Karl Knausgaard - Dancing in the Dark

On our last night everyone was outdoors; we started with a barbecue on the beach, the group leaders had bought beer, and when that was finished we took a taxi to a big restaurant in a forest not so far from where we were staying. She was coming, she had said, and she did too, greeted me in the same warm way she usually did, stretching up on her toes, giving me a kiss and grasping my hand. We sat down at a table, I was knocking back the wine to summon up the courage for what I was about to attempt. In the bar I confided my intentions to Jøgge and Bjørn, told them I was going to try to get her into our room and fuck her. They smiled, wished me luck. It was a wonderful evening, outside the greyish-black clouds hung heavily over the green trees, inside under the glittering chandeliers people mingled, they drank and laughed and danced, there was a smell of sweat and perfume, cigarette smoke and alcohol, she sat at our table and talked to Harald, but kept looking in my direction and she lit up when she saw me coming with another bottle of wine in my hand. My stomach ached as I sat down next to her. She leaned forward, we kissed, I was about to pour wine in her glass, she held up a palm, she had to work the following day. She had a sudden idea: did I want to go back to hers? But we’re leaving tomorrow, I said. No, she said, no, you’re not. You’re never going home, you’re staying here with me. You can go to school here! Or find a job! What do you say to that? Fine, I said, that’s what we’ll do.

We laughed and a wave of anguish washed through me: soon we would be in my room, soon she would be standing close to me and whispering, convinced I knew what I was doing.

‘Fancy going for a walk?’ I said.

She nodded.

‘What about the wine?’ she said.

‘We’ll be back,’ I said and got up. Put my hand on her shoulder and guided her out of the room. Turned and met the eyes of Jøgge and Bjørn, they gave me a thumbs-up and smiled. Then we were outside.

She looked up at me.

Where are we going?

Into the forest? I said. I took her tiny hand in mine and we set off. I had already kissed her breasts, on a bench I had put my head up her jumper and kissed everything I found, she had laughed and held me tight. This was what I did with girls, lay on top of them, smooched with them and kissed their breasts. Once I had pulled down a girl’s panties and poked a finger inside, that was already two years ago now.

A shiver ran through me.

‘What is it?’ she said, wrapping an arm around me. ‘Are you cold?’

‘A bit maybe,’ I said. ‘It’s turned colder.’

The big heavy clouds that had been drifting in and were now over the forest had cast a pall over the gathering darkness between the tree trunks. A gusty wind had picked up. Above us the top branches swayed.

Blood was pounding through me.

I swallowed.

‘Would you like to see where we’re staying?’ I said.

‘Yes, love to.’

The moment she said that I had an erection. It pressed hard against my trousers. I swallowed again.

In the dusk the light in the buildings where we were staying was a deep yellow. It collected around the lamps in haloes. I felt sick and my palms were damp with sweat. But I was going to do it.

I stopped and put my arms around her, we kissed, her tongue was smooth and small. My dick was throbbing so much it hurt.

‘It’s over there,’ I whispered. ‘Are you sure you want to go in with me?’

A flicker of wonderment appeared in her eyes. But she said nothing apart from yes.

I took her hand again, squeezed it hard and we walked quickly over the last two hundred metres. Hugged her again outside the unmanned reception area, almost suffocating with desire. Down the corridor to the room I shared with three others. Key out, into the lock with trembling hand, a twist, handle down, door open and in we went.

‘You back already, Karl Ove?’ Jøgge said with a laugh.

‘Have you brought a visitor with you?’ Bjørn said.

‘How nice!’ Harald said. ‘Would you like a beer, Lisbeth?’

There was nothing I could say. They were my room-mates and had just as much right to be there as me. Nor could I say that they had run back here out of sheer bloody-mindedness, or the cat would have been out of the bag, and although Lisbeth may well have guessed my plans, this was not the sort of thing that could be said out loud. Or at least not when the others were here, what would she think, that I was making fun of her?

‘What the hell are you lot doing here?’ I said.

Jøgge smiled. ‘What are you two doing here?’

I glared at him. He was doubled up with laughter on the bed.

Harald passed Lisbeth a beer. She took it and smiled at me.

‘How funny that your friends came too,’ she said.

What? Did she mean that?

She looked around. ‘Anyone got a fag?’

‘We’re footballers,’ Harald said. ‘Only Karl Ove smokes.’

‘Here,’ said Bjørn, tapping out a Prince Mild from his packet and passing it to her.

Such a wonderful opportunity as this would not come up again for several years. And they had ruined it out of pure devilry.

Lisbeth put her hand in my back pocket and moved close to me. My dick was like a crowbar again. I sighed.

‘Here’s a beer, Karl Ove,’ Jøgge said. ‘It was just a bit of fun.’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Very funny.’

He writhed with laughter again.

We stayed there for half an hour. Lisbeth chatted with all of them. After we had finished the beers we went back to the restaurant. Lisbeth left at one, the rest of us stayed until early morning. The next day I met her briefly, we exchanged addresses and she started to cry. Not much, there were only a few tears running down her cheeks. I hugged her. Lisbeth, I said. We can meet in Løkken before very long. It’s only a ferry trip away for me. Can you make it, do you think? Yes, she said and smiled through the tears. I’ll write to you so that we can organise the details, OK? Yes, she said. We kissed, and when I turned round she was standing there watching me.

The Løkken idea was nonsense of course, just something I had said to lighten the atmosphere. She was nothing to me, I was in love with Hanne and had been all winter and spring. Everything had been about her, all I wanted was to be close to her, not to sleep with her, not even in the hope of a kiss or a caress, no, that wasn’t it, it was the light and the excitement I was filled with when I saw her that attracted me and which I occasionally thought was not of this world, it came down to us from another world. How else could it be explained? She was a normal girl, there had to be thousands of girls like her, but she alone, by being exactly the way she was, could make my heart tremble and my soul glow. Once that spring I had knelt down on the tarmac before her and asked her to marry me. She was pushing a bicycle, it was dark and raining, we were walking up by the blocks of flats in Lund, and when I did it she just laughed. She thought I was playing the fool.

‘Don’t laugh,’ I said. ‘I mean it. In all seriousness. We can get married. We can move to a house on an island and stay there, just you and me. We can do that! No one can stop us if that’s what we decide to do.’

She laughed again, that wonderful trilled laugh of hers.

‘Karl Ove!’ she said. ‘We’re only sixteen!’

I got up.

‘I know you don’t want to,’ I said. ‘But I mean it. Do you understand? You’re the only girl I think about. You’re the only girl I want to be with. Should I act as if this didn’t exist?’

‘But I’m going out with someone else. You know that very well!’

‘Yes, I do,’ I said.

I didn’t need reminding. She only went on these walks with me because she felt flattered and because I was so different from the other boys she knew. Any hope that one day I would be going out with her, that was gone, nevertheless I didn’t give up, I never would. So, standing on the deck of the Danish ferry, with the wind blowing in my hair, squinting into the low afternoon sun, surrounded by blue sea on all sides, I was thinking about Hanne and not Lisbeth.