Page 55 of The Happiness Blueprint
Fuck it. Dr. Hadid said the tasks need to be realistic and achievable.
• EDITED TASK:Not drink wine with Klara unless there’s at least one cat around
SAVED TO DRAFTS
Calle,
Do you remember the first time you kissed a boy? Writing this, I wonder if memory dies with us. I never thought about death: I prefer science, and there is no science in death. Only in the first stage of it. In what happens to the body and the cause of death. I have thought about that enough. If I begin to accept the concept that something remains after we die, then what parts of us? Rationality, memory, emotions? Are we then a blur of feelings and fuzzy love? Or a rational, thinking being perhaps sharpened from life, even?
Anyway, memory. If you don’t remember, in case you are simply love-unspecified or on a path to a new body (I hope you get to be a dog; you loved dogs and would make the cutest golden retriever puppy), I will remind you.
I think we were eleven and fourteen. When adults asked (it’s always adults, kids don’t ask these questions) what we liked most in school, I saidmathand you saidlunchtime. Neither of us saidrecess. Because recess went like this:
“We catch the girls and keep them inside the den. You guard it, Calle,” you were instructed. The group of boys was large, and the game was to catch the girls and not let them go (yes, primary school was a breeding ground for sexual harassment). Girls ran around excited and scared, depending on what rank they had in the class. The ones that got no boyish attention ran slower than the others, secretly hoping to be caught, to be wanted in the game.
“Game’s dull,” I said.
“Come on, Alex, if we don’t play, we are done for,” you said. This was true: whatever mad craze the class had gotten into was a join-or-be-shunned situation. If it was marbles that were in, you better bring some, or Pogs, round circular plastic things that our parents deemed a waste of money.
We hovered in the background, guarding the den or repairing it rather than chasing and dragging girls into it.
“It’s your turn to kiss someone,” a slender, freckled boy with teeth that sprouted rather than sat in his gums said to Calle.
“Nah, leave it. Dream on. Girl germs.”
“You gotta kiss her! Kiss her, kiss her!” The chants were there now, and I looked around hoping to see a teacher approach and raise their voice, adjourning the meeting. But coffee breaks are long, and there was no teacher in sight. You wiggled loose from the boy’s grip.
“Okay, I’ll kiss someone.”Wooochants of excitement. Girls wondering who would be picked. Again, some with excitement, some with fear. I looked at my shoes. My hand flapped against my leg like a drum.
“Who’s it gonna be?” the freckled one asked as if presenting a stock of animals at market, or options in a TV game show.
“You,” you said, eyes straight at our enemy.
“Eww. No way. Pick a girl, weirdo.”
“You said I had to kiss someone, not that it had to be a girl.” Suddenly boys and girls cheer, everyone except for the chosen one. Brave from your triumph, you walk up and plant a kiss on the toothy mouth. I don’t think it was how you imagined your first kiss, but I think first kisses are often bad, often embarrassing, often tinted with regret. Yours was a triumph and a power statement.
Chasing girls and keeping them in a den died out as quickly as Pogs and Tamagotchis did. And no fucking douche ever gave you a hard time about kissing boys when you got old enough to find the good ones and do it because you wanted to.
Seeing you kiss your Dan in the church that sunny May day was one of the proudest moments of my life.
Love you.
A
KLARA
How do I make the most of my viral moment?
Google Search I’m Feeling Lucky
My head feels heavy the next morning. I’ve never had a friendship with a man, and Google results forplatonic intentionsare confusing. My gut feeling is not one to be trusted, and when I look at the facts I could be wrong. Moving closer and maintaining long periods of eye contact would mean something, surely. Maybe. But Alex wants me back in London. That truth is difficult to ignore. In fact, he wants me to go back so much he’s helping me study toward that goal. Alice suggested perhaps heisinto me but is more into his wife and therefore needs me gone.Wife.
I’m caffeinated and as alert as I will ever be as I start up the van. Having it back and in working order feels like being reunited with a long-lost friend.
“Hi, Klara. This is Maja’s mum.” It takes me a moment to register who I’m talking to. Putting faces to voices and vice versa was never my strong point. Although I can remember every wrinkle of a face I looked briefly at on the Tube eight years ago, I can’t name acquaintances.
She helps me out.
