Chapter 3

“So, you are watching Rita,” she turned to the television, “I have a crush on Mille Dinesen, if only she had been my teacher.”

“You look a bit like her,” Donna chuckled, “just younger.”

“I knew there was something I liked about you,” she eyed me, “so, we are hungry, ja?”

“Ja,” I rose, “so, what is on the menu?”

“It is the lucky dip,” she replied.

Our second date was not unlike the first in that we weren’t actually alone and then Anina told me the unspoken rules before we got there.

“You are supposed to speak to the person on either side of you, even if it is just a few words, this is a community event and while we value your privacy we want to know your name.”

Thus because I was seated next to her I spoke to the man at my side and the woman on the other side of the table. The dinner was held in an old church that had been sold back to the community and was now used for community events. Anina paid my fifty kronor for the meal, which is a true bargain in Copenhagen and we settled down to a meal of fresh salmon and some kind of salad followed by cake of course!

Afterwards, because Anina was a true local we stayed on to chat with some of her friends who all wanted to know more about Australia and in particular Melbourne, which is south of Sydney and about the same size as well. No, I hadn’t been to Uluru but I’d been up and down the east coast and as far west as Adelaide. Overall I was left with the impression that they were fascinated with the country but couldn’t quite come to terms with its actual size.

“It’s bigger than you think,” I explained to Anina as we made our way back home, “you could fit Denmark inside my home state twice over.”

“But we have the largest island.”

“Have you ever been to Greenland?”

“No,” she frowned, “and it is a shitty thing to say because it would be a fascinating place.”

“I’d like to go there one day.”

“To Greenland?” Anina looked at me as we came to a halt, “well, maybe one day I will go, it is on my list,” she looked up at her flat.

“I am up there, do you want to come up?”

“Um,” I paused and bit my lip, “okay, you can show me your red room.”

“Hah,” she snorted as we started forward, “I fell asleep during that film.”

“Damn, I was hoping to compare notes.”

Anina’s flat was what I would call an organised mess in that there were piles of stuff spread about but you could still sit down and put your feet up and Anina was able to tidy up in a short space of time anyway.

“If I thought you were coming to my apartment I would have tidied up.”

“I’m glad you didn’t,” I replied, “because now I see the real you.”

“And that is a good thing or a bad thing?”

“You aren’t so messy, it’s just organised clutter. My mum is very organised and I’m very much my mother’s daughter these days but I wasn’t when I was younger.”

“What changed you?” Anina asked.

“The cancer,” I replied as I followed her into the kitchen, “maybe it was just my way of taking control, at least that’s what my therapist suggested but I went from being messy to organised,” I propped against the bench.

“I guess that’s one good thing to come out of it.”

“There is always something,” she turned to the coffee pot, “coffee?”

“There are biscuits in the cupboard,” she pointed, “I would offer you a wine but I have to work in the morning so I need a clear head.”

“So, what made you want to be a cop?”

“Jodie Foster,” she smiled crookedly.

“Ja, I saw Silence of the Lambs a few times and when I wasn’t lusting over Clarice Starling I was fantasizing about catching crooks but I found out there is a big difference between television cops and real cops.”

“But you’re still here though.”

“Ja, I am here. Once my head caught up with my ass I decided to make the most of it, I want to move up into criminal investigation soon.”

“So you could be the Danish version of Agent Starling.”

“You never know,” she opened another cupboard door and took out a plate, “do you have milk and sugar?”

“So, tell me, why did you decide to learn Danish?”

“It was while I was in treatment,” I started putting biscuits on the plate, “you can drive yourself crazy with all the things you should have done before you got sick or you can go out and do the things you always wanted to do. Mum was a bit reluctant at first but she soon came around and it drew us closer together.”

“I am glad I met you,” Anina flicked the switch on the coffee pot, “you seem to have suffered so much and yet you were able to come out the other side a little stronger. There are those out there who have not suffered nearly so badly but all you hear are complaints because things did not go their way. We have it here and I think it must be the same in Australia.”

“Oh it is,” I arranged the biscuits on the plate, “we had drug addicts coming into the pharmacy part of the hospital to get their morphine, you used to hear them outside arguing about stupid shit,” I picked up the plate, “but we can’t control other people, we can only control ourselves.”

Anina seemed to be in her own little world as she settled down beside me a few minutes later and for a few minutes we kept up the small talk until we finally got to my own personal history and it was thanks to my earlier confession to Rie that I came out with my history with David. It had felt a little easier with Rie because we’re related but telling Anina all about David felt a little dangerous because of the obvious connotations. However Anina was silent for about half a minute or so after I’d finished talking.

“It is not so unusual,” she finally spoke out, “when people are suffering many people try to think of something wise to say or make wild promises they cannot keep. Sometimes it is just best to keep your mouth shut until your brain is engaged. My maternal grandmother died of cancer when I was only ten but while she was sick I used to visit her with my mother just to sit with her. There were family members who said she shouldn’t expose me to such a thing so young but her argument was that my grandmother needed company not words of advice,” she nudged me.

“That’s the way it was with Tess,” I replied, “she used to just come and sit with me and I at first it made me feel awkward because I was feeling like shit and didn’t always want company but she just changed tactics and brought in a drawing pad and did her designs or even a book. Eventually I had to acknowledge she was wiser than me.”

“If only our leaders could say those words.”

“Huh?” I came to myself with a start.

“To admit that you don’t know or that someone knows more than us. You see them on television trying to convince the rest of us that they know what they are doing but they are lying, we know they are lying but they still keep lying. How easy would it be to just throw your hands in the air and admit that you need help?”

“Yeah, too right,” I murmured.

“So,” she nudged my hand, “what do you need help with?”

“What?” I blinked, “um,” I looked at the television and she turned the sound down, “nothing I was just thinking about David and the fact that I haven’t you know?”

“Had sex with a man since?”

“Had sex with anyone,” I replied, “it’s not like I don’t have the urge but it’s like part of me has been turned off.”

“Your sex drive is not controlled by your uterus or lack of a uterus,” she angled towards me, “the most erogenous part of your anatomy is not your breasts, your vagina or your legs. It is a part you will never ever see,” she tapped her forehead.

“It is the mind, the desire is born in the mind and it acts on the rest of our body if we let it. Some women go through what you did and they become sexual animals and fuck anything with a pulse but others seem to reject sex because they cannot have a child,” she paused.

“I have always thought it is better to be in the middle, sex is not everything. We are not having sex twenty four hours a day but we should also not reject our sexual desires. Just look at the Catholic church, they deny priests and nuns the right to have sex and then wonder why there is so much sexual abuse in the church. Denying your desires is not healthy, they are there to be filled, it lets you know you are human and alive.”

I’d heard that before back in Australia from my doctor, Agnetha and mum had said similar things but it’s funny that it took a relative stranger on the other side of the world to breach the walls I’d built around my heart. I remember leaning forward and blinking as I exhaled slowly and then Anina’s hand went to the small of my back and I felt the stirrings of desire even though it was a neutral gesture. There was warmth in that touch and intimacy, eventually I leaned back against the couch and Anina’s arm shifted to the top of the couch.

“Agnetha once said once that intimacy is not something we do between the sheets, and very often that’s where it ends.”

“I like that proverb,” Anina nudged me with her other hand, “can I borrow it?”

“Of course,” I looked over at her, “borrow away.”

Her right arm was still on top of the couch and her left hand rested on her thigh, I noticed a ring on her finger. It had an emerald set into the ring and I traced my finger over it.

“Who gave you the ring?”

“An old girlfriend,” she murmured, “although she and I were never serious, we fucked of course but we were better off as friends. It is a birthstone and I wear it because we are still friends.”

“Hjordis, you met her when you gave your statement at the police station the other day, she saw my name on the report and called me to confirm your side of the story.”

“Oh,” I smiled crookedly, “she didn’t strike me as being that way inclined, not that I’m an expert by any stretch of the imagination.”

“She isn’t gay, Hjordis experimented and I was one of the women she slept with but she moved onto men and she and I stayed friends. I respected her because she was always honest.”

“I’m not entirely sure I’m gay either.”

“You don’t have to be gay to sleep with a woman,” she chuckled, “sex is a dance between two people that usually involves taking off your clothes but not always,” she slapped my thigh, “but I have an afternoon shift tomorrow. We should do this again some time.”

“Yeah,” I shifted slightly “so I guess I should go.”

“Nobody says you have to go,” she pulled her arm from the top of the couch.

“There is room in the bed if you want or you can sleep on the couch, it is very comfortable, but I have to piss,” she rose.

It was that rather abrupt attempt to defuse the situation that weighed heavily on my mind as I too sat on the toilet seat some five minutes later. This wasn’t the first time since David when I’d been in a situation where things could have gone further but it was the first time I’d been so far from home and with someone I was attracted to. I guess what I’m trying to say is that there was no easy exit for me, although I was only a short bike ride from auntie Åsa’s place. Nevertheless when I came back to the couch it looked as if Anina was certainly set on having me sleep on the couch because she’d unfolded it and was busy tucking a sheet into place. I helped put the duvet down and then knelt on the sofa bed and stared past her as I tried to formulate an answer that wasn’t an invitation.

“What is this Danish custom about sleeping together without being in a relationship?”

“Huh?” Anina’s eyes shifted.

“I mean,” I raised my hand in defence and then lowered.

“You are wanting to have sex?”

I moved further onto the sofa bed and pulled my trainers off at the same time.

“Måske,” I used the Danish word for maybe, “I find it… confusing,” I finally finished.

“It is like buying a car,” she knelt on the edge of the bed, “you would not buy a car without first driving it, so it is with sex but it is not so much a Danish tradition as a part of the human condition. We have the moralists who try to force everyone into their mode of thinking, that the first time you have sex with someone should be on your wedding night or at least when you are committed to each other but that does not allow for spontaneity.”

“Maybe,” I conceded, “although I’m not extreme like that, I had a girlfriend in high school who was a Christian and she wanted to stay a virgin until she was married.”

“Helena?” I pulled a wry grin, “she um, actually had sex with another woman and got thrown out of the church for immorality.”

“Ah the holy mother church speaks again,” she too grinned.

“After my treatment,” I paused, “for a while even touching myself felt kind of weird but eventually I grew out of that one.”

“So you are out of practice, yes?”

“Busted,” I sighed, “not for lack of opportunity though, it’s like something was turned off. Maybe when they took out my uterus they took my sex drive even though that’s stupid.”

“It is stupid but understandable,” she replied, “you’ve been through the wringer as they say in your country, the loss of your uterus has changed you but your sex drive is still there. If it wasn’t then you would never have been out on a date with me, twice but it is up to you how far this goes. I am not going to talk you into doing anything, it is not who I am.”