I open the door, prepared to be cross with him but he launches himself at me out of the midnight darkness, all wild hair and leather and bone crushing hugs and I can’t remember why I was mad in the first place.
“Okay. You’re going to have to figure out how to move around the house with me hugging you because I am not letting you go,” he declares in that adorably boyish manner of his.
“B-b-but! I have to go to the bathroom!” I cry in mock distress as we begin …

I bend over the bar. For her, not for drinks. She says: “Finnish”; and it all starts right there.
“Finnish”, I smile. “Finnish” I wonder and I smile. F-i-n-n-i-s-h, I let it drup in, drup, drup,
drup, letter for letter.
“Lapland”, I think;
“Cold”;
“Foreign affairs” (I just read an article that mentioned the Finland model, questioning myself
what that could be);
“Somewhere north”;
“Cold”?!;
“Bears”? No, no bears I believe, and I smile.
I take another sip of my Friday eve beer. It’s a pity for those bears, I like bears. Maybe I
should go to Greenland and find some …

Laetitia is wearing colorful socks, a bit like mine, but wilder. Women have more choice when it comes to socks. Women have more choice in general. Her socks are pinky with yellow and green spots. I noticed those colors immediately, I’d describe them as bright little monsters devouring the pink. I am sure she disagrees with that statement. She ‘d call them cute little things. She is a girl. We disagree a lot, and often. Yet I fall about those raised eyebrows on her face, over and over. She chuckles, …

She plays, ten fingers running up and down the ivories, filling the audience room with music. She sits straight, very straight, it is part of the technique. I feel a smile growing on me, stupidly happy, as if I am still surprised to find us here, almost every day for weeks now. I just love this moment: her piano on stage, Eline totally drawn in herself, that very same spotlight, the empty chairs, and me, watching from the silent dark. It is like a movie, and I feel part of …

‘Pay attention to me when I’m talking,’ she raged.
Her husband flung his hands from the steering wheel in disgust. ‘Want us to have an accident?’
‘You do know her!  Admit it!’
He stopped at a red light.
‘I’m so so sad,’ his new wife flicked long fingers up to her eyes to wipe away the tears that had started falling.  ‘‘You swore you loved me.’
‘Of course I love, you I married you didn’t I,’ he reassured.
The lights turned green and he continued driving.
‘But you’re still seeing her.  Her with the too tight skirts …

I heard her voice. I turned my head toward the main entrance door, attempting to identify where the voice was coming from. She spoke again.
“It’s my mother!” I exclaimed, racing to the door, as my husband remained on the couch, confused.
I was excited as I realized my mother had come to visit. I opened the door. She was on the front yard. She seemed in no rush to come in the house. She was too entertained with the unkempt rose bushes that had grown everywhere about the yard.
Mom! I approached …