The “fruit” tea turned out to be nothing but earl grey and fake fruit add-ins, its bitterness causing Nikita to swallow hard and look around him for a sip of water. In the Netherlands, he had gotten used to pouring sugary cake toppings on his toast and call it breakfast, but the addition of black tea to every meal was more than he could handle. To Nikita, food, drinks and experiences should vary between sweet and sour: just strictly one at a time. This mixing of bitter and not confused not only his taste buds but also his brain. An unnecessary travel complication that he worked hard to not let spoil his fun. Outside there were mostly clouds and intermittent snowing. And a roaring breeze all the time. Upon waking in the tastefully decorated hotel room, the first thing he heard was the wind, the some child either laughing or crying: how could he be sure which? Later he breakfasted to the wind, he walked around in it and he went to bed with it. Yet he hadn’t seen the beach because it required extra determination after what had happened with Mikos and the seagulls. Nikita thought hard. He had no choice but to get back into the saddle, not literally as he was afraid of horses, and to brave the ocean.

As Nikita climbed the final dune, the wind exploded from the open sea and drove tears into his eyes.  

Before all that there was the leftover garlic spaghetti, and the dollar bills, and that text message they failed to trace back to its sender. There were bracelets with turtles on them, and a number of other obscure fertility charms. There was evidence of a clean-up, two instances of a mess. There were stains, laundry, telephone calls on answering machines and a broken typewriter. Before everything else there was the excitement, and the rage, and the carelessness of the housesitter.

If I absolutely had to say whose fault it was, and I don’t really have to says my lawyer, then I’ll have to say it was Marisa’s own fucking fault. She was always up in our business at camp and always concerned about what we were and weren’t allowed to do. And we were like “Hello? who the fuck cares what is allowed and what isn’t. This isn’t kindergarten, we ‘ll do what we want.” So we did. But she freaked out about it literally every time. Lindsey told Marisa to just stay away from us then, but she came along anyways. Thing is, Marisa’s older brother was at camp as well, as a counselor. Lindsey had a thing for him so we was somehow nice to Marisa regardless. Marisa and her brother are pretty tight I guess. So even when she was annoying as heck Lindsey didn’t complain too much, even though both Nell and I told Marisa what we were really thinking.

It’s not our fault she still went with us to the stone bridge. We had met some guys earlier that week at the lake, some other campers, and Lindsey had told them to meet us. Four boys, three girls. When we arrived there were five guys though so that didn’t make much sense, but I thought, cool, I get to choose and I’m not taking the one with the glasses. Then Lindsey was all “don’t tell your brother” to Marisa. I guess she wanted to not seem like a whore to him, and Marisa said we should just go. The one guy laughed and I could see she was creeped out, but then another of the guys hit him on the arm and they reassured us they were alright and only here to make out.

I didn’t really care what Marisa’s brother would think of Lindsey or if Marisa would sleep with anybody, I wanted to make out with the tall one so I went over there and we went under the bridge. Next thing I hear Marisa screams and two guys run and Marisa was holding a stone in her hand. So Lindsey and I totally don’t know what’s going on but my guy was gone and I don’t have his fucking number. Marisa was sobbing, that stone in her hand and Larisa yells “You’re bleeding”, but it turns out it’s not even her own blood so what the hell.

We went back, Lindsey and me cussing Marisa out and her still crying and stammering something about a dude pinning her down. That’s the point! I get so upset, she keeps on whining and Lindsey tells me that Marisa’s shirt is ripped, so we throw the stone away, and I yell at Marisa to shut up and get her act together. She sobs and says something about telling her brother, and I freak out. I can’t have my parents know about this, and what if that dude whose blood she has on her shirt rats us out? So I grab her by the wrist and tell her “You keep your mouth shut! You shouldn’t have come anyway!” Marisa has a dark side to her or something I guess, because she suddenly talked back to me and being all rebel, trying to get away from me. So when I pushed her, I didn’t really know she was gonna hit her head on a root, you know, and get a concussion. She needn’t have ratted me out either. It’s not like we left her there, we called the camp counselors and paramedics and she was fine anyways. The guys we never heard back from either, so I don’t know if she was still a virgin or what happened, but you see now that I did nothing wrong, so why the fuck are you all getting on my case?

There is such a thing as loyalty in friendship, right? But Marisa clearly didn’t know about that one.

We are the impatient, those who stumble over their own legs and feet entangled in the process of history. Entangled in the events sequencing, events strung like silvery pearls on a string one right next to each other, then twisted until tiny hooks went into skin and their order is suddenly messed up, confused.
We are the hopeful still, uselessly enthralled with our own ideas and lacking perspective.
We are those licking the final drops out of every glass; that’s a wrap, folks! We say since we were raised on television shows and movie theater tickets. But when we hit the glass out of everybody else’s hands in rage and illegitimate envy, we stoop down immediately to pick up the pieces and apologize.
We are the middle-aged who cut out quotes from magazines and preserved them in our wallets. Hidden behind the organ donor information cards, the paper gets thinner with every breath we take.

Oh, Ophelia. At first, I try to overlook your presence and stuff my face with falsehoods all the same. A funny thing, these agreements: one has something in writing, but can’t bring himself to show that piece and be granted rights. The other has it all in words on air only, they traveled from mouth to ear and burrowed themselves in brain. What good can they do there? The metamorphosis from sound wave to meaning cannot be reversed, the one is left with stale letters on tongue and a helpless look in his eyes. The third decides to be smart and asks her to etch her resolution into his flesh. She refuses, laughing, and the assembly of tiny cuts and ink on his arm does not spell out her text. He waits for a physician and a diagnosis of blood poisoning. We have three fools, she says, who believe they have something on me, by me, to do something to me.

We feel misunderstood. Do you not, Ophelia, realize how gifted and useful we are?

I fucking hate the snow, I am burning up in here with the heater on and where did they bring all that tea? There is only so much sweet Turkish apple tea I can swallow before I am taken back to Europe where the languages mingle and crossing borders is easy in cars, on trains, only they don’t get what I am saying. And every day is spring break, maybe, because topless beaches and schnapps abound.

If that’s what you want, I can show you the memorials and the histories that mix and match and fight and make up and we could get a neat postcard collection out of this.

This continent is impossible to contain in a few sentences, each country a mystery to me, each advance in a bar tainted by my hampered language skills. That I am chasing experiences more than I am money is news even to me.

It would have been safer to entrust you with this information in person, speaking slowly into the sound of electro music. Now that I have written it, I have given you the power of betrayal. It had been in your hands before, yet up to now hearsay was on my side. I have opened up pandora’s box because there are only so many secrets one can keep. You have mine to help me bear. I can keep yours.

The natural place for these confessions is outside, at night, at a party or bar, sitting on the curb or standing next to trash cans. One doesn’t look each other into the eye until all has been said. Then both sip. One nods, maybe even says “wow.” Then the other suggests going back inside and both wonder what to do now. What follows is a silence between them until the waves have calmed and both wordlessly agree to never speak about it again.

“I haven’t had enough,” she cries and snatches the slim volume out of his hands. “When do you think you’ll be reading all these books? A couple over Christmas, yeah, I see that. But all these?” His words are accompanied by a grand gesture, a vast movement of his arms. They are looking at a hill made of the written word. Books strewn across the floor, and barely a spot to safely place a foot. “I need all of these,” she says with authority. He kicks against a volume of Gogol and she cringes. “Ok then, suit yourself.” Trampling all over her Rimbaud collection he carves a path for himself amids the sea of print. Where he has left open space she can sit down and dust the footprints off Edward Said.

Thursday nights at the citizen’s recreational center. The large auditorium is painfully unsuitable for their small group of readers. Their voices leave traces in the air whenever one of them speaks up to read a passage aloud. Eleanor dreads these reading moments and cannot wait for the kindergarten group to graduate and leave them their room.

Eleanor reads. During drawn-out meetings. On the bus. At the laundromat. In bed and on the couch and at her breakfast table. One reason: because she can. Because nobody can stop her, like her parents did in those power struggles over cereal and cold milk. Another reason: because what else is out there? The office and its coffee bar with colleagues? The theater filled with insensitive bastards coughing and laughing during a movie? A dysfunctional relationship with old parents, arrogant sisters and grumpy ex-lovers? A third reason: The book club. It makes sense to join a book club if one likes to read. Indeed, it made sense at the time, when they were still meeting at a coffeeshop and had lattes and Eleanor’s arm touched Adaline’s if they happened to sit next to each other. Then some people complained about the expenses and the group ended up here. No matter how close Eleanor aims to sit to Adaline, the venue is too big and she can now barely remember how Adaline’s soft skin and tiny hairs felt on Eleanor’s forearm.

On Thursday mornings she showers, makes tea and gets the good clothes from the cupboard. The good underwear in grey and with black lace. The pressed pants with rolled-up cuffs. The low cut top and the shiny ballet flats. Eleanor eats, packs lunch, checks her email, does her hair and make-up and sighs deeply at the thought of eight hours in my chair before book club. She sighs deeply at the thought of Adaline’s dark curls and deep laugh. Eleanor locks the door,greets the ancient Mr. Winters (please, Mr. Winters, do not die while I am away, preferably even less when I am at home) and walks briskly to the bus station. Traffic is a nightmare in London, so Eleanor has enough time to finish the book they’ll be discussing tonight. She always has enough time to read.

An excerpt from “The Bookclub”, courtesy oh my and elphyon

The boys, ten years old maybe, and who can tell these days when all are wearing the same earphones, carrying the same smartphones and don’t get me started on the hairstyles, so maybe they are ten or twelve even. Standing in line to throw the snowball at the passing streetcar, the bulkier one gets to go first. He misses, but it doesn’t matter because there’s more snow, always more snow, and his friend has better aim anyway.