Chapter 16
Emelie felt as if she were in an old movie where she was standing at the back of the little classroom along with all the other parents.
The pupils from first until third grade were all sitting in pairs by the light wooden tables.
Liv, Kajsa and four other children made up the whole third grade, which was sitting by the windows to the right of the teacher’s desk.
Slightly further back in the room were five pupils from second grade and closest to the door were eight tense and wide-eyed first graders.
The schoolteacher had written ‘welcome to autumn term’ on the blackboard in big letters surrounded by flowers and leaves.
Did you still say schoolteacher? Maybe you were supposed to say the pedagogue or something of the sort.
The teacher or pedagogue had big, curly blonde hair that was held in place with a pink and white checkered headband which was matching her dress.
Her style was a bit rockabilly, and Emelie thought that she saw a tattoo sticking out through the short sleeve of her dress.
Emelie looked from Liv to Linnea. There they were her lovely girls in new clothes that they had ordered on the internet several weeks ago.
Light jeans and a white blouse for Liv and a yellow dress for Linnea.
They were the only dark children in the class and when Emelie thought about it she felt a familiar sting in her chest. But since they had run into the grumpy old lady in the store, no one had made any further remarks, not even Birgitta, which was a relief.
As long as they didn’t encounter any problems in the new class.
She chose not to think about it right now.
Both girls had been nervous and had difficulties sleeping the previous night, but they already knew most of the kids in school and had several friends there.
“Linnea Svensson?”
“I’m here!”
Emelie looked at her and got tears in her eyes, they were all growing up so fast. Not that she didn’t enjoy it, she wasn’t really that much of a baby person, and definitely felt as if she was through with the toddler years.
“Liv Svensson?”
“I’m here!”
Emelie smiled at her, her Chip and Dale.
As the teacher continued calling their names, Emelie’s thoughts wandered and – as so often these days – landed on Andreas.
She realised that a relationship between them was doomed.
He was only 31 and probably wanted children of his own, and she really didn’t feel like starting over.
She felt the tears burning in her eyes again and wiped them away, smiling a little at the mother next to her.
The other mum leaned in closer and whispered:
“It reminds you of how quickly time flies, right?”
When the teacher had finished calling their names and the children had gotten their timetables, children and parents went their separate ways.
Linnea was allowed to go home with Tore to have lunch and Kajsa’s parents gave Liv a ride back to the house to change and then go with them to the stables.
Emelie invited everyone over for coffee and cake afterwards, and they all happily accepted.
Emelie felt a bit melancholic since it was the first school day for her youngest and a bit of a milestone.
She didn’t have any small children anymore, only school children.
As she was passing the shop, she remembered that she had the notes about the Christmas market with her and went inside to ask if she could put them up on their notice board.
She asked the lady at the till, and she told her to go in and ask the shopkeeper.
She walked towards the staff entrance by the fruit and vegetables department and pulled the little string that controlled the folding door.
She discreetly peeked into the storage room.
There was a special kind of smell in there, a bit sweet and chilly and, as she walked around the corner, she caught sight of Oskar standing with his back against her, wrapped up in an intimate conversation with one of his colleagues.
“Hello.”
Oskar and the colleague bounced away from each other. It was Linn.
“Oh, hello there, mum, you’re not allowed in here,” Linn said, trying to sound strict.
Oskar took another step away from Linn, as if to put some more distance between them.
“Hello Emelie, what can I do for you?”
It was obvious that Oskar was trying to act natural, but he only managed to sound fake and older than his 19 years. Emelie smiled overbearingly at the slightly nervous young man.
“Linda at the till said that I should go in here and speak to your dad about putting a notice about the Christmas market on the notice board.”
“I’ll fetch him!”
Oskar smiled, seemingly relieved, and disappeared through a grey door further down the corridor. Linn looked uncomfortable, but then her face lit up.
“Oskar and his dad have promised to help me find all the weird ingredients that I need for Astrid’s baking. He has a delivery guy in town, and we are going over there to get everything that we need.”
Emelie didn’t have time to respond before Linn continued.
“And then I’ve spoken to Andreas. Oh, he is just a sweetheart, mum!”
Emelie didn’t smile.
“Er, yes, I guess so, what do you mean?”
Linn tilted her head and smiled.
“I happen to think he’s always super sweet.
Anyways, I spoke to him about the oven in our house and how it doesn’t always hold on to the heat, and then he told me I can use his kitchen for my baking.
It’s not big but completely new, isn’t that nice?
Whoops, my break is over, bye, I’ll see you at home.
But I’m planning on baking over at Andreas’ tonight. ”
Emelie didn’t know what to think about Linn and her love life.
Oskar? Andreas? Linn was young and it was great that she was enjoying herself, but people were rather conservative on this island and it wouldn’t take long before they started gossiping if she was flirting with Oskar and Andreas at the same time – or – God forbid – did more than just flirting. ”
“Hello there, Linn’s mum, I assume?”
She turned around and saw a tall man dressed in the same red shirt as everyone else in working in the shop, and with a sign on the chest saying ‘Anders’.
She reached out her hand and it vanished into his big, rough fist, and then she told him what had brought her there.
He gave her the go ahead for the notice board and he helped her move some old notices to make sure her note about the market would be well-visible and get a central spot on the board.
She took a step back, admiring at her notice:
We are starting up the old Christmas market!
At the community centre, December 14th.
Dance around the tree, meet Santa Claus, take our quiz, sales stands and Astrid’s café.
If you want to help, rent a table or perform your special talent, contact Emelie Svensson before October 15th. Come and join us and help revive the old tradition – Christmas market at Sardinon!”
The cursive font of the text was surrounded by poinsettias, Christmas ornaments and pine wreaths; images she had found and downloaded from the internet. Anders was standing next to her and put a friendly arm around her shoulders.
“That will be great, we are so happy that you have moved to the island and for the market initiative. And I will take this opportunity and say that we are so happy to have Linn working here in the shop, the missus and I. It isn’t every day that you find such a gem of an employee.
Not to mention how much Oskar likes her! ”
He squeezed her shoulder and laughed, loud and boisterously, and then excused himself, saying he had to return to work.
Emelie shook her head, feeling concerned as she watched him walk towards the storage room, cheerfully greeting everyone on his way.
He wouldn’t laugh as much if he found out that Linn was fooling around with Oskar.
She had to talk to Linn, even if she didn’t know how to initiate the conversation.
She sighed heavily, walked into the store and picked up a jar of cottage cheese and a couple of bananas for her single mum-lunch.
Emelie moved Linn’s shopping lists and a roll of baking sheets to the side to make room for her lunch plate and her computer.
The kitchen table really was way too small, she would ask Andreas to make her a new one.
She sat down, daydreaming about tearing down walls, repainting the chairs.
Then she opened her laptop and clicked into the Facebook event that she had created especially for the Christmas market.
She saw the pictures she had uploaded and the texts she had written for the event.
Social media really wasn’t her thing, but this had turned out great.
She started wondering if Andreas was into social media.
She tried to push the thoughts of him away and focus instead, but her fingers had gotten a life of their own and started typing his name on the keyboard.
There he was, he had a Facebook profile.
He clicked on his profile picture and his beautiful eyes were looking straight into the camera and straight into her.
Something small and warm started to move inside of her.
She chuckled, his last post was from a sunset last summer, so apparently, he was about as active as she was online.
For some reason that made her feel relieved, and she clicked back into the Christmas market event.
As the number of people who had clicked ‘interested’ showed up, she could hardly believe her eyes.
Fifty people had clicked that they were coming! And 183 likes – Christ!”
She got up, dancing a little dance around the table before sitting down and looking again.
Could it really be true? Oh yes, fifty people were interested in the event, and it was only August and still warm outside.
There were a couple of comments as well, and she started to look through them.
One hour later she had finished her lunch, read through all the positive comments, sorted out the questions she received and put them under different headlines in an Excel-file.
The questions were all about renting a table, what people wanted to sell and how much it would cost. Emelie felt slightly panicked, was she in over her head this time?
She quickly started counting and planning.
They had room for 20 salesmen, one table was reserved for her and the girls, so there were 19 remaining.
What if she had to prioritise? She had already gotten requests from about 15 people.
And what would they charge for the tables?
She found Christer’s number in her phone.
“Hello Christer, it’s Emelie, how are you?”
“Doing better and better.”
“Lovely to hear. I have some questions regarding the market.”
She took a deep breath.
“We have 19 tables and I’ve already gotten requests from 15 people who are interested.”
“What kind of people? No townsfolk, right?”
“Yes Christer, some of them are town people,” Emelie said in a tired voice. “But how should I go about choosing who gets a table, and how much should we charge?”
Christer explained that he used to try and make sure that most of the salespeople came from the island, and that they were offering different items. They agreed on what to charge per table and that Emelie would come and visit Christer the following day because, as he put it, some salesmen didn’t offer any quality goods, and they had to be prepared for those.
“Have you spoken to the teacher regarding the Lucia procession now that school has started?”
The door opened and she looked at the watch.
“Christer, I’m going to need to run, I’ve invited half the school over for coffee and cake and forgotten to make the coffee, but I’ll have a chat with the teacher about Lucia tomorrow and then I’ll pop by your place, around 10 a.m., is that okay?”
“It’s perfect, bring some cake.”
“Mom, we’re home!”
She hung up and sent Liv upstairs to shower since she smelled like a barn. Liv and Kajsa ran chatting up the stairs. Halfway up, Liv turned around.
“Mum, guess what? I’m going to get to care for a horse by myself. Kajsa’s mum has a horse named Tellus and it’s just the sweetest, and she doesn’t have time to look after him. Kajsa’s mum is going to give you a ring, but you’ll say yes, right?”
Emelie looked at her sweet, excited daughter who smelled like a farm boy and had hay sticking out of her curls. Emelie herself found horses quite large and quite scary these days, but she knew wouldn’t be able to say no.
“I’ll talk to Kajsa’s mum. Hurry up now, the others will be here soon.”