by Paddy Kelly
Why couldn't it be more like Ireland? If you bought a flat there you actually owned it and just paid for some nameless serf to turn up every week and keep the building in order. In Sweden you did kind of own your flat, but not really. What you actually owned was a share of the building, and you were expected to get involved in events like this to make up for the fact that nobody said as much as hello to you for the rest of the year.
But why now? Why today?
"Crap," Rob said, still squinting through the letterbox. He was becoming resigned to the idea of hiding under his bed all afternoon when suddenly he spotted his chance.
His neighbour Annika was making for his door, sweeping a wide mop from side to side as she approached. Annika was all right, and he was fairly sure she fancied him, so she'd be perfectly willing to help him make his escape.
When she drew level with his door he cracked it open and hissed her name. She looked up in surprise and gave a sly grin when she saw half of his face peering out. He invited her in with a jerk of his head. Her eyes widened and she glanced around before balancing the mop against the wall and slipping in through the door.
Rob closed the door and shoved his sports bag out of the way with his foot as he turned on the light.
"You are not cleaning, Rob?" she said, giving him what could only be interpreted as a naughty grin. "We thought you were not home. I told them you were probably in the church."
He stared at the woman standing in his little hall, not sure if she was joking or not. She was not unattractive, Annika, with her (probably dyed) blonde hair, white-rimmed glasses and sizeable breasts, all on a wiry, well-trained frame. She was somewhere in her mid-thirties, but Rob had never really cared exactly where that was since the grey zone after twenty-nine was not an area in which he was particularly experienced, or interested, when it came to females.
"Um, yeah, church. Sure, I never miss it, have a season ticket, me. Look, how long more are they out there for?"
"Some hours,” she said, shuffling closer to him. “Olle is in charge. He showed us a timetable. It is very extensive."
Rob groaned, one of those true, painful, heartfelt groans. Olle was the most irritating man in the world, a bald, arrogant, red-faced autocrat who always spoke to you as if he were addressing an auditorium without a microphone even if you were standing in front of him. As an unshakeable member of the residents association, Olle simply had to be in charge of everything and he loved ordering people about as if he had a God-given right to do so.
Rob heard his voice now, booming from the depths of the building as he bellowed orders at some poor sod concerning chairs and the proper way in which to move and/or stack them. If Olle saw him he was finished. He wouldn't get away from the building until nightfall, or possibly dawn.
Annika prodded her glasses flush against her face. "So you don't want to do cleaning? They won't be happy."
"Yeah, I know, but I forgot what day it was, and I have other things to do. Very important things."
"Hmm," Annika said, studying him in a way that he did not find altogether comfortable. "But you live on the first floor. Just climb down."
Rob thought about this. "Well it's a bit far to jump. No point going to play bandy with broken ankles, you know?"
Annika raised a finger and pursed her lips. "Wait, I have it! Just hang on!"
She slipped out though the door, leaving Rob to stand around brushing hairs from his jacket and checking his watch. Barely a minute later she knocked on his door and Rob let her in. She was holding what appeared to be a ball of rope, and he studied it with suspicion.
"It's a rope ladder. You know, if there is fire, and you escape."
"You have a rope ladder in your flat?" Rob said. "But … why?"
"Why? For times like now, when it becomes useful! We hang it from your balcony and trip-trap down you go! But Rob." She lowered her voice and tilted her head. "Then you must do something for me."
Oh hell, he thought, here it comes. Now she asks for money, or emotional support, or help with doing her wallpaper. Maybe it's sex she's after, and that could probably be managed, if it's just the once, and nobody found out about it. Although—he glanced at his watch again—things were running on rather a tight schedule.
"I have a midsummer party, and I would like you to come. You have something planned?"
Rob smiled politely and shook his head, since she was clearly holding all the cards here, and the card box, and the little plastic wrapper the box came in. It looked like he was on his way to her party.
Her eyes sparkled. "Good then! Everybody comes at one, and we drink a little, and then we all go to the park. It will be great!"
He nodded. Sure, it'll be great, especially as her dull friends would be there and he couldn't leave early with the excuse of having to travel home, since he would already be home. Oh well, that was a future worry, and right now it was getting late and this escape needed to be put into action.
"Great, then I show you," Annika said. "Come!"
She made her way through the living room and Rob felt a wince of embarrassment at the mess. Not any greater mess than normal, just a greater mess than the average person would ever have to deal with in their lives.
At least there were no magazines of a questionable moral nature lying open anywhere. Or, at least, he hoped not.
Annika pulled open the door to the French balcony. She tossed out the rope ladder, fixed the two big hooks to the metal frame, and stood back with a flourish.
"All ready. You go, I pull it back up. How do I lock your door?"
Rob shook his head. "Oh don't worry about it, what is there to steal? I'll just lock it when I get home."
He dashed back to the hall to get his sports bag, which he dropped from the balcony. It landed with a thump of dust and dry leaves. With Annika's help he manoeuvred himself onto the rope ladder. It wasn't very stable but with careful steps, and some panicked grabbing, he made it the short distance to the ground.
The door to the basement at the back of the building was open, and he could hear people moving around inside to the steady drone of Olle's voice, like slaves rowing a galley. He swept up his bag and waved a thank-you to Annika who was already pulling up the rope ladder.
"See you next Friday then!" she said cheerily and disappeared inside his flat, closing the balcony door behind her.
Rob went into stealth mode and moved off, hugging the corner of the building with his bag balanced on his shoulder to hide his face.
Just perfect—a dull party he was practically forced to attend. He'd been planning to just go out the night before midsummer and sleep the whole day away like he'd done with the previous two. Instead he'd have to entertain Annika and her boring friends and do his best to avoid the clutches of her middle-aged fingers.
Feeling quite sorry for himself, he slipped around the corner and took the long way to the subway station to avoid any chance of being spotted from his building. Now he was looking forward to forgetting his woes in a sweaty, violent game of indoor hockey and, more importantly, in the long, meandering beer evening that invariably followed.
“Come on, it's a party! We'll be in the park, and they'll be doing that frog dance, and there'll be people slippin' off behind the bushes and getting up to all sorts. It'll be brilliant!”
Eamonn shook his head. “Nah, it sounds kind of stupid. I'll just watch the telly or head down the pub.”
Rob drained his Guinness, trying to decide if it was worth pressing Eamonn a bit harder, or if he should just give up and turn his attention to Andy or Brian.
He put the empty pint glass down, pushing aside some older glasses to make room. The Shamrock was one of those bars where they didn't remove the glasses as they are emptied, and Rob liked it that way. It gave one a sense of accomplishment, having the night's hard work arranged upon the table. But it also served as a stern reminder. When the physical space on the table was running low it was clearly time to think about taking it easy. Or maybe time to move to a bigger table.
<
br /> “Come on Eamonn, I'm offerin' food, booze and nice women. And you just want to sit around at home and watch the telly?”
Eamonn fished around inside a crisp packet. Finding nothing, he extracted his fingers and slurped the salt from them instead.
“Well what's the whole idea with midsummer anyway? I don't get it.”
“It's a big fuck-off party, that's the idea! Just come along to a real midsummer, see how it is. They're nice people, lovely people. Go on now, tell him Andy!”
Andy leaned back and cracked his arms noisily behind his head.
“Rob, I've met your neighbour. Remember the New Year’s party, she got me in the corner and talked at me about her dead cat for half an hour? Had me ready to jump off the balcony and end it all.”
Rob shot him a look of daggers. Andy smiled back and shrugged.
“All I'm saying is, you sold your soul to this lady for a rope ladder so now you're gonna have to bite the bullet. Or whatever else she offers to be bitten.”
Andy Quirley was a nice guy but he had a sadistic streak in him, most evident when he was shoving you hard up against a wall during a bandy game. Sometimes Rob felt like tugging at his beard and slapping him repeatedly on his bald head in a Benny Hill manner, just to see what he'd do. He never did though, because Andy also had very big fuck-off muscles and looked like he knew how to use them.
Eamonn Dee, on the other hand, would only hurt a fly if the fly had forgotten to get its round in, or had conned him in a deal involving cattle. He was a wiry flap-eared lad from the wilds of County Mayo, not long in Sweden, and not exactly the kind of person you'd be all excited about bringing to a party.
Rob was desperate though. He just couldn't show up at a party by himself, and the list of possible candidates was growing short. He turned to Brian, his last hope, with as pathetic a look as he could muster. Brian raised his hand and cut him off before he had even inhaled.
“Sorry mate, I have to polish my ash-trays. And I have a whole pile of ash-trays, let me tell you.”
“Oh come on Brian, the café won't even be open on midsummer, will it? What can ye possibly be up to that's more fun than a party with people ye don't know?”
“I like it when you include the answer to a question in the actual question,” Brian said with a wise nod. “Very thoughtful. Saves time for all involved.”
Rob shook his head and scanned the bar, looking for somebody, anybody, he knew well enough to bring along. But he drew a blank. He pulled out his mobile and while Eamonn kept Brian and Andy entertained with some stupid story about a bus he clicked his way through his contact book. The As and Bs produced nothing but a few annoyed grunts, but when he came to E, his finger hovered.
Eoin? Who the hell was … oh right, the guy from Malone's a few weeks ago, with the fat date! Well they weren't exactly friends, but that night had turned out fairly well, after they'd got past the hatred and such. He was a dry bugger though. But still—dry party, Annika's dry friends, and dry Eoin. Could be a perfect combo!
He wrote a friendly text message, sent it off, and turned his attention back to his bar companions.
“Now there's an idea for your web business, Rob,” Andy said, eager to steer the conversation away from buses. “You need somebody to take to a social engagement? Hey, you just go on this site and find somebody else with nothing to do!”
“They have those already,” Rob said drily. “And they're called escort agencies. Or haven't ye heard about them?”
“No, I meant for free. Just lots of bored people, you know, out there looking for something to do. You could even do an iPhone app, sure you could!”
“Still sounds like an escort service to me. Or a kinky dating site, and there's already lots of them. Not that I'd know, or anything. Plus I'd never be able to make a better one, not this fast anyway.”
“So I take it your brilliant idea is still at the planning stage?” Brian said. “All those free cappuccinos just wasted?”
Rob flipped down his sunglasses and clasped his hands on the table. “I'd tell ye, but then I'd have to kill ye.”
Andy laughed. “You're a rubbish man in black, Rob. Good at avoiding questions though, I'll give you that.”
Rob's mobile beeped. He read the message and gave a surprised but satisfied grunt. So it seemed Eoin was on, in a half-arsed and unenthusiastic kind of way. Not a huge victory, really, getting a recently divorced single father to go to a party, but it took the pressure off him, and that was good enough.
“Seriously though,” he said as he tucked his mobile away. “I have a short-list of ideas, and I just have to pick out the best one. Things are takin' off any day now!”
Brian shrugged and raised his pint. “I guess we'll have to take the man's word for it. Here’s to things taking off any day now!”
Andy and Eamonn lifted their pints. Rob smiled and clunked his glass against each of them before taking a creamy swig. He put the glass down and kept his smile in place, while behind the foamy moustache and bravado he was fully aware that he wasn’t quite as far along as he should be.
In fact, he hadn't done anything at all on his killer site, beyond making a few lists with ideas, most of which he had lost. Being behind in this race was an understatement. Rob was still only lacing up his shoes at the starting line.
He would get down to it, though. Immediately, if not sooner. It was becoming too much work to lie to people about his progress. It was just a series of basic steps, to be taken in a certain order. First, find an idea that resonated. Then find somebody willing to work on it with him. Then program it and get people to actually use the thing. Finally, he'd need the users to somehow pay him to use it, and all that in only seven months.
Andy launched into a story about a girl he was dating, and Rob nodded along, laughing with the others at the sleazy bits. His grin was still pasted in place and he took another sip of his Guinness just so he could relax his mouth for a moment.
He seriously had to get this project moving. Otherwise all this smiling would end up giving him a heart attack.
Chapter 7
Eoin arrived at the door to Rob's flat at ten minutes to one on midsummer afternoon. He was carrying, as instructed, a bottle of red wine, a nice bunch of tulips and a fat wedge of Danish Blue. He pressed the bell and stood back.
Rob opened the door wearing nothing but a threadbare blue bathrobe and a look of blurry confusion. “What, already? Yer kidding me. Shite.”
Rob charged back in and Eoin, not knowing what else to do, followed him. He watched as Rob began extracting clothes from unlikely locations and throwing them on, removing wrinkles, crumbs and stains on the fly.
Eoin found a corner to stand in, feeling very much out of place. This whole thing had been a bad idea, and he'd known it all along. He didn't know Rob's neighbours—or Rob either, for that matter—and he wasn’t good with new people, especially in a party environment. But Alice had got it into her head that this would be good for him, and things that Alice got into her head usually got out of her head and into reality fairly quickly. That's just how it went, and so here he was.
His gaze drifted to Rob's computer. There were several windows open and the main one displayed code that he recognised as CSS. As small talk went, programming was fairly rubbish but it was better than nothing.
“So you're making a website then?”
Rob glanced over. “Yeah, well, I have a few ideas.” He paused for a moment, looking thoughtful. “Ever do anything like that yerself?”
Eoin shook his head. “A bit. I mean, I work as a technical project leader, so I know the basics. Big systems though, business support and—”
“Ah, right,” Rob said, now busy flattening sections of his dark brown hair with globs of wax. Once that had been applied, he dashed out to the hall where he opened and closed a few doors, making a great deal of noise about it. He stepped back into the room, buttoning a shirt, all ready to go.
Eoin looked at his watch and saw the whole process had taken Rob about se
ven minutes. That was how long it would take Eoin to just pick out his socks.
“Well come on then, what're ye waiting for, a taxi?”
Eoin followed him into the hall. “Right then,” Rob said, and held up a straining purple bag filled with clinking bottles. “Here's the drink and some of that fish-in-a-jar stuff, and you've got the rest. So let's get out there and meet the ladies, yeah? Are we ready?”
Eoin blinked, worried for a moment that he was expected to deliver a high five, or a fist bump. Thankfully it didn't happen, and a nod sufficed.
They crossed the corridor. The door to Annika's flat was open and before they even pressed the bell she dashed out to greet them. She was very enthusiastic as she shook Eoin's hand. He couldn't help noticing her breasts had been arranged optimally in a tight yellow dress, and he tried very hard to not stare at them.
“So glad you could make it Rob! And you Eoin, nice to meet some friend of Rob's at last. Except for them I bump into on Sunday morning when she's on her way home!”
Eoin kept on grinning, hoping he didn't look insane. When she turned her back to take care of the gifts they'd brought, Rob nodded towards the kitchen where a big punch bowl stood on the counter. Eoin nodded with enthusiasm and they hurried towards it like dying men in a desert.
“Cheers then,” Rob said, plastic cup in hand. “It might be a long day, so we should start as we mean to go on. When duty calls, I'm not the man to turn on my heel, never let it be said!”
“I suppose,” Eoin said. “And what do you mean, duty?”
Rob paused in his drinking and smiled sheepishly. “Oh. Well, nothing really. It's just, you know, Annika did me a favour, so I kind of agreed to come to her party.”
“Oh, right” said Eoin. “I see.”
Great, he thought. Not only was he the pity guest, but he was the pity guest of somebody who had actually been obliged to come. Could it be any worse?
