Karl Knausgaard - Some Rain Must Fall

I was impressed by him, not least because he was two years younger than me. What I couldn’t work out though, as I walked along, was why he had invited me of all people to his place. Our department was full of interesting and well-read students and he had turned to the one person who had no depth and no insight into literature.

But I was glad he had. If I couldn’t live up to expectations right now I might be able to do so eventually.

At home there was a letter protruding from the crack between the door and the frame. I opened it. It was a notice to move. Owing to renovation work I would have to be out before the middle of December.

Was that legal?

Oh shit. I was living way beyond my means anyway. It was just as well. But I would have to get out and look for new accommodation.

I went to bed early, but woke to the sound of someone banging on the window. I got up and went over. It was Gunvor. She smiled and pointed to the door, I nodded and went to open up.

Five minutes later she crawled into the narrow bed beside me and the fullness of her breasts against my hands made my body explode with desire.

‘Not yet,’ she said. ‘But soon.’

I was more than lucky with the accommodation problem. It turned out that Jon Olav’s friend Ben had just moved out of a large four-room flat by Danmarksplass and no one had moved in yet. It had formerly belonged to the shipyard in Solheimsviken, it was an extension of the office buildings there and was now owned by a bank. I rang them, yes, the flat was free, I could move in, but I ought to know that the whole building was due to be demolished soon and I would have to be able to move out at a month’s notice. When would that be? Well, she didn’t know, not in the immediate future at any rate. I accepted, and one evening Gunvor and I went there, we were met by Ben and he showed us around the four rooms. There had been a whole gang of them living there, but the rent was so low that two could easily make ends meet. Originally there had been two flats: one with two rooms behind the kitchen and one with two rooms behind the bathroom. There were wall-to-wall carpets on the floors, they could be removed, apparently there were attractive wooden boards underneath, the windows were single-glazed, filthy from car fumes and the traffic noise from the flyover was tangible, but according to Ben you got used to it. The general condition of the place wasn’t good, the kitchen was old, the stove looked to be from the early 1960s, but there was a shower cabinet in the bathroom and the rent, as Ben reminded me, was low.

I was given the keys and he left.

Together with Gunvor I walked around the rooms once more. We hugged in the middle of the floor of what I had just decided would be the sitting room in my part.

‘Don’t you want to move in with me then?’ I said.

‘No,’ she said. ‘Absolutely not! But perhaps one day. Who knows what might happen!’

‘Then I’ll have to get hold of someone to live here. Do you know anyone who needs somewhere to live?’

‘No. But I can keep my ear to the ground. No girls, that’s all. I daren’t take any risks.’

‘You? You’ve got nothing to fear. Is that how you think? Is that true?’

She went over to the window. I followed her, stood behind her, kissed her neck and gently fondled her breasts.

‘What’s your favourite?’ she said.

‘Eh?’

‘Food. What’s your favourite food?’

‘Shrimps, I think. Why?’

‘I was just wondering.’

I pulled up the carpet in one room, cleaned away all the remnants of glue, levelled any uneven bits and painted it green like a ship’s deck. The few pieces of furniture I possessed Yngve brought in a van we hired, I would buy anything else I needed from Ikea when my study loan came in. He told me he had organised a rehearsal room, it was at Verftet, we could use it two nights a week. Fired up with enthusiasm, we talked about songs, lyrics and getting hold of a vocalist. The following day we met in a café at Verftet. Me with two pairs of drumsticks, him with a guitar case, Pål with a bass gig bag. I was nervous, I hadn’t played the drums since the early days at gymnas, and I couldn’t do much except for the absolute basics. Yngve was aware of this, it was less easy with Pål, who was probably expecting a proper jam session with three musicians.

‘Actually, I can’t play,’ I said. ‘Did Yngve tell you? I only fiddled around on the drums when I was at gymnas. Absolutely hopeless I am. But I can learn.’

‘Relax, Yngve Junior,’ Pål said. ‘It’ll be fine.’

Pål was tall and thin and pale with dark hair and a slightly childish attitude to life. He wasn’t exactly afraid to show his little quirks, it was more like he cultivated them. He was an eccentric and in Bergen was famous for having read poems during the student demos with bells in his hair. He read a little, shook his head to make the bells ring, then read a bit more. Explosion of cheering. He played in an experimental band that emerged from the Shit Tape cassette label in Arendal, they were called the Coalmine Five after the politician Kullmann Five presumably, he loved everything that was odd, weird, way out. Yngve and he had been in the same class at their first school, I had heard his name all my life, but I had only met him in the last year. He had published two collections of poetry through his own publishing house and was studying marine biology. In his early youth he had played with the Salvation Army, and as a bass player, Yngve said, he wasn’t your steady plodder but melodious, inventive, an improviser. It was obvious from the very first moment we started to play that he knew his stuff. That is, from the first moment they started to play. I was fazed. I sat on the chair with the drumsticks in my hand, behind the kit, all the drums and cymbals, the two of them standing on either side playing, and I didn’t dare make a move, I was too afraid of messing up.

They played ‘You Sway So Sweetly’. Pål tried various fingerings, he was searching for something, and once he had it, it stayed while he went off on other forays, came back with new lines and then he was off again until he was happy and the song was in place.

Yngve stopped and looked at me.

‘Come on then,’ he said.

‘Play yourselves in,’ I said. ‘Then I can hear how it goes.’

They did. When they were about halfway I tentatively started to play. I should be able to keep the beat anyway, even if not much else was right.

‘That was good, Karl Ove,’ Pål said. ‘But try to get the bass drum to fall in with the bass. I can mark it for you. DUM dum DUM DUM dum. OK?’

‘And play a bit louder,’ Yngve said. ‘We can hardly hear you.’

I blushed and played and hoped this would soon be over. Pål looked at me and his whole upper body rose whenever the beat on the bass drum was imminent. After a while he turned away and just played, but then there was eye contact and raised shoulders again.

We continued for two hours with the same song, over and over again. It was all about getting me on board, of course they had it off pat. After we had finished for the day and they were starting to roll up the cables and pack the boxes and straps, my shirt was drenched.

‘You’d better find someone else,’ I said.

‘Not at all,’ said Yngve. ‘It’ll be great.’

‘That went really well,’ Pål said. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. All we need now is a vocalist and a name for the band. I suggest Misc M. Then we’ll always have our own section in record shops.’

‘I was thinking of Odd & Bent,’ Yngve said. ‘That works in both English and Norwegian.’

‘Sounds like a description of a dick,’ I said.

‘Speak for yourself,’ Yngve said.