’t walk around with such thoughts in my mind, I would end up going crazy or in prison.
I smiled, turned back and looked towards the usual gang playing football, across at the kids skipping, who seemed to be fine.
Oh no, Fatty was making a beeline for me.
‘Hi!’ he said, fixing me with his sad and happy eyes.
‘Hi,’ I said. ‘Have you been skipping?’
‘Yes, but I was out straight away.’
‘Life’s like that,’ I said.
‘Can I come to your flat today?’ he said.
‘My flat? Why?’
‘A little visit would be nice, wouldn’t it?’ he said.
I smiled. ‘Yes, that’s true. But today isn’t so good. I have to work, you see. But bring a friend along and drop by another day.’
‘OK,’ he said.
I took the watch from my pocket and checked the time.