lille julaften
Lille julaften, little Christmas Eve. Kjell knocked on his own ceiling with the red shovel this afternoon, which I've learned means come down.
His flat smells of pinnekjøtt, lamb ribs that have been soaking in a bucket since yesterday for tomorrow. We drank aquavit and watched Dinner for One, the old English sketch with the butler and the tiger skin, which Norway puts on every 23rd of December and nobody in Britain has heard of. Kjell knows every line. "Same procedure as every year, James," he said, about a minute before she did.
Later I told him about the chart. I hadn't meant to.
He was quiet, then he said there was a boy in my flat years ago. Polish, Piotr, at the university, something with ice. "He came down and asked me if I had knocked. Every day for a while. Half eleven. I said, Piotr, my knee." He didn't remember what happened to him. "He went home, I think. They go home."
So it's not me.
Knock this morning 11:43.