Edguy - Painting on the wall
Eirins notes:
I came down the stairs just in time, as what must be the younger sister of Olivers girlfriend came through the door. Of course, I wanted to give the best impression possible, so I immediately put on my cleanest set of clothing.
I guess her mother, Iselin, had the same idea, though I do think she was a little to scantily clad for a family woman maybe, but oh.. it does remind me a little bit of me in my younger days! Oh, those were the times, guys were swooning for me left and right, mm mm!
I thought I would walk outside to welcome everyone when they came, when I heard this snickering laughter around the corner, and I knew it was one of those pesky garden gnomes again. "Get off my property, you little scoundrel" I told it, as I gave it a kick to the head. "And stop stealing my fruit!"
Ingmar Motorsen profile:
Ingmars notes:
The christmas party that Eirin had been talking about all month was coming up, so I guess I had to pull myself out of my little cave for a while to socialize with the family. And, well, I was getting a little hungry, so I went to the kitchen to get a little snack.
I think Oliver has a bright future ahead of him, being the first of the family to go to university to get a degree. Of course, he had gone and got himself a girlfriend too, and from what I understand they've been steady since high school. I hope she is of a different calibre then her mother, she didn't really impress me much at all.
I suppose the flowers could have been a nice gesture if she had stopped there, but the lewd suggestions she made afterwards, were about as unfitting as the length of her skirt.
Eirins notes:
When I came back inside, I saw Ingmar coming from the kitchen saying he would go back to the office room for a while for some rounds of chess. Over the years we've had our quarrels over that room.. I bought that computer to write reports for my job, but more often than not when I came home in the evening after having interrogated someone, or even late at night after I had been literally out digging through peoples trash for clues, he would sit there, playing his chess game..
It was rough combining all that with taking care of the kids. He wasn't really much of a dad at times.. and we nearly divorced after the twins were born. That was a tough time. I am happy for all my children today, they have grown up to be the most wonderful human beings, but back then.. we had agreed to only have two kids. One boy and girl was what we hoped for, or, well, what he hoped for. He was a little disappointed when Monica was born, and we had two girls.. so we ended up giving it a try one more time, and, well when Eivind and Knut was born, he got his wish fulfilled there for sure, two-fold... All of a sudden with four kids in the house and two demanding full-time jobs (he worked at the hospital..) the situation was immensely stressful for all of us. If it hadn't been for Ranveig, our oldest daughter, taking care of the toddlers when we were all burnt out, I don't think we would have made it, to be honest...
Needless to say, our love life suffered greatly, too, there wasn't much going on in the bedroom to say it bluntly. We even slept in seperate beds for a while. As the kids got older and got their own bedrooms, I could feel my energy returning and I wished for things to go back to the way they were. I often had to go the extra mile to get some.. I tried everything, from lingerie to nothing.. until I learnt that swimsuits was the thing...and boy did that work! I still resort to this trick nowadays when I want his attention, or when I sense that something is up..
I wanted to call Justine to catch up and hear she was doing. It was so nice to be back at the office to do some police work and see my coworkers again. I was pleased to hear that our case won, and that the criminals ended up behind bars. I felt useful again, old lady still got it. Maybe I should go back to my job fulltime...
While I was on the phone, Oliver Freddy, Inge and her father had also arrived, and Inge decided to turn off the lights to tell a scary story while her sister was really enjoying the music.
Robert Bråge came soon thereafter, but I didn't see Ranveig anywhere, so I walked up the stairs on out on our balcony in the back that we had built for this gigantic space rock that fell into our garden!
After all these years it still fascinates me how something like that can just fall out of the sky! Oh, I'm just happy it landed where it did, and not on our house! It was still a bit of a hassle, though, since we had to rent a crane to put it where it is now, and an excavator to fix the hole it left in the ground, but selling it to make money was never an option! It was so special, I wanted to keep it!
Ranveigs notes:
I'm always happy to visit my parents house – the home where I grew up with my sister and brothers. When I look back on it, I have plenty of good memories from growing up, though I'm not gonna lie – it was a struggle sometimes, but now is not the time...
When I walked inside, christmas music was playing, and Inge was telling a ghost story to Oliver Freddy and her dad , but I didn't see mom anywhere, so I walked upstairs to look for her.
That hallway upstairs always felt a little claustrophobic to me, I never really liked it to much up there. The house had already been expanded with another floor holding Monicas bedroom, an additional bathroom and mom's workout machine, but when my brothers got of school age we needed a few more bedrooms as well, and that's when the hallway was built.
I could hear mom's voice from just opposite the door, sweet talking to the meteor that crashed in our backyard not long after my brothers had started school.. yes, really. A meteor almost hit our house and obliterated us all! I wanted to get rid of it, but mom wanted to hold on to it, so she had made a special balcony for it just behind this door, and that's when things started to get weird upstairs, almost like something else came down with it... It was around this time I heard that voice for the first time. I wanted to talk to mom, but I didn't really want to go out there to that space rock...
And I'm not even going to talk about that painting on the wall there that mom came home with late one night after rummaging through the towns dumpsters.. She was doing her best to hide it, but Knut, whose bedroom was to the left at the end of the hallway, later said he could hear mom talking in the hallway at night, and when he peaked through the door he saw her in what appeared to be a conversation with that picture... and this, he said, would happen repeatedly over the following years, and always late at night... I never asked mom what was going on with that picture, but.. I never really liked spending time upstairs in that hallway... so I walked back downstairs to watch some tv..
Inges notes:
After I finished the ghost story, I wondered where Olivers grandma went, as she had been gone for some time, so I walked around to look for her. I heard her voice from just opposite this door upstairs, and it sounded as if she was sweet talking someone she called her "big little rock from outer space". I didn't want to intervene and ask her what that was all about, but curiosity killed the cat, of course, because as I was standing there she came out the door and caught me listening..
I quickly made a lousy excuse, stuttering that I was just enjoying the art on the wall.. no way could she believe that, but she said she understood what I meant, titlted her head slightly as she looked at me and gave me this weird, but empathetic smile as if we both all of a sudden shared some kind of secret... and yeah, I couldn't help but notice that the picture on the wall there was a copy of the same cheap picture from our student dorm that gave me this strange feeling.. so... I don't know.. I don't know if it's me, the picture or what it is, but there is something weird here...
Eirins notes:
I admit, I got a little lost in thought there, reminsicing about the old times and that space rock. It happens from time to time that I sometimes just forget what I was about to do.. something that started happening more often in my early teenage years around the time of my parents divorce... Oh, but anyway, I remembered what I had planned again when I saw Oliver Freddys girlfriend Inge outside the door. Of course, I was throwing a christmas party! And I couldn't leave the guests waiting, so I had to go downstairs and tell everyone they could begin opening the presents...
She said something to me, though, that she was admiring the art on the wall. She must have meant that old picture I found in the Landgraab familys trash can when they were under investigation for financial fraud and tax evation.. I have no idea if the painting is worth anything (probably not since they threw it away), but I thought it was nice enough to put up on the wall... She looked a little frightened, so I told her I understood what she meant about the painting.. poor girl, she must be hearing it, too...
Narrators notes (gift opening part):
Eirins notes:
After a successful round of gift opening, it was time to gather everyone around the table to eat. Oh, well that was another thing I had forgotten.. to make food for the guests! But I was lucky that Inge had brought hamburgers and Iselin had brought a pumpkin pie, or I would've had to leave everyone waiting while I was preparing the food...
That was a bit embarassing, but what could I do? I heard no complaints, and everyone appeared to be enjoying themselves.
And my sweet grandchild Robert just had to made sure everyone knew that he wasn't going to be doing any of the dishes. That was perfectly fine by me, I wouldn't have expected him to.. I know, of course, how important christmas eve is for the children, so I would never have him do that! There was absolutely no need for him to anyway, as Kristina and Oliver volunteered to clean everything up without anyone saying anything. They're such lovely and helpful kids!
Ranveig had already sat down in the sofa to watch tv, when I got this impulse where I wanted to run out into the garden to have some fun with the sprinkler.. Since I was already in the swimsuit, I thought to hell with it.. why not?
Eeek! Oh, hahahaha, that water, it was so cold! This brings me right back to my childhood! This is how we used to cool off on the warmest days! Oh, I had so much fun out there, and realized I had completely lost track of time when it started to get dark and my guests started leaving! When Robert was about to leave, he saw me playing and joined me for a while! It was great fun, I felt so much like a kid again!
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