“At the Christmas party.”
“What Christmas party?”
“The office party at the H?yfjell Hotel. My first year out of law school. I had a little too much to drink. And I kissed Merethe from work.”
“One time?”
“One time.”
“Just that?”
“Just that.”
I thought this over. Mulled over what had happened. Not a bomb blast, really. Not Nagasaki.
Actually balance, equilibrium.
Yin and yang. Harry and Sally. Hall and Oates.
A gift instead of a disaster.
So completely unexpected.
I kissed him. It was a kiss that had been repeated many times. It wasn’t the same, but it wasn’t different. It had the same warmth, taste, feeling, and consistency as the year before and ten years before that.
It was a kiss I felt at home in. Which was home.
Maybe I didn’t need to be scared it would disappear. Maybe I could just be grateful. For right now.
“Are you guys going to suck face all day or what?” Ebba was in full soccer regalia, holding out her cell phone. “Come on, we’re late. Jenny’s standing by the front door waiting. You said we were going to give her a ride. Could you get a move on?”
“I’m coming,” Bj?rnar said. “Just had to do a little kissing with your mother first.”
“How much do you love me?” I asked him.
“Six percent.”
“Six percent?”
“Well, twenty-seven then.”
“Twenty-seven percent? You love me ninety-seven percent, right? At least?”
He and Ebba walked out the door.
“To be or not to be,” I called after him.
And as the door closed, he responded, “That is the question.”