Page 49 of The Happiness Blueprint
“It does?” Haven’t heard her say thatTommeans a lot.
“Of course!”
She looks straight at me. How can a cold kitchen light make a person look so good? It’s not a fucking sunset, just an LED light bulb, but there she is all shiny and wide-eyed in front of me. My knee has been resting against the outside of her thigh for a good few minutes now, and she hasn’t moved away.
She leans closer to the book, and her breaths are quick and so loud in the silent kitchen. Then she closes it, places the pencil neatly on top and leans in toward me, and her face breaks out into a huge smile as she pulls away from me.
“Alex! I just realized that I can makesevenan even number. I just remove thes!”
What almost felt like a moment is gone. Lesson over. Class dismissed.
KLARA
What makes a good boyfriend?
Google Search I’m Feeling Lucky
I’ve brought Hanna to an address in Lund. Her apprenticeship is going from strength to strength, and I enjoy the company of another girl.
“Are you okay?” I ask my second friend. She is walking a good few yards behind me.
“I’ve noticed that you prefer...um...space?”
“Only when it comes to some people.”People I might like too much.
The door is opened by a pretty young girl with Down syndrome. Her blond hair is curled into soft locks, and she is wearing a glittery purple bomber jacket over a body-con dress. Even if I had completed a fashion degree, I wouldn’t be able to achieve this level of sass.
“Maja? I’m here to check how the work on your bathroom is progressing.”
“Hi, come in!” She beams at me. It’s nice seeing a friendly smile after having spent most of the morning with loud Copperplate Gothic and his home spa.
“I want purple tiles. I already went to have a look with my mum on the weekend.”
“Great. There’s still time to choose. If you have something in mind already that will help and will make the quote more exact. Did you make note of the tile’s serial number in the shop? Was it by any chance Lennart that helped you?” She collects a paper from the table and puts it in my hand. It’s got notes of tiles and shower curtains as well as some sketches of lush-looking bathroom goals.
“These are great. Are you an artist?”
“Drama student!” I should have known. Her personality jumped at me the moment I came inside.
“I wish I could act. It would make my life so much easier.”
“I just love it. We are doing monologues from the classics right now. I’m preparing one fromRomeo and Juliet. It’s my favorite love story. I adore love stories.”
I wait in the kitchen for Hanna to finish the measurements.
“It’s my first apartment. Mum comes every weekend to cook batches of food, and my boyfriend visits every Friday. Do you have a boyfriend?” Maja looks at me hopefully.
“Not at the moment. They seem quite hard to secure. But I’m seeing someone, I guess.”
“Oooh. Do you have a picture? Does he bring you flowers? Mine brings me flowers and chocolates every time he comes over. Like a gentleman.”
I stop to think on this for a moment. Tom’s made me dinner, yes, but no, he’s never brought me flowers. “Does he make you laugh? It’s important to have fun in a relationship. My boyfriend is sooo funny. He does the best impressions of artists. We love One Direction and Billie Eilish. But they’re not so funny.”
I’ve never looked forfun.It’s one of the most misleading, two-faced words I know. It has connotations of parties where I stand in the corner, strained team-building exercises and holidays where the strongest memories are sunburn and food poisoning. I try to think about having fun with Tom. I laugh more at Tom than with him, I decide.
“And does he give you butterflies in your stomach?”
“I don’t think he does.” He may give me something, but if I try to visualize it, it’s more of a single moth fluttering around in my gut than a butterfly. The type that only come out at night.
