Ansgar Martinsson

“Yes, do,” Ansgar turned with his hand on the doorknob. He gave Bettina, whose face had become lined with worry and apprehension, a quelling look. “It’s not me, and it’s not Mags or Bec or the kids. Don’t worry, Bee. I’m fine. I just… I just need to sort some things out.”

“Leda? Your mum?”

“No, they’re fine. Something else entirely.”

“Anything I can do to help?”

He let out a heavy breath. “Tell me,” he said, striding back to her station, “exactly what meetings are you going to be rescheduling for today?”

With a helpful smile, Bettina set her hands on her keyboard and her fingers flew. She paused, viewing her screen with an expert eye. “Noon lunch with Jameson Michaelsson over at SansaCorp. Cancel that?”

“Please. Reschedule to next week.”

“And two pm,” she continued, “assembly in the TRC.”

He cocked his head, his brow knit. “An assembly? Whatever for?”

“Not for the company, Sgar,” Bettina clarified. “For the STEM campers. Camp starts today, and you were to address them, greet them, and um… it says here you were to have cake with them.”

“STEM Camp,” Ansgar echoed, and then, the little LED bulb in his head took a spark, fired up and shone brightly behind his eyes. “STEM Camp,” he said slower, more deliberately, the idea fully forming in his mind.

“Affirmative,” Bettina said. “STEM Camp. You know, the kids, those kids you recruited over the past year? Your genius little proteges?”

“Ha!” Ansgar let out a long excited breath, grinning like a madman. “Tell me, Bettina,” he said, stepping closer to her station. He leaned over the partition, his elbow perched atop it. “Are there two boys registered in the camp by the name of Lindberg? Specifically, Hugo and Adrian Lindberg? They would have only signed up a day or so ago.”

Bettina furrowed her brow, confused. “Don’t know. I’ll look.” And once again, she set her fingers on the keyboard and mouse and worked her magic. She leaned forward, squinting at the screen. “Lindberg,” she intoned. “Yes, there, just there,” she pointed. “Lindberg, Adrian and Lindberg, Hugo.” She looked up at him. “But, why?”

Ansgar gave her a wink. “Personal Emergency means personal, comrade,” he said. He turned on his heel and headed back toward the main bank of lifts, waving as he did so. “You’re the best, Bee!”

“Sgar?” Bettina called after him.

He stopped. “Yes?”

“Still want me to cancel your meetings?”

“Yes. Absolutely. I likely will not be back in today at all. Set an away message on my Outlook.”

“Copy that.”

***

Ansgar peeked in the oblong window of the TRC - the Training and Resource Center at the heart of the Martinsson Construction building. It was a large lecture hall, complete with long, arched tables, conjoined chairs, acoustically sound walls and ceilings, and the latest in AV and Smartboard technology.

He caught the eye of the instructor, Lars Jorgenssen, his Director of Training and Continuing Education, and he curled his finger at him, beckoning. He saw Lars turn back to the class - a group of fifty fresh-faced, eager, and excited ten to twelve year olds - make a ‘just a minute’ gesture, and jog over to the door. Lars gave Ansgar a quizzical look through the window and flicked his eyes back toward the kids in the audience.

Ansgar shook his head, mouthing “No.” He was not there to talk to the kids yet. Not there to make his appearance. He made it clear by the intent glare in his eyes, the point of his finger, and the set of his lips that he just wanted to talk to Lars.

Well, first Lars, then the Lindberg boys.

Lars opened the door, and the sound of childish voices and chatter reached Ansgar’s ears for the split second before the door slid closed again. “What’s up, Sgar?” Lars, a much shorter, squatter man, peered up at him.

“I need to see one of the Lindberg boys,” Ansgar said. “Adrian or Hugo, doesn’t matter which… emmmm,” he squinted. “No, better make it Adrian, Hugo’s not much of a talker. More cerebral, that one.”

“What for?”

Ansgar bristled. “A personal matter,” he intoned. “The boys’ aunt is a friend of mine, and I’ve some business to ask after. Beyond that, I don’t believe it’s any fucking business of yours.”

Lars put up his hands, quelled by Ansgar’s burbling anger. “Okay, okay,” he said. “You’re the boss.”

“I am,” Ansgar said. “Now, kindly fetch me Adrian Lindberg. And don’t worry, I’ll talk with him right here, and we won’t be long. I only need one bit of information from him. He’ll be back in your charge before you can say piss off.”

Lars chuckled. “I’ll be right back.”

***

Adrian sat across from Ansgar in one of the many sets of waiting chairs just outside the TRC. The boy seemed to disappear in his seat, swallowed by the large size of the furniture and the small size of his body. His legs swung back and forth, the chair back towered over his head, and his arms barely made it to the ends of the arm rests.

Ansgar, for his own, perched on the end of his seat, his elbows on his knees, hands clasped in near supplication between his legs.

“What’s up, Herr Martinsson?” Adrian directed his question to Ansgar, but his eyes were roving around, taking in every detail of the immense, echoing glass atrium.

“I’ve a question for you, Adrian,” Ansgar replied. “Do you mind me asking you one?”

Adrian looked straight at Ansgar. “My dad says you’re going to hire him to work here. Issat true?”

Ansgar smiled. “I thought I was asking the questions, mate.”

Adrian shrugged. “I just wanna know, is all. I wanna work with my dad when I grow up, and if he works here, then me and Hugo, we want to work here too.”

“Well, Adrian,” Ansgar said. “I’m most gratified to hear that.”

Adrian’s brow knit. “What’s…. gratified?”

“Happy,” Ansgar chuckled. “Very happy.”

“Mmkay, then I’m happy too.” Adrian beamed. “What’s it you wanna know?”

Ansgar looked down at his hands and then back up to the boy. “I… erm,” he paused. Shit, he thought. Just come right out with it. “Where is your Auntie Joline?”

And with that, Adrian’s little face crumpled. His eyes squeezed shut and his chin quivered. He sniffed, and his head fell forward into his cupped hands.

Oh, no.

“Hey, hey, hey,” Ansgar soothed. “Come on, mate. It’s okay. It’s okay.” He knelt on the ground in front of the boy, placing his hands on the small, skinny shoulders. “Tell me, Adrian,” he said, trying desperately to keep the fear out of his voice. “Tell me what happened.”

Jesus Christ, no. Please tell me nothing’s happened to Joline. Please, please, please for all that’s holy…

“It’s Farmor Emilie,” he sniffed again, wiping his hand across his nose. His words came rapid fire and reedy, his voice breaking with tears, with fear for his grandmother, with the sight of his parents as upset as they were.

“She’s sick, Herr Martinsson. Real sick. Mama says Auntie Jo had to call an am-bal-lance to come out and take her to the hospital. Mama says… Mama… Mama… Mama says she is in something called… tents of care. Don’t know what that means about tents and care, but that’s where she is. Papa’s real upset, and he went to the hosp-hosp-hospital too and met Auntie Jo there.”

“Adrian,” Ansgar garnered his attention with a palm to his cheek and a brush of the single tear from beneath his eye. “I’ve one more question for you, and I’m so sorry, so sorry to have upset you, but I need to know. It’s very important, you see. Very important.”

“Yes, Herr… Herr Martinsson?” the boy sniffed.

“What hospital?”

Adrian looked disappointed. “Oh. I don’t know, sir,” he shook his head. “I just kept hearing Papa say something about Carol, about going to see Carol. I don’t know who Carol is, but that’s where they went.”

“Carol,” Ansgar repeated, eyes narrowed in thought. He looked back at the boy, tilted his head and asked, “Karolinska? Is that what he said?”

Adrian’s eyes, red and rheumy as they were, lit up. “Yes! Thats it!”

Ansgar stood, grasped Adrian by the head, and planted a long, loud “mwah” of a kiss on the top of his mass of blond hair. “You, my darling boy, are brilliant.” He stood back and helped Adrian to his feet. He looked down at the child, the child who looked so much like his Joline, and he rest his hand on the boy’s shoulder. “You okay?” he asked.

“Yes, Herr Martinsson, I’m okay,” the boy replied, wiping his eyes. “Herr Martinsson?” he asked.

“Yes, Adrian?”

“Can I go back to class now? I don’t want to miss anything else about structural engineering. I need to know that stuff if I’m going to come work for you someday.”

Ansgar grinned, his heart warmed, his spirit settled, and his mind comforted with the knowledge, the plan, the strategy successfully realized. He knew where Joline was. He knew why she’d been incommunicado. He knew… he knew it hadn’t been on his account.

She hadn’t left him.

“You’d best run along back in there, then,” Ansgar said. “I need lots and lots of good engineers like you.”

***

Karolinska University Hospital rest upon a sprawling, massive campus at the intersection of the E4 and the E20 just at the edge of Solna. Ansgar knew it well. Very well. Intimately, in fact.

He recalled what Adrian had said about tents of care, and surmised from that broken child-speak that he’d meant that Emilie Lindberg had taken up a bed in the intensive care unit of the hospital.

The doors of the Inpatient Wing opened with a soft schuss and a quiet ping. Ansgar stepped through, turned, and approached the lift off to the right of the entry. “Pardon me, sir,” a voice called from behind him. “Sir?”

Ansgar turned, pointing to himself. “Me?” he queried.

“Yes, sir. Please come here, sir.” A young woman, blonde and buxom, sat at a modern, semi-circular reception desk in the middle of the lobby. She lifted the phone, poised to dial. “Who are you here to see, sir? This part of the hospital requires clearance.”

“Oh,” Ansgar said. He stepped up to the desk and stood before it. “Ansgar Martinsson, and I’m here to see Emilie Lindberg, please.”

“Oh,” the woman said, setting the phone back in its cradle. “I’m sorry, sir, but she’s on a unit that does not permit visitors who are not immediate family. Are you immediate family?”

Ansgar had thought about lying, about telling the woman – of course, Emilie Lindberg is his blood relative. Of course, he’s immediate family. Of course…

“No, I am not,” he said, factually and with surprising honesty, “But my… my significant other is her niece.”

“My apologies, Herr Martinsson,” she said with a mild touch of impatient disdain. “I cannot let you up. There are restrictions on visitation.” She gestured to the chairs near the massive windows. “You can wait if you wish, or you may phone any family member here for updates, but I….”

Ansgar took a breath. “Look,” he peered at the woman’s name tag, “Lissa,” he said with a tight-lipped smile, “I am Ansgar Martinsson.”

Lissa gave him a blank stare. “Yes, sir,” she echoed. “You’ve told me your name already.”

Ansgar shook his head. “No, you don’t understand. I am Ansgar Martinsson. CEO of Martinsson Construction?” His eyes went wide with expectation, waiting for the woman’s light of recognition to go off.

Which it didn’t. She cocked her head, confused. “I apologize, sir. I don’t understand what that has to do with Frau Lindberg.”

He sighed, irritated. “I built this wing,” he stated. “I designed everything around you, even down to the detail of that comfy little chair you’re sitting upon.”

“Well,” she shifted in the chair, squinting. “It’s not all that comfortable.”

Ansgar fixed her with a gimlet eye. He spoke slowly, deliberately, and a bit dangerously. “Fine, but I will have you know that I am a patron of this hospital.” He mashed his index finger down on the granite countertop. “My company donates, and I personally donate hundreds of millions of kronor to this hospital every year.”

She smiled blankly. “And we thank you for that, Herr Martinsson. But I still don’t understand what that has to do with…..”

Bam! Ansgar pounded his fist on the desk. He growled in annoyance, his lips tight, his eyes wide and bright. “What it has to do with, Lissa, is that you shall give me one of those pass cards, there,” he pointed. “You will sign me in and allow me to go up to the ICU floor that I designed, that I built, and that I pay for.”

“I’m sorry, Herr Martinsson, but I have my instructions, I can’t –”

And with a loud ping! the lift doors opened.

Every hour on the hour, a nurse ventured into the intensive care unit to check on the patients suffering various ailments, administer any therapies, and make any adjustments to their treatments. Because of the degree of severity that Emelie came into the ward, the Lindbergs had a small room of their own. A small corner room with no windows, only wired and machines and monitors. Although the nurse staff came in hourly the doctor didn’t come in as often.

Stella, a lanky severe redhead started her shift around the same time Elias showed. She possessed a gravelly voice, a resting bitch face but made sure the siblings had enough blankets and pillows to withstand the minimalist chairs. “You come, you tell me,” she gruffed, “when your arse goes numb, I’ll bring more.”

Joline managed to crack a smile at that, “Thank you. That’s… thoughtful. Thank you.” She draped one of the surprisingly soft blankets around her shoulders. Her own body temperature bottomed out after the surge of activity and the spike of urgency, so much that she shivered in the sterile air conditioned room. “The waiting is the worst part,” she commented to Stella and Elias.

The man himself looked completely put out by the chairs left at the patient’s bedside. “Toilets have more give than these… monstrosities.”

Nonplussed, Stella pointed to the loo, “If you’d prefer, its right in there.”

“Elias,” Joline chided, “be grateful. Stella burgled those from the fifth floor. Just for you.”

“Judging by these chairs,” he groused, “I believe all of the fifth floor only had three cushions.”

With a forced smile, Joline said, “Forgive him. Seems I got him out of bed on the wrong side and then pissed in his coffee for the trouble.”

In all his maturity, Elias pulled a face that he’d seen on one or both of his sons and disciplined them for. He blew a raspberry and skulked back in his chair.

Growling in her rough baritone, Stella comforted, “Quite all right, deary, just see that you don’t do it again. He might give you a noogie next.”

Joline and Elias spent most of their night exchanging stories and reminiscing to pass the time and fill in the white noise of whirring and beeping machines. Neither wanted to sleep nor could until they had some news from the doctor about their mother’s condition. Joline refused to leave Emelie’s side while Elias stretched his legs by visiting the coffee machine at the end of the corridor every few hours.

Joline lost all sense of time without a window to the outside world. That room existed to preserve and save lives, yet nothing much existed beyond those four gray walls while she waited. A weird trance fell over her, like the whole of Stockholm ceased, froze in time all because she remained stuck in limbo, and caught between life and death. Her own as well as Emelie’s, simply for the fact that Joline felt she couldn’t go on with her mother.

And so Joline and Elias settled in for the night waiting for words of any development in their mother. Although the world remained in shadow, Joline did notice that the intensive care unit ebbed and peaked depending on new arrivals or patients moved to stable condition. Even that felt somewhat removed from that, background noise and subtle distraction.

Elias made good on his promise of coffee and scones in the morning. Joline sipped at the burnt thick substance that they tried to pass off as coffee, but it was hardly drinkable. She picked at her scone absently, hunger foreign to her, and ended up eating about three bites of thing before trashing it. Elias took sustenance when it could, keeping his strength for two of the most important females in his life. He lent a hand when he could and he stepped in when one or both of them needed it.

The doctor paid a visit midday to check on Emelie’s condition, and he relayed the information to an eager Joline and a stoic Elias. Doctor Karlsson had treated Emelie for as long as Joine remembered, so she trusted him. “We’re going to keep her sedated while the antibiotics work. Her fever is down, which is good. Her blood pressure is rising, another excellent sign. I’m… encouraged by the progress. I’ll be back for rounds this evening.”

“How… how is she though, Doctor Karlsson?” Joline asked, nearly pouncing on the man when he walked toward the door.

“Better. But she’s not out of the woods yet. The dialysis and the hydration are front and center, and neither has improved her condition.” He pushed his glasses up his nose, flipping the top page of Emelie’s chart up and then down, up and back down again. “Until we know if the infection will taper off, we just don’t know.”

Elias read his sister like the daily paper he’d fetched from the atrium a few hours ago. “What can we do? Is there anything?”

Doctor Karlsson surveyed them both from over the rim of his glasses. “I’m afraid you’re doing it. Keeping her company, talking to her. But do take care of yourselves as well, yeah? If and when she wakes up,” the doctor winked at Joline to calm her, to give her hope, “she’ll rely on you during recovery.”

“Thank you,” Joline breathed on a sigh, releasing some of her tension and stress from… she didn’t know how long.

When the doctor left to see to other patients on his watch, Elias offered, “Let me take you for a meal, some proper food. You look haggard.”

“I… I… I can’t leave here, Elias.”

“You can, but you choose not to. There’s not much we can do for her. You need to take care of you, so you can take care of her when she’s awake.”

Joline stared at the still figure of her mother, the tubes in her mouth, neck, arm and belly, all working to keep her alive. “But what if I’m not here when she wakes up?”

“She’ll be raging mad that you fussed over her, and you know it,” Elias reasoned, hands on his hips. “Let me take you for a sandwich or something edible.”

Joline wavered, torn between her heart and her head. Yes, her mother would hate that she’d wasted so much time. But she would rather deal with her mother’s attitude than miss her waking up or taking a turn for the worse. “Not for long. I don’t want to leave her alone.”

Elias took her hand, and pulled her towards the lifts, bringing his little sister back out into the world again, like he did when they were younger. “Thirty minutes. You’ll feel better for it.”

Joline’s feet protested and she glanced back over her shoulder towards the ICU room. Her reluctance only sharpened the longer they waited for the lift to arrive. The moment she voiced an excuse not to go, the doors slid open.

Elias took her shoulders in hand and marched her into the compartment. “No more debates, no more arguments. I’m watching over you now.”

He held her until they arrived in the atrium, the open lobby made of glass and steel, sleek and modern lines, decorated in green lounge chairs and matching plants. As if her mind conjured him for wanting him, because she had imagined him ranting, she heard Ansgar. Her Ansgar.

“Ring your superior. I would like to speak with him or her immediately. I… respect your instructions, but I must insist. Your superior…”

The tirade continued on, the flustered receptionist interjecting only single syllables when she could. Just barely. Joline knew it wasn’t her imagination. She whipped to the sound of his voice and saw him leaning over the wooden reception desk, his back to her, using his height to intimidate the poor woman behind the desk.

Elias heard it too. “Is that… It is. That’s—“

“Ansgar?” her tremulous voice called to him.

Ansgar stopped mid diatribe, spun to her and stalked the few feet between them.

The slap of his loafers on the marble floor kept time with her pounding heartbeat. She held his gaze, unable to grasp that he could be there… in front of her. “What… what are you doing here?”

“Joline.”

“Ansgar, it’s good to see you, man,” Elias stuck out his hand.

Absently, he shook it, his gaze entirely on Joline, the flat hair, lack of makeup, oversized tee, and ripped jeans. He could see the sleepless night on her, the tears she’d cried, and the anguish and worry. Beyond all of that, he saw her gratitude for his presence. He hoped.

“You missed our meeting this morning.”

Joline blinked and swallowed, her mind reeled behind her tired eyes. “Did I… what day is it?” She squinted, willing her brain to engage, to catch up with the world again.

“Monday. It’s Monday, darling.”

She padded her pockets to search for her mobile. When she came up without, she looked to Elias, “What’s the time?”

“Just gone one.”

Joline repeated, “Monday, gone one.” As realization dawned on her, she asked, “What… what are you doing here? How did you find me?”

“I was worried about you. You don’t keep me waiting.”

Elias took the opportunity to slip away and give them a moment to themselves. He remembered Ansgar’s confession over lager at the Martinsson Construction picnic. He suspected that his sister felt the same for the CEO, but neglected to tell him. And how could she with all that was going on?

“Something’s happened, Sgar. I… I couldn’t make it.”

“I know,” he told her truthfully. “I know,” he repeated for emphasis, imbuing his words with as much weight as he could to make her understand.

“Thank you… thank you for coming…” She felt numb, a bit stupid. Her heart… God, her heart pounded in her ears and her head felt fuzzy, light and she couldn’t feel her hands, all for him.  “I… uhh… uhh…”

“You haven’t seen my texts then I take it.”

And so, come early morning, still dark, Ansgar pushed himself, groaning, out of bed. He reached immediately for his phone, disappointed to find Joline hadn’t responded to, or even read his texts.

“Shit,” he muttered, running his palm viciously down his face. “It’s too early anyway,” he said. “Probably still sleeping, the lucky darling.” He rubbed his eyes, blinked away the rest of the sleep - or lack thereof - and texted.

5:01: Good morning, darling. 5 am comes too quickly. Hope you rested well. See you at 10 x

***

He strode out of the bedroom, dressed and showered, combing his hands through his damp hair. He’d left his curls loose again, eschewing his typical slicked, combed and pomaded look. It wasn’t a conscious decision, not a calculated thought, just… an instinct. A knowledge. A deference to Joline’s comments, to the way she toyed with his hair when they made love, to the anticipation of more of it to come.

And of course, Rebecka noticed.

“You look… different, Sgar,” she said, handing him a cup of coffee. “What gives?”

“Well, good morning to you too, my dearest sister.” He took the cup, bent to her and pressed a warm kiss to her cheek. “Thanks,” he muttered, and took a long drink of the fragrant brew. “Mmmm. You’re up early, early bird.”

“Ingrid woke up. Had to feed her,” she shrugged, yawning. She walked back to the table and sat slowly down, straightening out the placket of her pyjama top. “What’s going on with you?” she pressed. “Something’s off.”

“How was the wedding?” Ansgar asked congenially. “Did Mags make a fool of himself on the dance floor?”

Her eyes flicked up to him, fixing him with a deep, delving stare. “Quit the diversionary tactics, Sgar. I’m a journalist. I’m tenacious. I won’t give up. Now, spill.” She sipped at her coffee.

Ansgar leaned against the back of a chair, crossing his legs beneath him. He drank his coffee, eyeing Bec over the rim. “I’m sure I’ve no idea what you’re on about.”

Rebecka glared at him, eyes narrowed. “Okay,” she intoned, nodding sagely. “Don’t forget, Sgar. I’m married to your twin.”

“So?” Ansgar shrugged.

“So, I can tell what you’re thinking. I can read you and Mags like books on a shelf.”

“No. You can’t.” He spat, shaking his head. “Don’t even try.”

“Oh. Really.” Bec’s eyes widened above a broad, knowing smile. She settled back into her seat, perched her feet on the opposite chair and cradled her steaming cup by her chest. “Tell me, Ansgar. What’s her name?”

He stopped, mid-sip, and stared. He held the cup to his lips for a long moment before he lowered it slowly, set it on the table, and straightened. He swallowed, dropped his customary mask, and let his lips curl into a blithe sigh of a smile. “Her name,” he said brightly, “is Joline.”

***

10:35 a.m. Monday

Ansgar peered at his watch for what he knew was at least the fiftieth time since he’d read the face at 10:00. He’d paced Joline’s office back and forth for the past twenty minutes, sure he’d worn a fresh path in her already threadbare Oriental rug.

He’d even taken to sitting at her desk, making a surreptitious attempt to gain access to her laptop in an attempt to locate her. He tried various combinations of the names Hugo and Adrian and Emilie and Elias and even his own name until the system locked him out of any further tries.

He’d called, and by the time he’d finished, his phone showed twelve calls to her mobile number and two calls to her land line, all of which went unanswered. Voice mails, two. Face time attempts, three.

He’d walked the theatre, asking for her at the reception desk, the ticket office, the light booth. He asked the foreman of his own company, the costume designer, the stage manager, the director of the production of Aida. None had seen her. None had heard from her. With every person he’d asked, it became more and more difficult to hide his anxiety, his fear, his apprehension….

… his anger.

And, then there were the texts.

10:05: You’re late.

10:07: How long are you going to keep me waiting?

10:18: I’m still at your office. Are you on your way? Are you okay?

10:26: Joline, respond to me. Pick up your phone. It is most unprofessional of you to miss a meeting with your partner without notice. Please advise where you are ASAP. Work cannot proceed without your authorization.

10:30: If you are not here by 10:40 I am going back to my office. Text me when it is convenient for you to reschedule this meeting.

10:35: Joline. Where the fuck are you?

“God damn it to hell!” he bellowed, wrenching open her office door. He strode angrily down the marble hallway, his loafers slapping against the slick surface, echoing off the walls like his heartbeat in his ears.

He clenched the steering wheel two-handed as he bobbed and weaved his Tesla viciously through the midday Stockholm traffic. He sat forward, keeping  his eyes fixed straight ahead. But his thoughts were elsewhere, far away.

He couldn’t help it. He thought of Faye, damn her. His flesh, his bones, his very soul remembered. Remembered that desperate, empty coldness, that numbness of the nerves and fire behind the eyes and thickness in the chest that felt as if he were choking in the sulfuric clouds of Hell.

He wondered, as he slipped the car dangerously into the left lane, nearly missing a trash collector truck, whether she’d, whether Joline, too, had run from him. Whether she had severed ties and slipped away and deserted him like Faye had. Wondered if she, too, abandoned him.

Left him.

Took his heart and wrenched it asunder at the seam of his scars.

Heaving the wheel hand-over-hand, he caromed the Tesla, tires squealing, into his parking spot, and threw the car into park. He sat there, breathing like a grampus through his nose, his throat too tight, his jaw too clenched to even open his mouth. His heart pounded against his chest wall like a caged lion desperate for its freedom. “Fuck!” he shouted, slamming his fist against the dashboard. “Fuck, fuck, fuck! Not again! Not fucking again! I never should have said that! Never should have told you… told you….”

Never should have told you I loved you.

He peered down at his phone, the mute-arsed piece of shit. He lifted it, opened the messages, and peered at it. “Come on,” he growled, willing it to chime. “Fucker, come on, give me something, you useless bastard.”

Nothing.

He opened the car door, lifted the phone high and nearly threw it across the garage, his imagination painting him a picture of the phone and all of his overtures of love to Joline breaking into a million pieces – glass and little red broken hearts shattered against the concrete abutment.

But instead, he lowered the device, regarded it once more, set his thumbs to the keyboard and typed.

11:10:  Ms. Lindberg. Come when convenient. I may or may not be available.

Pocketing the phone, he lit from the car, slamming the door shut with an echoing, hollow thunk. He kept his hand there, on the top of his Tesla, and he bowed his head, thinking - or trying to think. His mind was clouded, foggy, his logic blocked with filthy, sticky clots of pain. He breathed, calming himself, flushing those mental pathways clean of corrosive emotion.

And then, he imagined two compartments set apart by a partition in his mind. A massive wall.

He placed Faye in one compartment. Placed her there and sealed her up along with the gory, blood-soaked detritus of her -  his anxiety, his worry, panic, desperation, despair, self-hatred, loneliness, loss, and hopelessness.

And Joline he set, free to roam, within the other.

And this wall, he fashioned it of steel girders and heavy masonry block and thick concrete and kevlar siding.

Impregnable. Indestructible. Mathematical.

Faye =/= Joline. The two sets do not intersect. Disjoinder. Non-union.

And thereby, the fog lifted. He found he could think again. He stood up straighter. He settled his shoulders. He relaxed his breathing, let his clamped jaw go slack, slowed his heartbeat. Logic, as it does, won out over emotion once again and the calculations and numbers and words flowed freely through his intellect.

“Something has to be wrong,” he told himself, calmly. “It’s not you. She’s not left you. Ergo,” he muttered. “She can’t communicate. She’s distracted. Something happened. She had an accident, she… Jesus!” His eyes flashed with the realization of it. “Her mother!”

And, like a shot arrow, he ran toward his private lift, mashing his hand on the button. While he waited, foot tapping, eyes staring at the moving numbers, he pulled out his phone and dialed.

And as expected, the call went to voice mail.

“Elias,” he barked. “Ansgar Martinsson here. Ring me when you get this. It is an urgent matter so you must respond immediately if you can.”

And as the lift arrived, he hung up and opened his messages again.

11:14: Joline. Is it your mother? Is she ill? Tell me where you are and I will be there.

***

Peritoneal Dialysis Infection.

The doctor called it. The doctor used those words to explain what happened, why Emelie needed to be hooked up to hemodialysis, intravenous antibiotics, a heavy drip of hydration and a ventilator to breathe for her. Her body suffered from a massive infection. She no longer had the antibodies to fight, her system already weak and depleted by her low red blood count. Her own immune system attacking itself, gone haywire by a disease that confused healthy and detrimental cells. The lupus had destroyed her kidneys, her blood full of toxins, her belly full of infection.

Joline understood it logically, but she couldn’t justify it happening all at once and certainly not to her mother. The doctors explained it time and time again to both of them, but Jolie still felt a sense of outrage for all of it. For the doctors explanations. For the lack of a cure. For their inability to fix it, to even make it better.

Joline felt her mother being ripped from her life, ripped from her arms, and ripped from her heart. Her heart ached with missing her mother already, the way she pulled Joline’s leg about her choice in shoes, the way she played with Joline’s hair while she worked at her computer, how she met Joline at the door when she was due in.

Joline clutched her mother’s hand (not cold but not warm either) as she listened to the machines beep and whirl and drip and spin. She willed all of it to work, to bring life back into her mother, to bring her mother back to her. She wasn’t done, and even as a grown woman, she needed her mother’s practical guidance and savage logic.

Tears slid down her cheeks in utter helplessness. She couldn’t lose hope and she wouldn’t, but she felt impotent, handicapped and entirely lame… just sitting there, doing nothing. But didn’t dare more, to wander away and leave her mother’s side. Emelie needed her, and Joline needed her mother.

The chair was anything but comfortable, but she stayed, nearly glued to it, waiting for a miracle to occur. She’d sit on railroad pikes if it meant saving her mother from this danger, this hint of death. Joline laid her forehead on her hand gripped around her mother’s and stared at the jeans she wore beneath. She couldn’t remember putting them on, the act of sliding into them forgotten in her haste, in her agonizing stress… but she must have done.

On her days off, at home, oversized t-shirts with the neck cut out suited her. She still wore the Harley Davidson one that she’d been wearing while reviewing her notes for Ansgar.

Ansgar… he felt a million miles removed from this, from her, from their fledging relationship. A million miles, a million hours, a million heartbeats and breaths away.

The jeans she’d shimmied into just before the first responders arrived and rung the bell to fetch her mother had been the first pair Ansgar had seen her in, after the smart pencil skirt that she’d worn to invade his office. She’d changed into the threadbare, broken knees, painted massacre of denim, but the first pair of jeans she’d worn in front of Ansgar, that first day they met. She couldn’t figure why this was important, other than… she missed him. She missed her life.

Absently she pulled at the white strings at the knee of her jeans, trying not to cry, trying not to dissolve on the spot. She didn’t often find comfort in another’s arms but she suddenly longed and craved for Ansgar’s, coveted his confident strength, yearned for his unflappable arrogance.

Joline could imagine him in her mind berating the doctors until they fixed her mother. Demanding a better doctor, a better specialist, a better hospital, even a better procedure because he simply could. That’s precisely who Ansgar Martinsson was. He expected the best and accepted no less than that. He didn’t accept failure.

A sob, a combination of fear for her mother’s fate and the realization about how she felt for Ansgar, escaped in a hiccoughing sound and she finally lifted her head. Swiping at the tears with the heel of her free hand, she whined and cried to the woman in the bed, “Oh, God, mama… I love him and you haven’t met him yet.”

Please don’t leave me. I can’t bear it, mama. Not yet. I don’t know what I’m doing.

Finally, mercilessly, Elias made it to the hospital. He held Joline securely in his arms as the doctor repeated everything for him, for his benefit, without the filter of Joline’s limited knowledge. Elias remained stoic, listening, intent on getting pertinent information and a possible course of treatment. The next three days were critical to get through and would indicate whether Emelie would survive this bout of infection. The doctor also mentioned a kidney transplant, not for the first time, as a possibility.

Elias rubbed Joline’s back, imbuing her with some form of comfort, as she took it the hardest. His sister was capable of so much, she exceeded in diplomacy and logic and management in her everyday life, but she experienced intense empathy for her family. That strong part of her all but disappeared when her emotional, compassionate side emerged.

When the doctor left them alone outside the intensive care unit, just outside their mother’s window, the siblings tried to make sense of all that happened in such a short amount of time. “Did she give any indication that she was unwell?” Elias asked softly, without blame.

“You know how she is, she’s so stubborn about… God! I wish I’d known. I should’ve known!”

Elias pulled her to his shoulder and kissed the top of his sister’s head. “You can’t blame yourself, Jo-Bo. You know that. This,” he indicated their mother upon the hospital cot with a wave of his hand, “was always a danger. The course treatment she chose… it was a risk.”

“I just… I need her well. I need her with me. I need her, Elias.”

He nodded silently, stroking her back again. He let the quiet between them calm her, dry her tears some. It was so rare to see or hear Joline cry that he didn’t know any other way to stop them other than letting them run their course. “I remember the first day mum brought you home. I hated you, Jo-Bo,” he said with a sad chuckle.

Joline laughed through her tears even.

“It was a Friday. I was meant for this show and tell or some shit at school. Instead our grandmother kept me home to meet my baby sister. I was pissed right the fuck off—“

“At five?” Joline asked with a reserved smile.

“Don’t mock me. I never got to show off my car collection.”

“The horror!”

“You were a little terror,” Elias pulsed his arm around her shoulders. “Cried all the damn time. I was the star until you came along.”

Although their father was a big part of both of their lives when he was alive, for the most part, Emelie was a single parent. Bryan, their father, visited once a month and took long vacations in the summer to spend time with them.

“Sorry, I stole your spotlight, big brother.”

Elias brought Joline into a hug. “I do remember when things changed though… just so you know.”

“You don’t still hate me for stealing your thunder?”

“Just a bit sore, but I’m getting better,” he joked, holding her tightly. “You gave me your scone. You were maybe, three or four? I was whining mum’s ear sore about something… she gave you the last lemon glazed or cranberry. From your highchair, you pushed your plate to me. You kept the peace even then, and I knew you wanted it.”

“Did you give it back?”

“Hell, no! I wanted it! But you weren’t so bad after that.”

After another lull in their conversation, both lost in their musing about Emelie, Joline asked, “What are we going to do, Elias? This… this is serious. I can’t lose her. Not now!”

“It is serious,” Elias acknowledged with a nod. “We just have to see how the next few days go, and we’ll make the decisions together. Yeah?”

Joline nodded, fighting back another wave of tears. “Thank you for coming. I didn’t know… I still don’t know what to do, how to fix this.”

“Be patient. There’s nothing you can do. I know you’re used to fixing things, finding the best solutions for all parties, Jo-Bo. But this isn’t one of those things for you to solve.”

She nodded, unconvinced.

She’d wanted, apparently, to use the circle-shaped round and round swinging thing, for which Ansgar had no idea what the name was, but she’d wanted it anyway; and there had been a line of other children waiting for it.

But she’d wanted it right then and there, sod the line. Sod the other kids. Sod the horrified parents watching her and ‘tsk’ing at her - at him.

Sod her uncle who was hovering over her, bent double, begging and pleading in a quasi-soothing, increasingly-furious tone with her to “Get up… get up Beanie. Viktoria Bean Martinsson, you stop this nonsense and you get up right now. Right this minute. Come on, darling, sweet summer child, up you get.”

Sod her mum, sod her papa, sod the twins, sod the ice cream man, sod everyone. She wanted the… circle thing… and she would have it.

Or not.

“All right then, alskling,” Ansgar had hissed, wrapping an arm around her waist and heaving her, kicking and screeching, to his hip. “We’re leaving!”

And so, they’d left. Beanie having gone limp, snot-soaked and sobbing beneath Ansgar’s arm, the twins - placid and unknowing in their double pram, pushed along with Ansgar’s free hand. And Ansgar, fizzing with fury and red with embarrassment, had wondered just how the fuck Magnus managed to deal with such things every single damn day.

“I get to be the fun one, she says… cool auntie, she says…” he muttered to himself, only to be interrupted by a high-pitched male voice. The voice of some man who’d jogged jauntily up to Ansgar at the car as he was loading the children in.

“Hey! All right there, Mags?”

“Huh, me?” Thunk. Ouch! Ah! Fffff…. fiddle feathers!” he’d cursed, rubbing angrily at his head. The sharp impact against the car’s door jamb rang through his skull, blurring his vision and cramping his jaw. The word ‘fuck’ rest precariously on the tip of his tongue, teeth buried deep into his bottom lip, but he’d promised. No profanity around the Bean… although, he knew from the content of her screaming tirade moments before that she knew exactly what words were naughty and exactly what words to use when one is furious beyond control.

“Yeah, man,” the overly fit arsehole had said, patting Ansgar jovially on the back. “Lookin’ like you’ve got a handful there. The kid giving you a hard time? Need help?”

Ansgar had stiffened, railing at the stranger’s unwelcomed and impertinent touch of his person. He felt a sneer lift the edge of his lip, but with a breath, he brought his face back under control. “No, thank you,” he said tersely, calmly, and leaned back into the car.

“When’d you grow a beard, Mags? I swear I just saw you out in your yard yesterday, and your face was bare as a baby’s bottom. Is that fake or something?”

Click. Ansgar had fastened the buckle over Axel’s little belly and, as Rebecka had showed him, fixed the blanket around his legs, having done the same to Ingrid. He offered the child the pacifier, and when the baby took it, closed his eyes, and relaxed into the seat, Ansgar, too, took a breath.

He’d crawled back out of the car, stood straight, and peered irritably at the man, arms akimbo. “It’s not fake,” he said.

“You sure about that?” The man had reached out a hand to touch Ansgar’s face, to see for himself.

Ansgar bent back, turning his face, and he slapped the man’s hand away. “Bugger off! It’s mine. It’s real, and I’m not Magnus, okay?”

The man had made an incredulous face, turning his head to fix Ansgar with a gimlet eye. “Come off it,” he said, popping Ansgar one on the shoulder - there he was with the touching again - “You’re Magnus Martinsson. My neighbor. What’s the deal, man?”

Ansgar had sighed and glared at the man, his face a mask of annoyance, of burgeoning anger just bubbling beneath the surface and waiting to explode. “The deal, man,” Ansgar mocked. “Is that I am his brother. Ansgar. Not Magnus. And I am… babysitting…,” the word had tripped from his lips on a wave of icy venom, “my brother’s children.”

His eyes flashed. “Not to mention, one of said children just staged her very own Shakespeare in the Park tragedy right over there,” he pointed. “So. I am taking her home, where I shall fill her face full of ice cream or muesli or applesauce or whatever will work to settle her down, then we shall have a bit of a cuddle, and I shall put her to bed. Now,” he quirked a sardonic smile. “If you will kindly step away from my brother’s daddy-mobile grocery-getter, I can get in, start the damn car, and get the flippin’ hell out of here before I die of absolute mortification.”

“Flippin hell!” a small voice chimed from within the car. “Flippin’ hell!”

Ansgar had growled, eyeing the man with increasing disdain. “Excuse me. Please.” he said dangerously, and he turned, folded himself into the car, and started the engine.

Only to hear “flippin’ hell… flippin’ hell… flippin’ hell…” sung in a bouncy, off-key child soprano all the way back to his brother’s house.

And now, they were back in the house, and Ansgar’s beloved niece, Viktoria Bean Martinsson, was barely able to keep her eyes open, barely able to walk into the house at the heels of her uncle, exhausted as she was. “Uncle Sgar, pick me up. Want you ta hold me pweeze an’ I’ll sleep wif you.”

And Ansgar looked down at the little girl, the little girl whose blonde curls and blue eyes looked so much like his own. And now those little blonde curls were mussed and tangled with bits of brown bark, and those blue eyes were large, trusting, and imploring, yet glazed, rheumy, and tired.

And she was the most heart-melting thing he’d ever seen.

He pushed the stroller into the living room, the twins having fallen asleep, and he picked the girl up, smiling as she rendered herself into his arms, against his chest, over his shoulder.

***

Ansgar sat on the sofa, legs spread wide beneath him, Beanie sprawled splay-legged, face-down over his chest. Her sleepy, sweet breath wuffled softly over his neck and cheek. The twins he had fed, changed their nappies (oh, Christ, the smell!) and settled them into their own cots for the night.

Now with just Beanie with him, he lifted his phone high above him, peering up at it as he was finally able to read Joline’s text. A text that was time-stamped about four hours prior. He frowned, confused, even though the text was obviously sent to prevent confusion.

Sorry - was out and about with the children. A bit insane. Envied your “cool auntie” status with your nephews. What do you mean faithful, darling? I have no doubt you’re faithful to me. Why do you feel the need to reassure me of that?

He let his hand drop to his side, his eyes growing heavy. The weight and warmth of the child, the after-bath lavender and chamomile scent of her, the softness of her cotton pyjamas, the tickle of her still-damp curls – all lulled him to a slumber of his own.

His mind wandered to thoughts of her, thoughts of Joline, images and flashes of their time together - the beautiful fury on her face, the passion replaced thereby moments later, her smile, her eyes, her body beneath his, her mind, her spirit. And he felt the need to express it to her.

Once and for all.

I trust you implicitly, Joline. I know it’s only been a short time, but I find myself awash with feelings for you. They’re rather pleasurable, and new, and different, and frankly, I feel like a new man with you. I want to name them but I’m afraid to, but if I did I would call them something like… love.

He shook his head, cringing after he’d hit send on the last message. “Idiot. Arsehole,” he groused, tapping the edge of the phone to his forehead. “Telling her that way, what’s wrong with you?” He lifted the phone again, pressed the button for FaceTime, and dialed her number. The chirpy ring of his iPhone sounded and sounded and sounded, and eventually timed out with a discouraging beep, her having not answered.

“Damn,” he swore, and then he tried simply calling her. Again, the phone played the ring music for him through the speakerphone, and again she did not answer. He flipped back to the home screen, seeing the time - 10:45 pm.

He furrowed his brow, sat up, and gently moved the child aside to rest, mumbling to herself, on the sofa. His gut clenched, a combination of fear and worry and self-loathing. Telling her you love her, his mind berated him. You dipshit. Now look what you’ve done. She’s stopped speaking to you. You’ve frightened her. With an irritated growl, he scooted forward to the edge of the seat, hunched over the phone, and texted.

Darling? Are you there?

Nothing. Not even the little bubble with the three dots. Not even an indication that his messages had been read or  delivered. He blew out his breath and stood, pacing the small living room, his mind whirring and whirling. But then, he stopped. He closed his eyes. He inhaled through his nose and exhaled slowly on puffed cheeks.

Trust her, his other, more rational voice said. She’s occupied. Not near her phone. Busy. Sleeping, Taking a bath, taking a shit, taking care of her mum, watching a film… She’s not ignoring you. The world does not revolve around you, Ansgar Martinsson. She’s fine. She … she loves you too. She hasn’t said it but you know it. In your bones, deep down in your bones, you know it.

Ansgar brought his phone to bear, and set his thumbs on the keyboard again. It’s late on a Sunday, he texted, I suppose you’re busy at home. I’m knackered, and I need to hit the sack. Long day. Will tell you about it tomorrow. Early flight and then I will meet you at the Opera House at ten sharp. Don’t be late.

And then, with a smile on his face, a shrug, and attitude of ‘why not?’ He sent one more text.

I love you, Joline Lindberg. Think on that, my darling, and sleep well.

Ansgar’s words played over and over on a loop in her mind, and her focus had been split by his fingers inside her at the time. Pleasure pounded in her ears then, her body strung out and tensed for the fall into blissful oblivion, her hands full of leather seat, her toes curled in her heels. But she’d heard them all the same, that hidden possessive threat.

‘While I’m away in Ystad, no orgasms. Your orgasms belong to me.’

Ansgar had said it in the heat of the moment, just before he left her side for more than twenty-four hours and two nights in her own bed. She’d realized that he’d promised fidelity to her but she hadn’t promised herself to him at the same time. She should have done it then, only so he didn’t have to ask – demand – that she remained his.

Joline couldn’t name the moment, pinpoint the minute she knew or at what point she had become so, but she knew. The second, that split in time didn’t matter, only that she recognized that she belonged to him, with him, for him. Reassuring him felt an important step for her, as much as it was for him.

It was the most important realization in her world until the infection hit.

There were good days and bad days since her mother’s diagnosis; that Sunday had been the worst yet. Emelie, in her weakened state, fell victim to infections often, sometimes without warning or any symptoms.

Emelie’s restless energy should have tipped Joline off that something was wrong. Too rare though that Emelie would let Joline fuss over her beyond administering her daily medications and nightly treatments. Schedules, pill bottles, catheters, needles and other medical equipment littered every room in the house. Emelie despised the reminders of her fate, and did everything to minimize it for her daughter and son. She lied, hid, and withheld the truth to keep them in the dark about how her disease progressed.

It was true, Joline’s cooking could only be described as mediocre at best. The taste of the omelets didn’t put her in the bathroom, heaving into the toilet bowl though. Not this time. Emelie disguised her sickness by running the shower to cover the sound. She wouldn’t let Joline touch her for fear that the fever would clue her daughter into what was happening. She knew, only too well…

“Mama,” Joline called from the lounge in late afternoon, “shall I put on a dvd?”

From the confine of the bathroom, Emelie cleared her throat and padded her flushed face with a cool wet flannel. “No… no, baby girl, you’re—“ She gulped, choking back another wave of nausea. She took a deep breath chasing the rise in her esophagus back down. “You-you’re working.”

Joline clapped her binder closed, swinging her bare legs off the armrest of the oversized reading chair. She sat sideways on the chair every time, it supported her back and didn’t make her sit funny like her computer chair did. She knotted herself into a human pretzel in that contraption.

“My day off, I’m… I’ve a meeting tomorrow. Reviewed all I could for that,” she lied to her mother. With Ansgar involved as her partner and the man she was seeing, she kept mum on what she’d really been going over, the lighting permits. Until she knew where she stood with Ansgar and the rumors died down to the next scandal, she could avoid mentioning him to her mother.

“I’m… okay, baby girl.”

“Good to know, but I didn’t ask,” Joline quipped unfolding and standing from her chair. She shoved her binder and house issued netbook into her leather bag from Monday. She checked her phone in case she’d missed an incoming message from Ansgar, in case it hadn’t sounded. No luck, but she knew he was busy with the newborn twins and the toddler.

Emelie called out, “Don’t wait for… me.”

“How about fika and kanelbulle?” Joline offered rummaging through the kitchen cupboard for a snack. She found the last of the pastries, and the thought of coffee made her mouth water. She flipped the switch on her coffee maker and fetached two mugs from the cupboard.

Emelie finally emerged from the bathroom while Joline brewed her K cups, staggering through her fever, feeling dizzy. She took a tremulous breath and spoke unevenly, “Jo-line.”

Her daughter whirled around just in time to see her fall to the floor.

In one singular instant, Joline was thrust into her worst fucking nightmare. From the moment her mother collapsed to the floor like a rag doll, fear stuck to her. Her new shadow. “MAMA!” Her scream echoed against the empty spaces in the room, the high pitch bouncing back.

She lunged to the floor, dropping to her hands and knees beside the prone figure of her mother, her best friend, her favorite person on the face of the planet. Handfuls of her mother’s clothes filled her palms as she unraveled the older woman. Joline pressed her cool hands to her mother’s inflamed face. The shock of the burn made her gasp and draw away, terror gripping the base of her spine. Gently she tried rousing her mother with gentle slaps against her cheeks.

“Mama? Mama? Please, please…” she heard the panic rise in her voice, “oh, God… not now. Mama?” She checked her mother’s pulse point. Weak but present. Checked her breathing. Shallow but steady. If she had her wits, she would’ve grabbed the blood pressure machine that she used morning and night to check her mother’s levels.

A lump of dread and alarm formed in the back of her throat, but she used it as fuel. Fuel to push her to her feet. To propel her towards her mobile. To pound her fingers to dial 112 for emergency responders. To fall to her mother’s side once more.

“What is the nature of your emergency please?” A flat voice asked immediately.

“Please, please, send an ambulance…” Joline’s eyes filled with unshed tears. “It’s, it’s, it’s my mother. She’s ill… she’s sick. Please send help.” Brokenly she rattled off the address of her childhood home in Gamla Stan, not for the first time, but she always feared it would be the last. She wasn’t blind to her mother’s condition.

“How old is the victim?”

“She’s sixty-three… she suffers… from kidney failure, a complication of Lupus.” As calmly as she could, she named all the medications, dosages, and the time of her last hookup to the peritoneal dialysis. Joline memorized all the pertinent information for emergencies of this nature. It was precisely the reason she’d returned to Sweden.

The dispatcher talked her through to when the first responders arrived, Joline barely functional in her worry. She threw her mobile aside when the bell sounded and she let the two men in to tend to her mother. Within minutes, they were on route to urgent care. The next hour flew by in a flurry of rushed, barked orders, checking and rechecking her mother and dashing her into the intensive care unit.

Infection… that was the only part Joline understood in her shock. She was near comatose, completely beside herself when the nurse pressed a phone into her hand and ordered her to call someone. She rung Elias since she knew the number, and the dam burst when she heard his voice on the other end of the line.

“Describe it to me. What is success to you?”

“It’s…,” he breathed. “It’s doing what you love. It’s… living the way you want to live. Control over your own life, your own decisions. It’s caring for others. It’s comfort. It’s getting up in the morning with the actual desire to go to work. It’s dreaming big and having those dreams, through hard work, become a reality. I mean, if your sister in law’s dream was to be a wife and a stay at home mother, then she’s a huge success. If it was her dream to, perhaps,” he frowned, “I dunno… be a barrister, then, she’s not a success. She’s a failure.”

“Hm,” Joline intoned. “I suppose.”

“And take you,” he said. “Your dream, from what I can see of you, at least your primary dream, is not to be solely ike your dear, dear sister in law,” he laughed. “Quite the opposite, in fact. I can’t picture you leading such a boring lifestyle. Your dream is to entertain, to build, to run the very best theatre you can, one of the most prestigious theatres in the world, and my God, but you’re doing it, aren’t you?”

She remained silent.

He stopped walking, giving her arm a small, gentle tug. “Aren’t you?”

She nodded. “Yeah,” she said. “I am.”

“Then, you’re definitely a success. Success is wholly subjective, my darling, remember that. Her success is not your success, and frankly,” he started walking again, facing forward, his nose in the air, “she’s a bitch for making you feel the failure. Besides,” he said in a false plummy tone, “I don’t associate with failures, how could you possibly be a failure.”

She laughed, leaning her head into his shoulder. She gave him a small push with her hip. “She’d probably feel the same way about you, you know,” look down on you with your…. with your situation. Divorced, no kids.”

He lifted one shoulder in a gesture of ennui. “Eh. Let her have her… feelings. I don’t give a rats arse about her opinion of me. She wouldn’t dare say anything of it to my face, I’d cut her down in an instant for her bigotry. I’ve not cared about the judgment of others for years, I’m not going to start caring now.”

“I wish I had that attitude,” Joline said.

“Ah but you do, on the outside. I’ve seen it,” Ansgar said. “You just feel comfortable enough sharing the deeper side of yourself with me.” He smiled gently. “That side that’s there before your shell hardens over to hide a wound. And…,” he sighed, “I… I thank you for that. I feel the same about you, that… and I….”

BOOM!

A clap of thunder railed off in the distance, echoing through the trees, the sound bouncing off the side of the hill and the water. Ansgar peered up toward the west, where the setting sun was suddenly occluded by dark, threatening clouds. “Damn it to hell,” he said. “We’d better go.”

Joline followed his line of sight. She sighed. “What’d I tell you? Always rains when I come up here. Never fails.”

Ansgar grinned. “Stayed beautiful out here just long enough for us to… to make love.”

Joline snapped to attention, her head swiveling sharply toward him. “Is that what that was?”

Ansgar shrugged as he opened the passenger door for her. “I think so,” he said, shutting the door behind her and leaning on the window ledge. “Don’t you?”

She said nothing, but stared wide-eyed at him, as if he were reading her mind, as if he’d somehow invaded and buried himself deep beneath some private part of her, and the strange thing was… she liked it.

“Well,” Ansgar said, drawing his hand over her cheek, “I think the look on your face says it all.” He trailed his fingers down her neck to her shoulder, and down her arm as he strode back around the car. He folded himself into the driver’s seat, and started the engine. The seat readjusted itself to his height. “Better get the top up, eh?”

“You okay to drive?” Joline asked.

“Sober as a priest,” he said, looking back to ensure the top had secured itself. He pushed the shifter, putting the car in gear. “Besides, I’d best take the helm if it’s going to storm.” He backed up, turned the car, and drove back down the long, winding road to the main highway. “Where to now?” he asked, moving his hand from the gear shift to her knee.

“Anywhere,” she said absently.

“Feel better, darling?” he asked, concerned. “About… about what your sister in law said to you? You still seem a bit off.”

“I’m okay,” Joline replied. “It’s just that… she told me she’s pregnant again, too. Rubbed it in my face like it was some prize she’d won and I came in second place because I’ve never had children. It’s like, it’s all she talks about. Ever. And the look on her face when she told me they were having another baby, it was… so smug, I wanted to smack the look off of her.”

“Oh, really?” Ansgar’s blood went cold. Cold with the knowledge of his own fate when it came to having children, of his own failure… if that’s what it was… on that front. Of his own tamped down jealousy for his brother and his children… his beautiful children. Damn. He swallowed hard and plastered on a wide smile, hiding behind it. “What did I say, Joline?” He turned on his turn signal and merged back on to the E4. “Hmmm?”

“Her success is not my success,” she recited.

“Yes, very good,” Ansgar replied instructively. “And there is no way in hell you are second best to your sister in law or anyone else.” He looked at her and gave her knee a squeeze. “Remember that.”

“Well, okay,” Joline mused. “But you still owe me that ice cream with M&Ms.”

He sighed, thankful for the sudden turn in conversation. He’d tell her, yes. Eventually, but not yet. Not so soon. “M&M’s eh?” He pulled a comically mock frown. “I thought for sure after what we just did you wouldn’t need M&Ms anymore. Am I second best, then? Am I not a good enough replacement for your tiny candy coated chocolate tidbits?”

She gave him a false look of resignation. “Sorry, Sgar,” she sang. “Nothing can replace those tiny candy coated chocolate tidbits. Ever.”

Ansgar gave her a doe-eyed look, batting his lashes. “Your first love, eh?”

“Yeah,” she said airily. “But not my last.”

“Ice cream with M&Ms it is,” Ansgar declared. “And I know just the place. It’ll take about an hour to get back,” he peered at the clock, “it’ll be about nine thirty when we arrive. Would you be terribly upset if I took you home after? I hate to, honestly I do, but I need to get up at oh-fuck-thirty in the morning tomorrow.”

“Why?”

“I’ve got to catch a six am plane to Ystad. Going to watch the nieces and the nephew for the day whilst my brother and his wife go to a wedding. Magnus’ former boss is getting married… for the third time, apparently.”

Joline beamed at him, laughing. “Ansgar Martinsson: babysitter extraordinaire. Who’d have thunk it.”

“That’s me,” he said. “And a damn good one I am.”

She snorted. “Somehow, I doubt that.”

Ansgar cringed, sucking air through his teeth. “Yeah, not my strong suit,” he rumbled. “There shall be a lot of candy type bribery tomorrow, and a bag full of expensive pressies, and a bit of PlayStation, and a smattering of kid things on Netflix.”

“I would expect nothing less,” she smiled.

“I aim to please.” He grinned. “Listen, I’ll text you tomorrow. All day if you like. We can even Face Time when the children are napping. Then, I can meet you on the Monday at the theatre, say at 10 am? For business, of course. We’ve some work to do on the engineering plans. Need you to sign off on some more things.”

“Ooh, sounds exciting,” she joked, insinuating her hand between his thighs, curling her fingers around his flesh. “I’ll sign off on anything for you.”

He purred, revving the engine to echo the sentiment. “Keep touching me like that and I’ll not make my flight in the morning, and you definitely won’t get your M&Ms.”

She pulled her hand back as if burnt.

He laughed heartily. “Yeah, I see where I stand now. I get it.”

The lamps in the lounge glowed in the window, a mother’s touch, to welcome Joline home. She knew the polite thing to do would be to invite Ansgar inside, offer him a drink and introduce him to her mother. The possibility that he might accept, rather than respectfully decline, had her too worried to offer it. She wanted to put her mother’s mind at rest, that Ansgar wasn’t the beast or adulterer that she potentially believed him to be. But Joline wasn’t ready. For each mile they drew closer, she wrestled with how to handle her developing relationship with him and her family dynamic.

She often didn’t bring the men she dated into her home or to her mother or introduce him to her brother or her nephews. The inevitable questions that Joline couldn’t answer would surface and the awkward stilted conversations that followed a short-term fling annoyed her. They only way to avoid those weird talks was to not allow men into her life, at least not entirely. Although her feelings for Ansgar changed, she couldn’t be sure if his had changed for her.

Until she knew, she couldn’t bring him into her life. He’d already claimed a place with the boys and with Elias. The questions and the explanations and Joline’s inevitable heartbreak that loomed in the future kept her from committing to Ansgar and inviting him all the way into her life. He’d said to trust him, and she was trying to do that. She wanted to believe that he was hers and she belonged to him. But she didn’t believe in herself enough to giver herself over to it. She didn’t believe that she could find another relationship of substance after a ten year marriage. How could she? How did she move on from that?

She simply tried, one step at a time. “Thank you, Sgar – for earlier… about Leah,” she murmured just over the oppressive beat of the driving rain on the durable vinyl of the convertible top.

“Of course, darling,” he said turning the car off and killing the ambient light of the car’s dash.

“She means well, she does,” Joline explained with a shrug. “She doesn’t intend to be the bitch.”

“You don’t have to explain her behavior to me.” He pulsed his hand around her thigh, which was noticeably higher than when their journey from Uppsala began. “Or make excuses for her. My concern is you.”

Joline swiveled enough to pillow her head upon the headrest and looked at him. She wasn’t in any rush to leave Ansgar’s presence, even if she was a few feet from her door. “Leah, she’s good people… she is. She almost idolizes Elias and they do make beautiful children together. If I’m honest, I’m looking forward to being an auntie again.”

“What’s your favorite part? About being Aunt Joline?” His questions appeared innocent enough, but his hand under her skirt scooted higher.

“I get to be the fun one! I take the boys to the zoo, to the park, bike riding, out to the pier to watch the wind surfing and the pedal boats. Adrian and Hugo are good boys, I rarely have to discipline them. And when I do, I turn them over to Elias for that.” She sighed inwardly. “Sometimes that’s the hard part, taking them home at night… Elias and Leah get to tuck them up, read them stories, making them breakfast in the morning. It’s a rare treat that I get to babysit them for that part. Leah doesn’t like to be away from them… ever.”

Ansgar made a sound, an abbreviated sound of humor. “I can see that in her, sure.” His thumb grazed over the smooth skin of her thigh.

A far off look washed over Joline’s face as her eyes unfocused and almost looked through Ansgar. “I’ll find my shell again. I will. I… well, I didn’t want you to think poorly of her. She means well.”

Ansgar drew her attention back to him by touching her cheek with a gentle swipe of his unoccupied hand. “I can form my own opinions about her. I’m only sorry that she made you feel bad when you already angry with me.” He smiled crookedly.

Placing her elbows on the console, Joline breached the car median and kissed the lifted corner of his lips. “Don’t do it again.”

“I won’t do it again,” he recited, his tongue in his cheek though he planned to live by it. He tucked his hand between her thighs, encouraging them to split a bit more.

She beamed and retreated back to her side of the car again, to her previous position. “You know, it’s kind of encouraging, this being an auntie thing… again. It’ll be great to have another niece or nephew. Another hellion to unleash on Leah, if she ticks me off. Another person to love, really…”

As if she’d just confessed her heart to him, as if he’d been waiting for her to say it, Ansgar kissed her. He kissed her passionately, reverently and entirely. His tongue stole into her mouth to taste that word or that emotion from her – or chase it away and replace it with lust. He either wanted to take it from her and hold it within himself or wipe that four letter word from her palate and put desire there instead. She couldn’t read him. She couldn’t be sure.

His fingers deftly invaded below, coaxing that word from her lips again or filling her core with splendid sensation. Joline whimpered, widening her legs, offering herself up for the taking, however he wanted her. She lifted her hips, heedless of the place or the neighbors whom might catch an eyeful. Her arousal had been ebbing and cresting since the journey back from Uppsala, Ansgar kept her teetering on the edge with ghosting touches and deliberate squeezes. He made her aware, keenly aware that he was close to her sex all night.

She hummed and moaned in approval as his fore and middle finger pumped a lazy rhythm. Her hand shot to his as she began to climb. Ansgar tore his mouth from hers with a heated, “Nuh uh uh!”

She cursed into the closed area of the car, “Fuck!”

His fingers stopped within her, no more flicking, no more massaging, no more grazing. “Be a good girl. Pry those fingers off me and I will continue.”

She obeyed at once, panting to manager her body’s basic desire to seek pleasure quickly. She surrendered to him, to her man.

“I don’t need direction to find your orgasm, darling,” he whispered. He circled the spongy ridge inside her with a teasing fingertip. “I know. Patience and I’ll make your heartbeat echo through your core.”

Joline threw her head back, training her hands into the leather of the seat under her, and sang her pleasure. “Oh!… Ah… Sgar… I… fuck – just there!” She gasped and held her breath, squeezing her eyes shut, as he swirled her g-spot.

“Now, listen to me… Christ, so wet… While I’m away in Ystad,” he alternated between pumping his fingers in time with the syllables of his words and orbiting her chaos point. He watched as her jaw dropped and her shoulders lifted in need. “No orgasms. Do you understand me?”

She whimpered again, biting her lower lip, trying not to squirm.

“Open your eyes, darling. Tell me that you under—Uh uh uh uh… don’t come yet!” He slowed the teasing down.

“Sgar… please…” Then she hissed as her body clenched in anticipation. She gulped and gasped, desperately trying to follow his direction.

“Tell me that you understand!”

“Yes!” Her body bowed involuntarily.

“Good girl. Your orgasms belong to me. There will be none without me. Will you wait for me, Joline? Until I return?”

“Yes…”

“Say my name.”

Joline licked her lips, tasting her climax… so close, so close…  “Yes, Ansgar!”

Swiftly, he gave her the high that he’d been promising for the past hour.

*~*~*~*~*~

Joline’s mobile pinged with an incoming message as she was making breakfast with her mother. Emelie looked pale and moved with a jittery nervousness. She couldn’t focus, so Joline stepped up.

Ansgar’s message arrived in the midst of whisking eggs. Ingrid has decided pulling my hair is more fun than her binky. Beans has built a castle in every room of the house. Axel slept through most of it. Any tips for me?

Tell Ingrid, the little brat, that those curls are for the lady grown-ups and adult activities! Hands off.  Joline typed back.

She’s not backing down.  His reply was almost immediate. What else have you got?

Have you tried bribery yet? Coffee. All the coffee… and M&MS! Joline typed back.  Bribery for the children. Coffee and M&Ms for you.

I should’ve known.  Have you left any for me?

Joline put her mobile aside. “Mama, why don’t you take a load off? I got this!”

“Your cooking is mediocre, my love. I—“ Emelie gasped as she tried to lift the milk from the fridge. Her hand shot to the small of her back.

Her daughter dropped the whisk with a clatter and went to her. She saved the milk from its fate of a puddle on the kitchen floor. She supported her mother into one of the kitchen table chairs, hoping the episode would pass quickly. Joline knelt in front of her, tabling the bottle, “At least you’ll eat a meal, mama.”

*~*~*~*~*~

I missed waking up beside you this morning. Remind me not to let you sleep alone anymore.  Ansgar messaged again a few hours later.

Joline sat in the lounge pretending to read through some of the upcoming budget proposals for the new season. The costume shop had a huge expenditure list, and she was looking for avenues to cut or at least shave a bit to be able to afford it. The numbers and bullet points only floated in front of her face like a collage, her focus mostly on her mother. Emelie had finally settled upon the sofa, but she seemed restless with her knitting needles.

I’m not doing my job right if you need reminding.  Joline answered, smiling at the device.

I assumed I was being thoughtful to let you sleep in when I couldn’t. Am I in trouble?

Not at all, I understand. How are the children? Are you surviving?

They don’t all nap at the same time, I’m learning.

I’m sure you doing great with them, Ansgar. They’re all still breathing, right?

All alive… and kicking. Literally. Axel may be have a future on the roster for Sweden national football team.

Joline cracked a smile, imagining Ansgar with an infant. The large, broad man cradling a newborn baby appealed to her, his protection, his strength to defend the helpless child.  At least he’s awake now. You can bond over manly things.

He knew nothing but the woman. Nothing but Joline. Nothing but the wet heat of her lips, the slide of her tongue, the rose perfumed scent-flavor of her, the delicious give and take and push and pull of her body against his, the way she bent like a reed in his arms, molding herself to him, the way her arms caged him, blocked out all sound from his ears, the way her fingers clutched like those of a drowning sailor’s in his hair.

The way she moaned when he touched her skin, the way she cried out and sang hymns of praise into his mouth when he worshipped her, when he gave her his offering, when he sang his own Laus et Jubilato to her.

And there, in all of creation, in the outdoors, in the seclusion of the deserted, heavy grove of summer trees, he made love to her.

He lifted her, tucking his arms beneath her back and her knees, and he carried her to her place, the spot she’d pointed out–  the shadowy glen between a massive oak and a thatch of reedy, white birch. The spot was clean, green and without stones or patches of dirt. Just a blanket of thick, manicured grass, and he laid her gently upon it.

He laid her upon it, and he gazed down at her, his eyes nearly in tears from the heat, from the pressure of desire within them. She returned his stare, her own eyes glossy and glassy and heady, her mouth slack and loose, her dark hair fanned out like a halo around her head.

His body lowered to hers, covered her, hid her from the eyes of Heaven and the rest of the world. He brushed his fingers with a delicate, reverent touch over her forehead, her closed eyelids, down her nose, over her lips, and he lingered there. Lingered at her lips, tracing the reddening, maddening line of them once, twice, three times before replacing his fingers with his mouth - open and hungry and needy.

Tongue and fingers explored her simultaneously, one from above, one from beneath, and Ansgar gasped in her mouth. Gasped with the surprise, with the knowledge, with the sensation of a significant lack of fabric beneath her skirt.

He gasped and she chuckled, smirking beneath his lips.

“You absolute fiend,” Ansgar growled, caressing his nose over her cheek. “You seductress. You’ve been without your knickers like this all day, haven’t you.”

“Look what you could have missed out on, big man,” she teased, wrapping her arms up and over his head. “Remember this for the next time.”

“Oh,” Ansgar huffed. “I will always remember this, believe me, darling. Always.”

And with that, he pushed her skirt up, up, up over her hips, exposing her manicured sex to him. “Christ, you’re wanton,” he whispered. “Look at you, lying there with your legs spread, your blouse askew, your hair a mess, on the grass.”

“On a hillside. In Uppsala,” she grinned. “What’s the difference?”

“Someone may see us,” Ansgar sang. “See you all… naked. Exposed… like you are.”

She ran fingers up her thigh, toying with the crest of hair at the apex between her legs. “You mean, someone may see me do this?” She plunged two fingers in between, curling them into her own sex. She let her head fall back, her eyes rolling up as she brought her wet fingertips out to swirl at the top of her desire.

Ansgar groaned as she pumped herself more and more. His eyes remained fixated upon her theft, her invasion of his territory, her self-stolen-ministrations. His jaw was slack and heavy, eyes narrowed and intent, breaths coming heavier… and heavier… and heavier. His cock twitched, pounding its heartbeat against his cotton shorts like a strait-jacketed madman in a padded cell.

Shorts which he, with quick yet fumbling fingers opened and shoved down his legs. With a possessive growl, he lurched forward, grabbing roughly at her sinful fingers. “No! That’s mine! You don’t touch that,” he gnarled. “Mine.”

She laughed. “Then come get it.”

He threw her hand to the side and with a swift arch of his body, he shoved his hips deep – and he entered her. “Aaaaah… fuuuuuuck.” He entered her and he reveled in the heat and the throbbing pressure and softness around his flesh. He let forth with a violent, eye-clenching, teeth-baring roar and held himself there, panting, his full length slid into her. He threw his head back, muscles arched like a strung bow. His arms were taut, straining, and locked, and his legs quivered beneath him.

“Mmmmmm….” she hummed, her hands snaking around to clutch at his bared bottom. “Yes. That’s… yes!”

“Ah, God! Joline!” he grit through clenched teeth. He hissed, and slowly pulled himself back, rolling his hips on a steamed breath like the piston of a steady engine, each long stroke accompanied by a feral moan.

“Ansgar,” she said breathily, crawling her hands up his body, pressing against his chest, covering his heart, willing it to beat its rhythms for her. “Ansgar, look at me. Please.”

And he did. He looked down, opened his eyes, and glared wide-eyed, fully intent upon her. “Joline. God help me, I –” he began, the ability to speak all but stolen from him. “I… I… am… I am… Oh, Christ!”

Joline. God help me but I am… falling in love with you.

Joline asked, implored, begged for him to look at her, and what she saw when he did, what she felt in his wide, nearly black and rounded eyes tore her apart. Ruined her. Destroyed her. The first time they were in bed together she’d asked for him to do just that, and he’d made good on it. She hadn’t meant for it in this way, nor had he intended in this way. But what she saw, what she felt, tender, affectionate, consideration and generously passionate intimacy… and hers!

Rosie had been wrong. It was personal, this attraction between Ansgar and Joline, but her affections for him had grown beyond tolerance, beyond that of a professional co-worker, beyond that of her shallow sexual attraction to him, beyond that of her appreciation of his willingness to help her in her time of need, beyond that of their sexual compatibility. She didn’t like him; that wasn’t strong enough. The emotion, the weakness, the phantom ache that kept creeping back wasn’t like. It was far deeper, something wholly personal and entirely hers.

In all her protestations and denials and barriers, she’d fallen for him. She’d fought but she’d lost long before their eyes locked as they made love in her favorite place, the plush carpet of green lawn beside a pond in Uppsala. She didn’t care if someone else saw them, her only concern was pleasing him, pleasuring him, loving him.

Joline would think about the consequences later, whether she was only a rebound, or a bit of fun while he healed, or a good lay for a few nights until he moved on.

Her hands curled under his arms and splayed over his shoulders, pressing him down into her. She needed him closer, more immediate, more intimate. He spread himself out over the top of her, her body sandwiched between his massive weight and the soil of their motherland. He cupped the sides of her head like a pillow. The only movement came from their hips, that primitive, carnal dance of lovers. She rocked her hips and tipped her sex to accept his languid strokes into her. His undulating center pressed into her core in time with his accelerating pulse.

“Ans…gar…I…I…” Her speech broken by the placement of his cock into her. Her brain simply couldn’t form the words she wanted to say, those words to express what she felt. Then being with him, in this way, wasn’t about her. Not only about her. “Yessss…yesss…ah…God…”

Rapture dug into her before Joline was prepared for it to come and claim her. Her body betrayed her and she surrendered to the pleasure she experienced with him. It was unlike anything she felt before, physically or emotionally. She cried out her ecstasy, her entire body seizing and releasing. Her arms and legs clenched around him as the source of her euphoric crisis and in her need to share it with him.

Ansgar saw the clench of her sex around him on her face before he felt it. Her beautiful face had gone slack and a veil of… of… something undefinable cleared from her eyes in that insanely gorgeous moment. He, like her, felt the betrayal in his body… the icy heat in his lower back, the maddening clutch in his balls, and the raging pressure in his cock to give Joline what she wanted. And give it, he did with a final grunt and violent press forward. He growled into the cushion of her breasts, mewling like the defeated lion cat he was. She purred possessively underneath him, stroking his spine, her claws withdrawn from the high.

“Minx,” he mumbled into the folds of her skin and the cotton material of her blouse that had stayed on in their need and urgency to be together. “Vixen.”

Airiy, she laughed, her body too sexed and mushed to commit to it. “How many more can you come up with?”

He paused, his mind wiped almost entirely clear of anything but the calm in his body, that syrupy numbing buzz. “Mine.”

Her fingers on his back moved into his hair and combed through his mussed up curls. “Entirely.” More than you’ll ever know, Ansgar Martinsson. More than you’ll ever know.

Gingerly he lifted his head to gaze down into her eyes. “You planned that, having your wicked way with me.”

“Hoped,” she corrected. “Hoped, and left ample opportunity. Who knew it would take you that long to touch me like that? You got close a number of times on the drive here.”

“I was distracted, by your bare legs, your mouth-watering cleavage, and your sucking me off in the carpark.”

One side of her mouth quirked up into a silly lopsided grin. “All foreplay, Casanova. All for you to get your fingers on me and notice that I’d gone without knickers - for you.”

“Temptress… Jezebel… my siren.” He uttered between fluttering kisses across her lips.

She giggled. “You’ve found your words again. I think that means that our journey to Uppsala was a successful one.”

Ansgar gently withdrew from her body and dropped upon the grass beside her, moving into a seated position. He offered a hand to help her sit up too. As he tucked himself back into his shorts and tugged his shirt back into place, he broached the subject, “Are you okay, Joline?”

She combed her fingers through her hair, straightening the strands, and pulling a piece of summer fluff from it. Ansgar too pulled a few blades of grass from her mane. “About this? What… fucking in the grass?” Her heart skipped a beat and shriveled for having said it. What they’d done had been so much more than that, but brave face. She assumed she’d passed the point of no return alone. She couldn’t impose on him; she offered her body, he couldn’t know that she’d given him more than that.

“I was referring to today, as a whole. Are you okay? Aside from our row, your brother and the unfortunate rumor mill, are you all right? You… your…“ he searched for the best description without hurting her. "You were distracted by… something…”

Ansgar blinked against the amber dawn light that streamed in through the picture window. He stirred, moaning quietly as he woke. He woke but he didn’t move, entirely unwilling as he was to relinquish the weight and comfort of the baby, the little girl, his daughter. And so he stayed there, one arm thrown over his head, his leg bent haphazardly off the edge of his Poul Kjærholm sofa, the woven pink blanket barely covering his midriff, but securely snug and tucked up beneath his hand and around the little bundle.

And his gaze centered strictly upon her. A blithe, placid smile flowed across his lips and remained there, breath after contented breath. 

As irritated as he’d been during the first few nights after he and Joline brought Magnes home, eventually the strange sleep patterns, the late hours, the near constant cycle of feeding, changing, playing and sleeping had become routine. In fact, over the past two weeks, Ansgar had come to almost enjoy the pre-dawn hours he’d spent with his little Maggie. The soft cries from the co-sleeper attached to Joline’s side of the bed, Joline waking to feed her, and then Ansgar taking her into his office for a lie down on the sofa - quiet time for mama - had become a welcome part of his life.

And it was a part of his life that, for the first thirty-five of it, he thought he’d never have. The fact of his inability to father children - well, his alleged inability - had shaped choices he’d made, attitudes he gave, personas he’d adopted. He’d led his life as if the only person he would ever care about, be responsible for was himself. Just him. Nobody else. Ever. And he’d been okay with that. He’d even built his business, birthed his multi-national multi-billion kronor enterprise on the very concept that it alone would be his child, his offspring....

His legacy.

But now, things were different. Vastly different. And like the unaccustomed disorder in his office, he didn’t mind the paradigm shift so much. In fact, in that moment, Ansgar Martinsson felt as if he had not truly been, as he’d thought, on a lifelong climb to the summit of success in business. In reality, the trail had been leading him to this. To more - so much more. To a truth. To fatherhood.  

And maybe, just maybe, Magnus was right all along. Maybe, just maybe, one day, he’d admit that to his brother. Maybe. And maybe one day he’d tell Magnus this: that he now knew exactly what had been missing from his life. That he’d been inexplicably, secretly, and insanely jealous of Magnus all these years, ever since Viktoria was born. 

He now knew why.  And he was no longer jealous.

He brushed pooled tears from the corners of his eyes, sniffed, and sighed beneath his broad grin. Humming tunelessly, he wrapped his hands around the tiny body of his baby daughter and sat slowly, carefully up, cradling the newborn against his chest. He kept his movements slow, cautious, deliberate, easing himself to the edge of the sofa. “Ah, here we go, Magpie,” he murmured as he rose to his feet. “Let’s go see mamma.”

At the very mention of “mamma” Maggie squirmed in protest against his shoulder, pulled an irritated face, and whined quietly. She curled her little body downward, buffing her cheek against Ansgar’s breast, her little mouth opening and closing -- a baby bird desperate for its mother’s nourishment.

“Ah no. Not there, Maggie darling,” Ansgar chuckled. He adjusted his grip so that she lay in the crook of his elbow. “You can suckle on that all you want, I suppose, but I’d advise quite strongly against it. It’d only be disappointing for you and painful for pappa. Then we’d both get angry and we’d both cry, and we don’t want that, now do we? Hm? No we most certainly do not.” 

In response, Maggie twisted up her face, clutched at a tuft of Ansgar’s chest hair, growled, and let out a low, rumbling - and very wet - fart. 

“Oh, Christ, Maggie! Perfect timing, that.” Ansgar sniffed and groaned. “Yes. Make pappa change you before you go to mamma. I get it. No interruptions on the num nums, ja?” He laughed as he turned the corner, swiftly shifting his destination from the bedroom to the nursery. “Yes. I see how it is. I do. Two weeks old and you’ve already sussed how to work the system, haven’t you?” He cradled her in his hands as he rest her down on the changing table. “My little mogul. Yes, that’s what you are. Conniving, cunning little thing you are ....”

“Just like her pappa.”

Ansgar peered over his shoulder as he worked, and gave Joline a broad smile. “Morning,” he chirped. “I’m just um... ugh!” He moaned and coughed as he opened her diaper and the fetor reached his nostrils. “Oh, Jesus Christ, Maggie, that’s... that’s... oh Christ! That’s disgusting!” 

Joline laughed, stepped comically outside the door and covered her nose. 

“Sure,” he choked. “Save the nastiest one yet for me.” He bent over Maggie’s face, narrowed his eyes and shook his head. “And here I thought you liked me best. Serves me right, ja?”

Maggie cooed happily and kicked her legs, her eyes wide and her fists balled up against the sides of her head. She stared brightly at Ansgar as he made quick work - or as quick as he could with a squirming child - of cleaning up the malodorous effluent and once again clothing her in a clean diaper. 

“There,” Ansgar cleared his throat. “Finished, you nasty little beastie, you.” He picked her up and turned to Joline. “Here,” he said. “She keeps trying to breastfeed off me, and I keep telling her it’s no use.”

“Girls never listen to their pappa,” Joline joked. “Not at first, at least.”

“Great,” he replied. “Is that what I have to look forward to, then?”

Joline sat in the rocking chair, opened the flap of her shirt and put Maggie to her breast. “Not if we do things right,” she said lightly, airily, as she toyed with a wayward lock of the baby’s hair. “Not if we don’t spoil her.”

Ansgar knelt down in front of her, his hand rest on Joline’s knee, his other hand caressing the crown of Maggie’s head. “Oh, I intend to spoil her,” he said. “But I won’t allow her to become a little hellion. She’ll get the things she needs, but the things she wants, she’ll have to work for.” 

Joline hummed in agreement.

“I mean, I’ll buy her a car when she’s old enough, and it’ll be one that’s nice and one that’s safe, but it’ll be perhaps a Toyota or a VW. If she wants something more luxurious or with more prestige, she’ll have to get a job and work for it.” He chuckled. “I may be a wealthy man but I’m still Viktor Martinsson’s son, damn it. If there’s one thing Viktor taught us, it’s the value of hard work.”

“Same with my dad,” she smiled. “And I know we’ve talked about this before, but I’m glad to hear that.”

“Why? Were you ever worried about that?” Ansgar lowered himself to sit on the floor, his head rest against Joline’s knee. 

“Sort of,” she shrugged and curled the fingers of her free hand into his bed-mussed hair. “I just know how you enjoy the finer things, and how you like to... well....” She bobbled her head and rolled her eyes, her lips in a tight smile. 

“Throw my money around?”

“Your weight. You throw your weight around.” Joline corrected. “You know what you want and you know you have the power to get it. Not that you ever act spoilt or anything because you don’t. Maybe a bit brutal and demanding from time to time but righteously so, but.... oh, here, take her for a sec. I need to switch sides.” 

After a few minutes of shifting, covering, uncovering, and situating Maggie back in her arms, and in response to Ansgar’s “But what?” Joline continued. “But we just have to be cognizant of the fact that Maggie will learn by example, that’s all. She’ll watch you especially.”

Ansgar stood and nodded. “I get it. It’s a Herculean responsibility, raising her right,” he replied. “I want her to learn how to assert and defend herself, how to not be a doormat. However,” he lifted a finger, stopping the words on the tip of Joline’s tongue. “However, she shouldn’t be vain or boorish or selfish about things. That’s a bit of a fine line, I know. But, between the two of us, I’m sure we can make that happen. We can make anything happen, you and I.”

Joline smiled and shifted her gaze to Maggie’s fluttering, sleepy eyes. “We made her happen.”