25.5.2009
ACT 7
ACT 7
http://www.netsaga.is/media/files/zoology3%281%29.mp3
Solla friend was thin, but she had padding on her hips that God had given her in her genes, but which had not started to grow much before she was 20 months into puberty. These pads of flesh and blood which were thus situated on the woman's hips had quite some effect on men, causing them to notice her, especially at swimming pools. Solla friend was unusually tall?six feet, four inches. She had fled from home from the weight of a family where tenets of Jehovah's Witnesses had governed everything. Her parents had had a brood of children without considering what the cost would be. She hated the Jehovah's Witnesses with a deep conviction because they had censured some of her best friends. Among them was one of her youngest brothers who never got over the censure.
Solla friend was no sniffler. She rented an apartment in the Vogar neighborhood and got a job in a grocery store. The old man who rented to her was named Ebenezer. He lived on the floor below with his wife and two daughters. He was an upholsterer and always looked unkempt, teddy-bearish and showed little sophistication. She sometimes heard him shout when he needed something or when something was wrong.
When Solla friend discussed the details of renting with Ebenezer, she got instructions about how she should use the laundry, storage room and clotheslines in the yard.
Solla friend registered in the evening division of secondary school, and because she was a good student and very interested in her studies, she got her diploma with no trouble within three years. By then she had moved from the Vogar into an apartment on the 12th floor of one of the tall apartment buildings on Solheimar. Solla friend would certainly have stayed in her apartment at Ebenezer's if everything had gone smoothly. But that was not to be.
Solla friend was kicked out after she had rented from Old Ebby for nearly a year. When she came home from school one evening, an incredible sight spread before her. All her belongings? mostly little things?clothes, books in plastic bags and cardboard cartons along with a few household items, chairs, a divan, a table and television had been thrown out in the street. It had begun to rain?certainly not much, but enough to lend drama to the moment.
There she stood in the rain and looked at her belongings. Then, for the first time in her life she felt impoverished and helpless.
This did not just happen by itself, and Solla friend knew it. She had expected something, but not this. This seemed rather too much.
Ebenezer was always fussing around up in the garret space where Solla friend rented. If she left laundry on the clotheslines, he was sure to bring it up to her and give her a warning. "It's impossible to have such laundry flapping in front of the house for a whole day."
If she came home late from a dance, he was sure to give her a talking-to the next day?especially if she had been with a guy.
You had to say, though, that Solla friend was a wonderful girl. She invited her guests up for tea and crackers with cheese and marmalade. She often had grapes and sliced apple, and she always had candles. She lit them on all occasions along with incense. Her garret was cozy. There were small stones, colored bits of glass and small seashells which she had collected on the beach, dried flowers, clippings from magazines and pictures, little jars and everything you could imagine. That is how Solla friend was.
Ebenezer had been waiting for her when she got back from the dance. The missus, so it was said, had gone off to a summer cottage, and the sisters were gone. And when Solla friend woke up in the middle of the night and saw Ebenezer standing in very little clothes at the foot of the bed, she said gruffly and involuntarily: "Who is it?"
The man started and was going to say something when Solla friend sat up in bed and said in deliberate tones: "Stop futzing around Ebby and fuck me!" That was that.
Then there was the missus who actually never had gone off to a summer cottage, but had been spying in the next house for more than 12 hours. She had long ago begun to suspect Ebenezer of malice. When Ebby had gone up to the garret, she sneaked into the house and listened. First she heard nothing. Then came some conversation, but finally when suspicious sounds and groans from the renter wafted down to her, she ran upstairs. She paused a second outside the door, but when the woman's screams became so loud that people on the street, if any, had to hear them, she thought that was enough. She discovered that the door was locked and began to pound on it and call: "Ebby! I know you're in there. Open up, you hear Ebenezer." And she pounded the door and yelled.
When Ebenezer seemed likely to heed his wife's exhortations, Solla friend said: "Don't you move!" He lay stretched out on the bed, and she straddled him, pinning his arms behind his head. She moved up and down, emitting screams of passion while the missus continued to pound on the door and implore Ebenezer to come out. When Solla friend finally stopped screaming, Ebby tore himself loose, gave a threatening roar, slammed the woman on her back and brought himself to climax. The missus stopped pounding and hurried downstairs to her apartment.