One Way Street

Date: 31.03.12
Place: JFK
Destination: Iceland, Akureyri.

You know how, when people have something horrible happen to them. Someone cheats, lies or worse. They go as far away as possible but some how end up right where they started. I was one of those people. I just wanted to forget what had happen back home and get away for a while. And what did I do? I went to the only place where I knew know one would recognise me. Iceland, better yet, Akureyri.

I turned my phone off after ignoring Kevin’s phonecalls for about an hour. A few moments later he tried ringing me up on Skype. I logged off. The clock on the computer showed three in the morning. I got up and got a glass of water. As I stood over the sink thinking about what they’d say back home when they found out where I’d gone, I heard a strange humming sound. I looked around me for something that could possibly be producing the sound. Then, as the humming got louder, I realized it came from the apartment next to mine. I decided to ignore it and go to bed.

The humming continued the next day, and the next night, the day after that and the night after that. When it had not stopped for three nights I decided to go next door and ask kindly whoever was making this noise and if they could please restrain themselves at least during the night. When I was about to knock it stopped. I returned to my apartment, no need to bother them since they stopped. The next day I decided to leave the apartment for the first time since I got here. I walked sround the town, got some coffee and walked along the sea. It was nice. When I got back the humming had started again. When it was about two in the morning I was getting a bit annoyed so I decided to go and see what was going on. I knocked on the door and the humming stopped. There was some moving of chairs and footsteps. A girl answered the door. She looked around my age, a bit younger maybe. She had short brown hair that stuck out in the air like little springs from her head. She was quite short and looked up at my face with big brown eyes.
“Hi, can I help you?” she asked with a voice that was so completyely out of context to her body that I was a bit taken aback. I had expected a high-pitched shriek but in stead her voice was quite dark and soft, like the darkenss that lays over the city back home. Like how in the summer when it’s so hot and quiet that you can almost see the darkness lay down like an animal, getting ready to sleep.
“Yes,” I replied. She looked at me waiting for something more. I stared back for a while.
“Is it my turn?” she asked.
“What?” I asked dumbly.
“To say something,” she replied. “You’re just staring at me so I thought that maybe I missed the signal for my turn.” I kept staring. “Nevermind,” she said after a while. “Would you like to come in?” she asked in another attempt to get me to say something.
“I – no, I just came to see if this humming noise was coming from your apartment.”
“Humming noise?” she asked confused. “Oh, you mean my cello.”
“Your what?” I asked.
“My cello, I’ve been practicing a lot lately,” she said, directing my gaze inside, towards an intrument that was laying on the floor. It looked like a giant violin.
“Oh, well, then don’t let me disturb you,” I said. I felt bad for interuppting her when she was parcticing. I rembered how I hated when people disturbed me when I was playing the piano back home.
“Oh, no not at all, I can stop if it’s bothering you,” she said.
“No, don’t do that, I’d hate to be the reason for you not being able to practice, what are you playing?” I asked, more because I wanted to be polite, no that I was interested.
“It’s a cello concerto by Elgar, I’m supposed to be playing with the orchestra on saturday,” she said.
“There’s a concert?” I asked. Now I felt even worse.
“Yes, at Hof, the concert hall by the sea, you should come.”
“I’d love to,” I said, regretting it the moment I said it.
“Great, it would make me really happy to see someone I know there, I’m worried nobody is going ot show. My family is back home in Reykjavík.” Great now I had to come. I just nodded and tried to smile. “I’m sorry, it’s late. You’re probably tired,” she said apologetic. I just smiled. I couldn’t say no, because I really was tired but I didn’t want to seem rude.
“I’m Johanna,” she said. I just smiled. When I didn’t reply she added: “I thought we could exchange names so that I could actually say that I know you on Saturday.”
“Yeah, of course, I’m Chester,” I said.
“Nice to meet yo Chester, I’ll try to keep it down for you,” she said and closed the door. I returned to my apartment, just in time to hear my phone ring. I was so absent minded that I forgot I was ingoring everyone and answered it.
“Finally,” Kevin exclamied when I answered. “We have been calling you for days, why didn’t you answer?”
“I didn’t feel like talking.”
“Yeah, we got that,” he said, sarcastic. Then he calmed down. “Look, Chester, we know how you fell about what happened, but you can’t just run away from it.”
I tried my best to focus on the fact he meant well by bringing it up but I got too angry.
“I don’t want to talk about this,” I said with a flatly.
“I’m sorry man, I’m just trying to help,” Kvein said, desperatly trying ot get me not to hang up.
“It’s two in the morning here, I have to go,” I said with the same flat voice.
“I’m sorry Chester but you have to talk about this.”
“I’m tired, I’ll talk to you later,” said as I hung up. I lied down in the bed but I was too upset to sleep. It seemed as Johanna had stopped practicing to give me peace to sleep. I felt bad about her consideration to go to waste because I couldn’t sleep anyway.