The Days of Bluegrass Love Read online

  This is an Em Querido book

  Published by Levine Querido

  www.levinequerido.com • [email protected]

  Levine Querido is distributed by Chronicle Books LLC

  Copyright © 1999 by Edward van de Vendel

  Translation © 2022 by Emma Rault

  Originally published in the Netherlands by Querido NL

  All rights reserved

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2020937518

  Hardcover ISBN 978-1-64614-046-6

  Ebook ISBN 978-1-64614-057-2

  Published May 2022

  This publication has been made possible with financial support from the Dutch Foundation for Literature.

  “We’re good friends, and it’s good to be … you know … good friends. That’s a good thing …”

  River Phoenix in My Own Private Idaho

  CONTENTS

  Summer 1999

  First Half

  Halftime

  Second Half

  Author’s Note

  About the Author

  About the Translator

  Some Notes on This Book’s Production

  TYCHO HAD NEVER BEEN on a plane—but he’d experienced a moon landing, live and up close.

  * * *

  IN THE ORCHARD WHERE he’d been working to save up money for his ticket, he’d met Nina. After a day of thinning plums, she’d coaxed him to her house and to her bedroom. They’d sat down on her bed: Nina was laughing, Tycho was talking over her, and then she’d started fumbling with the buttons of his shirt. Slowly unfastening them, from top to bottom—as if counting down to zero, as if pulling the petals off a flower …

  Tycho let the sleeves slide off his arms. His shirt fell helplessly to the floor. Nina grabbed the hem of Tycho’s undershirt and pulled on it. He held his hands up and said, “Help!” Nina giggled—and took her top off. They fell back onto the bed and gently turned, their bellies touching. He could feel Nina breathing as she guided his hands to her bra clasp. He fumbled with it. She kissed him. Then she lifted herself up on her elbow, allowing him to pull the bra from between them. She arched her back and her breasts touched against his skin. For the first time, he felt that double pressure of velvet on his smooth body. Like the legs of a lunar module, carefully touching down. Nineteen sixty-nine, Tycho thought. First man on the moon …

  * * *

  WHEN HE BIKED HOME that evening, the night wasn’t blue, but pale—like skin.

  Yes, the moon was glowing, as pale as Nina’s skin.

  For years Tycho had lived in his pencil case. His days had opened and shut like his schoolbooks. He was the faceless pupil, the son whose parents each recognized half of themselves in him. He looked in the mirror twice a day—once in the morning, and once in the evening—and during the hours in between he didn’t think about himself.

  Until his senior year. That’s when everyone started asking him what he intended to study. What his plans for the future were. Whether he was moving out, to the city. For a while he replied, “Oh jeez, I don’t know,” but one afternoon he sat down, opened his computer, and typed his name forty times in a row. Tycho Zeling. Tycho Zeling. Tycho Zeling.

  Then he ran to the bathroom to look in the mirror. He saw the startled expression in his eyes. He thought his nose was too small, his lips too full, and his short blond hair too lifeless, as if someone had dropped it on his head by accident. He decided to buy stronger hair gel, take a trip to America, and go a year without thinking about college.

  His parents said “What?” and “Oh” and nodded cautiously.

  * * *

  IN THE RESTROOM AT the airport, Tycho checked the mirror to see if his hair was mussed up nicely. It was just as it should be. It had to be sticking up in different directions, like signposts pointing his busy mind toward all the corners of the world. He ran a hand through it and headed off to pee.

  Men are hunters, he thought, or there wouldn’t be pictures of flies in these urinals. Taking aim, a primal instinct. Such an old-fashioned idea.

  He hadn’t been on the hunt for Nina. With her it had all just happened. He’d liked that. Nina thought his eyes were so beautiful, so blue, so full of expectation. She’d caught them in her laser gaze, from when he first shook her hand, until they kissed. That’s what you called a weapon: more advanced, more subtle, and maybe more dangerous than his, the man’s. All right, Tycho thought. Me, the man.

  He went to one of the sinks and looked at himself. The door opened. Tycho quickly nudged up the faucet handle and started washing his hands. He glanced up at the reflection in the mirror. The boy who walked in was about his age and height. Dark hair, almost black, dark eyebrows too, and friendly eyes. He was wearing a bright blue T-shirt and skinny jeans. Tycho turned off the tap, turned around, and waved his hands under the towel dispenser. The boy turned too and said, “Hi. You must be Tycho.”

  * * *

  THINNING PLUMS IS SOMETHING you do in the summer, when they’re still small and hard and green and hang in bunches. You lug a ladder into the orchard, lean it against the first tree, and climb up. You close your fingers around a bunch and tug: four, five plums come loose and fall down, thudding onto the ground. You climb up a little higher. You grab one handful after another. You grip onto a branch with your legs so you can get at the farthest bunches.

  Nina is there too. You don’t know her. Your boss says, “I trust that between the two of you, you can manage all of these plums.” He winks at you. Nina climbs into one tree, you take the other. You don’t see her, all you can see is leaves, but the branches of your trees are intertwined. You talk and talk. The sun is shining and there’s a warm breeze blowing.

  You stay late, because it pays more. Darkness falls and you keep talking. About all sorts of things. About school. About summer vacation. About friendship. About sex. You’re really open. It’s as if one word pulls out the next. As if you’re seduced by your own words. The crotch of your jeans rubs against the tree trunk. Twigs against your skin. Hay fever in your stomach.

  And then Nina says: “Wanna come to my place? My parents are out.”

  * * *

  HE’D WANTED TO KNOW what it was like for a long time. Sometimes it had seemed like it was all his classmates wanted to talk about, but for some reason he preferred to change the subject rather than listen to them. For a while he told himself that sex was like driving lessons—something for the future, for when he was older. Later on it just felt inconceivable. He simply couldn’t picture himself walking up to a girl and starting a conversation, his eyes twinkling.

  But Nina had come along and taken him by the hand. As he’d cycled home that night from her place, there was a strange sort of pride in the way he pushed on the pedals. He felt like a wise old man and a young knight at the same time. I’m in on it now, he thought. I know what they’re talking about.

  When he got home, there was a note from his mother on his pillow: You’re home late, but that’s okay. Sweet dreams.

  He threw his clothes over the desk chair, turned down the covers, and heard his phone vibrate in his pants. It was Nina. He picked up.

  “How was the ride home?”

  “Yeah, fine.”

  “I just wanted to hear your voice for a moment.”

  “Oh.”

  “And I wanted to say I thought it was really special tonight.”

  “Me too.”

  “How do you feel?”

  “Good. Kinda tired.”

  “Me too. I’m lying here thinking of you.”

  “Yeah? That’s sweet.”

  “Are you lying in bed too?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay.”

  Tycho tried to stifle a yawn, but fail
ed. “I think I’m gonna go to sleep. Sleep well, okay? And, um … thank you.”

  “Oh, okay, Tycho. Yeah, me too. Good night, then.”

  * * *

  HIS PARENTS WERE GOING to the campsite in Southampton for the nineteenth summer running. “No,” he told them, “I’m not coming.” He wanted to go to America. He’d looked around online, found the home page of an international kids’ camp, and sent them an email. A few weeks later a letter from Knoxville, Tennessee, arrived in the mail telling him he’d been selected. “Dear Tycho, welcome to our Little World Organization. It’s going to be great!”

  * * *

  OLIVER KJELSBERG FROM GJØVIK, Norway, had gotten the letter too. He’d remembered Tycho’s name and recognized him from the camp logo on his shirt. Now they were sitting side by side in the middle of Amsterdam Airport and Oliver was speaking English with a funny accent. His sentences were short and clear, with a lilting tone, and when he started talking about football he used gestures to complement his words, his fingers drawing curves and circles in the air. To anyone walking past it might have looked like he was writing math on an imaginary blackboard, but Oliver was trying to explain to Tycho that football was a form of abstract art.

  “It’s all about the lines, you know? Look—here’s Frank de Boer.”

  He slammed his fist down on the table.

  Bam. There he was. Frank de Boer.

  “Here are the others.”

  Bam, bam, bam, half a football team.

  “And then here you have like a clear line.”

  His index finger traced a curve between three or four opposing players.

  “Like a tunnel, you see? And right now de Boer doesn’t see anyone at the other end, but he knows in one or two seconds Jari Litmanen is going to be there. And Litmanen sprints to the end of the imaginary tunnel and gets there just in time to receive the ball. See?”

  Tycho did see, but there were still some other players on the table.

  “That’s Laudrup—do you know who that is? He runs forward, tapping the ball ahead of him three, four times as he goes. Then he passes, and look, the striker is waiting. Or this one. Or him.” Tycho looked at Oliver. His eyes were shining. He held up his hands, like he was holding up a trophy. “I still can’t believe I’m here. In Amsterdam! Home of Ajax! I love Barcelona, but I love Ajax too.”

  “I know almost nothing about football,” Tycho said. “But if you come and visit me after the camp, I’ll show you around the city … and the stadium.”

  “Deal!” Oliver said, holding out his hand. Tycho touched his fingers against Oliver’s and looked at him. Oliver’s pupils didn’t flinch—they widened.

  * * *

  IN THE WEEKS BEFORE he left, he’d had the strange, inescapable feeling that he’d been occupied. Like a village in wartime. Nina had added herself to him—it was like riding a tandem bicycle, as if someone else was constantly pedaling along behind him.

  In the days after that first late-night phone call, she flooded him with texts. If he didn’t reply quickly enough, she’d write: Call me. Or she’d call him. At dinner, at his grandma’s, even once when he was on the toilet. She’d start talking right off the bat. Telling him how in love she was. How proud she was that he loved her. That she thought he was handsome. That she thought she was pretty. That she couldn’t stop thinking about him. That she’d told her family. That the dumbest love songs were all fantastic, were all so true. That she wanted to see him a lot more often. Could she come over?

  More and more Tycho felt like slamming on the brakes, but Nina was relentless. Tycho didn’t know how he felt about it. He felt all kinds of things at once: pride and excitement and bewilderment, irritation and interest, pity, anger and surprise and panic, all spinning around in his head like a wheel of fortune. When he made his decision and it finally slowed to a halt, all he felt was a great sense of calm—calm and resolve.

  He invited her over. Another night, another bedroom—his, this time. And the moment she sat down, he ended it. He had been dreading it, but the words just popped into his mouth.

  She cried. He grabbed some tissues. She left.

  As she got on her bike, she said, “You asshole! Couldn’t you have just done that over the phone?”

  Tycho didn’t know how to respond. He understood that she was angry, and he also felt like something had failed, something that could have turned out much better, but at the same time he was so hugely relieved.

  “Who was that?” his mother asked. “Did you have someone over?”

  “No one,” he said, “no one!” and he ran up the stairs to his room, three or four at a time.

  * * *

  THEY WALKED DOWN THE tunnel and were greeted by a group of flight attendants. While Tycho strode past their smiling faces and onto the plane, he heard Oliver’s voice behind him: “Hello! Is the airplane full? Do you think I can sit with my friend?”

  One of the flight attendants said, “We’ll see what we can do,” and smiled. Oliver smiled back and before they knew it a woman had offered to move for them. They shoved their bags into the overhead compartments and sat down. Next to each other.

  “That okay with you?” Oliver grinned.

  Tycho thought he meant them sitting together, but Oliver stuck out his hand again: “Friends?”

  Tycho grabbed it and said, “Of course.” He felt something pink creeping across his cheeks, because he’d taken it a little too quickly, but Oliver was still beaming at him. Like a team captain who puts an arm around his opponent’s shoulder before the game.

  * * *

  A YEAR OFF,” TYCHO said. “Maybe I’ll get a job for a while. And then college. To study Dutch, maybe.”

  “Physical therapy,” Oliver said, “if I get a place in school. I’m too old to play football professionally. I should already have been scouted by now.”

  “How bad did you want that?”

  “Dunno. Real bad, sometimes. But I gave up on a big tournament to go to Little World. I didn’t feel like being cooped up at home for three weeks first, with Mom on safari and Dad baking in the Spanish sun.”

  The flight attendants fanned out into the aisles and started gesturing toward the emergency exits, more or less in sync, followed by another routine with life vests.

  “Look,” Tycho said to Oliver. “Ballet.”

  “Shh,” said Oliver. “We’re moving.”

  The plane slowly taxied to the runway.

  * * *

  IN TYCHO’S TOP 10 of people that were easiest to talk to, women in their thirties and forties ranked first. Small children came in second, then girls and old people, and further, much further down, boys.

  Last, by quite a long way, were grown men. It had been that way ever since he was a kid. When he went to a classmate’s house for a playdate, he’d ask the mothers about their work and usually he’d get candy and compliments. The fathers he would try to avoid.

  Of course later it had become easier. In high school he’d started spending his lunch breaks hanging out in the bicycle shed with the other boys. Even so, he was one of the few who also hung out on the steps in front of the school. That’s where the two groups would mix, though the girls were in the vast majority. They’d talk about what he was wearing, what he’d done with his hair. In return he’d put an arm around them from time to time, their long hair tickling his skin.

  But this Norwegian boy, this Oliver, seemed to defy every category. And if forging a friendship took time and space, six or seven miles of altitude and six or seven hours were plenty for Oliver and Tycho. By the time they changed planes in Atlanta, they dashed side by side into the Plane Train as if they’d been traveling together all their lives.

  * * *

  THE LITTLE WORLD ORGANIZATION had started in the dreams of a sweet old lady. She’d dreamt about children from all over the world, beaming with happiness, with nothing but play on their minds. Children who, once they were all grown up and were ministers, ambassadors, and sergeant majors, would put down their work every onc
e in a while to think about all their old friends from overseas. And about peace.

  One day that inspired old lady founded the Little World Organization. At first it had just been a small group of dreamers, but nowadays there were branches in a whole bunch of different countries. Every summer there were between forty and fifty Little World camps all over the world. Ten international delegations came to each camp: two boys and two girls, all ten years old, accompanied by an adult leader.

  Then there was a staff team—three people from the host country, assisted by four junior assistants around eighteen years old: Tycho, Oliver, and two American girls they’d soon be meeting.

  They were coming together for a month of vacation in a miniature world, where everything was fine, everyone was okay, and they found friendships that crossed borders.

  * * *

  THEY HEARD SINGING AND laughter. And when the doors whooshed open—the doors to the arrivals hall, the doors to their Little World—they saw a huge group of people arranged like a royal family on a balcony. Everyone waved at them.

  But when Oliver and Tycho took another three or four steps toward them, the welcoming committee broke apart. Someone took their suitcases from them, arms were slung around their shoulders, and before they knew it they were being presented to the three people who formed the core of the group. Three dark purple polo shirts with white letters saying Knoxville’s Little World—The Staff. A short woman in her mid-forties (“Hi! My name is Carol!”), a tall, thin guy with a beard (“Hey, I’m Gary”), and the head honcho, the biggest and strongest of the three, who gave each of them, in turn, a fervent hug. “Welcome,” he said, “welcome to America. I’m your camp director. Call me John.” He smiled, the way men smile when they feel responsible for something—proud and determined and a little sad. His hair was thin. He was wearing a button that read, They Tell Me I’m the Boss.