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Chapter Text

Isak isn’t ready when the door swings open. There’s a cruel moment of dissonance when his somatic memory tricks him, offering up snatches of his younger self, rushing up the stairs to this same door with elation and an incongruous sense of belonging. Isak reminds himself to breathe. He lets his limbs settle into the pose of slovenly boredom that was once his trademark. It was a lie then and it’s a more excruciating lie now. He knows that there is no limit to the time he can sustain it.

“Look at you.” It’s a small shock, but none that is registered on Isak’s carefully bland face: the person in the doorway isn’t Geir. It’s Sara. She’s smiling, narrow-eyed and nervy like one of the lesser carnivores. “The prodigal son returns.” 

“Good to see you, Sara.” She is still wearing her signature stud earrings, rose-shaped with a single diamond accent solitaire. Isak leans down to kiss her cheek. “By the way,” he murmurs, “you’ve got lipstick on your teeth.”

He’s barely passed Sara before he walks into William. It’s only when the coppery taste hits his tongue that Isak realizes that his teeth are mauling the inside of his cheek. Geir likes an audience for his private meetings, always has. It was stupid of Isak to forget that. 

“Isak,” William drawls. His nose looks a little more crooked than Isak remembers. Never one to shirk a pointless altercation, that’s William. “What’s with this… I don’t even know what to call it…” William’s gaze sweeps over Isak’s dress shirt and chinos. “You look like an accounting clerk. A cheap one.”

Isak has an excellent comeback, but it slips from his mind as he steps into the lounge. Turns out it’s not the lounge anymore – it’s been transformed into the master bedroom. The floor to ceiling windows are framed by lavish curtains in a feverish Jackson Pollock design. The door to the balcony is propped open. Geir has swapped out his old bed against a Japanese futon with a slatted frame. The sheets are white, a stark contrast to the exposed brick walls.

Freyja, Geir’s cat, jumps down from her lookout on the windowsill. She looks like a drunk pirate with her three-legged hobble and the dark patch surrounding her left eye. Isak holds out his hand and Freyja rubs her chin against his knuckles, one stray greeting another. 

“Fancy meeting you here.” It’s Geir, leaning against the frame of the door leading to the balcony, cigarette stub still dangling from his fingers. He’s in his uniform of plaid slacks and designer hoodie. His dark reddish hair is cropped short, and his sharp, foxlike features are accentuated by a five-o-clock shadow. There are new lines around his eyes. He must have turned forty-three a couple of weeks ago.

“It’s good to have you back,” Geir says, eyes warm.

Isak wills his muscles to relax. Ignores the swooshing sound of his heartbeat in his ears. “Who says I’m coming back?”

“You know me. Ever the optimist. How’s your mom?”

“Fine. She liked the flowers that you sent for Easter.” Geir has sent Marianne flowers at Easter since the two of them first met, years ago, and discovered an unlikely shared passion for hyacinths. Geir would probably continue to send hyacinths even if he and Isak weren’t speaking, a thought that Isak finds consoling and upsetting in equal measure. 

“Do you know”, Isak asks, “what I received in the mail this morning?”

“No idea, Spurv. I hope it made you happy.”

“Don’t call me that.” Isak fishes a crumpled letter from his pocket and pushes it into Geir’s unresisting hand. “It’s the fifty-sixth rejection letter I’ve received in just six weeks. Pretty impressive, don’t you think? At this point, there’s no show left in Norway, no matter how small or shitty, that hasn’t wasted good paper to tell me that their measly paid assistant producer positions are regretfully filled for the foreseeable future.”

Geir’s long mouth twists to the side. “Karmic spite. I’m so sorry.”

“It’s not karma that’s being spiteful here.”

“I think,” says Geir, “you’re overestimating my ability to sway an entire nation’s television industry.”

“It’s a tiny nation and humility doesn’t suit you. What do you want?”

Geir’s laughter, boyish and full-bodied, hasn’t changed. He draws Isak into a one-armed hug. “I want you back on the show. You can work off the considerable sum that you still owe the network.”

“That’s very gracious of you. What about the charges? Will the network drop them? I haven’t got the money for a lawyer and you know it.”

“We’ll talk about it later. Come along.” Geir is still clasping his shoulder and Isak is well aware that it would look churlish to pull away, so he doesn’t. Geir smiles: “Let me show you what we’re up to.”

It’s like a school reunion from hell: lounging in sleek designer chairs and sprawled over bean bags are the people that Isak has done everything in his power to avoid for the last six months. It’s not just William and Sara: Sana, Ingrid, and Eskild are in attendance as well – pretty much Lykkelig alle sine dager’s entire assistant producer crew. Plus some guy Isak has never met before, perched on the armrest of Geir’s favorite easy-chair. He looks like he’s barely out of school, smooth-faced and implausibly tan, and he’s wearing a grey fedora of all things. In Grünerløkka. In April. Surely there are laws against this. 

Eskild skips over and hugs Isak. It’s a bit awkward because Eskild is also clutching a champagne flute and ends up spilling much of the content on Isak’s sole pair of formal shoes. But his smile is sincere and before he draws back, he presses his cheek against Isak’s and whispers: “Watch out.”

Geir drops to the floor and sits cross-legged in perfectly executed Sukhasana pose. He snaps his fingers. “I want to show Isak the new suitor.”

Sara grabs the remote. The massive flat screen comes to life. Isak’s stomach turns. 

It’s a clip from last season’s finale: the wedding ceremony, photogenically styled and studded with more product placement than an entire season of Top Model Norge. Something is off with the audio – you can hear the panicky whispers of the crew and someone cursing with abandon. The priest is whiteknuckling the lantern. The bride has pushed back her veil. She’s tearing off her silk gloves like she’s about to enter a boxing ring while last year’s suitor, buff and brainless, is still working his way to the realization that a staged wedding that’s already a farce is becoming more farcical by the minute. That’s because Isak, looking badly out of place in his snapback and torn jeans, is lurching up and down the altar stairs, cradling a 15-liter bottle of Moët & Chandon Impérial and ranting about the moral bankruptcy of the show and everyone connected to it. 

“Oh my god!” New guy stops messing with his fedora for a moment to point at Isak, handsome face flushed with excitement. “I didn’t see it at first because you dress so differently now. But that’s you, right?” He snorts. “That’s really you! You’re the deranged fucker who cost the show a fortune!”

“Do your research, moron. I’m the deranged fucker who scored the season’s finale LASD’s best ratings ever.” Isak lets his gaze sweep from this idiot kid to Geir. “What happened to your standards?”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” William cuts in. “Geir didn’t know that Sara was about to pull up the wrong clip!”

“Right,” Isak says. “That’s precisely the kind of thing that passes under Geir’s radar. So?”

“All in good fun, Spurv.” Geir grabs a beer from the cooler and tosses the bottle to Isak. Isak catches it clumsily. “Sara, show him the tape.”

Isak has watched his fair share of audition tapes since he first joined one of Geir’s shows as a runner, aged eighteen or thereabouts: boring, hopeless, half-decent, amateurish, unexpectedly brilliant, so-awful-it’s-funny – he’s seen it all. But the tape that Sara puts on –  that’s something else entirely. 

This wanna be suitor isn’t filming himself with his cellphone and droning on about his high-powered job, workout routine, and charmingly old-fashioned belief in “true love”. No, the first thing that comes into view is a pair of stylish, brown leather boots, striding down the street. Even before the camera pans up and the Bee Gees’ pronounce in smooth falsetto You can tell by the way I use my walk, I’m a woman’s man it’s clear that this a homage to Saturday Night Fever. The guy looks the part, too: wavy dark-brown hair, bedroom eyes, well-groomed beard. He smiles confidently into the camera and introduces himself as Mutasim Tatouti. 

The video cuts to a montage of clips and Isak kind of wishes he’d paid better attention during the lecture course on “Contemporary European Cinema” that he took during his second year at uni. Most of the references go over Isak’s head, but the ones that he catches are strange enough: there’s Mutasim cooking the perfect romance in a pan, twitching his nose like a shy rabbit in perfect imitation of whatever Gael García Bernal’s obnoxious character was called in The Science of Sleep. Mutasim is telling viewers what he looks for in a woman while hanging out with a conservatively dressed sex doll, and something about the whole setup brings to mind Ryan Gosling with a mustache – even if Isak for the life of him can’t recall the title of that weird-ass film. There are quite a few shots featuring a lonely lobster scuttling through a hotel lobby, and Isak, a little impressed despite himself, wonders briefly if whoever made that film is actually taking the piss out of LASD. Finally, there is Mutasim fiddling with flowers in a manner that looks Chaplinesque and weirdly hot. Isak can’t quite slot this scene into its appropriate place in film history because he’s too thrown by the sight of a pale wrist, encircled by the thin, red threads of a bracelet, that briefly enters the frame when someone hands Mutasim another flower.

Isak is busy telling himself that this is just a bizarre coincidence, nothing more, when there’s another cut and now Mutasim is sitting on an ancient-looking sofa, framed by about a million books and vinyls that clutter the shelves in the background. He’s not alone: as he’s telling the camera, he’s brought back-up, a close friend who knows him better than most and who’s going to help him go through the questionnaire provided on LASD’s website. Mutasim’s friend has a deep, raspy laugh, and Isak schools his face to dullness right before the other man appears in the frame.

He's a study in contrasts: tall and broad-shouldered but very slender; the pallor of his beautiful, fine-boned face offset by the severe hues of his clothes – distressed black biker jeans and dark, piled-on layers underneath a silver-buttoned, high-collared jacket that looks military by way of steampunk. He cards a hand through his styled hair, nearly dislodging the cigarette behind his ear, and squints at the crumpled sheet of paper that Mutasim holds out for him. “Come on,” Mutasim coaxes. “Read out the questions. This is an interview situation.”

“Alright. Where do you live? Do you have roommates? Yes, me. Do you have allergies? Do you have pets? Jeez, who comes up with these questions?” He turns to the camera and waggles his eyebrows. “Do you discriminate against lactose-intolerant reptile owners? In that case we’re not introducing you to Mutta’s baby alligator. Even though he’s adorable and very nearly house-trained. His name is…”

Mutasim elbows him in the ribs and smiles at the camera: “Living with Even means that I’ve built enormous tolerance for eccentric roommates – a quality that will surely come in handy once I move into the LASD mansion. What’s the next question?”

“Tell us your funniest first date stories.”

“Right…” Mutasim picks at a loose thread in the pillow fabric.  “I’m trying to remember. I guess there were a couple that turned out to be kind of funny. Uh… Even?”

“And here I thought you’d never ask.” What follows is a firework of stories that are hilarious, not always entirely coherent, and focused on Mutasim as the universally appealing romantic lead. But for all that Mutasim is at the center of these stories, Isak doubts that anyone watching this tape spares Mutasim a thought while Even talks. Face bright, blue gaze playful and private, he meanders through his stories with undisciplined charm, delivering twists that are offbeat and cheerfully inappropriate. He’s using his own dating misfortunes as a foil for Mutasim’s successes, ending with a story about Mutasim waltzing into the tense morning after an unexpectedly acrimonious threesome with a guy and girl who turned out to be supporters, respectively, of Lyn and Vålerenga. “Mutta is fluent in soccer and even precaffeinated a master diplomat, so he smoothed the guy’s ruffled feathers while romancing the girl – all the while speaking grids and passing patterns and chipping the goalkeeper. It was very impressive.”

“Nah.” Mutasim waves him off. “By the way, what did you do in the meantime?”

“Made pancakes. Stretched. Added soccer fanatics to my no-hookup list.” Even looks at the camera and shrugs. “You’ll be pleased to learn that the guy is now on Mutta’s soccer team and that Mutta ended up dating the girl for about six months. Collectively, they’ve forced me to memorize the names of a sickening number of soccer maneuvers and half a dozen goalkeepers. I chipped the one on Mutta’s team.”

Mutasim shakes his head. “You still have no idea what chipping means, right?”

“Nope, but we had fun.” 

“Stop the tape there, Sara”, Geir says. His gaze locks with Isak’s. “What do you think?”

Isak is thinking many things, but what he says, voice carefully neutral, is: “Of your new suitor? I think you’re going to tell me that you want the other one.”

“Exactly!” Geir laughs, unambiguously delighted. “That boy is TV gold. You know who he is?”

“Sure I do.” 

New guy cranes his neck. “What do you mean? Who’s that guy?”

“Do you live in a cave?” Sana stares at him. “Oh, right. I forgot that you were a zygote six years ago…”

“What the hell?” New guy throws down his fedora. Like a fucking gauntlet. “I’m not that much younger and I think I deserve-- ”

“Lay off, Christoffer.” Geir doesn’t raise his voice, but Isak notices that the kid flushes like he’s been slapped. “You too, Sana. No one’s interested in your little spat.” 

“Is this a bad moment”, Ingrid asks, “to confess that I’m about as ignorant as Christoffer? I mean, not generally speaking.” She pulls a face and lets her slim shoulders shudder for added effect. “But in this case… I don’t have a frigging idea who that guy is. He’s hot though. Like… smoking hot. Like so hot I kind of want to…”

“Spare us the visuals, Ingrid.” Sana carefully puts her fingers together and sighs. “Okay, children. Let me enlighten you. Jan Næsheim, anyone? Enfant terrible of avant garde theatre. Remember that big production of Enemy of the People at Nationaltheatret? With the disemboweled horses and chorus of amputees? That’s Næsheim. The kid on the tape is his son, Even Bech Næsheim. Landed a huge hit with a graphic novel about a family member’s suicide when he was just out of school. Won a couple of prizes for it and was feted for about a year as god’s gift to Norway’s wilting literary scene.”

“I think,” Sara interrupts her, “there were rumors right from the start that his dad had written or co-written that book… And his second book was shit. I haven’t read it but from what people wrote about it, it must have been pretty awful. I don’t think he’s done much of anything since.”

Sana shrugs. “Well, the paps and gossip sites remember him, even if the literati don’t. He’s a bit of a wild child, got arrested a couple of times for stupid stuff, like climbing various UiO buildings and breaking into public places that really aren’t worth getting a criminal record for. He’s also openly pan, which makes things more interesting. He’s always with someone or other, never for long. Has a habit of dating ribbons through his father’s ensemble.”

Eskild puts his flute down with a clink. “A pan suitor, with male and female contestants. I’d watch that in a heartbeat!”

“You’re also watching Adam søker Eva,” Ingrid points out, “so that’s not saying much.”

“I don’t know…” William says slowly. Isak has always been fascinated by the fact that William seems physiologically incapable of thinking hard without drawing air noisily through his big nose. It’s like the overheating gears in his brain are directly ventilated by his frontonasal duct. “I don’t see”, William continues, “that this guy is all that attractive. But the Næsheim family is loaded. My dad’s hedge fund manager plays golf with Næsheim’s financial advisor. I guess Næsheim’s son would make a good suitor because people want his lifestyle.”

“Not so sure about how much access he has to that money.” Sana nods towards the frozen image on the flatscreen. “He must be in his mid-twenties now, and he’s sharing an apartment. That sofa does not look fancy.”

Like a strategizing buddha, Geir, legs still folded in his ridiculous yoga pose, has been following the conversation from the floor. Now he’s smiling at Christoffer. “What’s your take on all of this?”

Christoffer drops the can of Red Bull he’s been balancing on two fingers. “Me? You’re asking me?”

“Starting to regret it, actually.”

“No! I mean, I have opinions! Thoughts too! I…. I think that we’re selling a fantasy, right? And the suitor… he’s like the embankm… I mean the embodiment of this. Of that fantasy.” He’s blushing, stumbling over his words. Isak is vaguely disappointed when he unexpectedly pulls himself together to follow up this debacle with a decent point: “This guy has the looks and William says that he’s rich – but I don’t think that’s enough if he’s just fooling around and leeching off his family. I mean, the last suitor wasn’t the brightest candle on the cake but he’s a self-made millionaire who gets up at 4 every morning to work out. And the one before that was a goddamn pediatric surgeon. We want someone who’s like… a doer… so…yeah…”

“So yeah.” Geir doesn’t spare Christoffer another glance. He’s giving Isak his full attention and that’s just as thrilling and unsettling as it’s always been. “Your turn.”

Isak knows that he’s being expertly reeled in – thrown a bloody hook he’ll bite no matter what – and still he can’t resist proving to Geir, proving to himself, that he plays this game better than anyone else in this room. 

For the briefest moment, the memory, viciously repressed since Sara put on that tape, invades Isak’s thoughts. His thumb sliding between the thin red threads of that bracelet to touch the delicate skin underneath. The surprise of the wild stammer of pulse against his fingertip. Quiet laughter in his ear, a whispered plea. Strong, slender fingers twisting against cold tiles, reaching and reaching for Isak’s hand.

Isak puts his hands in his pockets. Raises his chin. “You’ve got it all wrong,” he tells Christoffer. “Beautiful disaster trumps perfection every time. This guy looks like someone dreamed him up, but he’s clearly got something that’s way more useful to us than looks alone: he’s flawed.”

“I don’t get it”, Sara says.

“Think about the story arc for the season,” Isak continues. “It’s the ultimate fantasy, the kernel of every epic love story, right? The trite old idea that meeting the right person puts you on a path to redemption and self-acceptance. You can play that up.” Isak avoids looking at the image, still frozen on the flatscreen, but he gestures to it. “Let people see all his faults and demons, whatever they are, and then show them the transformative power of televised true love – how that makes him complete or whole or whatever shit cliché you want to go for.”

“See,” a small, confidential smile lifts the corner of Geir’s mouth, “that’s why I want you back.”

Isak returns his gaze until Eskild clears his throat and asks: “But what if this guy doesn’t have any demons? I mean, what if he’s just… I don’t know … sunny and phlegmatic?”

“If he doesn’t have demons now,” Ingrid says, “he’ll have them once your lot are finished with him.”

That’s the cue for Sara: “There was a rumor some years ago that he has mental health issues. Bipolar or schizophrenic or something. Never confirmed or denied by the family.” 

“God.” William shakes his head. “It’s like bipolar is the new nipple piercing.”

“Pretty sure he’s got that too…” Sara mutters.

“What do you mean?” Isak asks.

“The piercing. He’s –”

“Not that.” Isak digs his thumb into the inner corner of his eye, willing his beginning migraine away. “What the fuck do you mean, William? Bipolar is like the new nipple piercing?”

“Oh, you know… everyone’s got it now. Russell Brand and Demi Lovato, Princess Leia, Kanye, Selena Gomez, Stephen Fry…. It’s like… it’s cool to be crazy now, you know?”

“Right. That’s an awesome insight, William.” Isak turns to Geir. Unclenches his hand. “So. You’ve found your new suitor. Has he signed yet?”

“No. Sana and I went to talk to him a couple of days ago.”

“And?”

“He laughed. Said that he’d love to be a kept man, but that he’s got no intention of whoring himself out on national TV.”

“Fair enough.”

“I want him,” Geir says. 

“Yeah, I’ve gathered as much.”

“And I want you back on the show. Junior producer, alongside Sana and William. Let’s run this thing together. There’ll be fat bonuses. You’ll be able to clear your debt in just a couple of short months. Unless you decide to crash another Porsche, but that’s up to you, obviously.”

“Obviously.”

“Come on, Spurv. You love this game and what’s more important, you’re good at it.” Geir is holding out his hands, palms up, like he’s expecting Isak to take them. “Join us.”

This… is not what Isak expected when he came here. But there’s an angle here, something that he can work – that he has to work if he wants to get a job in this godawful business ever again. “If I come back for this one season,” Isak says, “whatever fucking thing you’ve put out there to ensure that my applications go straight to the bin goes away.”

“Oh, certainly.” Geir is all solicitousness. “It’ll disappear in a plume of smoke.”

Isak nods. “I get first dibs when it comes to the candidates I’m working with. Girls and boys. Sana and William can take my leftovers.”

“Hell, no—"

“What the fuck! How can he—"

 “Fine.” Geir speaks over Sana’s and William’s protest: “I think you deserve as much. If you get Næsheim’s son to sign.”

“That’s now part of the junior producer’s job description?”

“What can I say? You’re good. People like you. They trust you.”

Isak narrows his eyes. “Say I deliver your suitor…”, he says, heart pounding. “If I do this, then you get the network to drop the charges. No fucking around. The charges disappear.”

Geir, at ease from his loosely clasped hands to his naked toes, says: “Now that’s… asking a lot.”

Isak swallows. “And so?”

“You know what, Spurv? Let’s make things interesting at least.” Geir rises smoothly to his feet and walks over to where Isak stands. “I want to see you work for this. Break a sweat, get all hot and flustered. Because to be perfectly honest, this ultra-composed little act you’re putting on for us is boring.”

He extends his hand and Isak, taking a step back, asks, “What is it that you want?”

Geir smiles. “Get the kid to sign by the end of the day and we’re talking.”

Chapter Text

It’s a fucking black tie gala. Not “some random opening-night party“, as Sara – expert social media stalker and back-stabbing bitch – had casually referred to the event where Isak would most likely find Even this evening. Fancy cars are dropping off theater folk and well-heeled donors in front of Nationaltheatret’s porticoed main entrance. Ushers are manning the doors and checking people off from a guest list. Everyone is in tuxedos and evening dresses. Isak, leaning against one of the ancient elm trees that guard the square in front of the theater, can see the bling from fifty meters away. 

Isak does not currently own a suit, much less a tuxedo. He has forty kroner in his back pocket and a negative balance on his bank account that he’d rather not think about. If he tries to get past the ushers in his street clothes, people will assume that he’s an exceptionally incompetent party crasher. Or maybe a cut-rate rent boy. 

In hindsight, it would have been wise to hang on to the ratty little matchbook on which Even had scribbled his telephone number for Isak. It had seemed ludicrous at the time.  

“What would I do with your number?” 

Even, fiddling with his belt, had looked up, smiling a little: “I don’t know. Call me when you’re bored?” 

“I don’t get bored. And I don’t do this.” 

Isak has been the regular recipient of telephone numbers, insta handles, and crude come-ons since he first walked into a club aged sixteen. He’s very good at shrugging them off. 

“But you…,” Even pointed out, smile growing irritatingly wider, “I mean we… just… did?” 

“Not really, no. I might have humored you because I’m high as a kite. Doesn’t count. My memory is patchy when I’m like this. It’s been… what? Two minutes since? I can already barely remember a thing.”

“Ouch. Now you definitely have to take my number. Let me make it up to you.”

“Pass”, Isak said as Even sidled up to him and carefully tucked his stupid matchbook into the inner pocket of Isak’s jacket. “I’m now a minute away from forgetting you.”

And Even, jaw dropping in mock-outrage, ducked his head and brushed his nose against Isak’s, nuzzled his cheek like that was a normal thing to do. “Kiss me before you forget me? You probably don’t remember, but we haven’t gotten round to that yet.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Tell me your name at least?”

“Pelle Proffen.”

Even chuckled, warm puffs of air against Isak’s cheek. “I loved these books as a kid. Wait for it. I’ll find us a roof to meet. We can…”

“No.” Isak put his hand against Even’s chest and pushed him back, not rough but unambiguously. “This ends here. It never began.”

Apparently, that kind of finality is a luxury Isak can’t afford right now. He pulls a face at Henrik Ibsen and Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, looking dapper in Verdigris on their pedestals. Nationaltheatret is a theater so maybe… Maybe he’ll have to think along the lines of thespian antics. 

It's a beautiful night, unseasonably warm for April. Some of the gala guests have taken their champagne flutes and wine glasses outside and are strolling across the square. Isak observes them for a while, putting off the inevitable. Then he turns around and heads straight to the NILLE on Stenersgata.

***

Finding Even once he’s past the doors and wandering through the crammed foyer is almost laughably easy. Isak ends his fake phone call. He swaps out his empty, light-weight wine glass – the one that still has the NILLE sticker on its base – against a freshly filled glass of Rheingau Riesling. He knows fuck all about wine –  would much rather get his hand on a cool Pilsner – but he knocks the wine down regardless, resting his shoulder against a slim pillar.

“Halla.” Someone steps out from behind that same pillar. It’s Even, wearing a magenta suit with a slightly undone shirt of the same color. And a nose ring. He looks willowy and decadent. Beautiful, too. His lips are a little stained from red wine. 

“I kind of wish you’d told me you’re into fundraising galas held for the rich and senile,” Even says. “I’d have gotten you a ticket. Then again, I’m not sure I’d have had the pleasure of seeing you in…” Even’s gaze drops to Isak’s very tight leopard print pants. 

“Camouflage?"

“Precisely.” Even puts his shoulder against the pillar, mirroring Isak. “You were very smooth, by the way. I watched you from the window, yelling into your phone and sweeping past the queue like you own this place. The poor ushers must have thought that you’re some crazy-rich digital entrepreneur whiz kid. Or maybe a major donor’s grandson with an anger management problem.”

“What can I say. The arts are my life.” 

“Good to know. Why are you really here?”

“We’ll come to that. Please tell me the nose ring isn’t a permanent thing.” Isak is confident that LASD can sell a suitor with a criminal record. A suitor with a nose ring is a different matter.

“I reserve it for special occasions. You don’t like it?”

“Let’s say –”

“Even!” Isak has seen Jan Næsheim’s picture in the papers, but he’s far more imposing up close. He’s tall and heavily built, and any potential resemblance between his rough-hewn face and Even’s more gentle features is hidden by Næsheim’s bald head, full beard, and dark-rimmed glasses. “You were supposed to be here two hours ago!” he says to Even, eyes fixed on a couple queueing at the buffet. One of the men turns his head and Næsheim waves him over.

He turns back to Even: “So?”

Even tilts his head. “I had a prior engagement.” He touches Isak’s arm lightly. “By the way, this is my friend Pelle Proffen. Be nice to him, he’s battling short term memory loss.”

Næsheim looks at Isak like he’s something iffy he stepped into. “What prior engagement?”

Even mumbles something about a shop opening that Isak can’t quite catch.

“Oh, there you are!” Næsheim is attractive when he smiles, and he’s cranking up the charm for the two men joining them. Isak recognizes the younger one from something on television. Næsheim introduces him as Sossen Bodd, the lead of his upcoming production of Ornitofilene . His partner, Arne Petersen, is a playwright. 

“I loved Kaldt Blått ,” Petersen says as he shakes Even’s hand.  

“Huge fan,” Bodd mouths over Petersen’s shoulder with an affectionate eye roll. 

“I have a thing for graphic novels, you see,” says Petersen. “Sometimes you get great storytelling and sometimes it’s the artist’s style that draws me in, but Kaldt Blått is this rare beast that has both. I was floored when I first read it. Just floored. And you were what age when you published it? Nineteen? Twenty?”

“Twenty. A while ago now,” Even says. “By the way, I saw your collaboration with Verdensteatret at Black Box Theatre, November Quartet . Very intriguing. Was it your first time working with video artists?”

Petersen preens under the attention and starts dishing out stories about clashes amongst the brilliant but headstrong members of Verdensteatret’s collective. Isak notices that Even is steering the conversation with practiced ease: he draws out Petersen with clever questions about multi-media projects, plays up to Bodd by asking for his opinion on Verdensteatret’s performance art, and creates not one but two excellent openings for his father’s unsubtle attempts to recruit Petersen as judge for a playwriting contest.

This is good: Isak, who has squandered too many precious hours of his life coaching self-involved, monologuing suitors in Conversational Skills 101, thinks that Even won’t need any help on that front. One less thing to worry about. The nose ring still has to go, though. That’s non-negotiable.

“Someone stop me,” Petersen laughs. “I can’t believe I’ve talked so much about myself! And I really want to hear more about Kaldt Blått and what you’ve been up to, Even. Are you working on anything at the moment?”

“Not really.”

“What? But that’s sacrilege! Talent like yours…”

Even smiles vaguely. “I guess I’ve just been busy with other things. Why don’t we—”

“What other things?” Petersen acts all wide-eyed and scandalized. “What could be more important than honing your art? Jan, what do you have to say to all this? Surely, having a genius for a son puts you under an obligation to—"

If the word genius is bandied around, Næsheim expects it to be applied to himself, that’s immediately obvious from his sour mien. “My son”, he interrupts Petersen, “prefers to get paid for having his picture taken at boutique launches and restaurant openings. Like one of these brain-dead influencer kids, although” – he turns to Even – “I’m guessing that you’re growing a little too old to be hired for such nonsense?”

Isak watches the words hit their mark. He turns to Næsheim and says pleasantly: “I wouldn’t say age is an issue.”

“What?” Næsheim asks. 

“I mean, you clearly had the poor photographer in a sweat earlier, when you posed for about a million pictures with the CEO of Exxon Mobil. But getting the lighting on sagging skin right was the smallest of her problems, I think. She seemed more troubled by moral distaste. No wonder, what with all the recent revelations about Exxon’s massive violations of human and environmental rights.”

There’s silence, broken only by Næsheim’s angry breathing. “Who are you again?”

“Just a random party crasher. I’m afraid I need to borrow Even now.”

***

Even pushes open the fire door and leads the way out on a flat roof. It takes Isak a moment to orient himself. Nationaltheatret’s famous dome looms in their back. They’re on the lower roof covering the back of the building, overlooking Johanne Dybwads plass. The sun has just set and the street lanterns, apparently designed to look like portly snowdrops, are blinking to life. 

The square is still busy: the metro station is spewing out a steady stream of people, and the peacock fountain is fringed with couples and teenagers, eating ice cream and listening to a busker playing her guitar. She’s too far away for any of the music to be heard distinctly, but when the ocean breeze turns it carries up snatches of song. I fell right through the cracks , now I’m trying to get back, before the cool done run out. Isak rolls his eyes. He hasn’t heard this song on the radio in years and that’s a good thing. 

Even fishes a spliff out of his shirt pocket. “Smoke?”

Isak shrugs. “Sure.”

Even lights up and passes the spliff to Isak. His eyebrows quirk up. “We’re on a roof. Just saying.”

“I’m well aware.” 

“What’s your real name?”

“Isak.”

Even smiles but doesn’t say anything. He’s leaning against the yellow-brick chimney, long legs crossed at the ankle, hips tilted just so.

Isak thinks that it’s a shame they can’t let him smoke on the show because this thing here – Even gently tapping the spliff against his lips like he’s teasing himself before taking a lazy drag, color blooming in his cheeks – that’s stellar entertainment at minimal production costs. Isak’s gaze drops to where the upper buttons of Even’s shirt are undone, revealing smooth, pale skin. He makes a mental note that they need to recreate this look on the show, only with a suit that comes in a more conservative color. The shirt should be white and maybe Even could be talked into undoing another button or two.

“What are you thinking about?” Even asks, voice deep and a little husky.

“Shirt buttons.” Geir mentioned they’d be shooting at a new location – a villa on Bygdøy. Isak hopes to God that the pool has decent heating, otherwise it’ll be a pain shooting the obligatory pool scenes in May. “Hey, do you work out?” Isak asks. “I don’t think I’ve seen much of your upper body.”

Even blinks, the spliff in his raised hand momentarily forgotten. “Uh… does lugging around camera equipment once in a while count as working out? Guess not.”

“No. Bummer.”        

“Is that,” Even says, looking a little demoralized, “something you’re into?”

“Well, many people are. Certainly the great majority of women and gay men with disposable income in the demographic bracket between 18 and 49.”

“Okay. Good thing I’m not trying to attract an entire demographic bracket.”

“Yeah, about that…”

“Huh?”

“Do you know when you asked me what I’m doing here?”

“Yes.” 

“I’m a junior producer with Lykkelig alle sine dager .” 

“Oh.” There’s a pause and when Even speaks again, his voice is wary. “Is that why you approached me? The other night?”

Isak bristles: “For the record, I didn’t approach you! I just happened to have to use the loo, and everyone knows that the downstairs restrooms at Tresor are a health hazard, so I went up to the panorama bar and you were there, and I was high, and we talked, and then we didn’t talk and…”

“Hey, that’s impressive recall for someone with your condition.” 

“Fuck you. Anyway…” Isak stops. He doesn’t like the dejected look in Even’s eyes. More to the point, this is bad strategy. “No,” he says more gently. “I didn’t know that my boss was trying to sign you when we met. But… this is where we are now.”

“Right.” 

“Why don’t you want to do it? Is it because your friend was so keen to be the next suitor and you feel bad for him?”

“Ha – no. Mutta’s back with his girlfriend. She’d have his balls if he went on the show.”

“Awesome. So why don’t you come on board? You’ll have a blast with the contestants. Just think about it: 25 hot, handpicked guys and girls vying for your attention. That must be nice.”

“Sounds kinda stressful to me.”

“Don’t you want to fall in love?”

Even takes another hit and blows out the smoke slowly. “I don’t think I need assistance from your show to fall in love. I’m excellent at falling for people. It’s everything that comes after that I’m no good at.”

“Well,” Isak points out sensibly, “that’s no big deal because that part isn’t featured on the show. Unless you end up proposing to someone and decide to sell us the rights to your televised wedding extravaganza.”

Even looks like he might puke. 

“Okay, okay…” Isak raises his hands. “No televised wedding, I promise! You don’t even have to propose. We’re quite flexible. You can choose the winner and the finale can feature you lovebirds departing for a romantic getaway, heavily implying that you’re planning to propose to the guy or girl when you’re not busy fucking each other’s brains out. And then, after the show has aired, you can quietly break it off and that’s it. You’ll be 900.000kr richer.” 

Even doesn’t comment on the obscene sum but Isak sees him take in that bit of information. Isak has read the portfolio that Sana put together before she and Geir went to talk to Even: it’s not exhaustive but he knows that Even barely scraped through at school and dropped out of UiO without getting a degree. He’s been the recipient of a couple of creative writing scholarships, but he has never had consistent professional training or a steady job. He’s twenty-five. If he doesn’t want to seek alms from his family, he needs an income. 

“Yeah,” Isak says offhandedly, “the money side of things is good. Some suitors go on to build careers on the contacts they’ve made in the industry or work as brand ambassadors. You know, what comes after LASD doesn’t have to be more reality tv or flogging protein bars on your insta. Who says you couldn’t use the money and contacts to…”, this is a shot in the dark, but Isak’s hunches are rarely wrong, “I don’t know, start a small production firm or make some shorts that you can submit to film festivals?”

Even stubs out the spliff. “From LASD to Grimstad’s Kortfilmfestivalen? Doesn’t seem likely.” But his gaze, directed at the darkening square, is wistful.

Isak scents blood and talks about a previous suitor who’s been taken under Geir’s wing and is directing his second high-profile music video at the moment, boosted in various material and immaterial ways by Geir’s far-reaching network of contacts in Norway’s entertainment industry. “What do you think?” Isak asks.

“I’m thinking that this is probably not me, fun as it sounds.” There’s something about the shape of Even’s mouth that doesn’t quite fit his impersonal tone.

Isak shrugs. “Not sure that’s true. But even then: think of the freedom this kind of money buys you! You can go and travel the world. Move out of your shared apartment and rent your own place. Go back to school. Do your own thing, whatever that is, without depending on someone else’s funds and good will.”

Isak has talked about two dozen reluctant contestants and suitors into signing over the last couple of years. He cobbles together a medley of his most successful pitches and tries his darn hardest to charm and coax Even into realizing that he’s never wanted something quite as much as find love and make a fortune on prime time.

“So…” Isak asks eventually, feeling a little parched, “do you feel ready to sign now?”

Even nods slowly, looking all serious with his lips pursed. Isak is starting to smile, carried on a warm wave of relief – a wave which crashes in on itself the moment Even rubs his chin and says: “Almost. I think I’m almost ready to sign. But.” 

“But what ?” Isak forces out, working hard to keep the smile on his face.

“Well, I’m not one for impulsive decisions. I like to take time to deliberate.”

“Is that so?”

“Oh yes. It’s very important to weigh the pros and cons. Systematically. Don’t you think?”

“Well…”

“Preferably over food. Aren’t you hungry?”

Isak is starving but that’s very much beside the point. “Okay, sure. How about you think about it while we raid the buffet downstairs?”

“Nah. I have a better idea.” Even pushes off the chimney and walks away without sparing Isak another glance. “Follow me.”

***

“Too bad we walked all this way just to find that they’re closed,” Isak points out. He’s not pouting because his job is to sign – not alienate – Even, but it’s close.

They’re right on the edge of Vippetangen. It’s colder out here by the waterside, and Isak has to remind himself every couple of minutes not to hunch his shoulders. The warehouse to which Even has led them overlooks the fjord and is covered in artsy graffiti. Isak gazes up at the gigantic image of a melancholy bearded man wearing a dastār. Fixed to the wall, right underneath the tip of the painted man’s lush beard, is a black board with opening hours. The food court closed at 9pm.

“I think we passed Mækken on our way here…” Isak mutters. “So if you’d care to deliberate over a Big Mac that would be awesome.”

“Isak.” Even is grinning, eyes bright. He’s clearly a masochist who gets a kick out of an empty stomach and the sight of Isak in barely suppressed gremlin-mode. 

“What?” 

“Have a little faith.” Even walks past the main entrance and on to the supplier entrance in the back of the building. He pulls open the heavy door and motions Isak inside. “We’re not having Big Macs tonight.”

“But…” Isak stares at the busy scene in front of them: the chefs manning the food stalls are still cooking up a storm. People are milling about, plates and beer bottles in hand, or lounging on battered-looking benches under strung up fairy lights. Radiohead is blaring from powerful speakers fixed to the naked concrete walls. “Why does it say they’re closed?”

“They’re closed to customers, not to friends and family. Come on,” Even shucks his suit jacket and starts to make his way through the crowd. “It’s the last Friday night of the month. That’s when all the staff gets together to party and test-run new recipes.”

Even leads Isak to one of the bigger food stalls. The timber sign reads Bakkoush. Isak frowns at it, thinking of Sana. The name isn’t that rare, but still. What a weird coincidence. 

The walls of the stall are covered in beautiful ceramic tiles and outfitted with little nooks for a small jungle of plants. Goofing around behind the counter, framed by hanging lanterns, is Even’s friend from the tape. He lets out a whoop when he sees Even. Another guy with a buzzcut and a crumpled chef’s apron turns around, grinning from ear to ear. There’s fist-bumping and shoulder clapping. Even introduces his friends as Mutta and Elias. 

“Good to see you, man! What happened – weren’t you supposed to schmooze your old man’s donors tonight?” Elias’s gaze strays to Isak. “No offense, but you don’t look particularly geriatric to me. Wild pants though.” 

“Wait,” Mutta says. He’s leaning his elbows on the counter, head cocked to the side like a friendly Labrador, and studies Isak. “Is that…?” 

“Oh!” Elias’s eyebrows rise. “Right! That must be –”

“This is Isak,” Even cuts in. “He works for LASD . Turns out they need a new suitor now that Mutta’s taken.” 

“Damn, I knew it.” Elias slaps his own ass before pointing both thumbs at his puffed out chest. “It’s me, right? They want me. They want me and Sana’s too pissed to tell me.”

Isak stares at him. So much for coincidences. “You’re Sana’s brother! The annoying elder brother who’s shit at basketball and got thrown out of…what was it…catering college?”

Elias flicks a pine nut at Even. “Charming new friend you’ve found yourself.”

“We’re not friends,” Isak corrects him in the same moment in which Even says, indulgently, “Isn’t he just?”

Isak would very much like to know why Sana, in dishing out information about Even, hasn’t let on that she knows him through her brother. She’s probably guarding her intel like a jealous, hijab-wearing Smaug, planning to work what she knows about Even’s taste and preferences to get her candidates ahead. 

Isak is still seething when Mutta pushes two plates, piled high with food that looks and smells unfamiliar, towards them. There’s no cutlery in sight. Even, not bothered in the least, tears off a large chunk of flatbread and starts to eat with his fingers, using the bread to mop up what must be some kind of stew. His fingertips are glistening. Even brings them to his mouth and licks them clean in the unselfconscious manner of a five-year old. 

His hands are very much not those of a child. Isak feels a tug in his lower stomach at the realization that while Even’s wrists are elegant and slender, his hands are large, certainly larger than Isak’s hands. They look strong and a little sinewy. Isak, unreasoningly irritated, thinks that surely this food stall isn’t going quite so badly that they can’t afford napkins for their customers.

It takes less than a minute for Even and his friends to withdraw into what appears to be an unironically enthusiastic debate about spices. Spices . Isak presses his eyes shut, trying and failing not to think of the defamation and negligence charges that the network is bringing against him. He can’t remember what it’s like to get on with his shit without feeling barely suppressed panic buzzing at the edges of his awareness every second of every day. 

“Aren’t you hungry?” It’s Even, nudging a platter with something that looks like small pies into Isak’s direction. “These are filled with bakoula and feta. They’re good."

Isak has no fucking clue what bakoula is. He’s tempted to snap at Even, tell him that Isak buys his freezer ready meals in bulk and comes from a family that considers lasagna a grandly exotic dish. Instead, he grabs a pie and takes a dainty bite. It tastes weird, but surprisingly not terrible. The tangy cheese is offset by something nutty and sweet, and Isak is about to take a second bite, chasing that taste, when he catches Even watching him out of the corner of his eye.

Isak puts the pie down and gives Even’s moronic friends his best smile. “My boss would very much like to sign Even as LASD ’s next suitor. Even will earn a shitload of money for hanging out with a bunch of hot contestants at a villa on Bygdøy. Every single guy and girl on the show will be panting to get into his pants. But Even’s undecided. What do you think?”

“Yeah, I think that’s cool,” Elias says around a mouthful of bread, “but why Even and not me?”

“Because Even’s pan, vaguely famous, and way hotter than you.”

Elias, shaking his head, says: “I really don’t like you, you know?” Turning to Even, he continues in a considerably more patient voice: “But you should do it. Your father would go ballistic.”

Even cocks an eyebrow. “I’m not saying that the thought isn’t appealing, but I’m not sure that’s enough of an incentive.”

“Do it so we can live vicariously through you. Plus,” Mutta runs his hand tenderly along the counter, “we’d have to discuss product placement. Maybe we can finally pay the loan back. Bakkoush can cater the romantic dinners, and rose ceremonies, and what not.”

“Well, not all dinners,” Isak interjects quickly, resolutely ignoring the quirk to Even’s lips, “but yeah, we can work something out. And if Even’s up for it, you can come on the show for an episode.”

Elias perks up. “To vet the candidates and tell filthy deets about Even’s past relationships?”

“Precisely.”

“Awesome!” Elias tries to high-five Mutta and ends up smacking his shoulder.

“I haven’t said that I’m doing it,” Even points out. Isak recognizes the practiced, easy smile Even used around his father’s donors and wonders what’s coming. “You should know that I’m type 1 bipolar depressive,” Even says levelly to Isak. “I’m doing reasonably well at the moment, but that’s… not always the case. If I came on the show, I wouldn’t want that part of my life to be a big deal, but it’s also not something that you can lie about.”

Isak, without making a conscious choice, stops thinking as a producer. “You need to put this into your contract. Lay out precisely how you’d want your illness to be dealt with on the show. My boss is super keen to have you, and if the suitor isn’t happy and game, the show dies - so he will comply. But you should still get a lawyer to check your contract before you sign.” Isak raps his knuckles against the counter. “Choose someone who’s good and fucking expensive. Get the show to pay their fee.”

“It could be a really good thing,” Mutta says. “Like, mental illness isn’t something that television gets right very often.” He looks at Even, a frown between his eyebrows. “ LASD is big – if you were on the show, it might make a real difference, don’t you think? Help people understand what it’s like to live with something like this? Give them a sense of how many people are affected by bipolar and related conditions?”

“Maybe.” Even gives a tight-muscled little shrug. “You’d have to tell candidates, too. Ahead of them signing on. Give them the chance to withdraw.”

Isak nods, suddenly unsure. “It’s not just the candidates who can withdraw, you know. I’m not gonna lie: I want you on the show, but if this is something that could be…  I don’t know, upsetting or difficult for you, then you shouldn’t do it.”

“Woah, careful Isak!” Even draws his hand to his chest in mock-astonishment, “people might start thinking there’s a soft core underneath that prickly shell!”

“They’d be mistaken.”

Even smiles. “That’s to be seen.”

Mutta’s gaze slides from Even to Isak and back, face unreadable. “Are you tempted?”

“A little,” Even says. “But I don’t think I’m ready to make a decision just yet.” He’s looking thoughtful in a way that Isak has already learned to dread. “I think… I think I kind of feel like going out.”

“Going out,” Isak repeats.

“Yeah. Come on, Isak. Let’s go dancing!”

Isak clings to the counter like it might gain consciousness and save him. “You want to go dancing?”

“Yes. Don’t you?” Even’s eyes, round and innocent, land on Isak’s abominable pants. “You’re dressed for it after all.”

Isak gives him the finger. “I want to sign you, go home, and sleep.”

“But where would be the fun in that?” Even grabs Isak’s hand and pulls him along. “Let’s go.”

***

“This is a terrible place,” Isak shouts over the squelching synths overlaid by droning monastic chanting. “Why would anyone come here to have fun?”  

Even passes Isak another shot glass and downs his own. He lets his gaze roam over the teeming and decidedly diverse crowd on Blå’ s industrial-strength dance floor. Then he inclines his head and brings his mouth close to Isak’s ear to be heard. “What’s not to like?”

“It’s like everyone’s coming here under false pretense,” Isak says, pressing his fingers against the chilled shot glass. The vodka is still scalding his throat. He made Even order kamikazes which is starting to feel tragically apt. “The hipsters pretend that they’re here for the awful performance art when in reality they’re just keen to ogle the kinksters. The kinksters are acting like they’re in a debating club and gobbling down vegan cupcakes rather than getting it on. And the EDM-fiends are clearly let down by all the Daft Punk and Air tracks thrown in.”

Even smiles. “Are you here under false pretense?”

“I’m here for the sole purpose of signing you.”

“Right. Well, I like the set. And I want to dance. Join me?”

Isak’s preferred style of dancing consists of bopping his head to the beat and maybe shuffling his feet if he’s feeling extraordinarily inspired. He’s surprised to find that Even is a good, fluid dancer. Sure, he’s laughing too much and there’s intermittent goofiness: someone on LASD, probably Isak, will have to tell him that the arm wave might look acceptable on people with an average arm-span, but that it’s bordering ridiculous when executed by someone with freakishly long limbs. 

But there’s no denying that Even’s good. Movements supple and easy, his body picks up each change in rhythm effortlessly, like he's not even thinking about it. He has this way of rolling his left shoulder with the beat once in a while that is a little mesmerizing, shirt stretching tightly over his chest and collar falling open. He’s pushed his sleeves up and Isak takes in the lines of his bare forearms and wrists. If Even has the nerve to pack sweaters for LASD , Isak will have a PA hiding every single one of them on day one. 

It's when Isak tries to make his way to the loo, fighting through the crush of bodies, that he’s given a vivid reminder of why you should never enter a club dressed in leopard print pants: it sends entirely the wrong message. Isak has barely made any progress before the first guy unsubtly grinds against him. It’s weird: Isak wasn’t bothered by the volume of the music or the pulsing nearness of all these bodies a moment ago, but everything is suddenly too loud, too close. He turns, putting space between him and the guy, and finds himself face to face with Kari Andersen, known in the industry for her razor-sharp mind and equally sharp designer heels. She produces shows that get extended coverage in the more serious press because people can’t decide if they’re scandalous rubbish or postmodern artworks. 

There was a time when Kari rang Isak once per month to convince him to ditch Geir so that he could come and work for her. These days Isak’s unsuccessful applications for two positions on her shows did not even merit rejection letters from her frazzled PAs, going straight to the bin for all that Isak knows.

“Isak.” Kari lazily adjusts the collar of her yellow dress. “It’s been a while.”

“Yeah, I’ve been…busy.” 

“Doing what?” 

Crashing on the floor of his mother’s tiny apartment. Over-analysing past mistakes. Hating his fucking insomnia. Relying on increasingly dodgy channels to source prescription sleeping pills. Turning self-loathing into an artform. “Just stuff, you know.”

“I don’t, actually. But good to see that you’re out partying.”

“Actually, I’m trying to sign some guy Geir wants as his next suitor.”

Kari’s dark, plucked eyebrows arch into mephistophelean consternation. “Geir took you back? I’m surprised.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, we were having brunch not long ago and he told me that this crazy mother of yours is rubbing off on you.”

Someone knocks into Isak’s shoulder and he stumbles sideways, swallowing against the acidic tightness in his throat. “Geir didn’t say that.” 

“Well,” Kari sighs, waving to a friend and beginning to turn away from Isak, “you weren’t there, so it’s hard for you to say, isn’t it? Later, Isak.”

Isak stares at her retreating back. He lets the music crash over him like a vicious wave and decides to get drunk for real. 

The bartender, a heavily tattooed woman in a polka dot dress, demonstrates admirable professionalism, holding off from commenting on Isak’s decision to pair Vikingfjord with Bourbon. Unwanted advances from various strangers are an excellent excuse for cathartic bitchiness: Isak drinks and offends assorted hipsters and kinksters. Then he drinks some more.

When Isak returns to Even, the alcohol supplying him with all sorts of bad ideas for the continuation of the evening, he can’t quite read the look on Even’s face. Something about the focused set of his mouth is different.  

“Thank you for coming back to me,” Even says. “My competition appears to be intense.”

“You don’t have competition. You’re the suitor. Plus,” Isak adds, “you were pretty busy yourself.” 

“Paid attention, huh?” 

“That,” Isak points out archly, “is literally part of my job.” 

Dancing with Even is surprisingly easy now. It’s probably just a sign of Isak being plastered – or of Even finally running out of steam and toning things down a notch – but they’re falling into a rhythm almost immediately, moving together without touching but mirroring each other. 

The DJ is playing a remixed version of some Air track that is strangely hypnotic and goes on and on, beat thrumming sweetly through Isak’s body, and after a while the room starts spinning, colors blurring together into a greyish-blue haze, and for all that Isak’s limbs are pleasantly heavy another part of him is feeling almost weightless. The pulses of the stroboscope paint their skin in streaks of neon light and shadow, and Isak is drifting, drifting. His eyes are half-closed and he’d probably shut them if it wasn’t for Even’s gaze on him, anchoring Isak in his body or maybe in the electric space between their bodies, all the places where they’re not touching but could be.

Even is watching him, really watching him, like he’s jealous of every second he misses to an involuntary flicker of his lashes. But he doesn’t take charge. Isak wonders why that is. He takes in Even’s height, the way the tailored shirt makes his shoulders seem even broader, the confident, assured way in which he moves and thinks that someone – anyone – else in possession of that face, that body, would probably reach out and seize what he wants. Even does the opposite: there’s an invitation in the way he’s matching Isak thrust for thrust, carving out all these empty spaces into which Isak could slide so easily if he wanted to, offering his body in a way that says I’m here. I’m here and if you want me…

There’s a faint flush on Even’s cheeks and his hair is starting to darken at the roots with sweat. Isak remembers the sound that Even made when he scratched his nails over the nape of his neck. He licks his lips and Even loses the rhythm for a long, glorious moment. 

Isak is about to make a pointed comment when one of the guys who approached him earlier moves smoothly into the space Isak has been sharing with Even. He’s pretty and young – perhaps even younger than Isak – and wearing some kind of leather harness instead of a shirt. He is thigh to thigh with Isak within seconds and Isak – unsure if the guy is uncommonly persistent or just terrible with remembering faces – decides that he’s had enough. Isak stabs his thumb in Even’s direction. “I’m with him, and I don’t like to share.”

“Say what?” The guy plasters himself against Isak’s side and the fraying, alcohol-soaked thread of Isak’s patience snaps in two. 

Isak turns and sways against Even, resting his back against Even’s chest. “Do. You. See?” Isak over-enunciates over the whoosh of the music. “We’re kind of in the middle of a very important negotiation here.” Isak reaches his left arm back and pushes his hand blindly into Even’s hair, moving with him as the tempo of the track changes, simmering down into a slower, sexier beat. 

The guy is staring at them like he’s hatching yet another plan to insert himself into this thing. Isak can feel Even shaking his head and tries to imagine the look on his face. He’d bet money that Even’s mien is polite but not particularly kind, and wonders briefly why this idea is such a turn on.

And then Isak stops using his brain altogether, because he trips and Even steadies him, hand landing on Isak’s hip. Even doesn’t remove his hand and Isak doesn’t shake him off. After a moment, Even slides two fingers into the front pocket of Isak’s pants. He doesn’t draw Isak closer – their bodies aren’t even touching below the point at which Isak’s shoulders are resting against Even’s chest – but Even’s thumb slips under Isak’s rucked up shirt, coming to rest on taut skin.  

Something about being held like this, lightly and intimately, makes want swirl hotly through Isak’s blood. The rhythm of the track changes once more, growing more syncopated, and Even finds the beat more quickly than Isak, stepping forward in the same moment in which Isak moves backward. Isak’s trousers are not only tight and an eyesore, the cheap fabric is also thin, which means that he can feel… everything. 

Isak closes his eyes and shifts a little, seeking, until Even is right where he wants him. Close to Isak’s ear, Even’s breath goes ragged. He leaves it to Isak to control the pressure and speed at which they’re moving against one another, but after a moment Even’s thumb starts drawing maddening little circles on the sensitive skin stretching over Isak’s hip bone. Isak breathes. Breathes in and out, until Even starts minutely to work the two long fingers he’s still got shoved into Isak’s pocket. Isak shudders against him and makes a desperate sound that might or might not be lost in the frenetic pulse of the music that engulfs them.

“Turn around.” Even’s voice by his ear is low and roughened. He’s so close that Isak can feel him swallow. “Turn around. I need to see you.”

Isak shakes his head and tightens his grip on the nape of Even’s neck. Even snaps his hips forward and Isak wants to howl with how good he feels against him. He opens his eyes and his gaze lands on Even’s hand, still cupping Isak’s hip. Isak presses back against Even with almost petulant need, urging him on, but what pushes him close to the brink, ultimately, isn’t touch at all: it’s the sight of Even’s fingers, reddened and more than a little chaffed from working against the constriction of the unforgiving fabric, stroking into Isak’s pocket in a rhythm that Isak remembers all too well.

Isak glances upwards, desperate for some kind of distraction, and finds himself caught in Kari’s gaze. She’s maybe five meters away, and they are separated by half a dozen sweaty, writhing bodies, but the look on her face hits Isak like a slap, the kind that leaves red fingerprints on your cheek. Selling the show and throwing yourself into the bargain, is what her eyes are saying, so that’s what Geir is keeping you around for these days.

Nausea claws up the back of Isak’s throat and everything’s rushing towards him – deafening bassline, jittery pulse of the stroboscope, all of his shame and self-contempt. 

Isak tears away from Even and pushes through the crowd, using his elbows, keeping his head down, hardly breathing until he’s made it outside. The chilly night air is a shock against his flushed skin. Isak rubs his knuckles over his closed eyes, forcing himself to sober up, to think, to plan his next move. But he’s exhausted, feeling drained and stone-tired all of a sudden. He leans against the brick wall of the former warehouse that is home to Blå. The wall is covered in street art that’s garishly illuminated by an outdoor chandelier whose graceful, glittering form is an incongruous presence among these run-down industrial buildings.

Even appears in the street a moment later, wheezing a little. The tight, anxious set of his jaw softens when his eyes find Isak. “Are you okay? Did I… did I do something wrong?”

Isak wishes himself into a different galaxy, a million kilometers away. “Course you didn’t.”

“Are you feeling unwell?”

Isak gives a humorless little laugh. “No, I’m grand.” God, he really has to do this, doesn’t he? Say the actual words, come up with some kind of bullshit explanation, try to keep Even on board, try to keep it together until he’s finally alone. “Look, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have… I…” Isak squares his shoulders, forces his chin up. “I’m a producer on the show. You’ll find us to be plenty unprofessional but not quite as unprofessional as I’ve just been with you.”

“That wasn’t just you,” Even says quickly. “That was us, together. And I want it. Don’t you?” He’s standing right underneath that bizarre chandelier, still in his magenta suit, nose ring catching the light of the crystal prisms every time Even turns his head, and Isak knows with crushing certainty that he’s never going to meet someone who’s even remotely like Even: bright and breakable, a little bit absurd and so beautiful Isak cannot bear to look away.

Isak draws the frigid night air deep into his lungs. “You don’t know me, and if you did, you’d turn around and run in the other direction. Fast. You don’t rise through the ranks in this industry and come out smelling like roses. I’m… I’ve done many, many things that you’d find fucking disgusting if you knew.”

Even takes a step closer. “I want to learn who you are now, not what you did in the past.” His mouth twists into a joyless smile. “Do you want to know about all the things that I’ve done that I’m ashamed of? Because then we might be here for a while.”

Even keeps doing this - chooses honesty even when it costs him, offers these little jagged pieces of himself as if he trusts Isak to treat them gently. It makes Isak helplessly angry. “I don’t care and I don’t want to know.”  

“Okay.” Even’s eyes are still on him, still searching for something that Isak sure as hell cannot give him. “So here’s a different question: What does it matter to you if I sign up?”

Fuck. Isak had been hoping that his personal stuff could stay well out of this little persuasion game, but he should have thought of this before draping himself all over Even in the club. If Isak dishes him an outright lie now, he’ll lose him, no doubt about that. That being said, Isak would rather hack off his right hand than tell Even about what the last months have been like; about Geir; about the fact that Isak is broke, alone, and hanging on to his career by his fucking fingernails.

Isak wonders what a younger, kinder Isak might have said to Even. He’s uneasy with the thought of revealing even a small part of himself to Even, but he tells himself that it’s okay because he’s a different person now. Thinking of his teenage self is like trying on old clothes and finding that the only thing that’s still familiar is the sensation of pushing his fingers through the holes in the fabric.

“It would have meant the world to me at seventeen,” Isak says, “to see a pan suitor on LASD.”

“In what way?”

“Well, to see a guy like you, who’s hot and kind and doesn’t give a shit about what other people think… Seeing someone like you being completely open about your sexuality. Romancing guys and girls on television.” 

“You weren’t out as a teenager?”

Isak shakes his head. “So deep in the closet I missed the turn to Narnia.”

Even nods, gaze careful, and Isak thinks that the world would be a less shitty place if more people would convey empathy like Even does and forgo the bullshit platitudes. 

Even smiles. “Now I’m trying to picture you at seventeen.”

“Spare yourself the trouble. I was nothing to write home about.”

“Liar. So seventeen-year-old Isak would have enjoyed seeing me make a fool of myself on national television?”

“Hell yeah. He’d have been smitten. Teenage-Isak,” he adds quickly when Even’s smile grows more teasing, “was a man of simple tastes, but then again that’s also true of our target audience.” 

Even laughs, eyes crinkling and fuck, that’s attractive. “I’d be working with you?” he asks. “On LASD?”

Isak nods slowly, pushing himself to draw the line that cannot be crossed. “I’ll never be your hook-up or your friend or your… anything. But I’ll produce your show, and I’ll make sure that the viewers eat out of your hand so that you can milk the publicity in whichever way is useful to you.” He crosses his arms against the cold. “If I can engineer you a grand fucking love story on the way, I’ll do that too.”

Even inclines his head and Isak, catching the look in his eyes, knows that he’s done it - wooed Even, won him - even if this victory doesn’t quite feel like he thought it would. “Who’d say no to all of that?” Even asks drily. 

“Someone with an intact instinct for self-preservation,” Isak mutters before he can think better of it.

“Not my strong suit.” 

And Isak, compelled by an impulse that hits him, like the blood-hot surge of desire that he felt in the club, without warning, holds Even’s gaze and says, unwisely, “I’ll keep you safe. You may hate me by the end of it, but you’ll do well on the show, I promise. Whatever you want out of it, I’ll make sure you get it.”

Chapter Text

Isak has been running around like a ferret all morning, dealing with harried florists and a defective marquee that has the stability of a cheese souffle. He briefly slows his steps when he realizes that he’s misplaced another cup of coffee that probably went cold half an hour ago. He could get a fresh one from the food truck parked among the trailers and production vehicles, but at this time of day there’s likely a long queue. He’s got better things to do than stand in a line and pretend that he doesn’t notice the stares and elbow-nudges.

LASD’s loud, belligerent beehive of a set used to feel like home, but that was… Before. Before Isak connected a few dots that had been staring him in the face for years. Before he decided to stop lying long enough to feed the press a few choice morsels of LASD’s modus operandi that now have Niko and Toril, two former junior producers, facing trial. Before he came crawling back because Geir has a filthy habit of getting what he wants, no matter what Isak does.

Isak isn’t new to despising himself, but he’s never felt quite like this before. It’s like his self-loathing has been inked into his skin, rendered close and painful and permanent. The thing is he didn’t betray the trust of his colleagues and former friends because he was trying to do the right thing. He did it because he was trying to cause maximum damage.

And now he’s back. Turns out that loss doesn’t harden you against more losses. After everything – even after everything – Isak cannot find it in him to walk away from his career, lose that bit of himself, too. He takes a sharp turn and walks down one of the gravel paths that leads to the creek.

They’ve never shot in a location half as swanky: Dahlvillaen has a private beach and pier, an infinity pool, two hot tubs, a private tennis court, and a beautiful Japanese garden overseen by a towering, three-meter tall statue of a sitting Buddha. The latter was designed by the wife of the current owner of the villa. Or rather ex-wife: according to Geir, who’s friends with the owner, the wife recently left her husband for her cosmetic surgeon, making the poor guy sufficiently furious – or heartbroken – to decide to lease their former love nest to LASD.

Isak isn’t complaining. The location will be an additional draw for viewers. Magnus and the rest of the camera crew have been crawling over the place since the beginning of the week, happy as toddlers in a sandpit, shouting non-stop about perfect panorama views and backdrops and whatnot.

Isak double checks that the dozy janitor has replaced a loose board at the end of the little pier before dropping to his haunches. This far inland, the water appears to have forgotten that it’s ocean-born: there are no ripples to disturb the calm, glassy surface that captures the reflection of Isak’s wan face and frames it with the otherworldly upside-down view of the villa.

Dahlvillaen was built at the turn of the twentieth century by a steel magnate whose funds clearly exceeded his aesthetic discernment. Isak knows shit about architectural styles, but he’s pretty sure that you’re not supposed to pair weird pseudo-roman columns with half a dozen turrets that resemble a poor man’s version of the Disney castle. The actual villa looks somewhat bizarre, but the reflection on the water, perspective flattened into Escheresque absurdity, is downright garish. It’s a perfect fit for a show that dresses up the candidates’ shameless self-promotion and Darwinian struggle for bagging the suitor as a search for “true love”.

Love on LASD is about as real as Kim Kardashian’s mane, but the same isn’t true for lust – and Isak knows how to make the latter look like the former once the camera rolls. He is pretty sure that the candidates will need zero encouragement to lust after Even. Which is awesome. Makes his job easier.

And Even… Even is moody and sensual in an assured, sophisticated manner. Isak can see him being politely discriminatory, but he’ll surely sample some of what’s on offer. Which is also awesome. Isak’s reflection nods, just once. It's time for him to get back, meet up with Geir and the other junior producers. God, he’s tired.

***

“Isak.” Chris’s voice is weirdly muffled. Isak adjusts the earpiece of his headset just in time to be treated to the crystal-clear sound of Chris attacking her slushie with no subtlety whatsoever. “Get your ass to the master suite,” Chris continues. “Your boy has just arrived. We might have a problem.”

“Five minutes.” Isak gathers the glossy portfolios of his chosen candidates into a neat stack. He meets William’s and Sana’s icy stares with a guileless smile. Geir chuckles and pushes back his aviator sunglasses, blinking contentedly against the sun. They’re sitting around one of the fancy outdoor tables with intricate mosaic inlays that are set up on the sun terraces of Dahlvillaen. Next to Geir, Christoffer is lolling in his chair and patting his newly acquired blond highlights. He’s brash and annoying. Ignoring him is somehow more exhausting than getting through the one hundred lunge squats that are part of Isak’s exercise routine.

“I’m still a little confused.” Sana is like a dog with a bone. “Isak talks shit to the press, gets the show into serious trouble, and ruins the season finale – and in thanks for the mess he’s made of things he gets to pick all the most promising candidates. The logic of that escapes me.”

“Aww, Sanasol,” Isak drawls. “Don’t be a poor sport. You’d lose against me anyway. Plus, you both got what you wanted, didn’t you? William gets to shepherd pretty girls with self-esteem issues towards their scheduled nervous breakdowns. And you scored all these hot Muslim boys, so why complain?”

“Two,” Sana corrects him. “I have two Muslim boys on my roster. You snagged the lapsed one, who’s the strongest contender of that set.”

“You’re right, Yousef’s pretty hot. A kindergarten teacher who can dance and cook, reads Dostoyevsky in his spare time, and has this… what should we call it… smoldering intensity? Plus, he and Even can compare notes on pan erasure.” Isak draws his brows together and pretends laboriously to work his way to an epiphany: “Yeah, you know, I think I might just start to see the potential there…”

Sana’s fingers play with the stick pin that secures her hijab and Isak is suddenly glad that they have William as a human shield between them.

“At least give me Laila,” Sana says to Geir. “She’s sharp and she’s wasted on Christoffer. None of the other PAs,” Sana continues doggedly, “get their own contestants to work with. I don’t see why he should get special treatment. It’s bad for morale.”

That’s both true and a ballsy line of attack. Geir can wax poetically about the beauty of flat hierarchies for hours, but he sure as hell doesn’t want people to take him by his word and offer unsolicited advice. Isak studies his hands and waits for Geir’s reaction. He’s more than a little put out to find that whatever or whoever is the source of Geir’s suspiciously mellow mood continues to cast its spell: the explosion that Isak expects doesn’t come.

“I think it’s excellent for morale,” Geir says pleasantly, “because all the other PAs will work a lot harder now to emulate Christoffer. Who’s earned his chance. Anyway, you’re all going to do great. We’re introducing a new feature, did I tell you? It’s no longer just the suitor who gets to eliminate contestants. Viewers, too, will get the chance to vote out contestants every other week. We’re going to have a lot of fun shooting this. I can feel it in my bones - this one’s going to be special.”

Geir takes out a tiny antique snus box with an enamel lid, and Isak freezes, fumbles in vain for the quip he was about to make. Geir pushes the box across the table towards Isak, initials on the bottom hidden from view, and smiles. “Don’t tell me you’ve lost your taste for it.”

Isak swallows. “Never liked it that much to begin with.”

“That’s not what I remember, Spurv. I remember you --”

“Fascinating as Isak’s previous experience with snus is,” Sana interrupts him, “I think we have more important things to discuss. Like…”

“Bonuses,” William inserts. “You were saying you’re upping them for everyone, Junior Producers and PAs, this year.”

“But of course.” Geir winks at Isak and opens his arms like he’s calling down riches from heaven. “Nudity, sex, 113 calls, catfights, physical blows, dirty secrets dragged into the daylight – give me that and on any given day you’re going home with 5000kr in your pocket. Same goes for the PAs.”

William smiles. “You’ll be poor before the shoot is over.”

“I’ll never be poor,” Geir says. “I’ve got my little kingdom right here. Oh, by the way…”

“By the way?” Sana prompts.

“There’s someone else joining us for this shoot. We’re going to have an academic on set.”

William puts his elbows on the table: “A what?”

“Academic,” Geir repeats. “You know, ill-groomed individuals partial to books? One of those. He’s writing a doctoral dissertation in… what was it? Sociology or something worse, I think…. Gender Studies? Can’t recall. Anyway, he calls himself a participant observer. His name is Jonas Vasquez. He’s Ingrid’s boyfriend. You’ll see him around. He’s not allowed into the control room or to access anything that’s sensitive. But we’re going to let him wander around and conduct interviews and stuff. It’s the least we can do after the PR debacle that Isak engineered for us.”

Sana looks from Geir to Isak’s blank face and back to Geir. “Is that wise?” Sana asks.

Geir waves his hand around, wrist loose. “Course it is. It’s my idea. And now…” Geir closes his eyes and leans back in his chair, “scoot, all of you. I need my beauty sleep and I believe you’ve got work to do.”

Isak stays when the others leave. Geir cracks open an eye. There is a tiny burst blood vessel next to his pupil. He’s been getting these almost constantly since his doctor put him on blood thinners. “You’re in the same ugly shirt that you wore yesterday, Spurv. And you look unshowered and deliciously exhausted. Someone got lucky last night?”

“So lucky.” What happened is that Isak got a stern talking-to from the manager of his mother’s group home, telling Isak that he’s running an assisted living facility for people with mental illnesses, not for their fuck-up adult children. Isak bumped into Eskild while checking out Dahlvillaen’s dilapidated garden shed as a temporary place to crash. Eskild, clucking his tongue like a fastidious mother hen, snuck him the keys to the gear truck. Isak is using one of the extra-wide shelves as a bunk. By the time he lies down at night, he’s usually too overwrought to fall asleep, too shattered to get up again. It doesn’t matter where he does his tossing and turning, although a little more air would be nice.

“I still haven’t had confirmation that the network has dropped the charges,” Isak continues.

“Oh, didn’t I tell you? Think I did.” There’s a pause. Geir’s fingers play with his shades but he doesn’t put them back on. “They’re no longer bringing charges of negligence against you.”

“What about the defamation charges?”

“You know, the president of the network is undecided. But I told him that you’re back on the show and very keen to prove your worth. I think he’ll listen to me when we meet in a few weeks to discuss my pitch for a new show.”

Isak makes himself go very still, betraying nothing. “I’m sorry to hear that. You used to have so much clout with the director. It must be disappointing to see your requests ignored.”

A flicker of annoyance crosses Geir’s face, immediately replaced by a smile. “Such as they were.”

“Such as they were.”

“Well then, Spurv,” Geir says, flicking a lazy finger against Isak’s wrist, eyes already closing again. “Prove your worth. Give me something to tell the director when I meet him next.”

***

Isak isn’t in a great mood when he strolls through the double wing door leading to the master suite. It’s huge and clearly cost a shit-load of money to decorate. When you enter, you find yourself in a private sitting area that’s separated from the main room with a partition wall covered in a monochromatic jungle mural. Isak, keen to take in the state of play, leans against the doorpost instead of entering the bedroom right away.

Sara is perched on the minimalist stainless steel four-poster bed that gleams underneath the stucco ceiling. She’s jabbing the tip of her pencil against her clipboard, eyes narrowed to disapproving slits. “You’re lucky that our producer has a massive boner for you,” she says to Even. “Otherwise we wouldn’t be so accommodating.”

Isak can’t see Even from where he’s standing, but he hears the startled pleasure in his voice: “You mean Isak?”

“What? No, don’t be stupid. I was talking about Geir Jørgensen.” This is a first: Isak has never before had warm feelings about Sara’s sneering condescension. The sentiment expires quickly though because Sara continues: “Isak fucks with people, but he doesn’t fuck them, if you get my meaning. Unless you’re the chairman of the network’s advisory board.” When Sara is excited about getting to dish proper dirt, her voice gets a honeyed inflection that makes Isak’s spine crawl. “Rumor has it that Isak made an exception for him, hoping it would help his career. But otherwise the guy has the libido of a misanthropic icicle. Only thing that turns him on are ratings.”

Even doesn’t respond and Sara continues: “You should tread carefully around Isak. He’s probably going to act like he’s your friend, like he’s on your side, but he’s just doing that to get you to say and do what he wants. I don’t know what’s between the two of you, but he clearly hates your guts. Only look at what he’s done with this room. It’s… petty.”

“Petty in what way?”

Sara lifts her head and stares at the huge, photorealist painting above the bed’s upholstered headboard. It shows two dinosaurs copulating, volcanoes erupting in the background. “Well,” Sara says, “you should just know that this room is usually hung with these amazing original prints of Helmut Newton nudes. The owner of the villa is a collector. He sometimes lends some of them out for exhibitions, but they were in this room just a few days ago.”

“What happened to them?” Even doesn’t sound more than politely interested, but Isak is a hundred per cent sure that that’s an act. And what’s worse is that Sara can never shut her stupid mouth.

“Isak had the Newtons swapped out against these atrocities… I think he made a point of going through the entire villa, picking stuff to replace the Newtons. He obviously went for whatever was ugliest in any given room.”

Sara eyes the eclectic art covering the walls. There’s a series of nineteenth-century lithographs showing grotesque human-animal hybrids: Cow Man, Bird Man, Bear Man, and Pig Man. An Araki photograph of a woman suspended and bound by ropes is displayed next to three neon signs in Tracey Emin’s elegantly forward sloping handwriting. They read: “Trust me”. “I said Don’t Practice on Me”. And “Everything for Love”.

Above the fireplace hangs Odd Nerdrum’s bizarre and very fleshly rendition of a meditation group, and just opposite the bed is a massive, gilt-framed TV screen with a CD loop that gives the effect of being a moving painting of an eerie underwater landscape.

Sara shakes her head. “You know, if you want to get back at Isak for ruining your suite you should ask him about –”

In terms of eavesdropping sessions, this one has been remarkably unsatisfying. Isak steps into the bedroom and interrupts Sara. “What’s up?”

“You’re here,” Sara says flatly. “Finally.”

“Yes. Now tell me why.” Isak isn’t looking at Sara as he speaks. He’s looking at Even because… it’s kind of hard not to. He’s lounging in the ridiculous, freestanding copper-leaved tub that’s positioned by one of the windows overlooking the creek. Fully-clothed, thank god.

Isak hasn’t seen him since he dropped off the contract at Even’s flat share a few weeks ago. Even looks like he’s just idled away a month under some pleasure-drunk Mediterranean sun, skin lightly tanned and eyes half-lidded. His hair is a bit shorter than it was, but it’s swept up and artfully mussed as always. The nose ring is gone, the bracelet back. He is wearing a fitted white shirt and khaki dress pants. Sunglasses are tucked into his shirt pocket. It’s easy to imagine him sitting on a piazza somewhere in Italy or neatly stepping off a sailing boat in southern France. Lazing around in other, similarly luxurious tubs, probably not alone.

“Isak.” When Isak drags his gaze back up to Even’s face, Even is looking at him consideringly, the beginning of a smile twitching his lips. He plugs an unlit cigarette into his mouth. Isak walks over and nabs it, immediately regretting this move when Even, voice pitched low and private, says: “I like it when you share my vices.”

Isak takes a step back. “I hear you’re being troublesome.”

“No one knows my struggle,” Even quotes blithely, “they only see the trouble.”

“Even,” Sara adds, “is a little, um, let’s say confused about some of the rules in his contract. Perhaps you can explain.”

“Which rules?”

Even’s eyebrows go up. “I’m aware that we’re not allowed to use computers or phones on the set because you want us cut off from the internet. That makes you guys look like the leaders of a mad cult, but okay. I can live without the internet, but if I can’t listen to music on my phone I need another way of doing that. I got myself a beat-up iPod Touch from eBay but now Sara’s just been telling me that she’s got to confiscate that too?”

“Ah,” Isak says. “That would be the no-music rule.”

Even straightens in the tub. “The what rule?”

“Did you not”, Isak asks, “read the appendices to your contract?”

“I read the contract. And the important bits from the… Wait, wasn’t it just one appendix?”

“Nope, there were six. See, music’s banned on set. Unless we’re throwing a shitty cover version at you to shoot a dancing scene.”

“But --”

“No but. There are microphones everywhere in the house and garden. We can’t have random music playing because that kind of background noise fucks with the audio. Plus, we can’t risk incurring copyright fees. Imagine there’s a big moment. Like the frontrunner is about to go down on you. Or there’s a well-engineered wardrobe malfunction. And then we can’t use that material because your half-forgotten iPod is playing Head over Heels…”

Even’s gaze sharpens. “I wouldn’t be playing Tears for Fears just for anyone.”

“Understood,” Isak says patiently. “But you get that you have to surrender your iPod, right?”

“No. I…” Even cards a hand through his hair, looking away. “I don’t think I can make it through six weeks here without being able to listen to music.”

“That’s what everyone says at first, believe me,” Sara says. “But it’s really no big deal. You adapt. You forget about it.”

Even shakes his head. “No. I… no. Not that.”

“Do we have to remind you,” Sara points out, “that you signed away your soul in blood when you put your name to that contract? You have absolutely no right to demand –”

Isak, taking in the tap-tap-tap of Even’s foot against the rim of the tub, like a twitching nerve, turns to Sara: “Why don’t you go and torment Sana for a bit? I hear you two have a budgeting problem to resolve.”

“You don’t get to tell me what to--”

“I do, actually, and you know it. Leave us.” Sara mutters obscenities under her breath, but she leaves and Isak, relieved, turns back to Even. “Get out of that tub.”

“It’s very comfortable.”

“You’re not here to be comfortable.”

“Says the boy who pettily divested my suite of Brigitte Nielsen’s boobs.” Even’s smile is sweet. “Thank you, by the way.”

“Dream on. I didn’t do this for you.”

“Interesting. Did you do it for the sexy dinosaurs?”

“Let’s talk some more about how you’re not allowed to play music on set.”

Even rolls his eyes and climbs out of the tub. It’s mostly graceful, albeit a bit of a production because whoa… his legs haven’t gotten any shorter in the meantime. It’s a good thing his feet look grotesquely oversized in the truly terrible leather sandals he’s wearing – gives Isak something to fix his attention on.

“Eskild will swing by later to fix,” Isak stares pointedly downwards, “this.”

Even looks unduly charmed. “You’ve detected a problem with my huarachas?”

“I don’t think the hua-whatevers are the problem. I mean, they’re plenty awful on their own, but I’m more concerned with your ginormous feet. Who has feet like this? They just look… wrong. You could probably use them to walk on water.”

Even, all seriousness, nods. “Like Jesus, yes.”

“No, like a basilisk lizard. Look them up. They look ridiculous.”

“Can’t look them up without my phone,” Even points out.

“That is true. Well done for taking the rules to heart.”

“It won’t work for me,” Even says in a different tone. “The no-music thing.”

Isak can sense that Even is giving him the truth. Part of Isak wants to chide him for not reading the contract properly, but relief gets in the way of that when the kernel of an idea presents itself. “Hey, do you play an instrument?”

“Yes,” Even says.

“Well, what is it?”

“Guitar.”

“Are you any good?”

Even shrugs. “Serviceable, I guess.”

“Okay.” This might just work. “We’ll fetch your guitar. You can play it here. Serenade your favourite candidates. In fact, that would be kind of—”

“I don’t play for others.”

“And I’m not fucking Mother Theresa, Even.” Isak pinches the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger, thinking. “Here’s the deal. We’ll get you your guitar and you can play it in your suite at night as much as you like. On the condition that on two occasions, chosen freely by me, I get to snap my fingers and you’ll play exactly what I say, for the candidate of my choice, without putting up a fight. Can you do that?”

Even doesn’t look pleased, but he nods.

“Great. Now make yourself at home. We start shooting in four hours. You can poke around the villa and gardens for a bit, but for the love of God watch out for the cables. They’re everywhere. If you break your foot and upset our production schedule, I’ll have to murder you.”

“That would be a different show, no?”

“Ha. Funny. Hand over your iPod.”

“What iPod?”

Isak’s steps up and digs for Even’s iPod in the back pocket of his fancy trousers. This close, he can feel the warmth of Even’s body, transmitted through the fine fabric of the shirt. His scent is the same – citrussy hair product and tobacco and sun-warmed, clean skin. Isak breathes in discreetly. Stops himself when Even tilts his head so that his mouth is just a breath away from Isak’s ear: “That was very nice. Do you want to try the other pocket?”

“No. I… – Even, what the hell?” Isak, jolted out of the moment, grabs Even’s right hand and forces it upwards. He inspects the palm to confirm that the light didn’t trick him just now. Then he reaches for Even’s other hand. Palm and the insides of his fingers are just as bad: skin yellowed and scaly; calloused in some places, cracked and fissured in others. “What the fuck have you done to your hands?”

“They’ll heal.”

“Not until tonight, they won’t.”

“They look fine from a distance,” Even says. “You don’t have to shoot close-ups, right? You could always…”

“Don’t tell me how to do my job. Tell me what happened.”

Even gives an exaggerated, full-bodied shrug, mouth contracting into a tense smile that Isak doesn’t like very much. “It’s nothing. I… sometimes get fastidious about cleaning them.”

“Do you clean them with a fucking cheese grater?”

Even’s eyebrows quirk up. “There’s an idea.”

Isak is still holding Even’s hands in his, their beautiful form a stark contrast to the abused skin of the palms, but Even pulls them from his grasp and steals back the cigarette that Isak diverted into his own shirt pocket earlier. He opens the door and steps onto the balcony.

Isak, feeling a little off-kilter, follows. The light out here is filtered through the foliage of the elm tree that casts its shade over the balcony, giving all colors a cool, grayish blue tinge. Even tips his face up and Isak glances at his profile, wondering if Even really has a face that is more changeable, less settled somehow, than most people’s faces, or if it’s just that Isak has developed a stupid, professional habit of paying more attention to all the subtle shifts that seem to redraw his features. It’s a little disconcerting how every change in light, every change in angle, seems to reveal a different man. Isak wonders which of Even’s many faces his lovers remember.

Even holds out his lit cigarette and Isak, taking a long drag, doesn’t point out that Even could easily roll a second cigarette for Isak rather than share his.

There are lots of things that Isak wants to ask – Are you okay? Is it the show that made you do this to your hands? How will I know if it’s too much? – but he’s still trying to string words together in his head when Even cuts into the quiet: “You really shouldn’t have gone to all that additional trouble.”

“What’s that?”

“Curating the outside art as well.” Even is gazing at the back of the buddha statue, chewing on his bottom lip thoughtfully. “Very flattering. See, I was hoping that some choice details might have survived your post-hook-up amnesia.”

“Er…?” Isak is still trying to catch up.

“I appreciate you taking the monumental approach.” Even nods solemnly. “Though I’m not sure you got the balls-to-dick ratio quite right.”

Isak chokes on his own spit. Stares at the statue. Huh. There’s no denying that from this angle… it resembles a giant dick. It’s the kind of thing that, once seen, cannot be unseen. “It does look a bit…”

“Tumescent? Engorged? Achingly priapic? Yes, and yes.” Even’s voice drops about an octave as he lets some suggestive breathlessness creep in. “Oh, definitely yes.”

The sound that escapes Isak’s throat is not a giggle. It’s a cough. “That’s seriously culturally offensive.”

“You think so? It’s not like we’re talking about an authentic Buddhist sculpture. Sara told me this thing here was designed by the owner’s ex. When she briefly considered herself a Buddhist between her Kabbalah phase and some kind of yoga cult she’s currently into...”

Even has a point. Isak doesn’t tell him so, asking instead: “So, according to your theory, what’s that oval thing at the top then?”

“Piercing. Obviously.”

“You don’t have one,” Isak says a little too quickly.

Even’s blue gaze sweeps Isak’s face and Isak, feeling it like a touch, swallows against the heat crawling up his neck.

“Not there, no,” Even says. “And I knew you paid attention.” His smile turns playful. “Hey Isak?”

“What?”

“You do realize that by erecting a giant dick right in front of my balcony you’re giving me high hopes. I’m expecting Wicker Man levels of weird shit to happen over the coming weeks.”

Wickerwhat? “Yeah… sure.”

Even, obnoxiously observant as always, stares at Isak. “I can’t believe you haven’t seen that film!”

“Bullshit. I’ve seen it.”

“Yeah? What happens?”

“There’s a wicker man. The plot is stupid. Stupid things happen.”

Even’s eyes are glittering. “I don’t think you’ve seen this film!”

Isak couldn’t care less if Even thinks he knows fuck-all about films. “Jesus fucking Christ, I’ve seen it. I’ve –”

“It’s fine.” Even gently takes the cigarette, burned down to a glimmering stub, from Isak’s fingers. “We can watch it together. Refresh your memory. We should get high, too, when we do it – open your eyes to the sheer wonder of phallic imagery in that film.”

Isak is a little rattled by the discovery that this alternative universe that Even’s sketching out, where Isak possesses the time and stupidity to get stoned and watch dumb films with Even, doesn’t sound… entirely awful.

He pushes off the balcony’s railing and makes a show of checking the time on his mobile. “I need to get going.” Isak says. “Back to the important stuff.” He holds out his hand, trying to channel an impatient parent dealing with a spoiled child rather than making another ill-advised attempt to rifle through Even’s pockets: “Ipod.”

Even looks at him steadily and there’s a pause, seconds seeming to stretch beyond their usual span. Isak starts stressing about what he’ll do if Even leaves him hanging. But that’s not what Even does.

Even steps closer, moving into Isak’s space. He smells of the cigarette they’ve just shared and he’s biting his bottom lip, sharp teeth dragging over delicate skin that reddens immediately. His gaze drops to Isak’s mouth and Isak breathes very, very carefully.

There’s suddenly an iPod in Even’s hand – how did Isak miss this step? Even leans forward a little. He reaches into Isak’s leather jacket and tucks the iPod into the inner pocket. Then he rests two careful fingers on Isak’s lapel and time curls, folding an earlier moment into this one. Isak thinks of Even in the club’s restroom, smuggling the matchbook with his number into Isak’s pocket, smile silly and uncertain.

“Did you throw it away?” Even murmurs.

Isak is a lying liar who lies. “What do you mean?” His body still sways forward, just the tiniest bit.

Even inclines his head and they’re close, so close – if Isak were to tilt his chin up, Even’s lips would touch his, and Isak is wondering what it would take to goad Even into biting Isak’s lip, too.

“Pity you don’t remember,” Even says. He brushes his nose against Isak’s, a warm, featherlight touch Isak might as well have imagined, and steps back. “I better go and check out the set then.”

Isak watches him go. He reaches back and closes his hands around the cool railing of the balcony. It takes him more than a minute to put himself back together.

Chapter Text

Isak has always loved shooting the first night on any new season of LASD: the candidates – styled to the nines, underfed, and amped up by the PAs – meet the suitor for the first time and the air crackles with nerves and excitement.

They’ve set up cocktail tables and a buffet by the waterside and the candidates are sauntering across the pedicured lawn and private pier in the golden light of 307 paper lanterns. Isak knows the exact number because Mahdi, long-suffering head of lighting tech, put in a complaint.

Isak stands next to Magnus, who’s operating his camera from the shadow of a bower overflowing with artificial roses, and waits for the first gossamer-thin threads of drama to reveal themselves, ready to be spun into a plot by Isak.

They’re introducing candidates one by one. The girls are at a distinct disadvantage because they have to walk down the steep, irregular stone steps to the lower garden in their stilettos. The girl who’s currently making her way down is teetering atop her nude high heels, eyes wide with kittenish terror. She’s wearing a flower crown, a salmon-coloured skirt, and a white lace top that is doing her no favors. Isak doesn’t remember her name, but she’s one of William’s girls. If she doesn’t break her neck within the next minute, she’s got a solid chance of making it through the first rose ceremony: not even seasoned reality tv buffs with a blunted sense of empathy would want to watch this girl go through a second ordeal tonight.

She wobbles on her next step and gives a panicked little shriek. Even, who’s been chatting to two candidates at the bottom of the stairs, looks up, alarmed. He pushes his champagne flute into the hand of the person standing next to him and bounds up the stairs, offering the girl his arm with a kind smile.

“A+ for romance, Even,” Isak murmurs to himself. “Now how about you carry her the rest of the way?”

Even promptly makes a joke about the producers’ laissez-faire approach to health and safety on set that hits a little too close to home and will have to be edited out. Fucker.

Next to Isak, Magnus guffaws. “He’s funny. Can’t believe this year’s suitor isn’t a douchebag.”

“The bar is low,” Isak says. “I want a second camera on Even and the girl.”

The girl, stepping onto the lawn and into safety, tilts her head up to Even. She plays with a stray lock of her white-blonde hair, looking nervous and enraptured. Isak is holding his breath for a sweet, telegenic moment when the girl opens her mouth and says in her high, thin voice: “I’m a bit surprised that there are Muslim guys here? Isn’t it… like… forbidden in their religion to sleep with you… I mean, with men?”

“Fucking hell,” Geir’s voice is loud in Isak’s headset. “What a stupid little bitch. That’s precisely not the kind of debate we want around the show. This is on you, William. Get her away from the suitor. Isak, give me something I can actually use. Now.”

“On it.” Before Isak goes to find Even, he makes sure that Magnus captures the entrance of one of his own candidates: Eva, a Pilates teacher and professional dog-walker from Bergen, is even prettier in person than on her audition tape. Her honey brown hair is in a messy side braid and she’s picked some kind of long, floral hippie dress that makes you think she’s wearing summer itself. She takes one good look at the stairs, then kicks off her heels and skips down the steps with the easy, unselfconscious grace of a dancer. She’s going to be a favorite with viewers in no time. Judging from Sana’s frown, Isak isn’t the only one who thinks that. Isak pats her shoulder consolingly when he passes her, searching for Even.

Even is talking to a good-looking guy with unruly curls and a set of expressive eyebrows that would make Zachary Quinto weep. Isak can’t remember having seen his picture among the contestants’ portfolios. He’s dressed far too casually for the event.

Even’s smile widens when he notices Isak. “Here is Isak. You can just tell that he loves being interviewed.”

“What the fuck?” Isak notices the dog-eared notebook in the stranger’s hand. “Ah. You’re Ingrid’s boyfriend?”

“Jonas.” He shakes Isak’s hand, gaze assessing. “Hey, you’re young to have made it to junior producer. Can I ask you some questions?”

“Definitely not tonight. It’s bad enough that you’ve waylaid the suitor. He’s got important stuff to do.”

“Really? Like what?” Even asks.

“Like fall headlong in love on camera, you moron.” Isak takes hold of Even’s arm and leads him a few steps away, until they’re standing under the creaky old weeping willow, out of earshot.

When Isak turns to Even, amusement is still crinkling the corners of Even’s eyes. Isak swallows. Stern professionalism, how hard can it be? “So, how are you feeling about the candidates so far? Anyone strike your fancy?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t had the chance to exchange more than three sentences with any of them. Shouldn’t you give them something to eat before plying them with champagne? I mean this one girl… Laila? She was clearly a bit out of it when she…”

Isak snorts. “Don’t be so naïve.” Isak knows for a fact that Laila wasn’t even a little drunk when she swanned down the stairs in her mesh dress and went all in, taking hold of Even’s shirt collar to draw his head down and kissing him, full on and with pretty shameless exercise of tongue. Laila, with her feline elegance, clearly knows how to play up her type – the story-book villain whom viewers love to hate – to maximize her chances of making it through several rounds of the elimination process. She’s smart, way too smart for Christoffer to handle.

The thought of Christoffer getting his own candidate to wrangle has been needling Isak all day. He tries to shake it off – he’s got more urgent things on his plate.

“How’s your night going?” Even asks.

“None of your fucking con— … I’m sorry.” Isak’s knee-jerk response to pressure is to direct some of it outwards, lashing out at whoever is unfortunate enough to enter his orbit. He doesn’t want to be that person with Even. “Everything is under control, but in order for this to be good TV we need… something flashy. Give the tabloids something to scream about.”

Even nods, giving Isak his full attention. “What are you thinking of?”

Isak runs through his inner library of scenarios that translate into stellar ratings. “Do any of the candidates remind you of… I don’t know, your first love or the one that got away or some other romantic shit? Or, even better, do any of them remind you of an awful ex who’s still giving you nightmares? Do you want to tell Mags’s camera all about it? I think that would be a thing of beauty.”

Even, lips pursed, shakes his head. “I think I’d rather not.”

“Okay. Well… if you wanted to hook up with Laila, then ditch her during the rose ceremony… that would also work beautifully.”

“I see.” Even steps a little closer. “You know what I’m thinking?”

“What?”

“I’m thinking,” Even says, mouth tugging into a small smile that’s warm and conspirational, “that we have to expand your working definition of beauty.”

“Fuck, Even. I really don’t care about semantics. All I want is good TV!”

“Noted. I can give you that. And beauty, too. Wait until the end of the night. You’ll see.”

If this was anyone else, Isak would tell them where to shove their cockiness, combined with a strong-worded reminder of who’s running the show and who’s a meat puppet chosen to appeal to the broadest cross-section of their demographic. But here is Even, all lit up with a plan he’s not sharing with Isak, a challenge to the tilt of his mouth, laughter in his eyes. Looking at him makes Isak feel curious and restless, on edge in a way that isn’t at all… unpleasant. Like this is a game, like they’re in it for the fun of it.

They’re not, of course. They’re in it because Geir forced Isak’s hand and Even could do with 900.000kr, but it’s nice to pretend for a moment. And so Isak says: “You do your thing. And I’ll do mine.” He motions towards the contestants milling about the lawn. “Back to work, suitor. There’s got to be someone who’s sticking out. Tell me whom you’d like to get to know better.”

“Um…” Even stares dutifully in the indicated direction. “They’re all –”

“No way. If this is because you’re having trouble remembering people’s names, you can just point at them. Rudeness is rewarded on this set.”

“Understood. Hang on… I…” Even is still gazing from one candidate to the next, seemingly undecided until a dark-haired girl in a halter-neck dress throws back her head and laughs, uninhibited and free. “Iben,” Even says. “I know nothing about her, but why don’t we change that.”

“Excellent choice,” Isak says. Iben was a last-minute addition to his roster of candidates. She’s an Oslo-based influencer who’s a little more kooky than your average beauty-and-fashion insta-babe. Iben is an avid collector of vintage matchbox cars, and part of her channel’s fame is due to her long-eared co-star. This is most certainly not what Geir had in mind when he asked Isak to take over, but Isak can spin TV gold out of nothing and here is his chance to spin it, quite literally, from straw.

Isak orders a camera and audio team over and turns away from Even to speak with Chris via his comms, arranging for her to bring over their special guest.

“How do you feel about Flemish Giants, Even?” Isak asks, once Magnus has his camera in position.

Even doesn’t miss a beat. “Are we talking about very tall Belgians?”

“You wish. Now turn around and meet the current buck in Iben’s life.”

Iben is giggling, prettily covering her mouth with one manicured hand and holding the leash with the other. “I’m so excited to introduce you to Aurgelmir, Even!” Aurgelmir’s fawn-colored fur is brushed to a high gloss. He is massive – easily measuring 80 centimeters from his powerful, broad hindquarters to resentfully twitching whiskers. “He’s my best friend! My soulmate,” Iben declares with great sincerity. “He’s also… oh! Oh! He’s…”

“Enjoying life unneutered?” Even supplies gamely as the rabbit proceeds to hump Even’s shoe. Enthusiastically.

“In Aurgelmir’s defense,” Isak points out, “it’s very easy to mistake your foot for a frisky forty-pounds doe rabbit. Please tell us more about your soulmate, Iben.”

Iben is fighting a losing battle, chiding the rabbit and trying to get it off Even’s shoe. She has just started to search for a decoy treat in her handbag when someone noisily pops a champagne bottle. Aurgelmir jumps, jerking the leash out of her hand and making a run for it, bringing Iben and Even in hot pursuit. Isak exchanges a quick look with Magnus before darting off himself.

The rabbit crashes into someone’s shins, tears down one of the awful floral sculptures, and then takes a sharp left towards a newcomer who’s just stepping down from the stairs. The leash tangles around the guy’s legs. He loses his balance and flings out an arm, making a desperate dash for Linn’s boom pole.

Isak, sensing Magnus by his side and in position, knocks the boom out of the guy’s reach. He goes down with a loud “oof!”

“Fucking unbelievable,” is what Even pants close to Isak’s ear.

Isak gives his shoulder a little shove. “Go on, tend to the wounded. It’s the least you can do.”

Even’s jaw tightens and Isak pinches his arm for good measure, calling forth the desired wince which Magnus expertly captures on camera when Even bends over the guy who’s half-sprawled on the stairs. He’s handsome, blinking dazedly and pushing his longish brown locks away from his face. Isak would have recognized him instantly even without the reminder provided by Sana’s smug grin.

He’s one of Sana’s crop: Mikael, a real estate tycoon’s son who’s given 98% of his inherited wealth away to live in an intentional community dedicated to organic farming, holistic health, and the dismantling of walls in our yards, hearts, and communities. Isak checked out his insta, coming to the conclusion that Mikael is pretentious as fuck and kind of vain about his hair. In the interest of good story, Isak’s more than happy to look past this though.

“I’m so sorry,” Even says, supporting Mikael when he sits up. “Are you hurt?”

“Don’t know. Mowed down by a rabbit… Not exactly heroic, right?”

“Struck down by a Flemish Giant,” Even corrects him. “I think that’s one for the annals.”

“Huh?” Mikael, looking mildly confused, smooths down the sleeves of his organic silk shirt. “Where’s the suitor? I heard he’s super hot. Have you met him already? Is he… like… worth a broken tailbone?”

“Nah.” Even looks down, then up, lips twitching. There’s a spark in his eyes and Isak can see that he’s not acting: he’s a little smitten. “A broken toe max, I’d say.”

Isak, suddenly remembering that he’s got a veritable resident on his own roster, yells: “Can we get medical assistance for Mikael? Right about now?”

Isak’s contestant appears promptly. Sonja was Isak’s first pick because she’s got it all: beauty and brains in addition to something steely and pragmatic, the gift of a difficult childhood, that is intuitively recognizable to Isak. She’s a resident in internal medicine at Ullevål and moonlights at Oslo’s Health Centre for Undocumented Migrants. She lives with her younger sister who’s still in school.

Sonja’s silver necklaces and bangles jingle softly as she bends over Mikael to examine his shoulder and left leg. She’s quick and competent, and Isak has to badger her with a million nonsensical medical suggestions to get a few meager quotes that can be edited into useful interview bites later. At one point, Even is in her way and Sonja snaps at him. She promptly apologizes and blushes, girlish and a little shy, the perfect counterpoint to her professional demeanor. Isak watches Even take notice.

Then he watches Mikael come to the belated realization that Even is the suitor. Turns out that Mikael is actually rather cute when he’s all wide-eyed and sheepish. Who’d have thought.

Finally, Iben – having retrieved Aurgelmir from the hamper into which he’s tumbled – returns. She comes to stand next to Even, petting the rabbit’s fur and sneaking nervous little glances at Even.

Isak steps back, crosses his arms, and basks in the warm glow of momentary triumph: what they’ve caught on camera here is not one but three perfect meet-cutes. No matter how things will unfurl from here, this material is going to give them plenty to play with.

It’s a good first night. Geir’s instincts, as always, were spot on: Even’s quicksilver charm translates into a pretty irresistible on-camera presence. He’s just mischievous enough to keep things interesting, but never wounding or self-involved. Not easy to know, which makes everyone all the more eager to figure him out.

Even distributes his attention evenly, chatting to all the candidates and making time in between to get to know the crew. When ten o’clock has gone by and Isak still hasn’t seen him finish a single hors d'oeuvre, he grabs a timid-looking runner and makes it her job to shadow Even for the rest of the night, force-feeding him carbs and water in opportune moments.

The contestants by and large are a bunch of affable extroverts, happy to put themselves out there, delighted to banter with Even and only a little less delighted to banter with each other if Even’s attention is temporarily otherwise engaged. Isak doesn’t have to interfere too much to generate raw footage that can be edited into juicy character beats later. That’s mainly thanks to the efforts of a couple of contestants who’ve been chosen mainly for their advanced skills in slander and manipulation.

Laila, bless her callous little heart, gets a couple of the girls together and instigates a drinking game that generates universal tipsiness and some intriguing insights. Sonja has just come out of a long, unhappy relationship. Eva needs more than two hands to indicate the number of men she’s slept with in the last six months, and Vilde thinks that sex without condoms is messy, and not in a good way. Then there is Liv, a tattoo artist who looks just like the young Brigitte Bardot – if Bardot had gotten it into her mind to cover every centimeter of her skin neck-downwards in single needle black and grey tattoos. The designs are gorgeous: Catholic martyrs intermixed with medieval beasts and delicate floral work. Liv knocks back what must be the fourth wine glass that Laila hands her and confesses that she’s never had an orgasm with a guy.

“Fuck yes,” comes Geir’s crowing through the comms. “Christoffer, you’re a star for putting Laila up to this.”

Isak knows that everyone on set, including Geir, is well aware that Christoffer isn’t smart enough by half to mastermind Laila’s escapades. Geir’s performative praise still riles him up. He nips to the fancy restroom in the boathouse to splash some water into his face and stares at his reflection in the mirror, eyes needle-sharp and a little wild.

Suddenly, there’s a sound that Isak’s heard plenty of times before. He walks down the row of stalls. None of them are locked and when Isak opens the door to the final stall with a precise kick, he finds Ilya snorting coke from his phone, razor blade still in hand.

“Thank god,” Isak says, leaning against the door of the stall. “I was starting to worry all that bad-boy talk is just shameless self-promotion.”

Ilya is an underwear model and self-professed troublemaker who enjoys talking about his Kawasaki streetfighter and insinuating that he’s a devotee of as yet undisclosed but risqué sexual practices. He looks Isak up and down. “Wanna have some fun?”

“Oh yes.” Isak snatches the phone out of his hand. “Why go to all the trouble of smuggling in a phone and then ruin the screen with your razor blade?” There’s no lock screen. Isak goes straight to Ilya’s WhatsApp and starts scrolling through his messages.

Ilya is still staring at him like he’s undecided if he wants to strangle or climb him like a tree. “Are you going to snitch on me?”

“To the reality TV police? I would never.”

“Can I have my phone back?”

“Let me think on it…” Isak is still going through Ilya’s messages, the adrenaline of accidental victory a sweet little rush. “Nah, don’t think so.” Isak pockets the phone. “I believe you’ve got a bet to win. No time like today, right?” He reaches out and brushes a tiny trace of white powder from Ilya’s upper lip. Ilya catches Isak’s finger between his teeth, sharp and glistening with saliva.

“Careful,” Isak says, voice quiet and exact. “My bite is quite a bit worse than my bark.”

Ilya lets go of Isak’s finger, gaze never leaving Isak’s. “You’re hot.”

“I know.” Isak wipes his finger on the hem of Ilya’s sequined wife beater. “Now listen: There are hidden cameras everywhere on set. If I ever catch you offering blow to Even or one of the contestants, I’ll make you wish you were roadkill smoked in the exhaustion fumes of your stupid Kawasaki.”

“You can –”

“That’s exactly right. I can do that and a lot worse. Now scram.”

Ilya makes a weird sound, a growl that’s half-threat and half-surrender and slinks away.

Isak takes his time washing his hands. When he leaves the boathouse, he spies Adam and Hakon engaged in a manly game of horseshoes. Adam presumably has a leg up in this competition because he leads riding tours in the mountains. His audition tape was lackluster, but Isak and Sana made sure he was picked up for the show. That’s because Adam is an idiot savant of innuendo: you just have to nudge the conversation towards his profession and Adam will happily talk to the camera about what it’s like to ride high-strung stallions. How you shouldn’t put them up wet but well… it happens. It’s a rare gift.

Hakon is a loveable himbo with hidden depths: one of Kystvakten’s finest, who does shit like abseiling from helicopters over the open sea, and only came out in his late twenties after he’d fathered a cute little girl whom he’s now co-parenting with her mom.

Isak makes his way over to them, a frown between his brows, gaze glued to the screen of Ilya’s phone.

“Careful, Isak!” Hakon grabs Isak’s shoulder and squeezes it bro-fashion. “You were about to walk into the pole!”

“Oh! Gosh… Thank you.” Isak, blinking rapidly, gives a shaky little laugh. “Guess I’m a little distracted. You wouldn’t believe… Anyway, what are you guys up to? Who’s winning?”

“Adam is.” Hakon shakes his head good-naturedly. “Guy knows his way around a horseshoe. Hey, you look a little peaky, Isak. Everything alright?”

“Yeah. You know… Like, the first night of the shoot is always special. Getting to know all the contestants is such a treat. And everyone is so nice this season! I just… I don’t know… it kind of feels like had we met in school or something, we’d all have been friends so fast.”

“Hey, I totally get what you mean, man!” Adam says with the warmth of a rugged camp-fire. “I was saying just the same thing to Hakon.”

“For sure. But something still has you worried, right?” Hakon asks. “You’re clutching that phone so hard, man.”

“Oh… right!” Isak stares at the phone in his hand like he’s just discovered that the biblical serpent, giving Eve a break, has snuck into Isak’s palm instead. “No, you know, it’s nothing. You guys deserve to enjoy this night. Shall we go and see what Even is up to?”

“You can talk to us,” Adam says. “Your work is really tough and you’re doing such a stellar job making sure that everyone is comfortable and settling in well. What’s bugging you?”

Isak remains steadfast and principled for exactly 90 seconds longer before he falters, sagging with relief against the pole – or against Hakon’s tree trunk of a shoulder, it’s kind of difficult to make out the difference. “You know, it just fucks me up when everyone is so nice and fair-minded… To discover that some people are playing dirty. Smuggling in phones and treating Even like he’s… I don’t even know…”

“What do you mean?”

“Well…” Isak signals to the camera team that’s been casually hanging out underneath the marquee ever since Isak made his way over to Hakon and Adam. “I guess I can trust you guys. Share this with you in full confidentiality. I just took this from Ilya.” Isak thumbs to the relevant part of the WhatsApp conversation and holds out the phone to Hakon and Adam.

“What a scumbag, if you excuse my language!” Hakon rubs his big hands over his brow.

“That sleazy motherfucker… I mean that’s…” Adam shakes his head, stumped by the evilness of the world. “That’s just… so demeaning. Joining the show just to win a bet that he made with his seedy friends that he would be the first to… um… bed Even.”

“Um… bed isn’t what he writes though, right?” Isak says. “Come on, I think the viewers should have the facts straight. Do you wanna read out Ilya’s message for the camera, Adam?”

Adam, probably wishing himself on the back of some trusty mountain pony, a hundred kilometers away, stammers out Ilya’s filth. Hakon and Adam stare into the camera and pledge to defend Even’s honor. Isak reminds them that timing is everything on a show like LASD and that they cannot make their move right away but need to wait for the right moment.

“How will we know what’s the right moment?” Hakon asks.

“I think the right moment will reveal itself.”

“But… like… how?”

“I think…” Isak worries his lower lip and stares into the middle distance before giving his head a decisive little shake, like he’s trying to rid himself of disconcerting mental pictures. “I think you guys have to keep an eye on Ilya. He’s going to try to get close to Even. With our crazy production schedule I may not always be on hand to intervene. You have to make sure that Ilya doesn’t, like, steal Even away for one-on-one time so that he can… you know…”

“Oh yes!“ Hakon looks disgusted.

“Yeah.” Isak lets a plaintive smile curl up the left side of his mouth. “I’m actually a lot less worried now than I was earlier. I know that I can rely on you to help Even with this.”

“Hundred percent, man,” Adam says.

Hakon and Adam cement their new bond by offering hare-brained ideas for monitoring Ilya. Isak smiles appreciatively and gives them time before inserting a few throwaway comments of his own. Adam latches onto them immediately - before he’s fully finished repeating one of Isak’s suggestions, he’s already convinced that he’s talking about his own idea.

Isak leaves them to it, and makes a mental note to talk to Sana. Adam is on her roster, Hakon and Ilya are on Isak’s. Milking this beautiful little bonanza might require a bit of coordination.

However, there’s a slew of things that he has to attend to first. Iben, having crossed the Rubicon from cute-drunk to abject-drunk, keeps staggering into otherwise promising scenes and has to be placed in Chris’s capable hands. Magnus, the idiot, manages to break his middle finger when he clowns around with Even and pretends to lower him onto a bed of roses. It would be funny if it didn’t mean that Magnus, Isak’s best camera operator, is out of commission for the 50 minutes that it takes their batty on-set medic to examine and brace his finger.

Meanwhile, someone spills wine all over Yousef’s shirt and Yousef, unaccountably, thinks that instead of stripping for the camera it’s a good idea to keep on the soaked shirt and cover the stains haphazardly with Vilde’s ugly shawl. Flabbergasted at this level of amateurism, Isak makes the mistake of glancing over at Sana. She waves back at him, looking like the dictionary entry of gloating.

Isak, with the rose ceremony on his mind, also has to make time in the midst of the general mayhem to corner Even and subject him to stern propaganda for and against certain contestants. They sit on the ends of two lounge chairs by the infinity pool – or rather Isak sits, while Even gets up every couple of minutes to meander across the pool deck’s beautiful travertine pavers. He's buzzing with energy, like he’s feeding off the general pandemonium, but there’s a strain around his eyes.

“How is it going?” Isak asks.

“Hm? Yeah, not a complete disaster, I think?” Even’s steps, not for the first time, trace the herringbone pattern of the pavers with claustrophobic exactness. “I don’t know. You’re experienced in wrangling suitors and contestants in this batshit mating ritual. What do you think?”

“They are here to make you fall in love with them, not the other way around. You know that, right? That’s the point of the show. They’re the contestants. You’re the prize.”

Even’s head comes up. “I’m the prize,” he repeats and Isak winces at the bright irony in his gaze.

“Nothing here is real,” Isak says, a little stunned by an unfamiliar desire to soothe and comfort. Groping for the right words. “Think of this… as a movie. Of yourself as a character in a film. Everybody here wants you. You call the shots. You cast the love interest and the sidekick. The villain. Direct your own sexy rom-com.”

Even’s smile, this time around, is genuine. “I thought you’re directing it?”

“I’m meddling from the side-lines. But really… You should remember that you don’t owe anyone here shit. You decide how much of yourself you want to give the contestants and the camera. Everyone here plays a role.”

“What about you?” Even circles back to Isak’s lounge chair, coming so close he’s looming above Isak. Isak leans back on his hands, tilts his head up. “What role are you playing?”

“All of them.”

“Right now? Right here?”

Isak rolls his eyes. “Please. As if I’d waste my considerable acting skills on you.”

“Thank you.” Even’s face is framed by the velveteen night-sky, thick laid with stars. Isak loves the stars and yet the only thing he sees is Even’s face.

“You know,” Isak says quickly, “you could be hot if you weren’t such a giant dork. Come on.” He swats the first part of Even he can reach – a knee, knobby even through the fabric of his dress pants. “We have a rose ceremony to plan.”

There are no surprises when it comes to the people Even wants to keep around: Mikael, Eva, Sonja, Liv, and Yousef are the first names that he mentions, quickly followed by Iben – although Isak is pretty sure that of that duo, it’s amorous Aurgelmir rather than Iben who’s won Even’s heart.

Things get a little trickier when it comes to the people who’ll get to pack their freshly unpacked suitcases. Even is undecided but not particularly drawn to Ilya and Hakon: “They’re both so serious. In different ways, obviously. Hakon is very nice but he has this… I don’t know… Teflon goodness that repels irony and dick jokes. I feel like a debauched pervert in his company simply by breathing. Which I don’t particularly mind. But I think he would. If he got to know me.”

“Just don’t make dick jokes in front of his three-year old,” Isak says.

“He has a kid?”

“Yes. Which is also why you can’t get rid of him. Ditching the queer dad is a bad look – viewers will hate you.”

“Right. Well, Ilya then,” Even says. “Did you know that he introduces himself as a sexual hedonist? In these actual words, making it sound like an LLM degree? It’s the third thing he’ll tell you, right after his insta stats and the cc of his…”

“…Kawasaki. Yes, I’m aware. You’d think it’s tiny-penis syndrome, but I’ve seen some of his underwear campaigns. That’s not his problem.”

Even wiggles his eyebrows. “Good to know. I still don’t like him.”

Isak carefully extinguishes the urge to explain to Even why they can’t send Ilya packing, maybe warn him, too. “He’s the only foreigner on the show,” Isak says instead. “You’re not a racist, are you?”

“I am not a racist,” Even says, calmly refusing to take the bait.

“Okay. Well, how do you feel about…” Isak thinks of Geir. Who’s made it crystal clear that he wants to get rid of Vilde and of Anders, a pretty, strait-laced law student who freezes like a ponderous deer in headlights as soon as you point a camera in his direction. “How do you feel about Laila?”

“Laila?” Even tilts his head to the side and when the light of the lantern falls on his face, Isak sees the long, single frown line between his brows. “Why eradicate her? She’s like a human Molotov cocktail. A producer’s wet dream, no?”

That’s exactly what she is. Isak wants last season’s dumbass suitor back. Pretty fucking please and now. “She’s… too dominant,” Isak says. “It’s like thrusting a panther into a chicken coop. She makes all the other contestants look dull.”

“Yeah.” Even scratches his chin. “I was starting to think that she’s gonna dictate all the other characters’ story-lines around here.”

As if. The person who’s going to dictate every single person’s story-line on the show is Isak. Who is the master of creating compelling character arcs and can wrangle someone like Laila with his little finger. In his fucking sleep. Isak opens his mouth to tell Even precisely this when he notices the concentrated stare that Even gets when he’s trying hard not to laugh.

Fuck. Isak shuts his mouth. Narrows his eyes. A smart dork. What is Isak supposed to do with that? “Nice try.”

Even, being a little too liberal with his grin, nudges Isak’s shoe with his. “I just want to understand why you’re so keen to get rid of Laila.”

Diversion. What Isak needs is a diversion. “You just called the beautiful men and women on this show characters!”

“Just inhabiting your mindset for a sec. We’re all characters to you, aren’t we? About to be slotted into a conflict-laden narrative with scandalous twists and revelations.”

“Well, it is reality TV,” Isak grumbles. “Not Dogme 95.”

“Very true.” Even nods, gaze sharp and pleased, and Isak makes an oath to himself, there and then, that henceforth any pointless googling of film nerdery shall strictly remain between Isak and Wikipedia.

“I think eliminating Laila is a mistake,” Even says. “But I’ll do it if you tell me the truth about why you want her out.”

Isak licks his lips. He doesn’t even have to think - his brain automatically furnishes him with an expedient lie. All he’s got to do is tell Even that Laila is an undercover journalist intent on digging up dirt about the show and that’s it – a plausible, compelling reason, no further questions asked.

“She’s a…” Isak lifts his eyes and finds Even’s gaze, patient and attentive, already resting on him. Fucking hell. “She works with someone on the show who annoys me and distracts me and I really, really want her gone. Do you know who else is annoying?”

Even smiles his damned smile and says: “Is it me?”

“This guy who promised me beauty and good TV. Should have known he’s all words and no action.”

“So impatient. You don’t like… waiting for it?” The purr of Even’s deep voice is an entirely calculated liability. “The anticipation?”

Isak does like it, that’s the thing. “No,” he says. “I like brisk, firm, and uncompromising. Results, that is. Think you can deliver?”

Even’s face is a mess of shadows. “Watch me.”

So that’s what Isak does. Watches Even, all animated and teasing charm, shape the perennially awkward rose ceremony into something that the contestants, with the pleasing exception of Laila, actually seem to enjoy.

Watches him strike up a conversation with the taciturn young janitor, who turns out to be a lot less useless on the accordion than he is with a toolbox. The janitor plays and somehow Even makes sure that his own guitar ends up in Jonas hands, who’s not bad either. Their combined sound has the mischievous, playful, rough-around-the-edges quality of gypsy jazz, and soon Sonja joins her warm alto voice to the music, fitfully backed by Vilde and Adam.

There’s dancing on the pier. Even Hakon and Anders, who’ve dutifully worn their fine jackets all night long, shuck them. The girls ditch their heels and dance barefoot on the wooden tiles, still a little warm from the sun that set hours ago. High above them, suspended from elastic chains, the lanterns are swaying gently in the breeze, painting the tiles in sinuous arabesques of light and shadow.

Isak watches Even dance with Eva and Yousef and, yes, there’s something very sexy about the way Even allows himself to be drawn in by one and then the other, warm arms winding around him, bodies sliding together fast and then slower, Even’s hair tumbled and cheeks flushed with exertion or something else. It’s not a performance though: here are three people who can actually dance and clearly love it, spurring each other on for the sheer pleasure of it.

“That wasn’t smart.” It’s Sana, wearing her fucking whisper-silent sneakers and appearing at Isak’s side like a judgy ghost. “Even for your standards.”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“Yes, you do. I was every bit as frustrated as you that Chris got to work with Laila. But now you’ve got two things going against you.”

“A mere two things going against me sounds like a vacation.”

Sana’s dimples deepen for the briefest moment, then she’s back to business. “Here’s the first thing: Geir knows now that there’s an easy way to get under your skin. And, second, he needs a new slut-slash-villain.” She isn’t looking at Isak, she’s watching Eva, laughing and writhing down Even’s body. “This one could have gone all the way. She’s a burner now. Your loss.”

“Bullshit. I can work her as a villain just as well. And my money’s still on Yousef. I’m good.”

Sana fixes him with a stare. “Do you know who’s also good? And a polyglot film buff who moves in Even’s circles? Mikael.”

Isak ignores her and orders their camera drone to be made ready for capturing some aerial views of the pier.

When it goes up in the air, Even looks up and follows the slow ascent of the drone. He turns his head, arms still looped around Eva, gaze roaming restlessly over contestants and crew, lingering nowhere until he finds Isak. Isak raises a single eyebrow, working a little harder than usual to look apathetic.

Even ducks his head and whispers in Eva’s ear, eyes still locked on Isak’s. A moment later he draws Yousef close, there’s another exchange, another long look at Isak, and -- that’s it: the three of them withdraw into their own world again, dancing if anything more riotously than before. There’s something in the air though, some static charge that connects Isak invisibly to Even, making it impossible for him to look away.

Someone is laughing, high and peeling, and then, all of a sudden, when the music reaches a wild crescendo, Even breaks into a run.

Eva and Yousef flank him, dashing down the pier towards the water. Eva stretches her arms high above her head and starts throwing cartwheels, one and two and three, and on Even’s other side Yousef propels his body into a series of flips. They reach the end of the pier together and Even, immediately followed by the others, is the first to jump, launching his body into the air, jumping higher than Isak would have thought possible, long legs wheeling, arms stretched out and hands closing around Yousef’s right and Eva’s left hand the second before they crash into the water.

It takes the other contestants, a little delirious with music, laughter, and free-flowing booze, mere moments to follow.

Isak grabs Magnus and they careen to the end of the pier to capture the gorgeous commotion in the water: there’s laughing and splashing, along with quite a bit of cheerful squealing given the frigid temperature of the sea. Isak’s gaze is glued to the control screen mounted on Magnus’s camera, obsessively checking that they’re harvesting every last fraction of this magic: The joyous, upturned faces, bopping like so many petals on water that is inky black in some parts and liquid gold where the light of the lanterns hit it. The wide expanse of the starlit night sky above them. Even, diving before breaking through the surface of the water right in front of the pier, hair plastered to his forehead, eyes and mouth wide open. He looks like a nøkk, otherworldly and beguiling, and Isak feels the strangest pull, can almost picture himself stepping around the camera, jumping off the pier, joining Even in the water.

He doesn’t. He prudently stays by Magnus’s side and watches Even on the control screen. Watches him laugh and shake wet hair out of his eyes, sinking deeper into the water and coming back up. Watches him mouth something at the camera that Isak can’t make out.

Isak frowns. “What?”

Even is panting with the effort of staying above the water. “I’m coming for you if you won’t come for me.” His arm goes back and curls, shoulder tensing up.

“Oh no, you won’t! You will n---” And just like that, Isak is doused in cold water.

Small rivulets of water are running down the lens of the camera, streaking Even’s face on the screen. Isak, turning away from the control screen and towards Even, doesn’t immediately manage to suppress his laugh: it forces itself out, unstoppable like a giant sneeze, and Isak doesn’t even think of keeping it civilized, forgets his usual urge to hide his teeth.

He reins himself in at once, but not fast enough to escape Even’s attention. Even bops up and down in the dark water, face bright with delight, all through Isak’s long tirade of expletives.

Chapter Text

Isak is lying on his improvised bunk bed with a nasty crick in his neck, wide awake, when his phone rings. It’s 4.10am and the voice on the other line is slurry with alcohol and malevolent delight. Isak, sitting up abruptly, bangs his head on the shelf above. 

He listens. Pleads. Makes a couple of implausible threats. Pleads some more. When it becomes clear that neither pretty nor ugly words will make this go away, Isak negotiates hard and manages to push back the deadline to Friday. Three days. 

Three days to scrape together 30.000 kr. 

Three days. Isak keeps repeating the words to himself as he searches for his clothes in the dark truck. He stubs his toe on a broken radiator, then knocks over a Tequila bottle, looted from last night’s opening bash and nearly empty now. He steps into the little puddle of liquid while hopping around to pull on his jeans and yesterday’s shirt. 

The control room should be empty but for the night guard – whatever poor PA fucker has been chosen to ensure that no unexpected bounty, caught by one of the ubiquitous cameras, goes unnoticed until the morning. He finds Ingrid in front of the monitor wall screen, curled up in one of the hideous ergonomic office chairs that the network buys in bulk. She’s asleep, her tight jeans unbuttoned and eyeliner a little smudged. Isak is about to extract the half-empty bag of Dunder Salts that she’s still cradling, when the sound of rustling paper directs his attention to the back of the room. 

What the fuck. 

It’s Christoffer, sitting at Isak’s work desk, chin propped on hand, and sifting through what turns out to be Even’s portfolio.

“Out.” All chairs in the room are identical and identically ugly, but Chris is sure as fuck not gonna rest his ass in Isak’s seat a second longer. “What do you think you’re doing?”

Christoffer gets up hurriedly. “Oh, you’re here already! That’s great. I was hoping to catch you before everyone shows up.” 

He’s either a far better actor than Isak would like to give him credit for, or – and that seems an even more far-fetched option – genuinely relieved to see Isak. There are dark rings under his eyes and three empty coffee cups spread out on Isak’s desk. His hair looks shit. 

“I’m done logging Laila’s exit interview,” Christoffer says. “Now that she’s gone, I have lots of time on my hands. Geir wants me to help you wrangle Even. To… you know… learn from you.” 

Isak scoffs. Anger is buzzing hotly just underneath his skin. 

“Geir…” Christoffer starts again. “He was saying we’d never have lost a contestant as strong as Laila if she’d been on your roster. Not…” He’s fiddling with one of the empty coffee cups. His nails are bitten down to the quick. “Not stuck with me.”

He’s so stupid Isak wants to slap him. “I work alone.”

“Geir said to tell you that it’s non-negotiable. He told me to give you this.”

It’s a folded post-it. Geir’s message, written in his idiosyncratic mixture of cursive and print letterforms, is brief: Congratulations, Spurv. You deserve an assistant.

Isak nearly laughs. Not because this is funny, but because he should have expected this. This is an invitation to play, and Christoffer is the pawn. 

When he looks at Christoffer, he’s biting the skin around his thumb nail. “Geir was… like… really, really angry about Laila.”

“I bet.” 

“So...” Christoffer straightens and turns back to the papers spread out on Isak’s desk. “I’ve spent the last hours reading Even’s portfolio and stalking him online. He’s… he’s a bit odd, isn’t he? I mean, he’s certified crazy, obviously. Being bipolar and such... But he’s also just… like… weird. Have you read his questionnaire?”

“Course not. Why would I.”

Christoffer stares at him, mouth slack. “But isn’t that… super important? As in… a requirement? Shouldn’t you --oh! Ha!” He has these bizarre switch-on eyes – they light up when he smiles and become dull with fatigue immediately afterwards. “You’re joking!” He bumps Isak’s shoulder with his and Isak draws in air through his teeth. 

“His questionnaire,” Christoffer continues in a more confident voice, “is something else, don’t you think? I’ve been googling that shit all night. His answers are mostly quotes and made-up stuff that’s clearly bullshit. I don’t get why he can’t just answer the questions like a normal person.”

Isak starts gathering together the loose pages: “Questions like Are you genuinely looking to get married and why? Or List three adjectives that would surprise people about you . Yeah, no idea what’s wrong with him.”

“Right? And the doodles! I know that he’s an artist. Or used to be an artist, whatever… But why can’t he draw stuff that makes sense? It’s just all… so bizarre, you know what I mean?” Christoffer grabs some of the sheets that Isak hasn’t reached yet and holds them up like exhibits in a trial. “There’s this weird eye-of-providence-thing framed by a forest of dicks, have you seen that one? He draws these ugly cactus-figures having sex in like… all the ways. Oh, and he has a thing for morbid and decomposing stuff, I think. Which is just… ewww , right? And this! I mean, what do you make of this?”

Christoffer proffers what Isak immediately recognizes as page 21 of Even’s questionnaire. Nestled in the upper left corner is a sketch showing a haughty-looking leopard lounging on a roof and chomping down on a cheeseburger in the company of a matchstick figure.

“No idea.” Isak plucks the sheet from Christoffer’s hand and puts it back where it belongs. 

“Well, anyway.” Christoffer hops onto Isak’s desk. He scrambles down as soon as his gaze crosses Isak’s. “Sorry! Sorry, man. Um… where was I? Yeah, I was going to say that I’ve started thinking about his demons.” 

“What do you mean?”

 “That was your idea, right? When we met up at Geir’s, you were saying we should build the story-arc of the season around Even’s… like… problems. And how he’s trying to overcome them by falling in love with the right person. I think that’s really smart. It’s annoying that we can’t go all in with the bipolar thing because of his contract. But I bet we could dig up other things in his past that are… unpleasant, you know? Make him more interesting to viewers by showing them that for all his looks and confidence, he’s actually pretty fucked up underneath it all?”

That’s a thing. That Isak suggested when he didn’t know the first thing about Even. And now it’s out in the world for people like Geir and Christoffer to toy with. 

Isak closes his fingers tightly around the reassembled portfolio. “Let’s wait until the first episode has aired and the online surveys are in. I have a feeling that viewers are going to love him. We don’t want to hurt our own product. If we do need extra material on Even, I’ll tell you what to search for.”

“I could start now – just in case?” Christoffer’s mouth stretches into a cheeky grin, far too many dimples on display. “It doesn’t have to be dirt-dirt… It could be stuff that’s just a bit racy – like I could try and track down some of his hook-ups and find out if he’s got any embarrassing kinks. Or why don’t we zoom in on the fact that his career seems to have reached a dead-end. I mean, that’s interesting, right?” 

“Don’t be idiotic. Viewers of LASD don’t care about literary prizes and if people do or don’t win them. I have a far better idea.” 

Isak’s idea isn’t better. It’s nonexistent. He rubs his temple which does absolutely nothing to hem in the first tendrils of an oncoming migraine. 

This day is only a couple of hours old. How can it suck so much already? 30.000 kr and now this. What the fuck is he supposed to do with Christoffer? Isak thinks of what he’s got lined up for Even and the contestants so far: today, they’re taking Even and a couple of candidates on the first group date to Oslo Klatrepark. Then there’s Ilya’s stupid bet. Hakon and Adam’s only slightly less stupid chivalry. It’s not much, but it’s something. 

He turns to Christoffer. Grits his teeth against the indignity of pretending to work with this insufferable twit. “Here’s what you’ll do. You’ll befriend Ilya. I think you two will click. Find out whatever weird kinky shit he is into, and use that as a theme around which we can build a group date.”

Christoffer perks up like a labradoodle at walkies. “Cool! Although that could be tricky. Like, per definition it’s not going to be something we can show on tv, right?”

“I said use it as a theme , not draft the script to a porn movie! For fuck’s sake. Use your imagination. It can be sexy without being explicit.”

“Oh. Right. You’re right.” Christoffer looks implausibly chipper. “I got this!”

Once producers, editors, yawning PAs, copious amounts of coffee, and a mountain of soggy Jarlsberg sandwiches are all assembled in the control room for the daily 6am briefing, Christoffer’s I got this! has morphed into the even more grating “Me and Isak got this!”

“What a relief,” Geir says.

Isak prudently avoids glancing in Sana’s direction. Christoffer is not his most urgent problem right now. He wonders what Sana would say if he laid out his other problem for her, priced precisely at 30.000 kroner. 

Hey Sana, he’d say, remember when I disappeared on everyone after flying off the rails during the shoot of last season’s finale? One of Geir’s work laptops disappeared with me. Because I needed a fucking computer and Geir had made sure that I didn’t have access to my own work laptop anymore. Yes, I realize that this is theft. Yes, I do know that there’s sensitive stuff on all our work laptops. Not a great look on someone who’s already being sued by the network. Do you know what’s also not great? That once I was four monthly rents behind, my asshole former flatmate changed the lock, got rid of my stuff, but held on to the laptop as security against the outstanding rent. And now he’s threatening to put the laptop on eBay if I don’t pay back the money I owe him. With interest. Wonder what the network will do if they learn that one of the show’s laptops is about to find its way into the wild because I stole it, then failed to hold onto it?

Sana, ever the pragmatist, would probably offer to shoot Isak to end things quickly if nothing else. 

Fuck. There’s got to be a way. Isak lets his gaze wander around the table, speculates how some of the others would tackle this particular problem. Sara, who’s fiddling with her split ends while staring at the sandwiches she’d never allow herself to eat, would ask her parents for the money. Eskild would probably start a GoFundMe under some absurd alias. Chris has a sickeningly large number of close friends, who’re likely as notoriously broke as Chris herself but would certainly come running to be sweetly unhelpful. William… William could be useful, at least.

While Geir does a post-mortem of last night’s most promising pods, Isak texts William under the table. “Heard Geir plans to slash the bonusses he mentioned yesterday. Sucks.”

William, thankfully, is a domino. Reliably topples in the predicted direction. Three minutes later, when Geir has just broached their current lack of a contestant that makes a convincing slut/villain, William raises a lazy hand: “Hey, Geir? We should talk about bonusses. They’re still on, right? I think we all need a challenge.”

“Do you now?” Geir dances his fingers against the edge of the table. “Greedy children. But why not. We’ll stick to the 5000 kr for all the usual shenanigans. And then, to make it fun, let’s say whoever turns one of these lovely ladies” – he slaps the Whiteboard with portraits of all the contestants – “into an adequate replacement for Laila within the day, goes home with 10.000 kr. How is that?”

Isak stares at the two top rows of portraits on the whiteboard, all of which are his contestants. Two rows of hopeful eyes, smooth skin, and well-practiced smiles stare back at him. 

Three days. 30.000 kr. This isn’t over. Isak chooses his mark.

***

“Oh dear, you’re back.” The weather-beaten face of the manager of Oslo Klatrepark is the first thing that Isak sees as he climbs out of the mini van. There are a couple of new lines around her eyes. Her twitchy smile is the same. “Whoopee.”

“Back every year”, Isak says. “Like the influenza.” 

“Soon as this park starts to make a profit, we’re out of this. I’ll never have to see you guys again.”

“Soon as our budget allows for it, we’ll go to a real climbing park and book out Sommerpark. Let’s see who gets there first.” Isak puts on his shades and thumps the roof of the mini van. “Everyone out!” 

Even and the five lucky contestants chosen for the first group-date – a series of trust-building exercises in Oslo’s least attractive climbing park – pile out of the van in slow motion. It’s not even 8am and they’re all looking various shades of rumpled and disheveled. Eskild and the make-up crew descend on their unsuspecting forms like a benign flock of vultures. 

Isak walks over to where one of the petite makeup assistants has sat down Even on a tree stump and is messing with his hair. The sun is seeping hazily through the leaves, too weak still to paint the forest floor in a clearly defined pattern of light and shadow. Magnus and the other camera teams are setting up at the high ropes course, and Isak can hear their distant shouts and laughter but is blessedly unable to make out the actual words. 

Even’s eyes are closed to slits, like he’s maybe dozing, but they open when Isak draws near. There’s a tiny scratch on his chin that the makeup girl seems to have missed.

“Hi.” Even’s voice is low and still a little hoarse. Isak wonders but doesn’t ask if he’s hung-over or just emphatically not a morning person. 

“Time to wake up.” Isak holds out the coffee that he just got for himself from the rickety little food stall. 

Even eyes the coffee, looking undecided.

“You don’t like coffee? I can send a PA to get you --"

“Nah, this is good. Thank you.” Even takes the paper cup from Isak’s hand. His palm looks just as bad as it did yesterday. Isak frowns at it. Even continues: “Only if we’re sharing though.” He smiles up at Isak, tired and a little guarded, and it’s fine .

It’s all perfectly fine. After all, it’s Isak’s job to befriend the suitor. Over the last couple of seasons, he’s managed to build relationships with suitors who were narcissistic arseholes and others whose personality had the depth of a puddle. He should be able to befriend someone who’s actually nice and interesting, and if Even notices in turn – probably sooner rather than later – that Isak is neither, well then at least Isak won’t be surprised.

“You’ll be ten meters up in the air in less than an hour,” Isak says. “What do you think about that?”

“I’m thinking,” Even says, “that I’m not sorry that I won’t be able to see a thing.”

“That’s the spirit. Eskild has fashioned some sort of attractive covering for your eyes. I trust that it’s not a gimp mask. Each contestant gets to lead you on a short segment of the trail. You decide at the end who did the best job. Winner gets to kiss you. All good?”

Even nods, lips pursed. “All good.”

“And you’ll be wearing a harness, doubly secured to cables, at all times. So even if something happens and you take a fall, you’ll be fine.”

“I’ll be fine.”

“Aren’t you,” the makeup girl asks, “into urban climbing anyway? Like, there was a story in the paper, back when you were… like… famous, about how you got arrested up on the roof of UiO’s chemistry department?” 

Even shakes his head politely. “Not into climbing, no. Just… impulsive.”

The girl whips out hairspray with one hand while shielding Even’s eyes with the other. “God, I’m glad I’m not impulsive that way! When I’m impulsive I book last-minute trips to places I’ve never heard of…”

Even coughs. “I do that too. Usually without thinking to pack a suitcase.” He’s squinting, looking at Isak through a cloud of hairspray, and Isak, who religiously gets started on packing his bag three days ahead of going anywhere, says: “Luggage is overrated. I mean, you can buy all the important stuff everywhere, anyway.”

“That’s kind of stupid though. And wasteful, too,” the makeup girl comments.

“Very stupid,” Even says, eyes fixed on Isak.

“And wasteful,” Isak mutters, returning his gaze.

Even’s smile warms and grows wider until Isak has to hide the shape of his own mouth by taking a sip from the coffee that Even presses back into his hand. It’s surprisingly tasty. All these years they’ve come here to shoot, and he’s never noticed.

Half an hour later, all the contestants look decent. Isak is about to herd them back into the van so that they can emerge once more for the camera – awake, ecstatic, and coiffured – when William appears by his side.

“I think one of my girls should lead Even on the high ropes segment. You can’t hog all the best challenges for your own candidates.”

“It’s not about that,” Isak says. Astonishingly, it isn’t even a full-fledged lie. “I prefer to have the suitor returned to me in one piece. Not accidentally castrated because Liv is still half asleep and Vilde is the type to get spooked by an enterprising squirrel.” 

“If Sonja’s doing the high ropes challenge, I want the brook challenge for Anders,” William says. “If you say no, I’m calling Geir.”

Isak snorts. “How very mature of you. But fine – we’ll have Anders for the brook and Eva for the meadow.”

When they’re ready to shoot the first challenge, one of the makeup midgets tries to help Even put on the blindfold, swaying on her tiptoes and doggedly stretching up her too-short arms to reach his head. Isak can see that Even is about to crouch or drop to his knees, and really there’s no need to make this thing more ridiculous than it already is.

Isak strides over and snatches the blindfold from the girl’s hand. “Sonja was just asking to be doused in Myggspray once more. Go help her with that.”

The girl scampers off. Even turns around, facing Isak. Eskild has put him in a fitted white t-shirt and dark heavy-duty climbing pants, cut into a super-slim silhouette with jogger cuffs at the ankles. 

Eskild is very good at his job.

“Hi,” Isak says after a beat, which is absurd given that they’ve spent the morning on the same set.

“Hello.” Even smiles, and then his gaze drops to the blindfold in Isak’s hand and he stops smiling. 

When he glances up again, a single muscle jumping in his jaw, there’s something in his eyes that sneaks past all of Isak’s well-maintained façades. It stirs a surging impulse in Isak, unreasoned and helpless, that needs to be throttled right away.

“So…” Even says, eyes dark and looking straight at Isak. “It’ll be you?” 

“No. Makeup girl no. 3 is just fetching a ladder because you’re so inconveniently…” This joke kind of fell flat before Isak was three words in. “Er… tall,” Isak ends lamely. 

“We’re almost the same height. I noticed that right away when we first met.”

“The things you notice.”

“Well,” Even says, “it makes many things more pleasurable.” 

The deep breath that Isak was about to draw remains stuck somewhere behind his breastbone, and Even notices. Not that he looks particularly composed himself – Isak has already learned that Even comes undone hands first, and right now he’s hiding his hands in his pockets. Isak is ready to bet that they aren’t quite steady. 

“Close your eyes,” Isak says.

Isak half-expects Even to resist so that he can draw this out some more, but he doesn’t. He closes his eyes and for a second Isak just stares because he’s never been able to do this openly before. Even’s eyelids are a little swollen still, and there are other signs of fatigue that the makeup team hasn’t managed fully to hide. Somehow they only make his face lovelier.

Isak swallows and Even can probably hear it, but he doesn’t react, just remains very still, quietly expectant. Isak drops his voice, puts as much surety into it as he can: “Turn around for me.” 

“See,” Even says, and there’s a very satisfying waver in his voice now, “that’s one thing that’s a lot more enjoyable when you’re the same height.”

Isak steps right behind him but makes sure not to touch Even’s body with his, just lets him feel the weight of the blindfold against his eyes without tying the ends yet. “Alright?”

He can see Even draw up his shoulders to repress a shiver and a small, hysteric part of Isak silently implodes with the absurdity of the moment, because they’re about to start shooting, Even is a stranger and Isak stuck fathoms-deep in a quagmire of troubles, and this thing between them is nothing but sexual attraction, and yet . And yet, all that Isak wants to do in that moment is laugh and draw Even closer, rest his forehead against the nape of Even’s neck, and whisper to him until he shivers against Isak and is powerless to hide it. 

Isak can’t. He won’t. So he ties two precise knots, not too tight and not too loose, and steps back. “Done.”

Even shifts and turns slowly back around, and as far as kinks go, Isak wasn’t aware that this is even a thing. Or that he’s into it. But he so, so is – at least when it’s Even, black blindfold resting against fine, fair skin that is becoming unevenly flushed now, inclining his head as if he’s waiting for Isak to touch his face.

Even clears his throat. “Isak?” He sounds a little uncertain but trusting and this -- this might be Isak’s kryptonite. This is…

Fuck . Isak mentally whacks himself in the face. This is not happening. 

“Here.” What the fuck is wrong with his voice? “I’m here.” Isak grasps Even’s upper arm with clinical detachment and leads the way. “Come on. They’re all waiting for us.” 

At first, everything goes to plan. Isak finds it easier to concentrate once he enters the familiar fray, steering the three camera units via his comms and trading insults with William, who’s the other lead producer for the day.

Even is teamed up with Sonja first. She is vigilant and graceful in equal measure, leading Even along the high ropes course without a single misstep. 

Vilde is next, and Isak feels for Even because Vilde has a pronounced left-right weakness and keeps navigating him straight into rather than around obstacles. If they edit this right – Vilde shrieking left when she means right, flapping her hands like a panicky bird, and Even knocking his long limbs into every conceivable vertical surface – this will be fucking hilarious. Isak still calls it off after just a couple of minutes.

“Are you out of your stupid mind?” William spins around, looking in equal parts furious and confused. “Why would you do that? Give this two more minutes and he’ll go down. She’s going to be in hysterics for the rest of the day. This is gold, asshole! If you ruin my contestant’s moment in the sun, I swear to god, I’ll --”

Isak interrupts him: “Forgot to check the weather forecast again, didn’t you?” William’s face falls. He’s not over ruining one of their biggest days of shooting last season because he paid no heed to the local forecast. Which is a good thing because Isak is lying through his teeth when he announces coldly: “It’s supposed to rain in two hours. We’ve got everything that we need from Vilde. Let’s move on.”

Liv does a decent job, and then it’s Anders’s turn. Isak can’t make him out. He’s bookish and taciturn, and at barely twenty their youngest contestant. Very attractive with his fair curls and quirky sense of fashion: Isak wouldn’t be caught dead in the things that Anders wears – bow ties and suspenders and eccentrically patterned socks – but he can see that Anders has a pretty sophisticated theme going. Even, in his own way, is clearly into fashion, too. If these two got together, they’d make a frighteningly handsome couple, albeit with serious tussles about wardrobe space on the horizon.    

Anders is even more quiet than usual this morning. He keeps squinting against the light which, filtered by the foliage of the tall trees, isn’t very bright at all. Right now he’s staring at the 15 mud-coloured obstacles rising from the shallow brook on the 700 meter course ahead of them. William has to snap his fingers beside his head twice to get his attention. 

“Show time,” William says. “Even’s going to be here in a second. Make sure to splash him good once you’re in the water.”  

“Come again?” Anders’s voice is sluggish. He glances from William to Isak and back. “Why… would I do that? Even’s wearing a blindfold.”

“He’s also,” Isak points out, “wearing a white t-shirt.” 

“That’s… I don’t know… exploitative. And trashy.”

“Very.” Isak rights the powder-blue bow tie they’ve generously allowed Anders to wear with his outdoor gear because viewers love this shit. “Off you go.”

In the end, premeditated splashing attacks aren’t necessary to ensure that everyone ends up drenched. Anders and Even have just successfully climbed through a shitload of wet ropes when Anders half-turns and – without a sound or word of warning – stiffens, body going rigid before crashing right into the shallow brook.

Someone cries out. Even rips off his blindfold, locates Anders, and wades into the water to fish him out. He doesn’t manage by himself: Isak, Sonja, and Liv all have to help because Anders’s limbs are jerking about and his stiffened body is a lot heavier than expected. 

Isak backs out of the frame as soon as they’ve lowered Anders to the forest floor and William signals that an ambulance is on the way. Magnus and his crew film everyone looking to Sonja, who speedily unties Anders’s bow tie. 

“Does he have a history of seizures?” she asks. “This must be in his questionnaire, right?” She looks up and stares right into one of three cameras that are currently trained on her. Her usually calm voice is suddenly shrill: “You’re filming this?”

“He has epilepsy,” William says. “Diagnosed and medicated. An ambulance is on its way. You’re the only medic on set right now. Why is he still convulsing?”

Sonja is monitoring Anders closely and William manages to get in three more pseudo-medical questions that generate useful soundbites for the cutting room before Sonja catches on to what he’s doing and stops talking altogether. She exchanges a glance with Even and they start working together, moving around and stepping into the crew’s way to block Anders from the cameras as best as they can.

Isak doesn’t reprimand them. It’s not necessary because people watching this episode won’t have a clue what these two are trying to do: viewers are going to see Even and Sonja, soaked through and worked up like they’re about to reenact the rain scene from The Notebook , locking eyes over Anders’s unconscious body. This, Isak thinks dully, is very good TV.

Anders returns to consciousness before the ambulance arrives. He’s groggy but clearheaded, and the first thing he says is that there’s no need for an ambulance. 

“No way,” William says. “We’re not taking any risks. It’s in your contract. We’re taking you to the hospital.”

Isak knows that there’s nothing to that effect in any of the contestants’ contracts, but no producer in his right mind would forgo the chance to turn a relatively minor medical incident into a full-blown crisis, complete with howling sirens, stretcher, and a teary Vilde recounting the experience for viewers. And if everyone involved lives through the ordeal in sopping-wet, semi-transparent clothes, so much the better. 

When the ambulance turns up, Isak grabs Even and leads him a few steps away. “Here’s what’s going to happen. You’re going to hop onto the ambulance, holding Anders’s hand and being all reassuring and sweet: You’d never let him ride to the hospital alone, you were so worried about him, yadda yadda yadda . We’ll film that and the doors closing behind you. And then you’ll come right back out and we’ll continue shooting here.” 

“What?” Even stops wringing out the hem of his t-shirt. “Why would we do that?”

“Because we can’t afford to rent this place another day, and we need to get a permit for shooting at the hospital. This takes a bit of time. We’ll catch up with Anders at the hospital tomorrow morning. It’s easy: we’ll just put you in today’s clothes and make sure that they look appropriately soggy. Then you can comfort Anders and drip all over the hospital floor like no time has passed at all. Meanwhile, everyone here gets a change of dress and we’ll continue shooting, pretending that we’ve returned to Klatrepark after a couple of days to let everyone process the tragedy.”

“There was,” Even says, enunciating every word precisely, “no tragedy.”

“Oh, but there could have been. If—”

“You’re sending Anders to the hospital against his will!” Even interjects.

Isak just speaks over him. “Even, get with it – this is reality tv! Of fucking course we’ve very nearly avoided a major tragedy. If we hadn’t been on hand, Anders could have… well, I’ll go with drowned for now, but I’m sure we’ll eventually come up with something more lurid. The whole thing is still giving Vilde nightmares. Liv is going to confess to having PTSD from the experience. Sonja… Sonja is probably a lost cause, but I’m sure Eva can be pestered into saying something useful.”

Even is staring at him, head tilted to the side, mostly annoyed but perhaps also a tiny bit amused, though that’s likely just wishful thinking on Isak’s part. “Okay, listen,” he says after a moment. “If you want me to do my bit in this farce, I want something in return.”

Isak is intrigued. He’s also drawing a blank trying to predict what Even’s going to demand. “What is it?”

“If I do this,” Even says, voice impersonal, “then you’ll pull rank and make sure that Anders isn’t shown at the height of his seizure. You can cut this segment in a manner that’s dramatic and suspenseful without letting people see him in ways that would be painful to him.” 

That’s the thing with Even. He’s… very different from a lot of the people Isak usually hangs out with. Isak hides his surprise behind his most surly face. “That’s a very inconvenient demand. If I… Okay – say I go along with this. Then you’ll have to do a little more than climb in and out of an ambulance. Have you thought about which contestant you’re going to kiss at the end of this?” 

“I have not, but let me guess,” Even says. “You want me to kiss Anders on his sickbed, risen from the dead?”

“You bet I do. But you’re going to kiss somebody else first.”

Even’s lips quirk. “And who might that be?” 

“Eva,” Isak says firmly. “She’s doing the final challenge. Afterwards, the two of you will sneak away. With the cameras on your heels, obviously. Remember that viewers will think this is several days in the future. At this point you’ve had your romantic moment with Anders in the hospital, time has passed, and we need to throw someone else in the mix. Eva is great and we need something fun and light to balance out all the drama.”

Even raises his chin and narrows one eye slightly more than the other one, which is his not particularly suave I am suspicious and want you to know it look. “Should I be worried? Don’t know why, but the words something fun and light paired with your best crocodile stare give me the chills.” 

“My what? That sounds deeply unattractive. What the fuck.”

Even smiles. “Unattractive, no. Disconcerting, yes.”

“Whatever.” Isak will not waste time thinking about what he looks like to Even. “Do we have a deal?”

“Yeah.” Even cards a hand through his hair, looking like he’s considering saying more but then he doesn’t, just gives a one-shouldered shrug. “Okay. Let’s do it.”

They’ve finally managed to get everyone changed and set up for shooting the final challenge when Eva walks up to Isak, looking determined.   

“What?” Isak asks.

“I tried to speak to you earlier, but the PA wouldn’t let me talk to you directly. She was saying you’re in a vile mood.”

“I usually am. But you’re one of my prize ponies, which means that you can always come and speak to me directly.”

“Um… why am I wearing this?” She pulls on the deep plunge neckline of her red jumpsuit. “I was made to wear this absurd dress this morning and now I’ve been given this thing. No one in their right mind would turn up in a fancy jumpsuit to do an obstacle course!”

“Don’t worry about it. You’re doing the meadow challenge, it’s the easiest bit right at the end of the course.”

“Yes, but…” Eva turns and casts a quick look at Liv, Vilde, and Sonja, all of whom are once again wearing racerbacks and leggings, sponsored by the tiny boutique that Vilde runs with her mom. “Why can’t I wear what they are wearing?”

“Because…” Isak pauses and licks his lips, pretending to be searching for the right words. “You know, you’re super pretty Eva, but the thing is… It’s true what they say, you know? The camera really adds about ten pounds. I think it’s best we don’t have you in lycra.”

“I… Oh.”

Behind Eva’s back, Eskild shoots Isak a look that should be reserved for the people who shred newborn baby chicks. But Isak’s words have their intended effect: there’s no more pushback from Eva, who fingers the jumpsuit’s sash and appears lost in her own thoughts – thoughts which are now unlikely to stray towards the real reason she’s in this femme fatale get up.

Eva’s challenge consists of a few easy obstacles, after which Isak has instructed her to steal Even away, take his hand and run with him, still blindfolded, through the knee-high soft grasses and wildflowers of a gently downward sloping meadow. Make the most of the moment when they stop.

The visuals are stunning. The meadow brims with yellow and pink flowers, bright under a sky that is just dotted here and there with blooming tufts of clouds. Isak has no idea what the flowers are called, but they are pretty and there are hundreds of them. Their heads are softly lifted by the breeze, and they sway against the long, fat leaves of grass – a promise of the summer days to come. And Even and Eva, these two look like the posterchildren of sweet, idle pleasures under the ripening sun. There is a gorgeous symmetry to their beauty: bee-stung lips, high cheekbones, and smiling blue eyes. It's perfect – or it would be perfect if Eva was… a little less exuberant.  

The first time they’re trying to shoot the kiss, they’re both so out of breath from running, and laughing while running – what’s so fucking amusing about dashing through a meadow escapes Isak – that they end up standing around for about a minute regaining their breath, Even’s blindfold dangling from Eva’s fingers, before Eva lets out a whoop and tackles Even to the ground. She pushes her hands into his hair and he returns her smile, bright and contented, and then they’re kissing and rolling around in the grass. It’s sweet and wholesome and Isak, shuddering internally, thinks that if this was soft porn, they’d probably crown each other with flower garlands before fucking. 

He claps his hands. “This was absolutely terrible. Eva you really…” Isak trails off. 

Eva stops nibbling on Even’s lips and pushes up, her hands still on his chest. “What is it? What did I do wrong?”

“Why on earth would you wrestle him to the ground? This was about as sexy as an unseemly scuffle between two horny teenagers. You both need touches, but soon as your makeup and hair are fixed, we’ll have to shoot this again.”

Eva scrambles to her feet, looking from Isak to Magnus to Linn to William and then back to Isak. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know…”

“Don’t think we’ve got anything to be sorry for,” Even says. He gets up, too, and stretches languidly before turning to Eva. “Come here.” He starts removing petals and bits of grass from her hair, fingers unrushed and gentle. Isak is about to bellow into his comms once more, admonishing makeup for taking forever, when he notices Sonja, sitting in the grass not far off and watching Even quietly. He signals to Magnus, who instantly dispatches one of his assistants with a handheld camera.

On their next attempt, Isak doesn’t make them run through the entire meadow again. They just re-do the final bit, and then Eva stops them, turns to Even and says: “Take off the blindfold.” Soon as he does, she jumps into his arms, locks her nimble dancer’s legs around his waist, and clings to him like an overly affectionate monkey. Even laughs into their kiss.

They look good together, easy and comfortable, and anyone seeing Eva like this – wriggling her naked toes as she kisses Even with joyful abandon – is a lot likelier to root for her than view her as the scheming temptress that any self-respecting reality tv show needs to trot out by episode two at the very latest. 

“Okay, stop it. Put her down.” Isak walks over and comes to stand directly in front of Eva. He towers above her, and he can see that she doesn’t like it. “Listen, we don’t have all day.” He picks up the discarded blindfold, balls the fabric together, and pushes it into Eva’s hand. “Here’s the suitor in a fucking blindfold. Can you not think of a single sexy thing to do with this?” Isak can think of about twenty-five. Very few of them suitable for prime time tv. 

“What exactly is it that you want us to do?” Even asks. Soon as he says “us”, Eva’s drawn-up shoulders relax. She takes a tiny step back, inches her body closer to Even’s.

“To put this in your language,” Isak takes off his sunglasses and says with frigid exactness, “I want you to make this less High School Musical III and more –“

“Isak!” The person shouting Isak’s name at the top of his lungs is… Isak squints.

Christoffer? 

What the fuck is he doing here, running toward them, crashing through the meadow flowers like the four riders of the apocalypse are chasing him?

“Isak!” he pants when he’s right in front of Isak. “Your mobile is switched to silent!”

“Yes, and? We’re shooting, I’m on comms.”

“Geir sent me. It’s your mother.”

Isak grabs Christoffer’s arm and yanks him away from crew and contestants. It’s so familiar, this feeling: fear and shame and love, spilling into each other, hardening into something rough-edged and bitter. “This isn’t for the contestants. Or crew. What happened?”

“Your mother took a fall. No! Don’t be ala…” Christoffer extends an arm like he might touch him and Isak recoils. “It’s okay! She’s okay! From what I’ve understood, she’s not in a critical condition, but the hospital has been trying to get in touch with you. They called Geir when they couldn’t get hold of you. I think they weren’t quite sure if she can stay in a normal hospital or should be sent to--“

“Okay.” Isak has already whipped out his phone, heart racing as he sees the number of missed calls. “Yeah, okay. I’m going to go to the hospital right now, just need to hand over to William. Don’t…“ 

“What?” 

“Never mind.” People will gossip either way. They always do. Isak is long past caring.

“Geir,” Christoffer says, “sent you a car with a driver. He said you shouldn’t drive when you’re upset.”

“Whatever. Go and fetch Magnus for me. I need to talk to him, too, before I can leave.”

William will never, not in a hundred years, help to let Isak’s contestant blossom into a telegenically slutty villain, so there’s no point in asking him for help. “Just do another take or two,” Isak tells him. “We fucked up the audio on one of the earlier takes. See what they come up with.”

Magnus might be willing to come to Isak’s aid, but here the problem is that Magnus’s sexual sensibility hasn’t actually matured much past High School Musical III . Isak doesn’t even want to think about what Magnus’s brain would cook up if he asked him to choreograph Eva and Even’s kiss.

When he speaks to Magnus, he says: “If Even proposes something, just roll with what he suggests. No matter what William says.”

He doesn’t allow himself to break into a run until he’s back in the forest and hidden from view. Then he sprints to the parking lot, drawing air into his lungs in painful gulps.

***

It’s well past 10 before Isak returns to Dahlvillaen. He’s exhausted and itchy in his unwashed clothes. Weary from all the explaining. Explaining his mother to doctors ready to deal with a fractured elbow, but not with his mother’s theories about the radioactive pesticides hidden in her plaster cast. Explaining the stupidly arrogant young doctor, sheltering behind his medical gibberish, to his suspicious mother. 

Isak is ravenously hungry but there’s no time for that. William and Sana have already pitched their contestants to Geir. Isak has until midnight to trawl through the logs and bite transcripts to cobble together Eva’s auditioning tape for promotion to LASD ’s reigning slut/villain and pocket the 10.000 kr. 

On his way to the control room, Isak cuts through the garden. The west wing of Dahlvillaen and the conservatory are ablaze with light: Isak, hastening down the gravel path, spots Even, Yousef, Iben and a handful of other contestants lounging on the honey-coloured rattan divans nestled under the small forest of orange trees in the conservatory. Bryn and Kjersti are painting each others’ toenails. Kjersti is on William’s roster but worth, Isak thinks, keeping an eye on: she’s a street musician who’s busked her way around half the world, and she has a radiant on-camera presence that rivals Even’s. Emma is leafing through a magazine. Yousef is juggling with a lot of random stuff, including his own snapback and a carrot that’s presumably the rightful property of Aurgelmir, stretched out on Iben’s lap. Even watches him until Mikael enters the room. He tosses something into Even’s lap. Isak can’t make out what it is, but Even throws his head back and laughs, shoulders shaking. 

They look so happy in their golden glass bubble. Just like people you see on television. Isak savors the irony without taking much pleasure in it. 

The control room is sparsely populated at this time. Chris has pitched her tent in front of the monitor wall. She’s munching on what Isak knows, from painful experience, to be excessively salty popcorn so there’s no point in stealing any. 

Isak walks straight to the cutting room and gets to work. Pilotware is slow to load, but the fastidious soul that logged the many hours of material they shot at Klatrepark today gets a gold star: the synopses with the timecode ins and outs are meticulously done.

Isak navigates to the meadow clips and speed-watches everything they shot after he left. Boring. Cutesy. Romantic bordering on nausea-inducing. Boring. B— 

Huh. Not boring. 

Isak rewinds and watches the clip in real time. It’s not the kind of material Isak was hoping to shoot, but it’s certainly… worth watching. He’s running out of time. He’s got so much to do still. He still moves the cursor back and watches the clip one more time, biting his thumb.

***

Isak is lying on one of the lounge chairs by the infinity pool, staring at the broken cloud patterns that fitfully cover and reveal the moon, when Even appears on the far end of the pool and walks towards Isak. 

He looks like he’s just stepped out briefly to take some air: he’s in a thin shirt that’s no protection against the nippy wind, and he has his right hand wrapped around a bottle of beer. Isak can’t read his face in the half dark. 

“You’re back,” Even says. 

“I’m back.” And 10.000 kr richer thanks to the string-out he’s just shown Geir, a roughly edited, jump-cut sequence of short scenes and bites starring Eva: stealing a grape from Sonja’s plate just before disclosing the double digit number of her recent sexual partners; dancing with Even on the pier, shimmying down his body; a little later that same night, emerging from the water, translucent summer dress plastered to her body; leaning against a tree in her red jumpsuit, twirling a lock of hair around her finger and muttering “I hate everyone” – with the latter part of that sentence (“who’s not yet been bitten by mosquitoes”) cut off; stealing Even away after the final challenge.

That meadow clip is also part of it. It shows Even, still wearing his blindfold, and Eva, standing about a meter or so away from Even, slowly removing the sash from her jumpsuit and using it to cover her own eyes. Her graceful, naked arms come up to tie the sash round her head to deprive herself of sight, and then she whispers: “Find me.”  

You wouldn’t think that something so simple – a blindfolded guy and girl in a meadow, beautiful in that overripe, slightly sinister way of fey creatures in folktales – would be so affecting. But it is because they keep reaching for and just missing each other, movements tentative and expressive of so much longing that it’s delicious, voyeuristic torture to watch them. When her fingers finally wind themselves around his wrist, he makes a sound that Isak will probably still remember when he’s old and senile, and the kiss that follows is vulnerable and so hot you’d expect the camera lens to fog over with steam.

Then there’s another cut and the camera shows Sonja, the good-girl doctor, sitting in the high grass and cradling her knees, watching as if she’s lost something precious. The end . Ka-ching.

Even holds out his beer. “Want some? It’s cold.”

Isak nods, takes a sip and then another one. It’s so good. He’s been thirsty for hours. “Nice job, directing the meadow scene with the two blindfolds.”

Even hums. 

“It’s not what I’d have done. And it doesn’t really serve the story I’m trying to tell either. But. It’s beautiful. We might use it.”

“I’m glad.” There’s a pause. “This story you’re trying to tell?” 

“Yes?”

“Formulas work. I know that,” Even says. “But I think that people like the recognition of familiar patterns as much as they like to be surprised. You don’t have to give them what they expect.” 

“This is your little petition for me to not throw Eva under the bus, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“Too late. And you’re fresh out of things to bargain with anyway.”

“See, that’s where you’re wrong.” Even reaches into his shirt pocket and puts a slim, dark shape into Isak’s palm. “Though I wasn’t gonna use it to bargain with you.”

“I thought these were gone.” Isak stares at his shades, quiet relief pouring through his body. “Didn’t think I’d get them back.”

“You dropped them when you spoke to Christoffer in the meadow. They suit you.” 

“I know.” Isak draws a finger along the rim. “They were a gift. From my mother, actually.”

“Your mother,” Even says, “clearly is a woman with excellent taste in sunglasses.”

Isak laughs quietly. Because it’s true. “She is that.”

He can hear the smile in Even’s voice. “Do you want company?”

“Even?” It’s a female voice, calling out and laughing in the distance.

“No,” Isak says. “No, I’m not working tonight."

“Oh. Right.”

“Do you want your beer back? Sorry for drinking so much of it.”

“It was for you anyway.” Even turns. “I’ll see you tomorrow, then.”

“Tomorrow, yes. Get some sleep. I should do that, too.”

But after Even leaves, Isak doesn’t move. He lies motionless on the lounge chair, one leg drawn up, and thinks of the fond glint in Geir’s eyes as Isak showed him the string-out.   Geir sent you a car with a driver. He said you shouldn’t drive when you’re upset. Was he truly worried about Isak? Or just trying to undermine Isak’s position with Christoffer and the crew? Isak looks up and gazes at the night sky. As a child, he told himself that all the spaces between the stars make a bottomless, black ocean – stare at it a little too long and it’ll suck you right in and make you vanish, never to be found again thereafter. Isak is not a child and he stares and stares at the dark, depthless canopy of the night sky above him.

Chapter Text

The villa looks like a sugar confection in the shifty early morning light. The low clouds are swollen with rain but the trimmed hedges and flower beds are still being watered by a battalion of rotating sprinklers. They go on and off in spiteful intervals: Isak – trying to stay mostly dry while crisscrossing the lower garden in search of Eva – has to fight a rough-looking herring gull for right of passage on a particularly narrow strip of dry gravel path. He can’t track Eva down for ages before finally discovering her on the steps of the boathouse veranda with Jonas. Eva is in her workout clothes, running shoes caked with dirt.

“That’s why we need a communal approach to reproductive labor,” Jonas is just saying. He’s half-lying on the lower steps, propped comfortably on his elbows. “Doing away with gender isn’t enough – we have to get rid of our current conception of the family and of reproduction to build new kinds of sociality. New kinship collectives.”

“I’m sure new… um… kinship collectives would be great,” Eva says. “But someone still has to get up in the middle of the night to rock the colicky little banshee. Who’s that going to be?”

“Well, of course the --”

Isak’s final steps are fast and then he plonks himself down next to Eva. “What is this?”

Eva’s smile is warm and wry. She’s gorgeous with not a shred of makeup on her face. “Jonas,” the pitch of her voice conjures up quotation marks as she continues, “is unthinking sexual reproduction and the nuclear family.”

“Nice. Do you think he could continue unthinking things without you?” Isak checks the time. “We need to shoot your confessional before breakfast and Eskild is waiting for you.”

“Sure.” Eva rises smoothly to her feet. She flicks her fingers affectionately against Jonas’s shoulder and turns to Isak. “You can be his adoring audience for a bit.”

Eva walks up the gravel path and Isak looks at Jonas with a raised eyebrow. “Trying to turn LASD into a hotbed of progressive politics? That’s ambitious.”

Jonas smiles. He’s got a good smile. Good laugh. Good everything. He’s funny, laid-back, and – deplorable taste in his current sexual partner aside – pretty damn smart. Isak would expect himself to be mildly attracted, but he isn’t really. He likes Jonas, which is a rare occurrence, and he’s also a little jealous. Jonas strolls around with the calm confidence of someone who knows who he is and likes that person. It’s so alien a concept to Isak, he sort of wants to study Jonas like a Petri dish under the microscope: see how surprisingly well put-together flannel shirts and beanies, battered Moleskin notebook, and first-year PhD student swagger all add up to this overall effect of ease.

Ease is something that Isak has never felt. Everything is an effort, an uphill battle. If other people vault over life’s difficulties, Isak sort of butts his head and shoulders against them until he’s made some room to scrape by gracelessly.

“So,” Jonas says. “There’s this thing. I’ve told Ingrid about it and asked her to talk to Geir. But you know what she’s like with Geir. Actually, you’re all mighty weird about this guy. It’s like… I don’t even know how to describe it.”

Isak laces his fingers together. “An unhealthy mix of professional opportunism, devil worship, and livid fear of Geir’s version of Stalinist purges? Yeah, it’s widespread.”

“Are you…?”

“A devil worshipper?”

“Yeah. Ingrid says that you two were close.” Jonas’s concerned eyebrows can convey a full conversation that never makes it into verbal exchange. Isak gets up. He’s not talking to Jonas’s eyebrows.

“Incurable opportunist, that’s what I am,” he says. “So what was it that you wanted Ingrid to bring up with Geir?”

“Last night, when I was getting ready to go home, I saw Christoffer with Ilya. Behind the boathouse.”

Now that’s interesting. There are no cameras behind the boathouse. “And what exactly did you see?”

“They were doing bumps of what I guess was coke together. And they did other stuff, too.”

“Right, so you hung around to watch?”

“No!” Jonas draws back, looking disgusted. “What do you take me for? I saw Christoffer drop to his knees and walked away. But there wasn’t much room for interpretation.”

Well, that was quick. Isak has no idea what he was expecting to feel at this juncture: maybe a pleasurable twinge of schadenfreude. He’s not feeling much of anything now. Just tired.

Jonas is looking up at him. “Someone should talk to Geir about it.”

“Absolutely,” Isak says. “Not me though.”

“I’m worried about him,” Jonas says.

“Worried about what Geir will do? Don’t be. He’d –“

“Not about Geir. Worried about Christoffer. He’s so desperate to do well and in a pretty vulnerable position. He’s only nineteen.”

“I was eighteen when I joined.” The words come out more sharply than intended.

“Yes,” Jonas says calmly. “But from what I’ve been hearing you were bookish and shy. And apparently the smartest eighteen-year-old ever to walk a reality tv set. Not the kind of boy who makes mistakes behind the boathouse.”

Isak shakes his head. “This is such a dumb conversation. I don’t have time for this.”

“Have you,” Jonas asks, “ever slept with a contestant?”

“You realize that I’d lie to you if the answer was yes, don’t you?”

“Course. I’m asking though.”

Jonas’s quiet persistence is oddly comforting. Isak still gives him the finger. “I get why you’re with Ingrid now. You’re nearly as insufferable as she is.”

“And so?”

“I’ve never slept with a contestant.” There are plenty of other ways to get hurt, he doesn’t say.

Jonas nods. “Thought so. Because that’s the other thing I’ve heard about you.”

“What? Oh right, libido of a misanthropic icicle.”

Jonas chuckles. “Don’t know anything about your libido, man. No. Ingrid says there are two kinds of producers who work on the show. Those who are ready to hurt the contestants for their personal gain and pleasure. And pragmatists who just want to get the job done and get paid. Well, and then there’s you.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Different animal altogether from what I’ve heard.” His tone is leisurely and amused, but his eyes are watchful. “Willing to hurt people for the show. But only ever in ways that hurt yourself, too.”

“Says Ingrid?” Isak’s tone is deliberately sardonic.

“Yeah.” Jonas gives a guileless little shrug, and Isak looks at him with new interest. Ingrid doesn’t possess the kind of empathy that yields penetrating insights into other people’s motivations. You don’t have to spend much time with her to realize that. Jonas, apparently, is different, and he’s clearly started to ask questions about Isak. Why? Despite his evident skill at dissembling he doesn’t strike Isak as someone who’s playing his own power game. Misplaced scholarly curiosity? Or some kind of weird reciprocity?

Jonas is still looking at him like he expects an answer. Isak decides that - whatever Jonas’s motivation - strangers who believe that they can channel Freud before breakfast don’t deserve explanations.

“I’ll leave you to deconstructing the nuclear family. Good luck with that.”

Isak turns and treks to the interview nook. The herring gull is still around, now perched on a folded lounge chair. When Isak jogs past, the gull lowers and then raises her head, trumpeting the ah-ah-ah-ah of her call in shrill staccato.

They’re about to start filming Even and a bunch of contestants fixing a super late breakfast in the villa’s swanky kitchen. Everyone’s waiting for Isak. They will have to wait a little longer because Isak has William trapped in the pantry.

“That’s your proposition?” William’s voice tends to be too indolent for anything in the way of inflection, but on this occasion he sounds a little more breathy than usual. “Are you cracked in the head?”

“Debatable. You’re not interested?”

“That’s… no. I’m not paying 20.000 kr for some girl’s phone number. Fuck no.”

“We’re not just talking Noora’s phone number. What I’m offering here are my unparalleled matchmaker skills.”

Noora first met Isak, William and the rest of LASD’s crew when she interned with Geir’s preferred law firm. William has been nursing an unrequited crush ever since Noora called him a sexist pig and convinced William’s #1 contestant of all time – a gloriously unhinged female race car driver – to ditch the show and go back to school.

“Noora is a sensible person,” Isak continues. “She hates your guts. But she’s always liked me. We’re still in touch. Let me put in a good word for you.”

“That would never work.” William pulls on his weird anime hair, for once brooding for real and not just for the optics.

“Come on, William. You know I’m good. There’s very little I can’t produce. Let me produce your and Noora’s grand first date.”

“You’re insane. And I’m not paying 20.000 kr for that. That would be… No.”

William moves towards the door and Isak puts his arm against the doorframe, blocking the exit. “Make me an offer then.”

William does some more brooding. Finally he comes up with: “5.000 kr.”

“In your dreams. 12.000 kr.”

They shake on 10.000 kr. Isak, thinking that it would only be logical for the shrieking alarm bells in his head to reduce their volume by 66,6% percent at this point, feels badly betrayed by reality.

He pulls himself together and follows William into the kitchen. Like everything else in Dahlvillaen, the kitchen is oversized and impractical. There are two kitchen islands with waterfall marble countertops, but naturally neither of them is outfitted with a sink or power plugs. The bar stools are the wrong height for the countertop, and the sleek knob handles look fancy but are absolutely no use when you’re trying to open the fridge or cabinets with wet hands.

None of this has so far stopped the contestants from gravitating to the kitchen whenever there is a lull in the production schedule. It’s only Day 3 of the shoot, but breakfast has already settled into a frustratingly harmonious routine: Hakon cuts up heaps of fruit; Iben prepares carrot sticks for Aurgelmir; Eva makes coffee; Vilde serves precisely measured granola portions; Liv and Sonja lay the table; and Even hovers before the behemoth-sized AGA cooker and messes around with a giant pan containing scrambled eggs for 25 people.

He’s talking to Mikael, who’s leaning against the counter, looking well-rested and poised. This, too, has already become part of the morning routine. They’re likely chatting about Moroccan rappers so tragically hip no one has ever heard of them. Or maybe they’re back to discussing this year’s Auroras. Or Eisenstein’s early aesthetic. It doesn’t really matter what topic they’re on because these two inevitably like the same stuff. No point in filming them agreeing on everything under the fucking sun yet again.

The only unexpected addition to the kitchen crew this morning is Ilya, who’s just swanned in. Shirtless. Isak makes sure that Magnus gets a good shot of Hakon exchanging an eye-roll with Liv that travels easily across two kitchen islands.

Hakon looks like he’s half-thinking of calling Ilya out, but then he turns back to Liv and says: “Hey, I gotta say, I really love your hair clips. My little girl is into hair clips now, and to be honest most of the stuff she likes is a bit hard on the eyes. Pink unicorns and these annoying sisters from Frozen and what not. But yours are really classy!”

“Um?” Liv comes a few steps closer, head cocked to the side, and eyes fixed on Hakon’s lips. “Sorry, I didn’t catch the beginning of what you said?”

“Hair clips. I was complimenting yours.”

Liv is still looking confused. Magnus, who’s a genius, has her in close-up and captures her nervous fingers as they stray to the inked vines encircling her slender neck.

That’s when Mikael joins them and says, body turned towards Liv and enunciating the words very clearly: “Hakon took your cochlear implants for hair clips. He was saying that they’re very pretty.”

“Oh! Yeah… I mean yes…” Liv’s smile flickers. “That’s what they are.”

“I didn’t know! What a stupid thing to say. I’m sorry.” Hakon squirms in the slouchy-apologetic way that appears to be reserved for mild-mannered 6’5 giants. “Is that why you have sort of… an accent?”

Liv gives a hesitant nod but whatever she says is drowned out by Mikael, who turns to Hakon, looking a little wounded. “Why would you say that?”

Hakon nearly strangles a pineapple in astonishment. “I really didn’t mean… Wrong thing to say again? Your voice is lovely, Liv! I really like it! I’m sorry!”

“I volunteer with Norges Døveforbund,” Mikael says, “and it really does my head in how little awareness there is in the greater population for the challenges that the Deaf community and their HOH allies face.”

“Really, you can sign?” Liv asks.

“I can sign.” Mikael pulls his hair into a messy man bun and secures it with the ornately carved wooden stick – “handmade with Spanish eco-leather” – that he’s carrying around in his back pocket all hours of the day. To Isak’s ongoing consternation, he sort of makes the man bun work. It’s deeply vexing.

Soon as his hair is out of his face, Mikael starts signing and speaking simultaneously, launching into a monologue about everything that’s wrong with Norway’s approach to inclusion and school placement for deaf and hard of hearing children.

Hakon looks like he’s slowly dying of embarrassment. Everybody else stares at Mikael like he’s Mother Earth’s gift to the downtrodden and disadvantaged.

Everybody else minus Ilya, who’s very busy with the cucumber he’s supposedly washing in the sink.

Isak tugs on Magnus’s arm. “Mikael is having far too much fun speaking for the girl with hearing problems. He’s not gonna stop anytime soon. Let me set something up with Even and Ilya. Can you guys be in position in five?”

Magnus knocks his bro-fist against Isak’s shoulder. “You got it!”

When Isak walks over, Even is standing with his body half-turned away from the AGA in order to listen to Mikael, all the while stirring the eggs vigorously with a fork.

“You’ll get wanker’s cramp if you continue to do this every morning,” Isak says by way of greeting.

“Hm…” Even runs his fork through the top layer to test the eggs’ texture. He gives Isak a quick smile before turning around to remove the pan from the heat. “If that happens you’ll help me out, right? Lend a brother a hand and all that?”

“No. We want you desperate and horny because your job, lest you forget, is to get it on with the contestants.”

“I feel grievously objectified. Also,” Even spins around, holds up his fork, and makes his eyes go disconcertingly wide and desolate, “I want a wooden -”

“Jesus fucking Christ, not again.” Even has only been at Dahlvillaen for a few short days but he’s complained about the absence of a wooden cooking spoon at least five times.

“Focus, Even, okay? Ilya has spent the last three minutes lovingly jerking off a cucumber under the faucet and you haven’t so much as glanced in his direction.”

“What, really?” Even leans on his left foot and cranes his long neck to look past Isak’s shoulder to Ilya.

“Oh yes. Can you go over and … do something about it?”

“You want me to go over and do something about Ilya’s cucumber?” Even’s eyes are nearly closed with mirth. He holds out a forkful of velvety scrambled eggs. “Try this first.”

“Ha. No.” Even must be delusional to think that Isak will stand around, in a kitchen filled with contestants and crew, and coyly incline his head to let Even feed him breakfast morsels. No matter how enticing the smell. “Come on. Ilya is dying to fill you in about what he’s planned for today.”

“Wait…” Even pauses to try the eggs himself, then licks a tiny piece of egg from his upper lip. Isak is fast, but not fast enough in directing his gaze back to Even’s eyes.

“You’re missing out,” Even says. Then he steps closer and drops his voice to a whisper. “I think you should tell me what kind of planning Ilya is doing.”

“Ilya,” Isak responds in the same unnecessarily hushed voice, “is the inspiration behind today’s group date. We’re filming this right after we’re done at the hospital. So there’s the group date and afterwards Ilya gets to take you on a one-on-one date.”

“What? Why?” Even waves his fork around. “What have I done now?”

“Don’t be so dramatic. We made the contestants draw straws half an hour ago. Ilya won.”

“Did he cheat at least?”

“Please.” Isak draws out the word. “Ilya is too dumb for that. I cheated for him. Hey, your resumé states that you can ride a motorcycle. That’s true, right?”

“I’ll get back to you on that. What kind of date are we talking about?”

“The group date is a beginner’s class in Shibari. Apparently that’s Ilya’s thing.”

Even’s eyebrows skip their usual wiggly dance and rise straight to unimpressed. “I’m not tying people up on national tv.”

“Okay. Understood. But how about –"

“And no one ties me up either,” Even says flatly.

“Prude.” Isak glowers for verisimilitude, but he’s not surprised. Nor truly annoyed. Because this is a thing about Even that he’s already learnt: for all his obvious experience and love of bad dick jokes, Even is private when it comes to sex. Isak can’t imagine him ever to sit down for a post-hook-up debriefing interview and divulge specifics of what happened between him and his partner. It’s a producer’s nightmare. It’s also something that resonates deeply with Isak.

“It’s no big deal,” Isak says. “It’ll be easy finding volunteers among the contestants. All you have to do is come along, practice tying a few basic knots, and make it look like you’re having fun. That okay?”

Even nods. “I can do that.”

“Great. Come on, then.” Isak looks to Magnus and Linn to confirm that they’re in position. “Get ready to be wowed by Ilya’s supple wrist moves.”

Even – when he stops clowning around and puts his mind to it – has a keen eye for everything from blocking to dramatic tension that makes or breaks the moment they’re trying to shoot. It doesn’t matter who you pair him with: with his quick understanding, Even plays to whatever makes the contestant’s personality attractive. Isak is positive that in a pinch, Even could successfully flirt with a lamppost, and probably make it blush, but there’s nothing routinized about how he engages the other person. He’s curious and playful, and so magnetic that people forget that they’re being filmed once he gives them his undivided attention.

Isak is pretty sure that Even’s opinion of Ilya hasn’t changed, but he laughs, and jokes, and offers up the required cucumber-themed innuendo in such a charming way that even Linn smiles a little. Ilya, frazzled by Even’s non-sequiturs and rapid shifts in topic, comes across as the decent human being he certainly isn’t in reality, exuding little of the sleazy-scumbag aura that Isak’s storyline requires.

It’s nothing, of course, that can’t be righted in the editing room: a couple of frankenbites, paired with close-up shots of Ilya checking out Even’s butt, should do the job rather nicely. But Isak still wonders abstractedly what it would be like to shoot this scene with Even fully clued into Isak’s agenda. Would he lead Ilya exactly where Isak wants him? Or would he elegantly sabotage Isak’s plans, making Isak work harder in turn, just for the fun of it? Isak has no idea why thinking about this is such a delicious thrill.

In any case, there’s a price to pay for getting distracted, because Adam and Hakon waltz into this small tête-à-tête – and while that was broadly Isak’s plan, they choose the worst possible moment. They arrive just as Ilya explains, in commendably explicit terms, why Shibari is such a turn-on for him.

Adam looks mostly puzzled while Hakon crosses his mighty arms and hovers like a puritanical Thor, interrupting Ilya every couple of sentences to lay out his misgivings about the outcome of the earlier drawing straws contest. Of course, none of this will mean anything to viewers, because this boring-as-fuck procedure won’t be included when they edit the episode. But it also means that most of the perfectly dirty – and therefore also perfectly perfect – stories that Ilya is telling are interspersed with Hakon’s complaints. Isak will have to sit Ilya down for an interview and make him repeat everything that he’s just said. Not that he has time for that. Fuck.

“I don’t understand,” Hakon mumbles afterwards when everyone has left and Isak and Adam are the only people with him in the kitchen still. “How can you let Ilya take Even on a one-on-one date, knowing what you know?”

Isak makes sure that his smile looks pained, which at this point doesn’t require much acting. “What can I do? Ilya won the contest. But I know that Even’s going to be fine. He’s got you. And Adam. You’ll come up with a plan.”

“Yeah.” Hakon nods, looking uncertain. His fingers are fiddling with an apple peeler that has escaped Vilde’s cleaning blitz. “I want to help. I really do. Just not sure if I’m cut out for this.”

Isak plucks the apple peeler from Hakon’s hand and runs his nail over the serrated, sticky edge. “You know…” He lifts his shoulders and shakes his head a little helplessly. “It’s fine. I’m not either. We just have to try our best. Everything else will fall into place.”

“For fuck’s sake,” Isak says, “what were you thinking?”

Christoffer has only had a day to set up a telegenic Shibari class for the group date, which – considering that Oslo, for all its attractions, is hardly the global capital of kink – is quite a job. Still, Christoffer couldn’t have bombed this any worse if he’d tried. Isak, being his usual contradictory self, is both pleased about this additional evidence of Christoffer’s incompetence and profoundly pissed that he has to deal with the fall out.

Isak puts his hands on his hips and slowly pivots, taking in the dismal little dojo that forms part of Teisen’s Community Centre & Aikido Klubb. The carpet on the floor is ratty and has the color of watery lemon sherbet. The windowless walls could use a new coat of paint. Even Christoffer, a tanning salon regular, looks sickly underneath the cruel glare of the fluorescent ceiling light. “You couldn’t book a studio space that’s a little less awful?”

“The whole thing was pretty short-notice!” Christoffer whines. “I did find a few places that were nicer, but Amani insisted that we go to a proper dojo. And I think he’s kind of partial to the Shisha Lounge downstairs.”

“Who’s Amani?”

“That’s the rigger,” Christoffer says. “Or Bakushi? I’m not quite sure what the right term is. Anyway, he’s the only person teaching Shibari classes in Oslo who’s willing to come on the show. They’re kind of snooty, these Shibari people. Not exactly fans of LASD.”

Isak fishes out his mobile and checks the time. Five hours until they have to start shooting. “I’ll go and talk to whoever is heading this community center. Their dojo is getting a free and deeply unprofessional makeover. Call Geir and get him to send us half a dozen PAs – not the ones with two left thumbs. Tell them to meet us at Jernia on Torggata.”

Five hours later, the dojo looks somewhat less atrocious. Or rather, it still looks atrocious but in a more thematically appropriate fashion. The walls are painted a community-center-approved shade of slate grey and the PAs are just done rolling out the last of the merlot-red Meknes rugs that they got in the sale. The lighting is a lost cause, so they’ve bought a dozen cheap floor lamps with satin gold stems and black cylindrical shades.

“Don’t lean against any of the walls,” Isak admonishes Even and the contestants, just walking in. “They’re still wet.”

The room, it turns out, was a lot easier to whip into shape than their Shibari expert. Amani is a soft-spoken native of Switzerland who’s apparently a household name in the tying community. Defying BDSM stereotypes, he looks like a young, bespectacled John Lennon and has a pronounced lisp.

Isak – making the rookie mistake of glancing over at Even when Amani demurely introduces himself as “Amani Ropeknight” – singlehandedly ruins their first take by breaking into an implausible coughing fit.

Amani seems to know his shit, but he’s somewhat obsessed with the health and safety angle, and right when he’s finally done talking consent and irrevocable nerve damage, he starts monologuing esoterically about his personal philosophy of bondage.

“Right,” Isak interrupts him. “That’s fascinating. But I think everyone here is… how did you put it? Like, really eager to walk their own path with the rope. Please and for the love of god can we start tying people up now?”

“Yukimura Haruki holdth that pathienthe ith a virtue,” Amani notes.

Isak gives him a sunny smile. “I choose vice,” he says, overenunciating the sibilants. “Get to it.” He grows conscious of someone’s gaze on him and, turning, sees that it’s Even. Wonders, briefly, what lies beneath the porcelain stillness of his face, his bright, intent stare.

Of all the contestants in the room it’s Adam who volunteers himself as Amani’s model. Amani shows them a few basic knots for tying someone’s hands and feet on Adam, then asks them to get together in pairs to practice. Ilya struts over and tries to claim Even as his partner. Even shrugs apologetically and teams up with Mikael instead.

Yousef and Kjersti get tangled up in bamboo rope in no time – there’s rope goo in Kjersti’s curls and Yousef manages to trip himself when he tries to stretch out a piece of rope with his naked toes. Kjersti whoops with laughter and starts to whip his shoulder with a choker while ever polite Yousef – clearly determined not to offend Amani’s feelings – stares at the snarl of ropes in front of him with a frown, then patiently gets to work untangling it. Sana, who’s directing the camera team that’s filming Kjersti and Yousef, looks up from the control screen and Isak catches the tiny smile that glides over her face, there and gone in the blink of an eye.

When Isak turns back to Amani and Adam, Adam is just stripping to his briefs, nattering on about his favorite brand of equestrian lead rope. Amani steps forward. He weighs the rope in his well-kept hands and explains that for him, Shibari is all about developing the intimately attuned, non-verbal communication between him and his tying partner. Adam looks rapt and eager to please, although Isak is doubtful that he’ll get the hang of non-verbal communication anytime soon.

Amani starts to put him in complex ties that could be used, he explains, in the context of suspension or floor play.

“Don’t you think,” Linn whispers into Isak’s ear after a while, “that Adam kinda looks like a tied roast pork?”

“No kink shaming. This is a safe space,” Isak says solemnly. “Mags, I think we want a close-up of Adam’s buttocks. And then we need to shoot Ilya.”

Ilya, whom fate, ably assisted by Isak, has partnered with Hakon, is busy tying Hakon’s arms behind his back. Once he’s done, he covers them in a series of decorative knots. Hakon, a little red in the face, looks like he’s dying to hulk out of his shackles, particularly when Ilya treats him to an unsolicited rundown of the pros and cons of crotch knots for guys.

Suddenly, there’s a commotion in the back of the room where Amani is working with Adam. Amani helps Adam up to a standing position and half of the contestants flock to them to inspect the intricate full-body harness into which Amani has tied him.

Mikael detours from where he’s just been fetching new rope for practicing with Even to join the others in ogling and joking with Adam. Even doesn’t follow him. Isak watches him roll his right shoulder, clearly trying to relieve some tightness there. Even’s hands and wrists are still bound. He tries to pull them free a few times but doesn’t get anywhere.

Isak walks over and snaps his fingers. “Give me your hands.”

Even’s headshake is a little jerky. He half-turns, like he’d prefer to blend into the tacky wall. “I’m not mad keen on you filming me like this.”

“Do you see a camera pointed in our direction? Because I don’t.”

Isak holds out his own hands and after a moment Even surrenders his. Mikael has tied the rope too tightly. Amani had been adamant that you should be able to slip a finger under the rope once it’s tensioned, and that the rope shouldn’t tighten on the wrists at all. The rope covering Even’s hands is pulled so tightly it would be uncomfortable on intact skin, much more so on Even’s battered palms.

“Fucking idiot,” Isak mutters, head bent down, working swiftly to undo the knots and loosen the rope.

“Mmh?”

“Not you.”

Even’s skin is cold and a little clammy where Isak’s fingertips graze it. Unlike Adam, he doesn’t seem to be into this one bit. “You should have asked Mikael to tie your monstrous feet,” Isak says to fill the silence between them. “Bet he’d have thrown in the towel immediately.” He carefully unties the final knot and the rope drops to the floor. “There. Better?”

“I...” Even flexes his long fingers. He’s looking at Isak strangely, biting into the fullness of his lower lip.

“What is it?”

“Nothing. Thank you.”

Isak sweeps the room with a quick glance. Amani and Adam are still surrounded by a gaggle of contestants. Adam preens under the attention. “We’re nearly done here, I think.”

Even’s mouth twitches. “Depending on how dedicated the Ropeknight is to his aftercare protocol.”

“Oh god, that’s true.”

It’s quiet in their little corner of the room. Or rather, this part of the room is probably exactly as noisy as every other bit of the dojo, but it feels oddly hushed. Private.

“Um, so I’ve been wondering...,” Even says after a moment. “You put the Araki photograph in my room. Is that your thing? Or… do you think it’s mine?”

Now that was an unexpected turn for this conversation to take. “Neither,” Isak says, hoping that bluntness will mask the lie. Then he directs his attention back to the crowded room, searching for some diverting silliness that they can both stare at before moving on to another topic.

Before Isak can point out Iben using her rope as an improvised lasso, Even speaks again. He sounds like he’s pushing himself to do it, and not finding it easy. “It’s the look in her eyes,” he says quietly. “I think that’s why I keep returning to that picture.”

Isak blinks at him, momentarily startled into thinking that Even is somehow fucking with him. But whatever Even is, he’s unlikely to be a clairvoyant who can read Isak’s mind, so this is just a freakish coincidence. Maybe it’s not even freakish – maybe there’s a statistically significant ratio of people who look at that photograph and have the same visceral response to the emotions that the photographer caught in the model’s eyes. Maybe --

“But,” Even continues, “I don’t think you need to tie a hundred knots to get there. If you’re with someone who’s… right.”

Isak never looks away. It’s one of his rules, in and out of the bedroom: given the specific variety of filth or insult directed at him, he might flinch, but he doesn’t back away, and he doesn’t avert his eyes. So why the hell can he not bring himself to meet Even’s gaze now? And why is this room so fucking stuffy?

“Well,” Isak says, voice bland, “Ilya is going to be so disappointed. Come on,” he walks away, knowing without checking that Even is following him. “I have something to show you outside.”

The change of scenery helps. When Even steps into the courtyard of the community center and sees the monster of a motorcycle they’ve hired for him parked next to Ilya’s Streetfighter, he starts laughing and doesn’t stop until Isak has given him three different scowls and an eye roll that might have done permanent damage to his optic nerve.

“Isak,” Even says, “you of all people should know that I already have a penis.”

“Can you ride this motherfucker or not?”

“Probably. I might not be able to keep a straight face though. Is your plan to send us biking with Putin and his Night Wolves?”

“Hilarious.”

Even walks around the motorcycle, hands in his pockets. “What is this thing?”

“The guy from the motorcycle rental called it a Rocket Something Something… and gushed about its… fuck if I know. Something about the engine, I suppose? It’s loud.”

“I bet. Why are we doing this again?”

“Because our viewers will find it hot – you riding off with Ilya to your one-on-one date right after the Shibari class. And it’s not bad: Ilya is working overtime curating his image as a bad boy and you’re…”

Even’s gaze cuts to Isak. “I’m what?”

Isak shrugs. “You’re all sorts of things, and people who watch the show will see this. But you’re also known as the bohemian enfant terrible of Norwegian letters, and you have a reputation for sleeping around. Which beautifully complements Ilya’s whole shtick.”

“Nothing I am or do could ever complement Ilya’s… anything.”

“I know. Even.” Isak steps closer. He means to put his hand on the smooth, cold handlebar of the motorcycle between them, but Even’s hand is already there and Isak’s fingers land on the rope burns on Even’s wrist. “I know, okay? We’re not portraying you as someone who’s remotely like Ilya. I promise.”

Isak has always played his cards close to his chest when it comes to wrangling suitors and contestants in the past. It would be idiotic to change course now. Last thing he wants is to… – oh. Isak, catching sight of his own hand, realizes a little too late that his fingers are still gentling the reddened skin on Even’s wrist. He withdraws his fingers but doesn’t take them away entirely, hooking them instead around the brake lever, just a couple of inches away from Even’s hand.

Even looks at him for a long moment, brows drawn together. Then he gives a tense nod.

Completely idiotic, Isak thinks.

“Look,” he says, “we’re not sending you on a one-on-one date with Ilya because we’re expecting action or a blossoming romance. Ilya is an asshole who’s playing his own little game. Two of the other contestants are on to him. The one-on-one date is set up so that they can make an intervention. It’ll be tacky as hell. In fact, it’ll confirm all your worst prejudices about reality tv. Don’t you dare laugh while we’re shooting.”

“You know,” Even says with a slow smile that Isak is appallingly glad to see, “I’m not terrible at acting.”

“I had an inkling.” Isak pats the saddle of the motorbike. “Get ready to prove it.”

Chapter Text

It’s late. Isak is perched on the back of a garden bench that’s outside the cameras’ range, staring at his phone, the only source of light in this neglected part of the garden. His dad is finally responding to Isak’s strong-worded request for an instant money transfer of 10.000 kr. Turns out his dad and Astrid, his new partner, are vacationing in the Dominican Republic. 10.000 kr is a lot – what has Isak’s mother gotten herself into this time? – but he’ll transfer the money first thing when he's back in two weeks. Unless he forgets, in which case Isak could always send him a reminder. There’s a picture, too: his dad and Astrid on the beach, tanned and in identical broad-brimmed hats, holding a silver necklace with a turquoise stone pendant into the camera: Bought you a souvenir! Hope you love it!

Isak puts his phone away. He’s got less than twenty-four hours left to scrape together 10.000 kr. He should try and catch some sleep, but his brain is still whirring like some dumb, overheating machine. If he takes a sleeping pill now, his mind will be sluggish until mid-morning. He can’t risk that.

Isak presses his eyes shut. When he opens them again and turns to look at the slumbering villa, he notices that light is still seeping through the lavish curtains of the master suite. Isak stares at the high, golden-rimmed windows. His brain, unhelpfully, supplies the crackling sound of moth wings singed by light bulbs. He still gets up and walks up to the villa.

It takes a while for the door to open after Isak knocks. Isak’s waspish greeting dies on his tongue. Even is still wearing the biker jeans and gray scoop-neck shirt that Eskild chose for the date with Ilya. His sleeves are rolled up and his hair looks tousled, like he’s been grabbing it without noticing. He’s wearing glasses – not stylish, hipsterish ones, but the kind of nondescript, thin-framed rectangular glasses that make Isak think of the spectacles that old men buy in bulk at Europris.

Isak has been staring for too long. He doesn’t want to stop.

“Hello.” Even looks a little dazed. Then his eyes widen slightly and he snatches the glasses off his nose.

Isak raises an eyebrow.

“I usually wear contacts,” Even says nonchalantly and steps aside to let Isak in. “Took them out already.”

Isak looks pointedly to the glasses that are now residing, practically out of view, behind a fancy vase. “So you’re planning to stagger through the suite blind now?”

“I’ll get by. What’s up?”

Isak should have thought this out better. What the fuck is he doing? “I… just wanted to check that you’re not about to jump ship after today’s shoot.”

“It wasn’t so bad. No, scrap that. In fact…” Even nods a couple of times, facial features quickly hardening to marmorean graveness. “I believe it was. Bad. Dreadful, actually. Poor Hakon. I feel scarred by the experience. Maybe the junior producer will have to put in a good night’s work to placate my affronted aesthetic sensibility.” He purses his lips to hide the smile that’s pulling on the corners of his mouth. “Do you want some pointers on promising strategies for appeasing the suitor?”

“Bodily favors are out.”

Even merely laughs. He looks like he sounds - gleeful and amused, not like he’s covering disappointment. “What about a foot rub?”

“Out. Covering that much ground I’d never finish.”

“You realize that I’ll need therapy for body dysmorphic disorder of the feet once LASD is over?”

“Sorry to tell you that dysmorphia doesn’t come into it. It’s all real, baby.”

“Did you just—"

“I did not. The term,” Isak points out grandly, “is often used as an insult.”

“Oh really. You ran a search on Urban Dictionary prior to coming here?”

Why does this always happen? Even now, when Isak is stressed beyond belief and so tired he wants to cry angrily into his fist, it takes next to nothing for him to slip into their rhythm, the easy back and forth of it. Simple as taking someone’s hand. Easy but not casual. Nothing about this feels casual, but it’s still… calming. Heady, too. Like Isak’s blood is rushing through his veins a little more quickly, a little more warmly. How can it be both at the same time?

He should probably say something. He’s been quiet for too long. This is getting weird. Say something, Isak. He slowly turns and takes in the state of the room: the stainless-steel monstrosity of a bed is a mess, clean and dirty clothes strewn about everywhere. Even’s guitar is lying on the sofa like he’s just put it down. A couple of magazines – the sort whose painfully artsy covers suggest that they could be dedicated to everything from contemporary poetry to topiary art – are scattered on the floor and dressers.

“You know,” Isak says, “the PAs have a bet going. One half believes that you’re an incurable slob. The other half thinks that the chaos in your suite is deliberately manufactured to keep us from using any of the material shot in here because the room looks like a dump.”

Even wiggles his eyebrows. “Either way, it works.”

“It works,” Isak concedes and confirms what he’d already suspected: Even has covered the cameras for good measure. “Don’t trust us to honor your contract?”

Even’s contract stipulates that they can’t film him in his suite between 10pm and 7am. Unless – and that’s a clause that Geir wisely insisted on – he has a contestant up here with him.

“I may be a slob, but I’m not stupid.”

“True,” Isak says around a yawn. “You’re a terrible disappointment.”

His stomach rumbles indelicately. Shouldn’t have skipped dinner again.

“Wanna feed the beast?” Even’s eyes are red-rimmed with tiredness but he still motions to the door like he’s ready to go on an adventure. “Bet there’s some food left in the kitchen. We could go and investigate?”

There are cameras in the kitchen. Isak doesn’t want cameras. He wants to disappear, withdraw into the blur of these unreal hours between midnight and dawn. Shelter with this stranger who’s becoming less of a stranger and more of a liability every day.

“Let’s stay here.”

Even smiles. “Let’s do that.” He starts opening drawers in seemingly random fashion, then hunts through the various compartments of his duffel bag. Finally, he brandishes a battered looking bag of Eldorado Chilinøtter, eyes glittering in triumph.

“Best before?” Isak asks suspiciously.

“Oh, who cares.” Even flips the bag around. “Sometime last year. But best before dates are bullshit anyway.”

“Food poisoning,” Isak splutters, only half-joking, “is real!”

Even dangles the bag from his crooked fingers. “Way I see it: you can starve. Or face the danger of catching food poisoning from vintage peanuts like a man.”

Isak is not returning his smile. No way. He’s not. “God, you’re stupid.” He plucks the bag out of Even’s hand and tears it open with the delicacy of a bin fox.

Even ends up in what appears to be his preferred lounging spot: the free-standing, copper-leaved bathtub. It glimmers a rosy hue of golden in the softly lit room. Isak sits on the rim and throws slightly rancid peanuts into the air before catching them in his mouth. Well, most of them. Every time he glances in Even’s direction, Even is watching him with beatific attention.

“You’re so bad at this!” Even cries, the blue of his eyes almost lost to his delighted squint. “I can’t believe that anyone could be so bad at throwing food into their mouth!”

“Fuck you. I’m very talented.”

“I think I’d give my left arm for access to my phone right now. You need all the help you can get. Bet there’s a WikiHow entry that we could consult.”

“Bullshit. Not every stupid shit in the world is covered by WikiHow.”

“Disagree.”

“Fine.” Isak shakes his head, but he gets out his phone. “Let me prove you wrong. There’s no fucking –”

There is a fucking WikiHow entry.

Even uses Isak’s moment of existential perplexity to seize Isak’s phone. He starts thumbing around on it, all the while shaking his shoulders in what looks like a tired but exceedingly smug victory dance.

Blackstar’s Thieves in the Night starts playing and provides the soundtrack to Even reading out instructions from the WikiHow page in the soothingly sonorous voice of a nature program presenter. “Hold the small food in your dominant hand. Raise your arm with your hand, while keeping your elbow close to the waist. While doing so, flick your hand up quickly to make sure the food gets high enough in the air. Now, and this is very important, Isak: Raise your head, following the now-flying food with your eyes. Next—“ Isak starts poking him in the ribs with his socked toes. “Hey!” Even complains. “I’m educating you here!”

“Oh yeah?” Isak angles his toes a little higher, nudges more insistently.

He expects Even to attack his foot and is taken aback when Even, lightning fast, picks up a peanut that’s gone astray and slips the nut between Isak’s lips. Fingers there and gone so quickly Isak wouldn’t think it happened if the evidence wasn’t there. On his tongue. In the way Even is staring at him, eyes heavy-lidded.

Isak returns his gaze. Swallows and says: “Another one.”

Even reaches up slowly but his hand stills when he’s two inches away from Isak’s mouth so that Isak has to lean in, close the distance. Even’s fingers brush against his lips, linger there for a moment.

Isak looks down at Even and gives himself license to imagine it for just a moment. Even in that same bathtub, unclothed and bare, fair skin flushed from the hot water. Gleaming shoulders and long, slender neck resting against the curve of the tub. He’d be reclining just like he is now, one leg drawn up. There’d be some kind of bath oil in the water, everything wet and slippery. Isak would be perched on the rim of the tub in the exact same spot. He wouldn’t do anything. Just stay close and watch him, talk to him. See what he can do to him, what he can make him do, with words alone.

Even touches his tongue to the corner of his mouth. “Ever done it in a bathtub?”

“Yeah. I slipped. Hit my chin on the rim. Cracked a tooth.”

Isak tells it like a joke and waits for Even to laugh or turn on the innuendo. What Even does instead is reach out and stroke Isak’s chin, fingers careful on Isak’s skin. “Ouch.”

It’s the gentleness of his touch that snaps Isak out of his haze.

“Anyway.” He gets up. Walks a few steps up and down besides the bathtub, left leg tingling with pins and needles. He’s a producer. He’s not strictly here as a producer, but he can pretend. He can always pretend. “Today was bad,” Isak says. “Like, even by our lowly standards the material we shot this afternoon is a pile of crap. Hakon and Ilya can’t act for shit.”

“To be fair,” Even says, following Isak’s wary pacing with his eyes, “Hakon must have been in quite a bit of pain after the second take.”

“I was in quite a bit of pain watching him blunder about as your valiant knight.”

“Then again you hadn’t just fractured three of your toes.”

“That was just bad luck. This guy regularly hangs from helicopters and plucks people from certain death. You don’t expect him to go and break his toes soon as a large pebble is thrown into his path.” Isak buries his hands in his hair and pulls on the strands. “God, I’ll be stuck in the cutting room all day tomorrow and this whole storyline is still going to suck balls.”

“I’m kind of glad that I won’t see this episode until long after it’s aired.”

“Oh, you have nothing to worry about. Mags is so in love with you, he even brought out the old pantyhose-over-the-lens trick when he shot you leaning against your motorbike. I’ve seen the result. You have all the old Hollywood glamor of a slightly underfed, squinty James Dean.”

Even mouth drops open. “Slander. I’m not underfed!”

“You are a bit. It’s fine.” It suits you, Isak thinks.

“You’re not going to turn Hakon into a complete moron, right?”

“Huh? No. Wasn’t planning to.” Isak fails to stifle another yawn. “But why do you care? He was on your elimination list, no?”

“Well, we’re not soulmates, that’s for sure,” Even says. “But I’ve gotten to know him a bit better over the last couple of days. He’s a decent guy. Kind. Completely out of his depth. Has never heard of personal branding and stopped using social media when Facebook bought WhatsApp. I think…” Even tips his head back a little, lips pursed. When he speaks again, his voice is void of all inflection: “I think he actually joined LASD because he’s looking for love.”

Isak scoffs. “In my world, stupidity doesn’t grant you special protection.”

“I know. But it’s not so much to ask, is it?” Even slings his arms around his knee and balances his chin on top of it, never letting Isak out of his sight. “Don’t wreck all the good ones.”

“Can we…” Isak rubs his gritty eyes with his fists. “Can we not talk about the show tonight?”

“You brought it up.”

“That’s right. What was I thinking?”

Even smiles. “I believe you were thinking diversion tactics.”

“Learn to recognize a rhetorical question, Even.” It’s supposed to come out snappish, but Isak’s voice is so tired it sands down all the sharp edges of his words. He walks over to Even’s bed and picks up a book that’s lying face down on the tangled duvet. The cover is crowded with blots of color that turn out to be tiny human and not-so-human figures. The title reads Gravity’s Rainbow. “What’s this about?”

“It’s about this guy, who’s got an awesome name. Tyrone Slothrop. He’s a GI, stationed in London in the 1940s, and whenever he gets an erection, a Blitz bomb hits.”

“What. Really?”

Even nods, pleased. “Really.”

Isak squints at the cover. Starts and stops himself from counting all the tiny panda bears hidden in the crowd. Then he flips to the page on which the book was opened when he picked it up. “You’ve not gotten very far and this monster has what… over 900 pages. Is it as awful as it sounds?”

“No, it’s good. I’m just a shit reader.”

Isak looks up. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“No… It’s really stupid. I just,” Even shrugs, sleepy and somehow still acutely embarrassed. “I love books. But I find it difficult to focus if it’s just words on a page. It’s a lot easier when I’m listening to stuff. I usually just get the audiobook version. Film’s even better.” The corners of his eyes crinkle. “Never had a problem yet focusing on a film.”

“Is there a film version of this?”

“Don’t think so.”

“Well then.” Isak swipes some of the clothes on Even’s fancy bed to the floor to make room. Some of them get stuck on the closest steel column. Isak’s too tired to care and plonks himself down on the bed.

Even grabs the sides of the bathtub but before he can heave himself up, Isak says: “No. Stay where you are.”

Even complies, but he looks doleful. Isak throws him a consolatory cushion. Then he lies on his stomach on the bed, feet crossed at the ankles, and opens the book. The pages reflect the pale blue light from the underwater landscape on the gilded television screen opposite the bed.

“Just so you know,” Isak says, “if you lied about the erections, this is over. And I want to know what’s up with the panda bears.” He glances over at Even and it settles something in him: the distance between them and Even’s eyes on him, unwavering.

His voice is hoarse and brittle, but it’ll have to do. Isak starts reading aloud: “Imagine a missile one hears approaching only after it explodes. The reversal! a piece of time neatly snipped out … a few feet of film run backwards … the blast of the rocket, fallen faster than sound—then growing out of it the roar of its own fall, catching up to what’s already death and burning … a ghost in the sky.”

When Isak wakes up with his face buried in an unfamiliar duvet, his bleary brain struggles through a short list of possible locations before landing him back in Even’s suite, sprawled diagonally over the bed, facing the room.

The dimmed lights are still on. Even is asleep, head resting on a pale arm that’s hanging over the bathtub. It looks hideously uncomfortable. Isak has no idea what time it is. It’s so, so quiet: no birdsong outside, no voices or muffled laughter emanating through the walls. Like the whole word has sunk into sleep.

Isak pads through the room and the adjacent lounge. He switches off the lights, one by one. When he grabs the doorhandle in the dark, the image of Even standing in that same doorway, a little rumpled and wearing his grandfather glasses, comes back to him. Isak remembers where Even hid his glasses, but he’d bet all the money he doesn’t have that Even has forgotten all about it.

It takes Isak a moment to find the glasses behind the vase with all the lights turned off. He feels his way through the dark once more and places them on Even’s nightstand. Then he leaves.

***

Things look somewhat hopeful for the first part of the day. Isak manages to scrounge together 2000 kr by agreeing to model Eskild’s very limited edition of home-sewn kimonos for Eskild’s insta.

“Tut-tut,” Eskild’s cold hand lands on Isak’s forehead without warning. “You don’t look so hot today, my little gremlin child. Are you high? Am I taking advantage of you?”

“I think you are a bit,” Isak says. “Should we make it 3000 kr to ease your conscience?”

“2000 kr and a cup of kombucha in the makeup trailer. How’s that?”

Isak pockets the money and makes half-arsed promises to swing by for something that isn’t kombucha in the future. His sense of the future sure as hell doesn’t extend beyond his midnight deadline.

He wastes half an hour sitting by the empty pool and squinting against the too-bright sun, composing awkward text messages to Lea and the two friends he kept from uni. Tries to explain why he needs their money – today, please! – while also sounding like a casual, well-adjusted adult. He deletes the messages.

Sana is already in the cutting room when Isak, cradling his fifth coffee to his chest, arrives. There’s a bitter taste in his mouth that will not go away.

Sana looks him up and down with genteel disgust. “Are you trying to grow a beard now? And when did you last shower?”

Isak collapses into the chair next to Sana and jerks his chin in the direction of the bulletin board, already covered in half a dozen pod cards. “Do you think we can wheedle a bonus of… let’s say 10.000 kr out of Geir if we turn this rubbish into a decent segment for the next episode?”

“What do you need 5.000 kr for?”

“That’s assuming that you’ll get half of the bonus. Which you won’t because I spent all day yesterday field producing the material we’re working with. I’ll be generous and let you have 2.000 kr.” He sweeps out an arm for emphasis and nearly knocks over his coffee cup.

Sana rights the cup. “And I’ll be generous and ignore everything you’ve just said. Let’s get to work.”

It takes them until the late afternoon to go through 75 hours of dailies and pull story-worthy bits, pods, and about a dozen useful cutaways. Cobbling together a mediocre string-out takes them another couple of hours.

At this point, Chris informs them that Geir is out for drinks with the head of the network. Isak’s hands are sweaty claws when Geir finally ambles into the cutting room just before 22:00. They show him the string-out and maybe, just maybe, Geir will like it and things will be alright.

Geir doesn’t like the string-out.

He leans his forearms on the back of Isak’s chair. His mouth is right by Isak’s ear when he says: “This is so boring I’d rather watch Magnus tending to his lady garden than be subjected to another minute of it.”

“This isn’t bad.” Sana swivels her chair around, looking drained and stony-eyed. “It’s a storybook prince charming vs. scheming villain situation.”

“With a nice side dish of heteronormative ideology,” Isak adds. “Which we know about 75% of our older female viewers will eat up. The good guy is the hunky dad and the asshole is the effeminate kinky guy. It’s… very much on brand for LASD.”

“No. It’s tedious and plodding and Hakon is about as interesting as a slice of kneippbrød. And you two,” Geir looks from Isak to Sana and back, “know it.”

“We need this storyline,” Sana says firmly. “We have just a few days left until the episode is airing – how are we supposed to fill the 12 minutes we’re losing if we’re axing Hakon and Ilya?”

“I’m not asking you to ax the storyline. I like Ilya. Viewers get to vote out one of the contestants when the next episode airs. You’ll make sure that it’s not going to be Ilya. I intend to give him a nice little redemptive arc.”

Isak stares at Geir, then looks away quickly, frantically trying to piece together what Geir’s agenda is. Fuck, Isak didn’t foresee this.

“However,” Geir continues leisurely, “I’m not at all committed to keeping Hakon around. So here’s what you’re going to do.” He sketches out a new story arc, going back to many of the clips that Isak and Sana pulled, selecting different moments, changing the focus.

“You’ll do the confessional with Hakon, Isak,” Geir says. “Tonight or tomorrow, I don’t care.”

“I…” Isak tries to breathe deeply to control his treacherous voice, but he can’t breathe past the pressure, and it’s fucking everywhere suddenly, under his skin, in his lungs, crushing his ability to think. “I think that’s a bad idea. I think that we should stick to the character arcs we’ve been developing so far.”

As arguments go, this is a shit one, and Geir has no qualms telling Isak so.

“Okay.” Isak wets his lower lip. He puts everything to the side. It’s a job. It’s something that Isak does, not who he is, although at this point this division has become a mere line in the sand. “If you want me to get Hakon to say what you want him to say, this will cost you 8.000 kr.”

“You’re already,” Geir points out, “costing me.”

“8.000 kr. I’ll do the confessional tonight. I’ll go and set everything up.”

“Do whatever you like. I’ll see you in the morning. We can talk about the bonus then.”

“No.” Isak’s mind is a warzone, thoughts firing into all directions at once. “I need the money tonight. If you’re going home, I can email you the material.”

Geir laughs softly. The sound doesn’t cohere with the look in his eyes. “You know what, Spurv? If you’re so desperate you can hand-deliver the footage. I’m expecting company, so I’ll be up.”

***

At 23.50 Isak stumbles out of the interview room and authorizes a money transfer of 22.000 kr. He texts his former flatmate a screenshot, promising that the rest of the money will reach him within the next couple of hours. Then he downloads the confessional and jogs through the cold drizzle to the bus stop on Hukgrenda.

The only other person waiting at the bus stop is an unkempt old man who’s compulsively emptying and refilling the pockets of his too-big coat. He’s muttering – about the sea and the rain and the storm tide because this, you see, this is the surge, this is the storm tide – and his words weave in and out of the interview snatches that Isak’s mind keeps replaying.

It takes nearly forty minutes before the delayed night bus pulls up. When Isak gets off at Dælenenga, it’s another twenty-minute walk to Geir’s flat. It’s still raining but that doesn’t mean that people aren’t out and about on this Friday night, leaving traces of themselves on the wet pavement. Half-eaten kebabs and soggy fries, empty bottles randomly deposited on street corners and windowsills. A girl is puking her guts out right in front of the entrance to Ching-Ching.

2 has come and passed by the time Isak presses his wet thumb against Geir’s doorbell. He’s buzzed in more quickly than he expects.

By the time Isak has climbed the staircase, Geir has opened the door and retreated into the interior of the apartment. He’s leaning beside one of the crowded bookshelves that line his corridor, wearing the same clothes he wore during the day. His feet are bare and his mouth tightens, briefly, at the squelching sound that Isak’s sneakers make on his beautiful herringbone floor. Isak doesn’t offer to remove them.

“Evening, Spurv. You look like a drowned rat.”

Isak holds out the stick on which he’s saved the confessional. “Watch it, transfer the money, and I’m out of your hair.”

Geir laughs, boyish and indulgent: “God, you’re tense these days. You can have a shower if you want. Dry clothes.”

“I thought you have company over?”

“I do.” Geir looks down, then uses his naked toes to shove an unfamiliar pair of brown loafers out of the way. “And terrible taste in shoes he’s got... He’s asleep. I can ask him to leave if it makes you uncomfortable.”

Isak’s brain gets stuck on the question of whether Geir would actually do that – throw out this unknown man because Isak has arrived on his doorstep in the middle of the night. Geir’s smile, when Isak looks back at him, is a trap.

“Just watch the footage,” Isak says. “I want the money. That’s all.”

Isak expects Geir to lead the way to his fancy new lounge, but instead he motions Isak to follow him into the small black and white kitchen with its table for two and Freya’s ratty old cushion on the windowsill. Geir’s MacbookPro is open on the table. There are take-out cartons, plates and two wine glasses stacked haphazardly in the sink.

Geir pulls the second chair out so that they can watch the video together. Isak shakes his head and leans against the counter instead. He makes sure that he can’t see the screen from where he’s standing, but he can hear himself talk on the video.

Freyja shows up when Hakon, carefully led by Isak, starts talking about being closeted throughout his teens and early twenties. Isak crouches down to stroke Freyja underneath her chin, but either his fingers are too cold or he can no longer get her preferred pace right because she turns and hobbles away, black and white tail raised like the exclamation mark to her dismissal.

The room spins when Isak pulls himself up with a hand on the counter. He’s not sure when this queasy, tight feeling crept into his stomach, but it’s been there for hours. The only other time he’s felt this nauseous was when his parents took him on a RIB boat ride for his sixteenth birthday, which Isak – for various reasons – never thinks about if he can help it.

He can hear himself talking to Hakon in the video. This is the section of the interview where Isak tells Hakon how much he hated school, how ashamed he is of some of the things he did to hide behind a straight, homophobic façade. He shares memories – all of them made up on the spot – of taking out his anger on others. You can actually hear Hakon swallow a couple of times and when he speaks, his voice is reedy with shame. He talks about the nerdy revue kid at school, a boy two years below him, whom he bullied for years, never quite knowing why the very existence of this boy, easy to hurt but defiantly queer, drove him out of his mind with anger.

When Hakon doesn’t bite the first two times, Isak nudges the conversation towards Hakon’s home life. Isak turns his own father into a taciturn homophobe. Hakon doesn’t say much, but he laughs once, bleakly. Says that his father was good with words but also with a belt.

In the video, Isak starts to bait Hakon with stories about Ilya, things he’s said, things he’s done, some true and some not, all the while adding little throw-away comments relating to Ilya’s preferred style of dress, his mannerisms, the pitch of his voice.

Rain is lashing against the windows. Isak turns and opens the cabinet containing glasses, only to find that he can’t easily use the kitchen tap for water because it’s blocked by the dirty plates and glasses. He mindlessly grabs the ancient rubber gloves that are stored in the drawer underneath the hob and starts rinsing the dishes, trying to focus on the clink of the glasses, turning the water on and off more often than is strictly necessary to distract himself from the video.

Hakon, voice a small broken thing, says: “I just… I don’t know. It’s my worst nightmare still. Being seen… as one of them.”

“As what?” Isak asks in the video.

“You know, limp-wristed pansies donning sequined shirts and eyeliner. I just don’t understand why they have to be so… damn obvious about it all.”

Behind Isak, Geir whistles through his teeth. The video is paused. Isak can hear the warmth in Geir’s voice: “Still got it, Spurv. I’m impressed.”

“You owe me 8.000 kr.”

When Geir doesn’t respond, Isak turns around, ready to snarl at Geir. He doesn’t get any of the words out because he’s stunned by the look on Geir’s face, stunned by the hot, painful rush of blood to his own face as he realizes what Geir must be seeing right now: Isak in the stupid old rubber gloves, cleaning up after Geir and his hookup.

Geir smiles and extends a sure hand, reaching for Isak. “I’m glad to have you back.”

***

Isak walks all the way back to Bygdøy. It’s like the East Asian Monsoon, having hitched a ride on the wrong train and ended up in Norway without a return ticket, is now desolately dumping weeks’ worth of rain on Oslo. His fingers and the display of his phone are slippery with rain when he transfers the outstanding money to his former flatmate and texts him a screenshot.

When Isak cuts through Dahlvillaen’s garden to reach the gear truck, the rain is no longer invisible in the darkness of the night but a gray sheet in the weak light of dawn.

Soaked and torn paper lanterns are dangling from the trees. The marquee is partly flooded. A gaggle of ill-tempered sea gulls congregates under a tree. Little brooks are streaming down the stone steps connecting the lower to the upper garden. Someone is gracelessly splashing right through them.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake…” Isak screws his hands into his drenched hair and waits by the bottom of the stairs.

Even is dressed in the world’s ugliest sweatpants and a soggy hoodie, and he keeps his head down, doesn’t even notice Isak until he’s right in front of him and stopped by an unfriendly outstretched arm.

“What the fuck are you doing here?”

Even blinks water from his eyes. They are bleary and distinctly unenthusiastic. “Later,” he mumbles. “Can we speak later?”

“Go back to your suite. No one wants to watch a suitor who sniffles and coughs his way through supposedly romantic dates.”

Even pushes Isak’s arm aside and makes his way to the pier, progress minimally slowed down by Isak’s scolding.

When they reach the end of the pier, Even removes his sneakers and pushes down his sweatpants, revealing the waistband of swim trunks and ignoring Isak’s hissed commentary on the bull-headed idiocy he’s displaying.

“Doing this once and for the camera is charmingly eccentric,” Isak points out. “Doing it again just a couple of days later, in the pouring rain, when the water is likely below 12 degrees, isn’t merely eccentric. It’s seriously demented. What’s wrong with you? Are you – Wait.” Fuck. Is this what mania looks like? Is this an actual emergency? Is this --

“Isak.” Even looks pissed off and tired and entirely levelheaded. His face and lips are shiny-wet with rain. “I’m okay. I do this every week. Can you… just go away, please?”

“Forget it.”

“Then give me five minutes. I’ll explain.”

“Oh, you’ll explain alright.” Isak stalks off and waits by the end of the pier, scratching his nails over the sodden gray wood of the railing, eyes fixed on Even’s head in the water.

It takes considerably longer than five minutes. Not the part that involves Even paddling around in the cold water, but everything that comes after. Even hurriedly pulls his rain-soaked clothes back on and sprints through the rain to the villa. Isak follows him to his suite and then, with vindictive calm, into the bathroom.

It matches the extravagant décor of the suite: the sandstone tiles are paired with sleek, polished chrome vanity units. There’s a giant backlit mirror, currently fogged up, and a small forest of Bonsai trees.

Even is already under the shower when Isak enters. The air is humid with steam. Isak props his back against the wall and crosses his arms. He’s not giving Even the satisfaction of letting his gaze stray a single millimeter below his stupid dimpled chin. “What. The. Fuck.”

“Working on my second career.” Even’s voice is awake now, dipping and swooping with the ghost of laughter. He is swiping at his brow with the back of his hand, trying to stop shampoo from running into his eyes. “I’m thinking dolphin trainer.”

“I swear to god, Even, if you don’t tell me what’s going on, I will roast Aurgelmir and feed you his haunches when you least expect it.”

Even’s jaw drops in melodramatic astonishment. “That’s dark.” He tilts his head back towards the stream to rinse shampoo from his hair. Water runs down his face and over his lips, their pink still tinged a little with blue, contours even more sharply defined than usual.

Isak thinks that Even’s lips are probably still cold, and that the hot water likely stings a little, and that’s when Even, eyes closed and head tipped back, touches his thumb to his wet lower lip like he’s chasing away that very sensation. Isak presses his back against the cold tiles and counts prime numbers from 1 to 100, viciously.

When Even steps out of the shower, Isak snatches his towels away.

“Really, that’s your revenge?” Even touches his tongue to his long canine, looking like a laughing and dripping wet predator. “You’re going to stand there, keeping my towels hostage, and pretend that you don’t care that I’m naked?”

“I don’t care. I don’t even –“

“Dare to look.”

“Want to look.”

“Yeah, I noticed. I don’t think my face has ever before been stared at with the same degree of single-minded fervor.”

“It’s not fervor, you idiot! It’s exasperation. Didn’t you hear? I have the libido of a misanthropic icicle.”

“We,” Even says, sounding entirely too pleased, “both know that isn’t true.”

“You know nothing.”

“Jon Snow,” Even says apropos of nothing.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“That’s what the hot wildling keeps saying to emo-Snow in Game of Thrones. She’s right. And also not. Because he’s pretty clueless in general, but he knows her.”

“For fuck’s sake. Stop going off topic.”

“I wasn’t. Why would I change the topic when we’re discussing how you’re too much of a chicken to look at me naked?”

“What is it with you?” Isak throws a hand in the air, palm up. “The topic is your early-morning lunacy!”

“Uh-hu. Chicken.”

“And I’d totally…”

Even shakes wet tendrils of hair out of his eyes. A few drops land on Isak’s cheek. “You’d totally what?”

“Look. If I wanted to.”

There’s a pause. Even’s voice is lower, stripped of its previous brazenness, when he says: “You can.”

Isak’s throat is uncomfortably dry. He’s feeling jittery, a little out of control. Even’s mien – eyebrows raised, mouth almost but not quite smiling – gives nothing away, but when Isak’s gaze drops to the side of his neck, he notices the minute, feverishly accelerated pulses of the artery there, clearly visible underneath Even’s fine skin. Isak wants to put his mouth there, open it against Even’s skin, bite over the pulse. He wants to crowd Even against the wall, slide his hands into his wet hair, pin him in place with his hips. Be selfish with him. Touch him fucking everywhere. Take him apart. Isak wants – he wants so much and everything at once, he’s spinning out of control, and this, you see, this is the storm tide.

He can’t even hear what Even is whispering to him over the sound of his thundering heart. How did this thing get so out of hand? And where the fuck do prime numbers go when you need them? His stupid brain seems to have lost the ability to count beyond 97.

Isak bites the inside of his cheek, hard. That’s when he remembers that there’s a place in his mind that can always be relied upon to swallow him whole, isolating him from whatever situation he’s in. So that’s where he directs his thoughts.

He meets Even’s gaze, no longer nervous. “Okay.” Says it and lets his eyes roam over Even’s body.

A few things register. He’s pierced alright, and he’s got a long, drastic scar on the knee and another one on his outer thigh. He’s half hard. But the person Isak’s with in his mind isn’t Even, and the onslaught of thorny emotions thus provoked isn’t for Even either.

Isak doesn’t keep track of time, just looks Even up and down mechanically until Even clears his throat and says in a voice that Isak hasn’t heard before: “I… um… I think you should give me my towel.”

“Sure.” Isak hands over all three towels, a neat stack.

The room is very quiet suddenly. Even dries off and struggles into his boxers and shirt like someone’s timing him.

Isak’s skin itches. He’s started to sweat in the humid room and his rain-drenched shirt is still sticking to his back.

“Could you maybe…” Even’s gaze darts to door, then down. “No – you’re not leaving until you’ve got your answer, right?” He doesn’t even wait for Isak’s response, just barrels on: “Cold water swimming. It helps with depression and anxiety. More effectively than most mood stabilizers I’ve been on.”

Isak, grateful for the distraction, tries to think of related physiological mechanisms that might impact mood in this way. “Are there studies done on it?”

“Um...” Even stares at him, like it takes him a moment to process the words. “Probably? I don’t know.”

Being pestered by a cocky and freshly-showered Even was onerous enough. This thing here – Even starting every other second to fidget with his hair or shirt collar, then stopping abruptly, a polite smile plastered on his face – is unbearable.

So maybe what Isak just pulled was a bit of a dick move. They’re not going to talk about it, that’s for sure. But he wants the tension gone from Even’s mouth, his drawn-up shoulders. He doesn’t want him to feel bad. He has no clue how to improve matters. Spread the awkwardness around, maybe?

Isak curls his fingers underneath the hem of his drenched shirt and pulls it over his head.

Even takes a rapid step back and knocks his elbow against one of the sinks. “What are you doing?”

Isak shrugs. “I need a shower and yours is right here.” He pulls down his jeans and boxers and walks over to the shower naked. He stops right before he steps behind the glass enclosure and glances over his shoulder. “Fair is fair. You can ogle me as much as you like. I don’t care.”

Even makes a sound that isn’t quite a laugh. “Yeah. I know.” He pulls a fresh towel from the shelf and flings it over the sink where Isak can easily reach it. “I’ll be downstairs.”

Isak turns up the heat, makes the water as hot as he can stand it, then turns the temperature up higher. He’s light-headed and unsteady on his legs when he steps out of the shower. When he grabs his jeans, his phone clutters from his back pocket to the floor. There’s a text from Isak’s former flatmate.

Isak stares at it.

Looks up. His reflection in the fogged-up mirror is just a blur of colors bleeding into one another.

Learn to stick to a fucking deadline. Computer’s already sold.

Chapter Text

All around the farm, the scenery looks like something straight out of a children’s book: rolling green hills that stretch into the distance, dotted by well-groomed sheep and little clusters of birch trees. A little brook that dips in and out of view like a glittering ribbon, weaving its way through the apple orchard. Not a cloud in the blue, blue sky.

Isak could be taking in the picturesque surroundings, but instead he’s losing a staring contest with the fainting goat blocking his way to Magnus and the rest of the camera team. There’s a metaphor in that: it sums up Isak’s day, his entire week, actually. A series of small, irksome obstacles that come in all shapes and forms – obstinate Bovidae, three of their best loggers wiped out by food poisoning, an almost week-long spell of rain that’s fucked up their shooting schedule. None of this would normally cause Isak so much as to blink, but right now, every little thing that goes wrong feels personal, like he brought it on himself by being a rotten disaster of a person.

Of course, that’s hardly news. Isak has a firm handle on his own nature. He’s gotten used to the crew’s scorn, but now he also gets to see the contempt that he feels for himself mirrored, with cold exactitude, in the contestants’ eyes. They tiptoe around him like a band of well-mannered mice reeling from the discovery that there’s a rattlesnake hiding in their midst. That’s because the day after the viewers voted out Hakon, someone – Sara? William? Christoffer? A new foe on set who hasn’t shown their hand yet? – left a crew laptop in the kitchen of the mansion, footage of Isak’s interview with Hakon helpfully opened for the first casual passer-by to find. The first passer-by was Vilde. Nothing about her reaction was casual.

Isak hasn’t asked, but he’s pretty sure that Even has seen the video, too. And it shouldn’t matter. After what happened in Even’s bathroom – nothing said, nothing done, and yet so much damage wrought – Even was bound to hate him anyway. So what if Even knows that there are more shades than one to Isak’s assholery?

It does matter, though. It matters in a way that makes Isak feel cold and slightly nauseated whenever he looks at Even. Unsurprisingly, it’s fucking difficult to avoid looking at the leading man of the show that Isak is producing.

Said leading man is currently kneeling in a vegetable patch, flanked by Mikael and Liv, and digging out weeds like he’s found his vocation. Isak needs to tell Magnus, who isn’t wearing his fucking comms, to get a close-up of Liv and Even being cute with earthworms. Because the goat isn’t budging, Isak has to splash right through a puddle to get to the camera crew. It’s a deep puddle. His shoes are drenched in a moment, then his socks. Just as Isak passes him, the little fucker of a goat farts, daintily and triumphantly.

Isak whips his head around in disbelief. The goat stares back and bleats as if to say: That’s what you get for shooting on a farm.

The beast probably has a point. Even and ten of the contestants are spending the day at Nordre Røine Gård, forty kilometers west of Oslo. They drove over in the wee hours of the morning, 30 members of crew in tow. A couple of hours later, Geir showed up in his black Porsche. He annihilated Sana’s shooting schedule over a hasty coffee-and-cigarette breakfast and replaced it with a much more ambitious, grueling program for the day.

Nordre Røine Gård is home to Mikael’s commune of intentional hippies. That’s not how they describe themselves, of course. No, Nordre Røine is a community of intention and Isak has heard this phrase so often today, pronounced with righteous and earth-loving sincerity, that he’s this close to losing his shit and snapping “But what is your intention? What fucking intention are we talking about?” at the next person sauntering by in birkenstocks and sustainable hemp clothing.

Isak has been good though. All day he’s been a model of restraint and politeness – mainly because he’s been observing the change that coming out here has wrought on Even. It’s subtle, easy to miss, like all of Even’s reactions that matter.

Most days, Even’s a bright, febrile enigma that no one gets to unravel. He can be spontaneous, a little reckless even. But then there are all these other times when Isak can tell that Even is keeping himself on a leash, tightly wrapped around his own wrist. Pausing in the doorway to a room to hide his restless hands in his pockets before sauntering in to join the contestants; stopping himself mid-sentence as soon as he starts monologuing about a film or artist he’s excited about; compulsively nicking pens to draw stuff on scraps of paper that disappear soon as a camera draws near.

Even is exercising the leash a lot more this week, Isak has noticed. He looks tired as fuck, even after the makeup girls have done their work, and he surrounds himself with people every minute of the day although he doesn’t look like he’s enjoying it much.

It’s a relief to see him out here on the farm – calmer, happier, the tight set of his shoulders that Isak has frowned at all week finally relaxed. Isak can tell that he enjoys hanging out with Mikael’s friends and two dozen species of rescue animals. Planting things, hands in sturdy gloves, which is good because Even’s hands are another thing that’s worrying Isak. He has a theory about Even’s hands that he doesn’t like.

Once Isak’s done briefing Magnus, he goes to find Sana. This requires crossing the courtyard, flanked by aesthetically distressed old farmhouse buildings that seem to hunker down under the weight of an overabundance of climbing roses. They’ll shoot here later – provided that Sana has been successful in negotiating the temporary removal of the two hellhounds that roamed the courtyard when they arrived this morning.

Mikael explained that they’re rescue Kintamanis, who are healing from their traumatic childhood in Indonesia. They don’t appreciate sudden movements and when you address them, you have to use one of three Indonesian phrases that Mikael helpfully repeated for everyone.

Isak is healing from his own traumatic childhood encounter with a large dog and would rather not spend time in the vicinity of highly-strung canines. Turns out the Kintamanis are still around: they have claimed the low wall that connects the main building to one of the former stables and are fighting over what’s bound to be a vegan dog treat. Isak makes sure not to show them his back, not even a half-turned shoulder, while walking towards Sana.

She’s talking to Audhilda Hove Greseth who founded this community twenty years ago. Audhilda is a soft-spoken woman in her fifties with an unruly mane of strawberry blonde hair, shot through with gray, and deep-set eyes that blink with owlish intelligence behind her glasses. She reminds Isak a little of his mother, but only until he hears what she’s saying to Sana.

“You have to understand that we’re experimenting at the junction of social-justice-based activism, earth-centered spiritualism, and radical environmentalism. We strictly reject speciesism and we’re not going to dictate the path of any human or non-human member of our community.”

“No one wants to dictate the path of your dogs,” Sana says. “We just want to encourage them to enjoy the beauty of the vegetable garden for an hour or so.” There’s a facial expression that Sana reserves for occasions like this one – smile lemony, eyes flat as coins – that has struck fear and terror into the hearts of many. Audhilda seems immune though.

Isak enjoys Sana’s wince as Audhilda pats her arm and says: “I don’t want to continue this conversation without including the dogs. Why don’t we --”

There’s a weird clucking sound coming through Isak’s comms, followed by someone humming the first notes of Circle of Life, badly. It’s the same signal Eskild has been using for the past three seasons whenever he’s needed to call in Isak for backup.

When Isak steps into the airy meditation room where Eskild and the makeup midgets have pitched their tent for the day, he’s expecting to walk into something ridiculous. All day, Eskild’s been on a mission to make the girls plus Yousef wear flower crowns for the grand picnic on the cow meadow – an idea that was greeted with considerable pushback even before one of the rescue cows started to chew on Vilde’s flower-studded bun.

But the only people Isak can see are a couple of makeup girls as well as Eskild and Even, standing on either side of a mobile garment rack. No one has noticed Isak.

Eskild usually rocks awkwardness like one of his sequined kimonos – with slightly twitchy aplomb. Not today though: he’s clearly unsettled, craning his pale neck this way and that like he’s looking for a hidden exit. And Even… Isak has never seen him in a confrontational mood and would be hard-pressed to point to actual evidence in Even’s posture or mien, but there’s something about the careful way in which Even holds himself, face politely shuttered, that makes Isak draw in a breath and look for trouble.

Trouble is leaning against one of the exposed wood beams, barely visible from the door, and scrolling lazily on his phone. “If you can’t sell yourself, we will,” Geir says without looking up. “Now get changed.”

No one moves. Isak can’t figure out what’s wrong, only that there is a strange quality to the silence in the room.

He’s about to say something, make his presence known, when Geir lifts his head and winks at Isak like he was expecting him. “Thank God, you’re here, Spurv. Someone needs to wrangle the suitor and last time I checked that was your job.”

Isak can feel Even’s gaze on him, but he doesn’t return it. Whatever he’ll find in Even’s eyes – anger, hurt, probably a healthy dose of disgust – will only distract him and he can’t be distracted. Not with Geir in this mood. He can’t even gauge if Geir is toying with him or Even or both. Isak locks eyes with Eskild instead. Eskild flutters his lashes in what appears to be some worried Morse code that isn’t telling Isak shit.

Isak deliberately relaxes his shoulders and, smiling, turns back to Geir. “Don’t see much need for wrangling here. We’re getting ready to shoot Even’s bucolic date with Mikael. Weather’s glorious and livestock freshly shampooed. Should be good.”

“You see,” Geir explains pleasantly, “Even isn’t happy with the outfit Eskild’s picked for him.”

“Options!” Eskild interjects. “There are lots of options! We could –“

“I like your first pick,” Geir says.

“I don’t,” Even says.

Isak thinks that maybe he’s got the wrong end of the stick after all. Maybe Eskild overreacted because this is a tussle over fashion – a foreign and ludicrous continent, as far as Isak is concerned. If Even, afficionado of magenta suits and nose rings, wants to be difficult about fashion, he doesn’t need Isak as audience.

“Come here, Spurv,” Geir says.

“I’m pretty sure pet names fall under workplace discrimination,” Isak says, friendly enough, as he walks over to Geir.

“Right.” Geir taps his phone against Isak’s nose before Isak can draw back. “I forgot that recent developments have turned you into an authority on workplace law. Here, take a look.” He holds out his phone. “What do you see?”

It’s a picture of a younger Even, goofing around with a girl at some glitzy event. The girl is very pretty, but she looks like she’s just raided a charity shop and come out with a loot of drab, ill-fitting clothes. It’s a weird contrast to Even, who’s wearing an outrageous velvet suit in turquoise with an extravagant, old-timey neckcloth. His arm is slung around the girl’s waist, body turned toward her intimately. She’s winking at him, grinning brightly and reaching out a playful hand, pretending that she’s about to grab his junk. In the picture, Even’s faced is flushed and a little shiny, mouth lax, eyes unfocused and narrowed with mirth. He looks high as a kite but also… free and euphoric in a manner that makes Isak, who’s still staring at the picture and needs to stop, now, unaccountably sad.

“Who’s she?” Isak asks.

Geir turns the phone around and shows it to Even. “Yeah, who’s that, Even? I mean, do you even remember?”

Surprise, ill-repressed and not of the pleasant kind, glides over Even’s features before his face smooths out once more. “An old friend,” he says.

Geir nods. “The best of friends, from the look of it. Reconnecting with old friends is always good but breaking in new ones has its own allure. Would you say that Isak is your friend, Even?”

It’s the truth and Isak has said so himself, repeatedly, but something inside him still tightens sharply at Even’s quiet “No.”

Geir nods. “I agree. See, Isak is the kind of guy who might come scratching at your door at night…” Isak’s stomach plummets just as Even’s stunned gaze swings to him. Is this just Geir, fucking with him, or did he somehow catch wind of Isak’s nightly visit to Even’s suite?

“But the thing you have to know about this one,” Geir says to Even, hooking a lazy finger into Isak’s belt loop, “is that he’s always working. Tireless for my cause, you know. Anyway, where were we?”

Geir makes a little show of checking the picture on his phone again and Isak uses the moment to extricate himself as casually as he can from Geir’s hold on him, which is not very casual at all. He can feel warmth sliding up his throat and into his cheeks, knows that Even must notice it and draw his own conclusions. He can’t allow himself to think about that now. What he needs to figure out is what Geir is playing at because none of this makes sense. The first night he’d come to Even’s suite, he’d seen for himself that Even had covered all the cameras in his suite.

He remembers lying on Even’s bed, reading to him, falling asleep there with the lights still on. The idea that Geir might have seen any of that makes him feel hot, then cold.

“Back to the problem at hand,” Geir continues jovially. He turns to Even: “When people thought that you were serious about writing, you were always noted for your fashion sense and pretty face. Probably more so than for your actual book, but who cares, right?”

Isak can’t tell where Geir is going with this but he sure as hell doesn’t like. He tries checking in with Even, but now that Isak is trying to catch his eye, Even is determinedly looking past him.

Hoping that he’s throwing a bucket full of water on an ant’s nest rather than poking it with a stick, Isak asks: “So… this is about a suit?”

“Oh yes. Yes!” That’s Eskild. He points to a couple of hangers with a hassled little flourish. “I was thinking we should… Well, actually, there are a couple of different outfits to choose from. How about…”

“The choice has been made,” Geir, who doesn’t give a fig about fashion, says.

“We’re on a farm,” Even’s deep voice is uncharacteristically curt. “Run by people who care about environmental justice and abhor the fashion industry. I don’t want to flounce around wearing stuff that makes me look like I’m trying to be Norwegian Harry Styles. If you want to tell a story about a city idiot falling over his feet on a farm, I can do a bit of that for the camera. But I want to keep wearing my own clothes.” He’s in jeans and a chunky cable-knit sweater that’s too warm for the season. Two more layers are peeking out from underneath the hem of his sweater. “I don’t see how that’s a problem.”

“We’ve been letting you do this all week,” Geir says. “And whenever we’ve released a picture on the website or IG, viewers have flooded us with messages asking what’s wrong with the suitor -- and why on earth does he suddenly look scrofulous? So from now on, we’re back to you wearing what we tell you to wear.” He flicks his finger in the direction of the clothes rack. “Now change or I’ll have Isak read you your contract.”

Even’s hand flexes against his thigh, just once. His face remains impassive, but Isak can tell from his sculptured stillness that he’s frenziedly chasing his thoughts. Trying and trying to come up with something to outwit Geir, beat him at this game, but he’s losing. Because that’s what happens when you challenge Geir and Isak hates it so much his teeth hurt.

When Even starts to change, he doesn’t withdraw into a more secluded corner of the room. He just pulls his sweater over his head and then continues to shuck his many layers of clothing one by one. Isak turns to leave, but Geir doesn’t allow him to. “You’re not done here, Spurv. I have a budget review meeting with the network head later today. Here are the things I need you to check for me.”

Geir starts dictating stuff that Isak types into his phone, but no matter how he’s trying to concentrate on Geir and policing his gaze, he’s still hyper aware of Even. Glances at him often enough to see two vivid splotches of color grow in his cheeks, then vanish, leaving him even paler than before.

The makeup girls who migrated into this part of the room as soon as Even started undressing are wandering away one by one because there’s nothing sexy about this. The contrast is discomfiting. Isak knows that Even, in the right mood, can turn very basic acts – say, leaning against a wall, smoking – into something else entirely. Long, deft fingers. Plush lips. Cigarette. A casual shift of his hips and a considered look will send your thoughts straight to the bedroom, never to recover.

This, here, is the opposite. It’s cold and a little ugly: Even’s movements are stiff and utilitarian, and Isak makes himself look away, he really does, but somehow he still glimpses all these things he’s not meant to see. Gangly, pale legs. The ridges of Even’s spine, bumpy and too sharply defined when he leans forward. A half-turned shoulder, streaked by a flare of acne.

The light is different, much colder than in Even’s steamed up bathroom, and what was an invitation then, warm and playful, has hardened into an expression of stark, helpless resentment.

When he’s done, Even makes straight for the door. Right before he steps through the beaded curtain, Geir says: “Even, wait. Do you know how many people are attached to the show?”

Even turns around slowly. Isak’s too much of a fashion ignoramus to know if an absurdly low-cut Breton tank top paired with navy chinos and a blue chiffon scarf are objectively terrible. He doesn’t care either way, he just wants the tension gone from Even’s features, from his limbs, forced into preternaturally still composure.

“Go ahead, tell me,” Even says.

“Seventy-eight and that’s only the team on the ground. They’re working their asses off to produce this show and you’re making everyone’s job here fucking difficult because you’re not delivering what you’re paid to do.”

“What precisely am I paid to do?”

“Crank up the charm. Fall in love, or at least fuck someone in a camera-friendly manner. Ideally, you’ll do both – just not with the same person because that would be boring as hell. And Even —”

Even lifts his chin. The light is shifty where he’s standing, the bright rays of the early-summer sun caught and refracted unevenly by the crystals of the beaded curtain. Tiny, swaying shadows play across his face, his throat, the exposed wings of his collarbones. He looks gorgeous and utterly beat. The corner of his mouth lifts without humor. “Make it look real?”

Geir smiles in return. “Exactly.”

*

“Man, what are we doing here?” Mikael, yanked none too gently behind a yew hedge, is staring dubiously at the cardigan Isak is proffering. “You know I only wear sustainable…”

“This wool,” Isak interrupts him, “has been recycled five times. It’s the slowest fashion on the planet. Fucking wear this over your shirt. Don’t give Even shit for his outfit, he didn’t have a choice. Just offer him your cardigan the first opportunity you get. Make it… you can play it up for the camera, you get that, right? Make it romantic. He’s cold and you want him to be comfortable.”

Mikael still looks unconvinced. “I don’t trust you. Plus, this is a weird-ass color and I really –”

“Viewers will love it,” Isak says through his teeth. “They’ll think you’re thoughtful. And kind.”

“Well, I wouldn’t say I’m not…”

“Yessss! Precisely!” Isak steps forward and all but manhandles Mikael into the cardigan.

“Does it look good?” Mikael asks, looking down at himself while pushing away a few strands of his mane that have gone static from rubbing against the wool.

“Yeah,” Isak says, a little bummed that it’s not a lie. “You’re still going to offer it to Even, though. Five minutes into the shoot tops. Viewers will eat it up, promise.”

Before they get started, Mikael takes Sana’s arm and leads her away a few steps, clearly conferring with her. Isak feels Sana’s stare on him, but when Mags and his team are finally in position, Mikael is still wearing the cardigan. More importantly, a few minutes later the cardigan changes hands under an exuberantly blooming apple tree.

Mikael playfully tugs down a twisted sleeve for Even, stepping a little closer than is strictly necessary.

Standing shoulder to shoulder with Isak, Sana hums appreciatively: “You’re pathetic. But thanks for helping my candidate to shine.”

They’re surveying proceedings from a little distance. Even and Mikael have been expertly micced by Linn, and Sana and Isak are listening in to their exchanges just as Linn records them.

Isak says: “Mikael’s such a disaster, he needs all the help he can get.”

“Oh, you think so? Do you know, Even told me earlier that he’s glad he’s spending the afternoon with Mikael because they never run out of things to talk about.”

“Same is true of me and my dentist. Doesn’t mean we’re riding off into the sunset together.”

“Mmh…” Isak doesn’t even have to turn his head, he can hear the satisfied smile in Sana’s voice. “But have you ever cuddled a potbellied teacup pig with your dentist?”

One of Mikael’s friends, who’s acting as their unofficial animal wrangler for the day, has just released the well-trained, pot-bellied little bugger, who’s bounding towards Mikael, or rather towards the apple that’s waiting on Mikael’s outstretched hand. Adorableness ensues.

The pig is called Grieg and it makes these delighted, hiccupy squeaking-sounds soon as Even starts scratching the bristles behind its ears. It takes less than a minute before Even is sitting cross-legged in the grass, a pair of tiny hoofs possessively claiming his left knee. Mikael plonks himself down next to him, laughing. Their shoulders touch. Mikael tells the sob-story of how Grieg was saved from irresponsible breeders. Even breaks into giggles when the pig starts rooting around his cardigan-clad midriff with his stubby snout. It’s all painfully charming even before Mikael teaches Even to sign I love potbellied pigs.

Next to Isak, Sana makes a sound that must be the noir-version of cooing. She fishes a chocolate bar from her pocket – definitely neither handmade nor vegan – breaks it into two and offers Isak half of it. “My contestant is winning this thing. Have some sugar to numb the pain.”

“Sonja will annihilate him,” Isak mumbles around a mouthful of chocolate, “just wait for it.”

It’s good: working and competing with Sana feels a bit like the old days. The queasy feeling that settled into Isak’s stomach during the earlier encounter with Geir isn’t gone, but he’s breathing easier in her company, can feel his muscles loosen a little.

“Why did you learn to sign?” Even asks Mikael.

Mikael talks about his younger sister then, who had cochlear implant surgery before she turned one and is soon to graduate from high school. Isak is expecting Mikael to go all in, exploit the sentimental value of a young girl facing discrimination and rising above circumstances, aided by her older brother. But that’s not what happens. Mikael doesn’t dole out juicy details or tell stories about the challenges his sister has overcome. He talks about the fact that she loves languages and wants to study linguistics, but he elegantly sidesteps giving her name. His love for her appears to be of the quiet, fiercely protective kind that’s not unfamiliar to Isak. It makes him feel some grudging respect for Mikael.

Thankfully, it’s a fleeting sensation because Mikael transmutes back into a walking cliché immediately after. He pulls an old-school camera from his jute bag and turns to Even, tilting his head to the side flirtatiously. “Can I take your picture? I love film, but photography is the art form that’s closest to my heart.”

“Dear Lord…” Isak groans and turns to Sana. “Bet you 500 kroner it’s a Leica.”

“I don’t go anywhere without my Leica,” Mikael says to Even.

Sana smiles when Isak mutters fatalistically: “He was lovingly taught by some doting old person.”

“My grandfather taught me,” Mikael tells Even. “It’s one of my most precious memories.”

Isak’s so busy commiserating with himself for always being fucking right, he misses half of Mikael’s wordy panegyric on Even’s movie star looks. He tunes back in when Mikael repeats his earlier question – can he take a couple of pictures?

Interestingly, Isak can tell that for the briefest moment, Even comes close to saying no. Then he seems to remember that three different cameras have their focus trained on him already and nods, well-mannered smile firmly in place. “Sure.”

They go off on a gander through the orchard, the camera team and Grieg on their heels, and Mikael snaps about a million pictures.

“This is excellent,” Sana says. “We can probably sell some of these through the fan shop. Viewers are shipping these two hard.”

“Really?” Isak hasn’t had time to look at their latest polls.

“Oh yeah. It’s Mikven all the way.”

“Ugh. That ship name is … fittingly terrible. Also, have you looked at Mikael’s pictures on IG? My gut says he’s not actually very good at this.”

When Sana’s taking uncharacteristically long to respond, Isak pokes a triumphant finger gun in her direction. “Knew it! They’re shit, aren’t they?! He’s a shit photographer!”

“What – are you five? You look so happy right now.” Sana shakes her head, but her dimples are definitively deepening. “Doesn’t matter anyway. There’s enough time to dispatch Linn later. She can take Even back to the orchard and snap a couple of beautiful pictures. She won’t mind if we tell people that Mikael took them as long as she gets a cut of the money.”

“Mmh. You do understand that I’ll have to tell Mikael though.”

“Yes, Isak. I understand. You’re a resentful grump and always will be.”

“You like it, though. We’re buds.” That’s a joke because in all the years they’ve worked together, Sana has never admitted to friendly feelings for Isak.

Isak stops sniggering when Sana says: “We were.”

“What?”

“We were something. Certainly not ‘buds’ because who on earth uses that word? Comrades-in-arms. Co-conspirators. That’s closer to what we were.”

“Right.” Isak swallows and keeps his gaze firmly on Even and Mikael. “Well, that was before I ratted out Toril and Niko, sabotaged last season’s finale, and turned myself into a reality tv pariah.”

“No.”

“No?”

“Toril and Niko,” Sana says, voice quiet and cutting, “supplied an unstable nineteen-year-old with vast amounts of crack and looked the other way when she was sexually assaulted on set. Of course, I want the people responsible punished. But I would have gone about it very differently. We both know that Toril and Niko were able to continue with their high jinks for so long because someone else very deliberately turned a blind eye.”

Geir’s name, unspoken, is a heavy presence between them.

“You would have moved against him?” Isak asks, incredulous. It’s unthinkable. Playing against Geir and winning.

“I want control of the show,” Sana says simply. “If you’d come and talked to me before going off like a self-destructive missile, I think we could have worked something out. Provided you’d been up for going against him. Because that’s the other thing with you: for all the damage you did to the show, I was never sure you were actually trying to damage Geir. Or just hankering for his attention.”

Her words hurt like a blow, scattering all the rationalizations that Isak had just summoned in his defense.

Sana clicks her tongue. “And you still don’t know, do you? You hate him and you love him, and you’ve been his favorite, his prize pupil, for so long, that you don’t know where your loyalty lies. Do you know when the two of us stopped being not-buds?”

Isak licks his dry lips and tastes copper. “When?”

“When you threw Hakon to the wolves. For as long as I’ve known you, you’ve been cunning as hell, but never cruel.”

“I –”

“Yeah, I’m sure you had an agenda. Still doesn’t excuse what you did.”

Isak presses his lips together, fights the impulse to tell Sana about Geir’s laptop that he stole, that is still out there somewhere. A ticking time bomb.

“Do you know, I think that things are about to get interesting.” Sana nods to Even who’s now inspecting apple blossoms with Mikael. “You two don’t talk, but it’s clear as day that you don’t want to see Even hurt. All week, you’ve been an absolute terror on set just to make sure that he gets as many breaks as possible.”

“That’s bullshit. I’ve merely…”

Sana interrupts him: “Geir has noticed, too. He’s testing you, and he’s going to go after Even. So if you want to protect him, you’ll have to take on Geir.” She turns fully to Isak, holds his gaze and doesn’t allow him to look away. “Make up your mind.”

*

Isak’s been on his best behavior all day, but he slips up right at the end of their interminable shoot of a relationship-building exercise, run by the Nordre Røine community for their LASD visitors. Everyone’s gathered in a converted barn that may have housed oxen a hundred years ago, but now looks like an Airbnb Luxe flagship property: exposed beams reach up all the way to the soaring vaulted ceiling; there’s a brick fireplace large enough to barbecue whatever is the vegan equivalent to a hog roast; and everyone’s sitting barefoot on a massive rug whose contemporary and interfaith-conscious interpretation of oriental motifs must have cost a fortune.

Prepping the Nordre Røine people for the camera wasn’t arduous because all of them present themselves either as suitably picturesque aging hippies, like Audhilda, or as smooth-faced and uniformly attractive young environmental activists. The thing they all have in common is their irony-purged dedication to better the world “one heart, one home, one acre at a time”.

They call their daily gathering in the barn their soul-work circle. Isak, who’s throwing in a question here and there to generate useful soundbites, asks what soul-work entails precisely and smiles kindly all through the comprehensive answer.

He continues to smile kindly when Audhilda presents a shoebox that’s unaccountably been wrapped in gift paper. It’s attached via string to a 1000 kroner bill. Audhilda presses the shoe-carton into Mikael’s hands, then whips out scissors with a beatific smile. Isak tries to steel himself for an object lesson, but it’s sort of difficult to prepare for what follows.

“See what we’re going to do here? We’re going to literally and fundamentally cut this connection!” Audhilda explains as she – literally and fundamentally – cuts the string. “And then I’m going to invite you to receive this gift of community and peacebuilding.” She mimes passing on the shoebox to Mikael. “Receive it – body, heart, and mind. And then turn around and give it – no, gift it – to the next person. And as you do it, just try to have an embodied experience.”

There’s lots of warm nodding and people gazing meaningfully into each other’s eyes as the shoebox starts to make its round. Isak glances at Even, who hates him, fair enough, but who might still betray himself in one of his most fleeting reactions – the twitch of an eyebrow, or maybe two fingers rubbing his chin while his face is all serious. Just a tiny something that tells Isak that he’s not the only person whose embodied experience currently consists of energetic attempts to repress his laughter.

But Even’s attention is fixed on Mikael, who’s hugging his knees to his body, squirming a little on the expensive rug like he’s just introduced his first crush to his embarrassing parents. Even gives him a smile, a real one that crinkles the corners of his eyes, then discreetly rests the back of two fingers against Mikael’s naked ankle.

Isak needs to check that one of their cameras is catching this because that’s his fucking job, but instead… instead he stares. Then starts counting until Even takes away his fingers after five and a half seconds. Right. It’s very useful to have the exact number because they might well… have to shoot something like this at some point in the future. Realism is everything in Reality TV. See, that’s why it’s called Reality TV – resemblance of reality, staged feelings all the way.

Even and Mikeal are whispering now, heads closely together. Irrelevant. Isak whips out his mobile and gets to work on a detailed list of things that he needs to brief the loggers on once they get back.

When everyone’s soul-work has been accomplished for the day and they’re finally wrapping the shoot, Isak wanders through the room because he’s spied an unattended apple on the sideboard and is ravenous enough to eat vitamins.

He steps on something pink and looks down. Edvard Munch stares back at him. Isak can’t believe that these entitled rich-kid hippies are so minted they can throw money on the floor and just forget about it. He crouches down and mindlessly pockets the note, a bit of string still attached to it.

“Look at this.” It’s Mikael’s voice, raised to carry.

When Isak turns his head, he can see him standing in the door, Even by his side, observing Isak.

Mikael jerks his chin in the general direction of Isak’s jeans pocket. “Really, you’re a thief, too?”

Isak rises to his feet, indescribably tired all of a sudden. “Damn,” he says after a moment, letting his eyes go round and distraught. “Haven’t done quite enough soul-work, have I?”

He turns away then and hunts down the apple. It’s mealy and tasteless.

Karma doesn’t like people who steal from the intentionally good, that much becomes clear almost immediately. Isak is jogging rather than walking across the courtyard because the weather is turning and if they don’t start shooting the picnic within the next half an hour, they’ll get drenched.

There’s a flash of black, a snarl, and when Isak staggers around, far too late, there’s a snapping, growling Kintamani about a meter away, a second one by his side.

There are things you’re supposed to do to assert dominance when faced with angry dogs, but Isak – heart hammering, vision whitening out like an overexposed picture – can’t think of a single one. He’s six years old again and gasping, no longer able to outrun the furious dog that’s closing in on him.

Help. There must be some help around – and really, when Isak wrests his gaze away from the Kintamani that’s now ducking its neck, baring saliva-slick teeth, muscles all tensed up, he sees Vilde and a few other contestants watching him from the other side of the courtyard. None of them look like they’re about to intervene.

He’s going to get mauled by these Furies while they watch and he’s going to, he’s going to -- His throat makes these high-pitched, thin sounds that have nothing in common with words. There isn’t enough air reaching his lungs, his muscles are seizing up -- and then the dog bounds forward.

Isak throws an arm before his body and there’s pain, ripping into his body white-hot and searing. The dog’s there and then it’s gone. Someone’s shouting in a language that Isak can’t make out, and then Mikael’s right in front of Isak. He has one of the dogs by the collar and Isak, stumbling backwards, can see that Audhilda is taking hold of the other beast.

Even’s there, too, and suddenly everyone’s rushing towards them and Isak’s throat is hurting from how hard and rapidly he’s swallowing to keep down the sounds, tame his breathing because he will not, cannot, let them see him like this.

When Audhilda proclaims that she was a pediatric nurse in a previous life and has seen to plenty of dog bites, Isak lets himself be ushered into the main building without protest. Anything to get away.

His arm is throbbing and his fingers are sticky and warm, but he stares ahead. Puts one foot before the other, counting prime numbers. When he gets stuck on nineteen, he just repeats that number in his head until the word has lost all meaning.

“Leather, most probably cowhide,” Audhilda interrupts Isak’s thoughts, poking the lapel of his jacket. “I don’t approve, of course, but it’s good padding in a situation like this. I bet you won’t even need stitches.”

It’s the jacket Isak bought with his first bonus. His gaze flickers down and he can see that he’ll never wear it again. It’s the most disorienting thought of all.

The communal bathroom into which Audhilda is leading Isak is spacious. The stalls are laid with expensive-looking blue and sea-green mosaic tiles. They shiver and drift apart before Isak’s eyes like the crystals in a kaleidoscope. Weird music is floating through the air, and at first he thinks the sounds are in his head, but then he notices the loud speakers.

Audhilda, following the direction of his gaze, nods: “Earth abides, but sea abides, too. On Fridays, we honor our sea-bound fellow critters.”

Isak has to swallow a couple of times before his voice produces more than a croak. “By playing foghorn signals on repeat?”

“Humpback whale song!” Audhilda corrects him. She takes a large, battered-looking first-aid kit from one of the drawers, then peels Isak out of his jacket.

“Knew it,” she says after a quick glance at his arm. “You boys are all big babies when it comes to dogs. Bet this won’t look half as bad once we’ve washed the wound.” And then – Isak misses the transition – she’s talking about the maritime conservation scheme that the community’s donations are keeping afloat, and that’s a natural segue into a detailed character sketch of each of the seven humpback whales who’ve been adopted by the community.

Isak is sweating and breathing raggedly, like he’s just run a marathon, but he’s cold, so cold.

Someone enters the bathroom and disappears into one of the stalls before Isak can summon the strength to turn his head. Audhilda is still talking whales at him, and he follows dumbly until she starts sharing her passionate views about autism among humpback whales. Then he closes his eyes -- right before wrenching them open again, just in time for throwing up into one of the sinks.

“Good aim!” Audhilda pushes a towel into Isak’s hand. “Clean yourself up. And then we better take a look at this arm, shall we? Put it under the faucet, come on.”

There’s quite a bit of blood. The soap burns, and apparently the wound needs to be rinsed for five minutes straight, which seem to stretch and stretch with vindictive elasticity. Audhilda is back to monologuing about humpback whale autism, and Isak’s legs feel like heated wax, melting into the floor. When Audhilda finally turns off the faucet, he kicks out the three-legged work stool that someone’s put away under the row of sinks. Sits down heavily. The thing doesn’t have a back, which is a shame. Isak gets a little lost in contemplating the faults of work stool design with his eyes half-closed.

When he pulls himself together, Audhilda is waving a heavy gauze pad before his eyes. “Here, put some pressure on the wound. Won’t take long before the bleeding stops.”

Isak squints at her, and this is when he notices that right behind Audhilda, Even is washing his hands in one of the sinks. And yes, Isak is a thief and a liar who deserves most of the bad things that come his way, but surely fate is being unnecessary cruel here: the weird melting sensation has reached Isak’s upper body and he just knows that in a moment, Even will either witness Isak crumple to the terracotta tiles or see him pitch face-first into the hand-woven waste basket – probably in slow-motion, set to the chanting of forlorn autistic humpback whales.

That’s not what happens though. Audhilda rummages noisily through the first-aid-kit, looking for antibiotic ointment. Isak bites his lip and is so focused on getting the trembling under control that he misses the moment Even crosses the room. In any case, he can’t see Even anymore, but he hasn’t left, apparently, because next time Isak sways on the low stool, his back comes to rest against something solid and warm. Isak starts and draws back, but it happens again, and when his back bumps against what must be Even’s legs for the third time – which can only mean that Even has noticed what’s happening but isn’t mad about it, right? – he stays.

If Even complains, Isak will just pretend that he thought he was leaning against a quirkily shaped fire extinguisher. He has no idea what’s keeping Even busy in this part of the bathroom. Maybe he’s studying the tile mosaics? Or admiring the view from the window, only half-conscious of the inert, massy weight resting against his legs?

“Still bleeding?” Audhilda lifts the gauze pad and shakes her head with the patience of a martyr. “You’re one for drama, aren’t you?”

“Perish the thought,” Isak says weakly.

Audhilda swats his good hand away and takes hold of the gauze. “I have very sensitive kneecaps, you know, and would rather not get on the floor. Are you sure that you need to sit?”

Somewhere behind Isak, Even says in his calm, decided voice: “Absolutely sure.”

“Aren’t you the medical authority.” Audhilda mutters. She drops to her haunches with a new compress and admonishes Isak to lift his arm higher. Then she presses the compress against the wound, with gusto.

Isak yelps and jerks back his head. It smacks against what’s probably Even’s hip, and Isak stiffens, mortified, because there goes the fire extinguisher pretense. He’d just gotten comfortable and now he needs to put space between him and Even, and how on earth is he supposed to support all this shaky weight he appears to have accumulated over the last half an hour?

He shuffles away awkwardly, but a large, warm hand closes around his shoulder and draws him back in. Isak tries to make himself as inconspicuous as possible, angling his head away, but then Even’s hand nudges Isak’s jaw until his head leans against the same spot he collided with a moment ago.

The whales are still wailing and the antibiotic ointment burns like hellfire, but Isak, absurdly, can’t stop thinking of how his mom looked after him whenever he hurt himself as a kid – of the warm, lovely moment right at the end, when the pain has dulled but you’re still being babied and cosseted. Even’s doing none of that: he probably thinks of Isak as a horrid person, and he’s certainly not touching him apart from where Isak is leaning against him. Still the feeling is the same.

Isak has tracked the path of Even’s hand out of the corner of his eye, and he is very much aware that Even is now resting it on his hip, just a couple of inches away from Isak’s face, palm open. Isak’s cheek would fit there just so, and as he drowsily lets his eyelids fall closed again, he imagines tipping his head to the side, nuzzling his cheek against the cracked, yellowed skin on Even’s palm.

Isak wants to stay in this moment, wants to forget that it’s not real, but of course Audhilda has to ruin things by launching into a diatribe against professional medicine, laced with short excursions into the hallowed lands of naturopathy and crystal healing.

It’s impossible to block her out and eventually Isak mumbles, voice slurred with pain and fatigue. “I’d love to hear some more about autistic whales, please.”

A minute tremble runs through Even’s body and it’s stupid, really, that such a small thing – the thought that despite everything, Isak can still make him laugh – should pull at the corners of Isak’s mouth. But he lets himself smile, just a little, and makes no attempt to hide it.

It doesn’t take Audhilda long to dress the wound. Once she’s done, she offers Isak a hand to help him up. Even’s gone before Isak is fully upright. Isak doesn’t manage to get a glimpse of his face, just stares at his retreating back, still clad in the cardigan Mikael gave him.

There’s something about Even’s tall, spare stature that makes Isak think of the Giacometti statues his mom took him to see years ago: how you could see that Giacometti, working his plaster with a knife, had started each figure with the ideal human proportions in mind before he’d elongated his tall, broad-shouldered men almost to the breaking point, giving them heavy feet and a haunted, angular grace.

Isak thinks of the promise he made Even the night he signed him: You may hate me by the end of it, but you’ll do well on the show. I’ll keep you safe. He’s delivered on part of his promise. He’s going to see the rest through as well.

Audhilda picks up his torn-up leather jacket with visible disdain. Before Isak can stop her, she’s chucked it into the wastebasket. He pauses to regain his balance.

His shoulders and back feel strangely exposed without the well-worn leather molding itself against his body. He turns and walks away to the door.

Outside, the dogs are starting to bark.

Chapter Text

The peacocks arrive early. They roam Dahlvillaen’s lower garden, ill-tempered and mildly disheveled. The most exciting thing they do is peck and scratch the ground, but it only takes a couple of minutes until a dozen contestants are gathered on the sun terrace. They observe the birds with the exacting curiosity of people who’ve been starved of the internet for three weeks.

Isak fights the impulse to shoo all of them away. He’s perched on the balustrade with Sana and they’re bickering about the story beats they need to shoot in the next couple of hours to set everything up for the great bonanza tonight. Isak’s running out of time because he was supposed to be in the parking lot ten minutes ago.

If they don’t leave for Lillestrøm within the next quarter of an hour, he won’t make it back in time. And he was just getting somewhere with his campaign for a well-scripted “conquer your fears” sob fest that would involve shoving ornithophobic Anders in front of these peacocks and letting Even rescue him.

Isak lowers his voice when he picks up where he left off with Sana. Not because of the discreetly recording microphones that are absolutely everywhere on this terrace: he doesn’t care if the loggers or other crew members are eavesdropping. But he’d rather not have the contestants pick up snatches of their conversation and spin it into something that’s both way-off and overly dramatic, as they are wont to do these days.

Isak’s about to checkmate Sana rhetorically, he most certainly is, when they’re interrupted again. This time by a double feature. First, everyone’s least favorite runner turns up and delivers Isak’s and Sana’s coffee, along with a message that’s murmured so quietly into Isak’s ear that he nearly misses it.

Isak dislikes this runner as much as everyone else, but he’s still ghost-writing stellar application letters for her in exchange for intel. The current intel is worrisome, but Isak barely has time to whip out his phone and hectically check a couple of things before William strides onto the terrace with his usual brooding fanfare. Behind him, two huffing and puffing PAs are carrying a massive whiteboard down the stairs.

“Listen up!” The contestants are already gathered around William, eager-faced and attentive, but he still snaps his fingers a couple of times and repeats: “Listen up, everyone! You’ve all seen the peacocks. They’re here for a reason. Tonight, we’re whisking all of you away into a fairy tale world of exotic splendor and you’ll get your chance to win the heart of the suitor.” He pauses for effect. “By charming his best friends!”

The contestants break into excited chatter. Adam whoops. Vilde claps her hands like a merry Hummel figurine while Sana mutters: “I can’t believe I’ll have to put up with my idiot brother at work. The show should pay me damages.”

Apart from Sana, Mikael is the only other person who’s not smiling when William starts to make use of the whiteboard to outline the night’s entertainments and the cooking challenge in which the contestants will compete.

“This,” Mikael interrupts William, nodding to the whiteboard, “is a neo-orientalist nightmare. Cultural appropriation at its worst.”

“I don’t think that we’re appropriating Moroccan culture here,” William says. “I think what we’re appropriating is… It’s…” He shakes his head and breathes noisily through his nose, looking from Isak to Sana and back to Isak.

“Something in the ballpark of Disney’s Aladdin,” Isak supplies. “Which means that we’re appropriating an appropriation.” He raises an eyebrow at Mikael: “Better or worse than standard appropriation? Feel free to discuss with Jonas. Because frankly, we have our hands full trying to turn twelve trees on wheels and a shitload of fairy lights into an enchanted orchard grove.”

“Worked for The Company of Wolves.” Even’s voice is a deep rasp, like he’s been smoking an entire pack of cigarettes before noon, and maybe that’s the truth because when Isak turns, Even is leaning against one of the columns, spinning an unlit cigarette between two fingers. Isak can see that it’s more than a calculated affront: Even flicks the cigarette back and forth in the same rhythm that his fingers tap out when he picks his way through the maze of leading questions into which they throw him nightly during the one-on-one interviews.

Isak hasn’t done any of these interviews himself, not since he stepped into the confession room with Hakon, but he’s watched every minute of the material they’ve shot with Even over the course of the last two weeks. Even is a fast learner: he still makes occasional mistakes, but never the same one twice. You can tell that he's observing his interviewers as keenly as everyone is observing him. Gathering morsels of information – Christoffer’s love-hate relationship with his three younger sisters, Sana’s preferred basketball position, William’s love of Porsche cars – that he’ll bring up in later conversations, fostering a sense of camaraderie that has gotten him out of more than one hairy situation in the confession room. He never tries this strategy with Geir though. Whenever Geir shows up for one of the interviews, Even’s responses become slow and brittle, plainly thought-through even more carefully than with the others. Geir is patient though, and Even’s rare missteps always happen with him.

Now, Even’s face is in the shadow and Isak can’t gauge his mood, but he feels his stomach tighten as his mind replays the runner’s quiet words. There’s no way he can cancel his trip to Lillestrøm, but he needs to find a moment discreetly to brief Sana before he gets going.

Mikael snorts. “Company of Wolves is a bizarre trip of a film.”

“For sure.” Even looks down at his cupped hand as he lights the cigarette. “That’s why I like it.”

“Yeah, no – I like it too! Particularly the… er…” Apparently Mikael’s speed at backpedaling isn’t quite matched by his ability to come up with illustrative examples. In any case, he looks relieved when William cuts in.

“Tonight is going to be magical,” William says. “And you all need to look the part. Particularly the girls. Costume and makeup begins in two hours, before then… -“

“Wait, I want to know what guys are going to wear!” That’s Ilya. “You can’t make this all about the girls wearing harem pants and bras! That’s sexist.”

William, nonplussed, ponders this for a moment before offering: “We’ll make it sexist for guys, too?”

Ilya crosses his arms and nods: “You better.”

Next to Isak, Sana gives a dainty but deadly huff. Isak sympathizes with the sentiment, but he’s not looking at her because his attention is hooked by the little drama that’s unfolding in the lower garden.

Without any prompting on Isak’s part, Anders appears to have wandered into the garden and crossed the path of a belligerent peacock. He wasn’t lying when he talked about his bird phobia: as the peacock, tiny head cocked to the side, advances, Anders inches backwards, mouth half open and brow taut. And then – just like in Isak’s half-baked script – there’s a rescue. But it’s not Even who turns up as Anders’ gallant knight.

It's Geir who steps out of the boathouse and takes in the situation in a heartbeat. He puts a casual hand on Anders shoulder and pulls him towards the steps that lead to the sun terrace. Isak is too far away to overhear what Geir is saying, but it’s working: Anders is moving more freely with every step that they take together. They stop, then go on a little detour to pick up the book that Anders left on a bench. By the time they’ve climbed the stairs and reached the sun terrace, Anders is glancing up at Geir and laughing shyly.

Something brushes against Isak’s hand and when he looks down, a bee is drowsily climbing across his knuckles. He flicks it away just as Chris’s warm voice comes through comms: “Isak, someone famous is waiting to pick you up in the parking lot.” She chuckles, then takes a bite out of something chewy and mumbles: “Not that kind of pick up. Although he’s a looker. And in a hurry.”

Fuck.

“Sana, can we –” Isak turns. And turns again. “Sana?” He’s talking to air. Ingrid is just passing him, and Isak takes hold of her sleeve. “Where the fuck is Sana?”

Ingrid’s lips curve into an insincere smile. “Funny, she was standing right beside you, so I’m not sure how you missed this?”

“And so?”

“She had to dash off because she was due in the confession room half an hour ago,” Ingrid says. “To interview one of your contestants because apparently you can’t be bothered to do this yourself these days.”

Isak ignores her and hurriedly scans the sun terrace, hoping against hope that there’s someone here whom he can trust to take care of things until he’s back from Lillestrøm. And which, an ugly voice in his head inquires, of your many and loyal friends is that supposed to be?

There’s nothing for it. He’ll have to find a way to talk to Even directly, but Geir is still chatting with Anders at the far end of the terrace, hip casually cocked against one on the marble tables, observing Isak from a distance. There’s no time to come up with an elaborate pretext to get Even to leave the terrace so that they can talk somewhere private. Somewhere without a dozen hidden microphones that pick up every word that isn’t whisper quiet. And Isak is running. Out. Of. Time.

“Hello, little one.” Eskild. He’s pushing a rolling cabinet with lav mics, recorders, straps, and half a dozen kinds of tape, but he stops to rap a finger against Isak’s knee. “You look a little peaky.”

“No. I’m grand. In fact --” Isak jumps off the balustrade and loots Eskild’s cabinet. “I’ll give you a hand.”

Even is talking to Sonja and Liv, and it’s obvious that he doesn’t appreciate Isak interrupting Sonja mid-sentence.

“You all need to be wearing your body mics. Now. You two –” Isak nods his chin towards Liv and Sonja. “Eskild’s waiting for you.” When Even moves to follow them, Isak steps into his way and proffers the lav and a waist strap. “Stay. I’ve got your stuff right here.”

There’s a pause in which Even stands, tall and silent, before Isak. And Isak has no idea, none, how something that outwardly looks like compliance can feel so fraught that his mouth has gone paper dry. They’ve only talked a handful of times over the last two weeks: short, necessary exchanges that happened when they were with a group of people ready to fill the silence with their chatter. This is different.

Isak swallows and forces himself to think only of the job at hand, the information he needs to convey.

“Let’s get this over with,” he says for the benefit of anyone who might be listening. Then he adds, so quietly he’s not sure at first that Even catches it: “Please.”

But Even must have heard him because while there’s no warmth in his blue gaze, he’s scrutinizing Isak more carefully now, and when Isak starts walking towards the widest point of the terrace, he follows. They can’t stir a finger here without being watched by everyone who’s milling around, but there’s maximum space between them and all the places – balustrade, potted plants, ivy-covered columns – that are harboring microphones. As long as they’re talking quietly, they should be fine.

Isak uses his teeth to make a small tear in the pocket tape that he stole from Eskild, then rips it off and quickly preps the lav, double checking that it’s switched off.

“We have to put the lav between the buttons of your dress shirt,” he says to Even. “Can you…”

Isak trails off when Even wordlessly shucks his cardigan and starts unbuttoning the shirt. His arms, where the shirt sleeves are rolled up, are lightly tanned, but the skin of his chest and stomach, revealed when the shirt falls apart a little, is moonlight pale, no more than a few shades darker than the fine, yielding fabric of the shirt. It’s just a bit of skin, nothing that Isak hasn’t seen before, but absurdly it makes him want to stare and retreat all at once.

What he does is force himself to step closer.

Careful not to touch Even when he tapes the lav to the shirt, he murmurs: “Geir is bringing in a surprise special guest tonight. Someone close to you.”

Even’s face remains perfectly still, but Isak, fiddling with the lav and placket of Even’s shirt, can feel his chest expand as he draws in an uneven breath.

“It’s not your dad,” Isak continues just as quietly. “I checked. He’s chairing an arts festival in Bologna. Do you… do you want to give me the names of possible candidates? So that I can do some digging?”

Even chews on his chapped lips for a tense moment, then says: “No.”

Isak nods and busies himself with fitting the recorder into the pouch of the waist strap. “Lift your shirt.”

Turns out that no matter how you contort your fingers, wiring someone and putting them in a waist strap without touching them is impossible. It’s been a while since Isak has done this, but he can’t remember ever having been so fucking clumsy. And his hands are cold, too. No wonder Even’s jaw locks when Isak’s fingers brush against his skin, right where his waist dips in underneath his ribs.

Isak mumbles an apology, then says: “Think of who’s the last person in the world you’d want to see on this set. Present company excluded.” It’s meant as a joke, but it comes out all wrong, faltering and bitter. Fingers still working on the hooks of Even’s waist strap, Isak glances upwards. Even is close, kissing close, but his expression is carefully shuttered.

“Prepare for this person,” Isak murmurs. “I have an appointment that I can’t miss, but I’ll be back in a few hours. Don’t agree to an interview with Geir or William. Let me do it. I…” He has no idea how he can convey what he wants to say. It’s not like he can regain Even’s trust with a handful of magic words. And maybe that’s as it should be. Because how long before he’d fuck things up again if Even lets him back in? He’d probably –

Even makes a sound, derailing Isak’s thoughts. It’s so quiet that Isak can’t tell if it’s a hum or a sigh. It’s probably just in Isak’s mind that it sounds like acquiescence. In any case, Even’s eyes tell him nothing, because he’s looking down to where Isak is struggling to fit the final hook into a badly bent latch. Even’s fingers close around the stiff fabric of the strap and pull it taut so that Isak can slide the last hook into place.

It’s their final excuse for exchanging words while standing this closely together, and now that’s done, too.

Isak bites his lip. “I have to switch on your recorder now. Be careful, okay?”

Even doesn’t respond, but his gaze softens into something wry and resigned right before he turns and walks away with his long, loping steps. Isak looks at his back with this raw, sinking feeling that he cannot shake off, no matter how hard he tries.

*

They’ve rung the doorbell twice, trying to avoid the remains of the gunk that someone has smeared all over the buzzer and the nameplate. No response.

Isak presses his eyes shut, just for a second. Everything about this plan is stupid. He should be on set this very minute, and he’s dragged Ken out all this way to Lillestrøm. For nothing.

The little terraced house is fronted by a garden – just as narrow and shady as all the other gardens stretching out right and left, but better kept. There’s a sandbox with a pretty, painted pergola roof. Low-growing shrubs are hemming in a flower bed. It’s not until you take a closer look that you notice the beer bottles and cans that people have chucked between the flowers.

Isak is about to ring the bell a third time when he can hear someone fiddle with the key on the other side of the door. This goes on for about a minute.

Standing next to Isak, Ken pushes back his shades and peers down his tan and very straight nose: “Tell me again why you didn’t call in advance?”

That’s when the door opens. Isak, staring into space, directs his gaze lower. And lower again.

A girl. Her mop of curly hair is held back by hair clips in every color of the rainbow. She’s wearing a pink unicorn pullover that comes down almost to her knees, which are naked and covered in a red substance that looks a lot like marmalade.

She has her father’s eyes. They blink up at Isak, guilelessly. “Pizza!” she squeals. “Or kebab?”

“Neither,” Isak says. “Sorry. We’re here to see your dad. Is he --“

Before he can finish his sentence, the little girl turns and disappears inside the flat. The door remains open. A minute passes. Then another one.

Isak scrubs a hand over his unshaven face and curses. Like a tiny djinn summoned by profanities, the girl reappears and announces cheerfully: “She’s dead! I think.”

“Who’s dead?” Ken asks.

“Tante Brígiða! But that’s okay. She was very old. Do we have to bury her?” This time, when the girl scampers away, Ken steps through the door and Isak follows.

Brígiða, it turns out, isn’t exactly fresh as the morning, but she isn’t dead either. She’s snoring on the sofa, one hand cradling the overflowing ashtray on her lap, lulled to sleep by Ex on the Beach Norge, still flickering on the massive television screen.

Ken, probably hounded by déformation professionelle, hovers in the middle of the small, cluttered living room and scowls at the tv.

Suddenly, there’s movement on the sofa. The snoring stops and Brígiða croaks in astonishment: “Well, I never.” Her eyes, heavily painted with olive eyeliner, are growing bigger by the second. “This is… is this…”

Isak quickly offers an explanation, but Brígiða doesn’t want reassurance that she’s not being burgled by two tall strangers. She wants --

“Ken! You’re Ken!” Brígiða’s gaze sweeps up and down Ken’s chiseled physique. “Now that’s how you wear a muscle shirt… I always said to Hakon that yours were the best on the show… And I like the beard! You’re Hakon’s friends, I take it?”

“We’re here to see him,” Isak says. “When will he be back?”

“God knows.” Brígiða takes a drag from a freshly lit cigarette and stares lovingly at Ken’s ultra-defined calves. “Helene should never have picked this wimp Adrian over you. That finale… it broke me.”

She heaves out a dramatic sigh and flicks her wrist, depositing a small rain of ashes on the worn arm of the sofa. “Tore out my heart. Because you were so… And she was so… You’re not still thinking of her, are you?”

Ken smiles. “Not in that way, no. But we’re in touch. Same as I’m in touch with plenty of other people who’ve been involved with Reality TV.”

Everything about Ken – name, blindingly white teeth, Buddhist faith, UiO Master’s degree in Human Rights Theory – looks fake but is the real deal. He was the runner up in Isak’s first ever season of LASD. At the time, he came across as the platonic ideal of a Reality TV contestant, so it feels like cosmic vengeance that he’s become Norway’s most vocal opponent of Reality TV dating shows. There’s hardly a talk show host left in the country who hasn’t invited Ken to talk eloquently and at length about the mental health risks and emotional damage that Reality TV contestants suffer.

Brígiða continues to grill Ken about his romantic life and Isak retreats into the hallway, eyes glued to the carpet floor. He doesn’t want to step on things and there’s so much stuff. Several layers of kids’ and adult jackets, mud pants, scarves and what not that have spilled down the coat hangers and are now heaped on the floor. A parade of these creepy stuffed animals – the ones with the enormous eyes that look like they’re seriously tripping – stretches from the living room into the hallway and on into what must be the kitchen. Cheap plastic toys, barraging you with tinny English songs and flashing lights as soon as you touch them, are strewn everywhere.

The walls are covered in pictures: no frames, just photographs pinned to the wall. They show the little girl and Hakon, faces covered in ice cream. The two of them posing in front of a helicopter with the Kystvakten logo. Dressed up as Vikings, with Brígiða as an unlikely shield maiden, at Tusenfryd. On the beach, again with Brígiða, all three of them wearing rainbow-colored sun hats.

Isak stares at the photographs until a sudden shriek, followed by the sound of pans clattering to the floor, makes him dash to the kitchen.

Hakon’s daughter is standing on a chair and staring at the spilled uncooked rice on the floor. After a moment, she looks up and stares at Isak instead. “There was no pizza,” she mutters.

“Okay,” Isak concedes. “Where’s your vacuum cleaner?”

She points to one of the cupboards. Soon as Isak opens the door, the rod of the vacuum cleaner thwacks him in the face and then stuff just keeps pouring out: baking utensils, wellies, several umbrellas, a potty-training seat, and finally a cardboard box overflowing with LASD merch.

“My box! You’ve found my box!”

“Um…” Isak tries to push the box back into the cupboard but he’s not fast enough.

“Pappa said he couldn’t find it anymore! But here it is!”

It’s about as hopeless as tackling a burst pipe. She’s elbow-deep in the box within seconds. Then reemerges with a fistful of ginormous rose-shaped stickers and a rhinestone tiara crown, topped with cursive letters that read Final Rose Material.

The tiara comes to sit askew atop all the hair clips. “When I’m older, I’ll go on the show! I’ll wear my ballerina dress because I like it best! And then there’ll be a wedding because we will get married. The suitor is a prince with a castle, did you know? There’s also dragons.” She squints at Isak’s hair. “Are you a prince, too?”

“No.” Isak drops to his haunches so that he’s no longer towering over her, rice crunching underneath his soles. Quietly he says: “Dragon.”

The girl comes closer. Pokes a finger against Isak’s mouth and nods with her brows drawn together in concentration: “Dragon teeth. Sharp.”

Isak smiles against her finger. “Mmh.”

There’s a little pause. Then she says: “My pappa was on the show. But he made a right mess of things.” Dramatic, drawn-out sigh. Flick of the wrist. The only thing that’s missing is the cigarette. “As usual.”

“That’s what your aunt says?”

She nods and looks at her naked toes.

Isak gently taps his finger against her big toe. The nail is a little ragged. “Your dad did fine. I know for a fact that the prince thought that he was one of the kindest people on the show.”

“Really?”

“Really. What happened to your dad wasn’t his fault. He got…

“What on… Get out! Out!” It’s Hakon, very pale but for the angry splotches of color sliding up his neck, a shopping bag and half-closed umbrella dangling forgotten in his hand. His boots are half-unlaced and he nearly trips himself rushing into the room to reach his daughter.

Isak is up in a heartbeat. He’s stepping back, and further back, his breathing painfully short. “I didn’t… I wouldn’t…” What the fuck is he saying? He wouldn’t hurt her? Because it’s a little late for that.

“What’s going on?” Suddenly, Ken and Brígiða are crowding into the small kitchen, too, and before Isak can say something, Hakon has grabbed his shoulder and pushed him into the hallway.

“Wait!” Here’s Ken again, stepping into Hakon’s way: “You don’t have to talk to him, but you should know that he’s here to apologize.”

“You have no right,” Hakon says, hands trembling in a way that Isak can somehow feel, coldly, in his entire body, “to come to my house! Talk to my daughter. Do you have any idea… Any idea what names she gets called by the other kids now? And you –” He turns to Ken. “How come you’re running with him? Aren’t you famous for hating the likes of him? And trying to end his show?”

“That’s me, yes.” Ken nods and offers both his hands, palms up, in a gesture of goodwill and placation that looks like something you’d learn in a body language seminar. It seems to work though, because Hakon’s drawn-up shoulders come down a little.

“This one –“ Ken elbows Isak in the ribs with no delicacy, “is an asshole, but a complicated one. We go way back. Doesn’t mean that I like him, but… he reached out to me. Told me what he did to you and asked me to come and to offer advice on how to deal with press and social media.” He gives a tight-lipped smile. “Don’t think I’ve made this pleasant for him.”

This is the moment when Isak apologizes, and he knows what he wants to say. The words are there, heavy in his throat. He’s chosen them carefully, thought about them often. “I—”

“Out,” Hakon thunders.

“Maybe you…” Isak tries to catch Hakon’s gaze, but he’s looking past Isak at the door.

“Out.” The word, this time, is quiet and final.

The little girl has ventured out of the kitchen and is leaning against Hakon’s leg, gazing at Isak with a puzzled look on her face. She’s still wearing the hideous tiara.

Isak inclines his head. Then he turns around and leaves them alone.

Closing the door behind him with a click, he takes a moment to breathe, hoping to quell the familiar throb behind his temples. It’s not working, it never does.

*

Dahlvillaen is a circus when Isak returns. Even’s friends – Elias and Mutta – have just driven up in their shiny new food truck. Isak’s first thought is that they’ll end up paying off the loan for this monster for the next decade. But that’s before he steps into the garden where Sana is unleashing Elias and Mutta on an unbriefed Even.

They hug-tackle him from behind, and then they’re rolling around on the manicured lawn, nearly crushing Even under their combined weight and enthusiasm, and Isak realizes that the moment Even has pocketed his 900.000 kr, Elias’ and Mutta’s loan will be history.

The first time that Even untangles himself from this jumble of limbs, a blade of grass stuck to his cheek, he’s smiling brightly. But then Sana looks up from the control screen and tells them that they have to film the happy reunion again. And that’s because Mutta’s loose pants got pulled down in the scuffle so that his butt-crack is plainly visible throughout the entire scene.

“But it’s a beautiful butt-crack!” Elias sing songs right before high-fiving a politely diffident Mutta.

“Again,” says Sana.

Eskild swoops in with a couple of safety pins to secure Mutta’s pants, and then Even is knocked to the ground and force-cuddled once more. This time, when Even gets on his knees, then stands up, his smile dims the moment the camera stops rolling.

“Damn it.” Linn pulls off her massive headphones. “Even, I think your lav must have slipped underneath your shirt and the fabric was rubbing up against it like crazy. We can’t use this. Once more, please.”

Mutta and Elias give the happy impression that they could do this all day. Even doesn’t, but he hunkers down to let the makeup girl fix his hair, then gets into position and mechanically follows Sana’s directions all over again.

He looks strung-out when they’re finally done, hands and gaze restless.

Sana plucks the lav from in between Even’s shirt buttons and switches it off. “You need to change into a different outfit anyway. If you promise to show up at Eskild’s den in half an hour max…” She turns to Isak for confirmation.

“We’ll turn our backs now,” Isak says with a nod. “And the three of you can make a dash for the food truck, which is one of a handful of certified camera- and mic-free spaces on this set.”

Elias and Mutta break into a run immediately, but Even hangs back to say: “Tell me another one.”

“Toilets and changing rooms should be safe generally, but you can always turn on the faucets just in case,” Isak offers in the same moment in which Sana says: “The green guest room in the boathouse. Same goes for your suite between 10pm and 7am, although I trust you know this because it’s in your contract.”

“I know this.” Even purses his lips briefly before adding: “And I certainly don’t trust it.” Then he turns and sprints after his friends.

Sana looks at Isak with a frown. “What was that about?”

They can’t talk right away, because Christoffer jogs over with a panicky face and announces that somehow the massive food delivery for the cooking challenge got mixed up and now they’re drowning in root vegetables with not a scrap of lamb or chicken in sight.

Right when Isak has dispatched a couple of PAs to raid the local butcher, Ilya and Emma get into a serious tussle over a pair of see-through harem pants. Sana and Isak rush over, camera unit in tow, and scramble to add fuel to the fire.

Afterwards, Isak walks a few steps, away from Magnus, Linn and their crew just finishing up, and Sana follows until they’re standing by the faux-baroque monstrosity of a fountain-for-hire that’s been installed in the garden for the night’s festivities. The thing splutters and gurgles asthmatically. Not even the most accomplished sound technician in the world could hide a mic here that would pick up anything useful.

Isak puts a hand on the rim. It’s painted to look like cool marble, but it’s plastic, the weather-worn surface coarse under his fingers.

Starting this conversation feels like jumping off a cliff, the free fall that follows. He’s made his choice and is ready to throw in his lot with Sana, even though they are unlikely to succeed. He will pay for this. He knows that, too.

“When we were shooting at Nordre Røine Gård,” Isak says slowly, “Geir said something that made me – and apparently Even, too – think that there might be one or several hidden cameras installed in Even’s suite that are recording outside the contracted hours.”

Sana’s gaze sharpens. “That’s serious. If there’s proof and we take it to the network head, he’ll have to appoint a new showrunner. And if Even sued, Geir’s career would take a serious hit.”

Isak swallows. It’s the right thing to do, but it still feels like betrayal, like another reason to hate himself. He pushes himself to go on: “I’m pretty sure that Even has searched his suite. I did a quick sweep yesterday when we filmed the segment with Yousef and Even in the suite. Couldn’t find anything – but I had to be fast and couldn’t be obvious about what I was doing. So who knows what I missed.”

“Mmh.” Sana has two distinctive frowns that show between her brows when she’s speed-analyzing a problem: two vertical lines when the result is tilting towards a negative outcome, and a little triangular frown that indicates cagey optimism. It’s the latter that makes an appearance now.

“Finding the camera isn’t enough,” Isak reminds her. “We also need proof that the recordings are on one of Geir’s devices.”

“Obviously. I’ll think of something. We might have to bring someone else in.”

“Whom?”

“Eskild.”

Isak narrows his eyes. “I don’t think Eskild’s undercover skills are advanced enough for this kind of thing.”

Sana tilts her head and does the annoying thing that isn’t an eyeroll, but rather the world’s most judgmental rapid blink. “Because working alone has worked so well for you in the past. We should --”

“Um, Sana, Isak… William, too, I guess…” Chris’s voice, transmitted via comms, has an odd ring to it. “Geir says to tell you: change of plans. We have additional guests tonight. They’ve just arrived and Sara is taking them around the back into the Japanese garden. It’s supposed to be a surprise for Even, but we can’t find him right now. Can you track him down and bring him to the Japanese garden? The plan is to shoot a private reunion scene real quick before we have to get cracking with the cooking challenge.”

Sana and Isak take off into different directions even before Chris is done talking. Sana hurries back to the mansion, while Isak zigzags through the bedlam of hastily assembled cooking stations, pagoda marquees, and low-hanging brass lanterns in the garden. Half a dozen PAs and runners are wheeling out orange trees from the conservatory. They’re depositing them in weird little clusters that make Mahdi howl expletives into his megaphone.

Isak has to give right-of-way to a peacock and nearly runs into a mountain of beaded cushions that’s still waiting to be shifted.

Mutta and Elias are clowning around with Yousef and Mikael like they’ve all been friends for years, but none of them have seen Even. Isak runs faster.

He finally tracks Even down in the changing room by the infinity pool.

Even is standing by the sink, washing his hands. Isak, just crashed through the door, does a double take, all his worries and strategizing momentarily wiped from his mind because Even is wearing the outfit that Eskild hasn’t shut up about for the last five days. And this…

This, Isak tells himself feebly, is ultimately nothing more than gray brocade trousers combined with a shirt. A gorgeous, black shirt with wide sleeves, luxurious cuffs, and a high, stand-up collar that rests snugly against Even’s long neck. The effect is somehow both puritanic and… scorching hot. Possibly the latter more so because of the former. Because all of these suggestively positioned lacings and embossed buttons are invitation and rejection at once, telling you coolly that touching is forbidden while also tempting you to imagine what it would feel like: to be chosen, when the night has run its course and everybody else has been sent away, to stay and help him take everything off.

It’s… a very good look.

For the camera.

Because this is a job.

Right. They’re about to start shooting. Because this is a job and they’re on –

The shirt looks silky-soft and the way it molds itself to Even’s body it draws the eye to his wide shoulders, then down to his narrow waist, then… Wait, is this a trick of the light or is this thing semi-sheer? Is this –

Jesus fucking christ, they’re on set.

This is a set.

That they are on.

And if Isak doesn’t get it together right now and stops thinking about whether his thumb would fit between the tight collar and the graceful curve of Even’s neck, Even will be screwed.

This, fucking finally, is a helpful thought that brings his rioting senses to heel.

“Hi,” Isak says, sounding a tad winded.

Even meets his gaze in the mirror. “Hello.”

His eyes are glassy, shoulders tense. Isak glances at Even’s hands under the faucet, his reddened skin, and now he wants to slap himself, hard, for the fact that he’s just spent a long moment leering at Even instead of noticing what’s going on.

The circular skylight is the only source of light in the windowless changing room, and the teal tiles and sumptuous charcoal paneling make it easy to imagine yourself already submerged in water and drifting. It’s much cooler here than outside. The questions that Isak wants to ask – Why are you not with your friends? What is this? How long? – present themselves in rapid succession and are dismissed, one by one, because they won’t help Even or soothe him, if that’s what’s needed.

Instead, when one of the peacocks sounds a shrill alarm outside, Isak – feeling self-conscious as hell but not hesitating a second – asks the kind of kooky question that he thinks might grab Even’s attention: “How… um… how does that sound to you?”

Even blinks blankly, but he keeps looking at Isak in the mirror, and eventually he says: “Squeaky cemetery door hinge. You?”

Isak shrugs. “The world’s most disconsolate cat?”

“Not bad. But you’re wrong,” Even says. “It’s the cries of shipwrecked sailors right before the mermaids eat them.”

“What the fuck,” Isak splutters. “Ariel eats sailors?”

Even nods gravely. “Hate to break it to you.”

Isak pushes the Disney films of his childhood out of his mind and thinks of the eerie, glamorously deranged mermaids that make occasional appearances in Even’s graphic novel. Isak’s not finished reading it, but he’s half in love with one of them. Clearly should have paid more attention to the sharp, filed teeth that Even has given her. “Are the mermaids in Kaldt Blått cannibals, too?”

“Course they are.” Even chuckles, a soft, startled sound. “Don’t look so betrayed. They’re still hot.”

“Fuck, yes.” Isak steps closer until he’s standing next to Even. He nods to the running faucet and says lightly: “Let’s leave a bit of water for the murderous mermaids. Okay?”

Even’s mirror gaze skitters away from his, but there’s no resistance in his mien or stance, and so Isak reaches out and turns off the water. Just as he’d expected, the flow goes down to a trickle the moment he turns off the left knob that controls hot water.

Isak looks at Even’s hands, at the angry red of skin that’s only partly healed, and while this is what he’s been suspecting for a while now, he still has to swallow against the sudden pain in his throat.

“It’s okay,” Even says. “Eskild is making me wear gloves tonight.”

Isak turns away at that, tries to busy himself by fetching paper towels for Even, but the dispenser is empty. And despite the fact that this is a fucking changing room, there’s not a single towel on hand, which is entirely on brand for Dahlvillaen.

By the time he turns back around, Even is already reaching for the leather gloves on the sink.

“No, wait!” Isak says. “It’ll hurt more if you slip them on while your hands are still wet.”

“Really,” Even says flatly and holds Isak’s stare for a beat.

His studied indifference gets hairline cracks when Isak comes closer and takes hold of his wrist.

Isak unceremoniously pulls up the front of his own t-shirt, gathers what he can of the soft fabric in his free hand, then dabs gently at Even’s palm before drying his fingers and the back of his hand, too. He doesn’t look up, not once, but he’s aware of Even’s shallow breaths, can sense his effort in holding himself in place rather than withdraw and disappear from the room.

“Don’t worry,” Isak says to take Even’s mind off what he’s doing. “I stole this t-shirt from one of the hangers in Eskild’s lair only his morning. It’s squeaky clean.”

“Cleanliness.” Even’s voice is a little shaky. “A neglected virtue.”

“Might very well be my only one.” Isak reaches for Even’s other hand. He can see Even pushing himself past another moment of hesitation before he lets Isak get to work on this hand, too. “And temporary at that. So… um… enjoy it while it lasts? I’ll go back to playing dirty in no time.”

The phrasing is meant to further distract Even, and it’s working because the corners of his mouth deepen, eyes suddenly alight with a spark that wasn’t there a moment ago. It’s not a proper smile – neither a polite nor a truly happy one – but it’s something real and familiar that seems to return him to himself. And it’s probably just this weird cocktail of adrenaline and sorrow that is wreaking havoc on Isak’s nervous system, but he’s so happy to see this minute change in Even that he can feel his cheeks grow warm. Which is just… unacceptable.

So he has to make it about something else entirely: “I’ll have you know that of the half a dozen lewd double entendres you’re currently enjoying, only two were intentional.”

Isak has a feeling that Even isn’t buying this, but he plays along, pursing his lips: “Thanks, I’ll take all of them.”

Isak steps back the minute he’s done drying Even’s hands. He grabs the gloves for him but, without really knowing why, looks away when Even puts them on.

Afterwards, Even clears his throat. He’s staring at his reflection in the mirror without pleasure. Isak can’t recall having told his feet to move, but in the mirror, he’s standing right beside Even.

“I want to be Alice,” Even says. “Walk through the mirror.”

“I’m coming with. The caterpillar probably has some really good weed.”

Even’s laugh is quiet as a breath. “They’ve arrived, haven’t they? That’s why you’ve come for me.”

This is true, but not in the way Even thinks. Isak wants to confess this. Somewhere behind the mirror, he does, and tells him so much more, too.

But here, in this cool, windowless room, he can only say to Even, to himself: “It’s time.”

Even draws himself up to his full height, touches his collar, adjusts the sleeves. Readying himself for elegant battle with unsteady fingers, and Isak thinks that no matter how vicious things are going to get, Isak’s got it in him to be more vicious.

“If need be, I’ll eviscerate them,” he tells Even.

Even turns in the doorway. “If I’m right about who this is, you might have to do something more difficult.”

“What’s that?”

Even lifts a shoulder. His voice is calm, his eyes are not: “Don’t let them get hurt.”

Chapter Text

It’s always raining in Dahlvillaen’s Japanese garden, even if there’s not a cloud in the sky, courtesy of the tall, doorlike steel structures set up at its heart. Day and night, they release beaded curtains of water into basins that are filled with glistening, mirror-smooth black stones.

Isak can hear them before they come into view. He tries to make sense of the sounds while his view is still blocked by the bamboo grove: the gentle clicking of the stones as they rearrange themselves under light soles, the patter of artificial rain made irregular by bodies passing through water. There’s laughter. Two voices, young and younger still. By Isak’s side, Even’s step hitches.

They round the final bend in the path. There they are.

It's the young woman from the photo that Geir showed Isak at Nordre Røine Gård. Her hair is now cut into a shaggy 90’s grunge bob, currently damp from the water, but her style hasn’t changed: she’s wearing rolled up dungarees that are two sizes too large for her gamine stature and a faded shirt with frayed sleeves. There’s a little boy kneeling on the wet ground next to her, clumsily filling his pockets with stones. A couple of meters away, William and Christoffer are looking at Magnus’s control screen, debating something with a man Isak hasn’t seen before.

“Even!” The young woman skips over and comes to stand on one of the small boulders, naked toes curling into moss, so that she’s closer to Even’s height. “Hello, gorgeous.” She looks him up and down. “Interesting get-up. What’s the theme here? Debauched vampire prince?”

Before Even can answer, she kisses him hello on the mouth, not lingeringly, but not a peck either.

Even’s hand curves around her shoulder, drawing her tightly against him before she pushes him back and, laughing, whips out a parcel from the back pocket of her dungarees: “Careful, I smell of freshly pooped in diapers! We had a bit of a situation coming in. This house is nuts. I couldn’t find a waste basket anywhere.”

“Kára! We’ve been over this, remember? Like… five times!” That’s William, pulling at his hair with a look of sincere desperation that would normally please Isak to no end. It’s just that he’s currently a little too confused to enjoy it fully. Even’s gaze, moving from Kára to the boy and back, is unreadable.

“You can’t talk diapers on camera!” William continues. “That’s just… I think that’s even worse than talking unshaved legs or something!”

“Fuck!” Kára has one of these triangular faces, pointy chin and eyes widely set apart, that look young and puckish even when the person is making an effort to project solemnity – which she decidedly is not. “I’m kind of into my armpit hair – can I talk about that?”

“Everyone!” William starts snapping his fingers and then just continues until it’s more tic than command. “Gather over here. Come on. Here’s what you’re all going to –”

No one moves. In fact, the man who’s been talking to William and Magnus briefly clasps William’s shoulder and says “Give us a moment”. Then he makes his way over to Even.

The boy arrives first though. He throws his bony arms around Even’s legs and gets in a good squeeze before Even crouches down to hug him, not at all fazed when the boy smooshes his runny nose against Even’s cheek and buries two grubby little hands in his carefully styled hair. Somewhere in the background, one of the makeup girls gives a high-pitched whimper.

Isak has had his measure of run-ins with kids for the day. He can’t gauge the age of the boy. He’s taller than Hakon’s daughter, but some of his movements are jerky and uncoordinated. There’s a draggy slowness to his voice when he pulls on Even’s wide, overlong sleeve and asks: “Ticktock? Ticktock…gone?”

Even gasps, eyes going wide. “We better check, right?” He pushes back the sleeve and reveals his watch with feigned relief. While he takes it off, he casually changes his stance until his body is blocking the child from the cameras and most of the crew.

Isak feels like an intruder, but he doesn’t step back. Looks on as Even places the watch in the boy’s hand. “I’d never lose it,” Even says lightly, voice so quiet that only immediate bystanders can hear it. “I’ll wear it for you until it fits around your wrist.”

“Better continue doing so right now.” It’s the stranger, wearing thick-rimmed designer glasses and a black turtleneck. He and the boy have the same freckles and fluffy auburn hair.

The man plucks the watch from the boy’s grasp and returns it to Even with a rueful smile. “A little too expensive for me to replace if it breaks.”

“Marten,” is all that Even says, voice neutral. He and Even hug, and Isak thinks that there’s familiarity there, but none of the warmth and intimacy that’s so obvious between Even and Kára.

Even turns to her now and says: “Call your mom and get her to fetch Kjell. He shouldn’t be here.”

Kára’s fingers stroke the boy’s cheek and then, almost as part of the same movement, both of her hands swiftly cover his ears while she says: “And that is because kids like him don’t belong on TV?”

“No.” Even cards a hand through his hair and Isak wonders what Kára sees: if she picks up on the exhaustion expertly but not fully hidden by the makeup team’s efforts, notes that Even’s collected tone is a mark of the force exerted to control it. “Kjell is not old enough to make the decision for himself. This is… you have no idea what this place is like.”

Marten looks at Even with patiently raised eyebrows. “It’s not Kjell we’re worried about. He’s just a kid, no one will pay much attention to him. We’re worried about you. The producers told us that you’ve been… struggling. With the stress of being on set 24/7 and other things. That’s why we agreed to come on the show. To support you.”

“You’re here to support me?” Even’s laugh is harsh. “And not at all to talk about your new gallery and Kára’s upcoming show?”

“That’s not why I’m here,” is what Kára says simply just as Marten points out: “Kára could do with the publicity. I’m kind of surprised that you of all people… would begrudge her that. I mean, the producers clearly know about her, so I’m actually surprised that no one has knocked on her door before.”

“Yeah.” Kára leans her shoulder against Even’s arm. Isak can see that, contrary to what he was expecting after the previous exchange, having her physically close seems to make Even relax a little. She tangles her naked fingers with his gloved ones. “Don’t they normally want to know all about crazy ex-girlfriends?”

Even looks down at the crown of her head, mouth softening. “You’re neither.”

“Very true. I’m admirably sane these days,” Kára says. “And ex-girlfriend doesn’t quite have the gravitas of ex-wife, don’t you think?”

Even’s gaze, for the first time since they stepped out of the bamboo forest, darts to Isak.

What.

The.

Fuck.

Isak’s smile projects that he is a professional, who tackles explosive surprises sprung on him by a wayward suitor with no more effort than stirring his morning coffee. Christoffer, just turning up by Isak’s shoulder, yelps a little when Isak’s hand descends on his shoulder to lead him a few steps away.

“Okay,” Isak says. “What is this?”

Christoffer wriggles his shoulders like he’s too thrilled to stay still. A smile that’s proud rather than smug pulls at the corners of his mouth. “It’s good, isn’t it? I found them.”

Isak scoffs. “Did you? Or did Geir tell you exactly where to look?”

Hurt drains all the pleasure from Christoffer’s face but is immediately hidden behind a good-natured grin. “Doesn’t matter. What do you want to know? I can brief you.”

“The PAs have compiled a list of all the people Even’s supposedly been with over the last couple of years. It’s a fucking long list, including about 70% of the better-looking actors in his father’s ensemble cast, so when did he have time to get married and divorced?”

“Oh,” Christoffer says. “I don’t think it was all that recent? But they’re still close. The little boy is Even’s godson. I’ve tried to find out what’s wrong with him but… yeah, that’s a tricky one, you know what I mean? You kind of want to be upfront about it and just ask, but then if you use the wrong words, you just know that everything will go to shit, so I haven’t yet and –”

“Don’t ask.” Isak rubs two knuckles against his eyebrow. If Even had told the show – had told Isak – about the fact that he’s been fucking married before, they could have come up with a strategy for handling this together. Not set themselves the impossible task of hemming in a wildfire with no preparation whatsoever. He gets why Even didn’t let him in though: you’d have to be blind to miss how he feels about Kára and the boy; even just telling Isak about them would probably have felt like exposing them to a world that Even has come to hate.

“Who is she?” Isak asks. “Kára?”

“Her mother owns a company that builds luxury sailing yachts. She’s roughly Even’s age, a year or two older, I think. Lives with Marten and the boy in a swanky house in Holmenkollåsen. She’s a painter.” Christoffer smirks. “But not, like, a painter anyone has heard of.”

“Right. Here’s what I need you to do.” Isak rattles off instructions so that Christoffer can set up the interviews, but over Christoffer’s shoulder, he’s eying Even. He is pale, eyes too bright, left foot tapping out a complicated, incessant rhythm.

Isak walks over to him the moment he’s sent Christoffer on his way. Even follows when Isak signals him to come along.

They stop as soon as they’re back in the little bamboo grove. The light has a strange liquid quality: it trickles down the stems, a dusty, greenish gold that’s gone before it reaches the ground. High above them, the slender trees are bending and swaying together, perpetually in motion. Down here, Even shifts his weight from one foot to the other, a strange, coiled momentum behind the movement, like he’s bolting and bolting in his mind.

“We can work with this,” Isak says without preamble. “It’ll be fine. You’ll all come out looking like relatable and well-adjusted grown-ups.”

Even drags up his gaze to meet Isak’s. “We’re really not.”

“Well, no one needs to know that. If I have to demonize someone, I’ll pick Marten.”

Even looks alarmed and Isak thinks that things must be dire indeed if Even has lost his casual, sure-fire ability to discern when Isak is riling him up.

“Jesus,” Isak says quickly. “Relax. Marten’s safe, too. And Kjell –”

“What about him?” Even is searching Isak’s face. This, Isak realizes, is the crux of the matter.

“Do you think he’d enjoy getting to pick his own costume? And… have his face painted? Eskild is very good at this kind of thing. Heavy on the glitter, if we tell him so.” Isak doesn’t say: people watching this on TV won’t be able to get a clear view of the child’s face. That’s implied.

He assumes that Even’s “Thank you” will be implied too, but it’s not.

“I…” Even stares at him. He’s stopped shuffling his feet, body turned towards Isak. “Thank you. That’s… you’re incredible.”

Isak is used to having these words hurled at him in outrage, not spoken softly. Even’s gaze is heavy on him, filled with undisguised wonder and that’s… that’s… Isak’s got no idea what to do with the spill of warmth in his chest.

He stares back for a heartbeat, and this strange, fierce yearning to give Even something in return is so strong that he’s babbling before he’s made the conscious decision to open his mouth: “Kjell will remember the stilts walkers and fire breathers. The mountains of food. Kind strangers falling over their feet to charm and entertain the suitor’s godson. He’ll –” Isak stops, worried that he’s overstepping, but Even tilts his head.

“-- be okay,” he finishes Isak’s sentence. “He’ll be okay.“

“Yes. Same goes for you, by the way.”

“Mmh.” Isak doesn’t like Even’s forced calm, all this nervy tension covered by exquisite clothes.

“We’ll play this as a second chances kind of thing,” Isak explains. “You and Kára didn’t work out, but your ex-wife likes you so much, she wants to help you find someone new. And don’t forget that your best friends are on set, too. All your favorite people are here to…”

“… support me,” is what Even says, mouth quirking. “God, this is even more of a nightmare than I’d realized.”

*

The problem, Isak soon realizes, is that Even’s favorite people aren’t exactly each others’ favorite people.

Elias’s and Mutta’s faces fall in comic synchronicity when Kára walks onto the terrace. Marten scowls like he’s soiled his fingers with something mildly distasteful, no napkin in sight. And Kára, pulled along by Kjell, only notices Elias and Mutta after smacking her hip into their table so that Mutta’s tower of carefully folded serviettes comes tumbling down.

“Boys!” Kára stretches out a negligent hand and rakes her fingers through Mutta’s mane and across Elias’s buzzcut while her eyes track Kjell’s exploration of the terrace. “What’s cooking?”

A little later, Isak is just a couple of steps away when Elias grabs Even’s sleeve and stops him as they make their way to the garden. “What happened? This was supposed to be about the three of us having a good time. Meeting your hot chicks –“

“And guys!” Mutta cuts in.

“Yeah,” Elias continues. “And finding out who of us is best at sneaking a minimum of three mentions of Bakkoush Catering into every sentence we’re saying in front of the camera. You didn’t tell us Kára was going to be here!”

“I would have,” Even says curtly. “But I didn’t know.”

“That’s so typical, I can’t believe this! This was supposed to be about you –“

Even raises his eyebrows.

“And a little bit about us,” Elias concedes. “Now it’s going to be the big Kára show. Marten will bore everyone to tears. By the time we’ve managed to gag him and stopped Kára from charming the camera with a story about her last bout of diarrhea, no one will want to hear about the food truck.”

“I’ll talk about the food truck,” Even says. “Just don’t give them soundbites about Kára and me that you don’t want to broadcast to the nation. Can you do that?”

“Hey man!” Elias’s indignation looks half made-up and half real. “What do you take us for!”

Mutta loops his arms around Elias’s and Even’s waists and draws both close. “Come on, we’re pros!” He glances from Even’s costume to his own tight-fitting tank top and harem pants before continuing cheerfully: “And we look like hoes! So I say we got this.”

They’re standing next to one of the dozen fire pits that are dotting the darkening garden, flames lapping up from gorgeous, coppered hammer basins. The hot air above the fire minutely distorts the shadowed contours of Even’s face and Isak wonders what he’s thinking as his gaze flickers across the frenzied activity in the garden.

The pagoda tents are glowing softly, heavy drapes of cloth drawn back to reveal the cooking stations and the contestants milling around them. Crew is still setting up, lugging around extra tripods and unrolling cables in the sorry little grove of orange trees, tripping a gaudily dressed, foul-mouthed pair of stilts walkers in the process. Mahdi is standing on the top rung of a slightly swaying ladder working with a screwdriver, a second one held grimly between his teeth, to fix a broken light.

Just a couple of meters away, Adam and Mikael are trying to charm an unimpressed peacock with what must be the world’s worst moon walks. They’re wearing loose trousers and open vests with softly shivering tassels and nothing underneath. From what Isak can see, this appears to be the uniform look adopted for male contestants, flouted only by Ilya – who’s predictably gotten rid of his vest – and Yousef, who’s wearing a shirt underneath his. The girls are dressed in satiny, diaphanous things that look like the tacky Coachella interpretation of classical odalisques.

They wait until all the contestants have been tasked with impossible culinary missions before they introduce their special guests. When William explodes the bombshell that Even has been married before, leading with the notion that tragedy and dark secrets are lurking even in the airiest of fairy tales, Magnus and his team are lying in wait to capture reaction shots. The contestants deliver: Adam drops a bowl with whipped feta; Liv hangs her head and hides behind her bangs with a melancholy little sigh; and Ilya plainly wasn’t listening but starts sharpening his carving knives this very moment, which works just as well.

Vilde turns to Magnus’s camera. It’s like she has forced herself to smile for such a long time that her mouth is still smiling now, labored and stiffly, when her eyes are already telegraphing the indignation that’s also straining her high voice. “I can’t believe this!” she says, looking at Kára, who has nicked a handful of blueberries and is sharing them with Kjell. “Eskild has just spent forty minutes contouring my face in five different shades of apricot and now you’re telling us that that’s the kind of woman Even wants? Someone who dresses like a homeless person and doesn’t even bother to dry her hair and who,” her voice rises even higher, “still ends up looking like a model? That’s just… deeply unfair to all female contestants!”

“Who’s being unfair here, Vilde?” Isak asks. “Can you tell us?”

“Well, Kára – obviously! She’s just… why don’t the rules apply to her? Even, too. Actually, all men, because this keeps happening: they tell us they want one thing and then we go out and buy stuff, and eat salad, and spend ages learning to apply spray tan evenly – and then they don’t even have the decency to stick to it! Going for someone like Kára instead.”

“I like the apricot thing a lot!” Magnus looks up from his control screen, eyes wide with sincerity. “You look very pretty and I--”

Isak has an arsenal of sharp rebukes for people derailing one of his interviews, but he decides to let this one slide because he can see that William is herding Even, Kára and the others to the group of low divans that’s been set up as interview nook for the night.

Geir, steering the evening from the control room, vetoes Isak’s attempt to wrest the interviews from William entirely, telling them via comms that they can conduct them jointly, with William taking the lead.

Isak performs some unseemly groveling to coax William to shake up the format: they’re going to invite individual contestants to join them for short segments, with each candidate getting to ask Even and his friends one question. It’s less likely, Isak thinks, that their candidates – always on their best behavior around Even – will ask the kinds of invasive questions that William would come up with.

They sit down on the divans, lit by low-hanging brass lanterns and covered with silk cushions. Even, who rarely drinks and if so only when they’re done shooting for the day, absentmindedly takes the glass of champagne that Sara offers him. Isak frowns at him but either Even misses it or he deliberately ignores Isak.

Everything goes well in the beginning. Iben, who is kind as well as savvy when it comes to getting viewers on her side, turns up with Aurgelmir and directs her question to Kjell, dressed up in fairy wings and covered in so many layers of glitter he’s practically shimmering in and out of view. Iben asks him if he wants to lead Aurgelmir by his leash and feed him carrots. Kjell squeals with delight and they take off.

The next candidate that William asks to sit with them is Ilya. He reclines on one of the divans, one leg propped up, and asks: “What’s Even’s favorite position?”

“The Byzantine braid,” Kára says without missing a beat.

Ilya, interest piqued, looks up from where he’s been studying his own abs. “What’s that?”

Kára smirks. “You haven’t done that? Boy, you’re in for a treat. If you win the contest, that is.” She gives the bowl filled with pretzels and gummi bears a lazy stir with her finger. “You need a minimum of five people, lots of lube, and a well-trained tortoise.”

Ilya stares at her. “Um… what?”

“We can demonstrate,” Even says, and the next couple of minutes see him and Kára erect a depraved pyramid of gummi bears, all the while bickering about the exact position of the tortoise. Elias and Mutta provide running commentary and wacky suggestions while Marten has his poker face on. Ilya looks uncharacteristically thoughtful when he leaves.

Afterwards, Sonja joins them. She’s about to ask her question, having spent a long moment exchanging polite hellos with everyone, when Sana’s voice comes through the comms. She’s asking Isak and William to send Sonja to the first pagoda straight away so that they can film Sonja demonstrating her medical expertise once more. Emma has cut her hand while dicing onions.

“Hurry, I’m doing what I can with warm water,” Sana’s bristles via comms, “but she won’t bleed prettily forever.”

Sonja looks at Even and tries to smile through her disappointment: “Of course.”

William calls up Adam, then Kjerstie. Then Liv, who looks nervous when she asks: “Why … did you decide to get married? You must have been pretty young?”

Elias and Mutta are laughing good-naturedly, like this is an old family joke and even Marten is smiling. Even’s face is blank, but Isak can tell by the stiffening of his shoulders that his relaxed posture has become a painstakingly maintained act.

“Mania,” Kára says with a small shrug. “It can make all sorts of things seem like an excellent idea, like getting married when you’re nineteen and twenty.”

She smiles at Even and he smiles back. Isak can’t make out what either smile is saying, only that hers looks like an apology and Even’s is the one he’s using when he’s at his most withdrawn.

“I’m bipolar, too,” Kára continues. “It’s how we met. Same therapist, same shitty treatment plan, at least in the beginning. Similar cycle of episodes even.”

“So getting married was a mistake?” William asks. “This is what you’re saying?”

“No.” Even doesn’t say more. Sara has refilled his champagne glass and he takes a large sip, watching Kára over the rim.

She nods. “Not a mistake, no.”

“Why did you break up then?” Liv asks.

The tension that Even’s and Kára’s dirty gummi bear skit had briefly diffused is back: in Mutta’s folded arms and Elias’s raised chin, Marten’s cooling gaze and the impatience with which Kára tucks back a stray lock. The gesture draws Isak’s attention to the tattoo inked into the skin right behind her ear. He remembers reading that the nerve ends in the thin skin covering the skull make these kinds of tattoos among the most painful ones to get. Hers is a small anchor with mariner’s rope.

Liv blinks and looks from Kára to Even and back, clearly worried that she has missed someone’s response.

Kára notices. Isak sees her glance skim over the multiple cameras pointed at them, then meeting Even’s eyes for the fraction of a second before she turns back to Liv and says evenly: “We separated because I kept cheating on him.”

“This,” Even interjects quickly, “is not why we broke up.” Isak can see that he’s irritated and trying to hide it, but not irritated with Kára it seems. “And we never promised to be exclusive, so it wasn’t cheating.”

“You would have liked us to be,” Kára says.

“Maybe. But that’s got nothing to do with anything really and I…” Even’s voice is terse. His gaze flicks down and to the side like he’s looking for an escape and finding that all exits are blocked.

“Kára and Even were like… the worst match in history from the very beginning,” Mutta cuts in just as Marten notes more politely, but with the same kind of urgency: “Kára and Even were looking for different things.”

“No!” Even says and Isak hasn’t got a clue what’s wrong but senses Even’s agitation behind the taut lines of his face. Everyone is staring at him. Magnus directs one of the movable cameras to draw closer when Even speaks again: “You know, this is… I’m not going to talk about this here, but I won’t let you turn it into a bunch of lies either… and I…”

“Won’t talk about what?” William presses.

“No, really – I’m not doing this.” Even gets up. His expression wavers, anger transforming into uncertainty, but then he pushes right through the camera unit and walks away.

Isak hears William asking Magnus “Did you get this?”, but by the time Magnus answers he’s already too far away to catch the words, running after Even.

He’s not the only one: Magnus has dispatched one of his guys with a handheld camera, who catches up with Even a second after Isak does. When Isak tells him to go away, Geir’s voice overrides Isak’s directive via comms.

Even glares at the camera like it’s taking his all to make himself remain still rather than swat the thing away like a wasp.

“Right.” Isak wets his lips, racking his brain to come up with something that will make this better, not worse, for Even. “You know,” he says, “I think it’s time we check out how the contestants are doing with the cooking challenge. Maybe one or two of them need some rescuing. You in?”

Even looks from the camera to Isak. His throat, mostly hidden by the high collar, works as he swallows. Then he says, quietly, “Okay.”

It works better than expected. Candidates have been paired up for the cooking challenge, but their uneven number means that Sonja is missing a partner. They find her wearing her apron inside out and staring in horror at two badly burnt pigeons.

“What are we making?” Even asks as he steps behind her cooking station and grabs a chef’s apron. In silent solidarity, he puts it on inside out, too. Isak spends a long moment staring uselessly. Because, yes, it’s just a fucking apron, but there’s something about this small act – kindness under immense pressure – that is so typical of the person Even is that it stops Isak in his tracks.

Neither Sonja nor Even are acting for the camera, but what follows is every producer’s dream. Sonja, usually so capable and calm, is a charming, frazzled disaster in the culinary arena. She tries to cut the pigeon meat into cubes before taking out the bones, then cusses at the sugar that refuses to be caramelized. All the while, she has a coin-sized piece of filo pastry stuck to her cheek. Even doesn’t seem to mind – kind of the opposite: he’s still tense, but he laughs with Sonja and puts her at ease, gently guiding her through the process of assembling the pigeon pastilla rather than taking matters from her hands.

It's just a brief reprieve though because soon enough William turns up, backed by Geir via comms, and Even is sucked into a vortex of group interviews in rapidly changing constellations, shooting scenes with the contestants, and a badly organized treasure hunt that makes little sense to the participants, will make even less sense to viewers, but is scripted to end with a roaring finale at Elias’s and Mutta’s food truck.

Night has finally fallen but the set is a pandemonium of blazing lights. Mahdi has brought out every last of their tungsten lamps, each one so powerful that your skin heats up uncomfortably when you get too close. A whole regiment of open-face lights are firing into bounce boards to provide ambience light. The fire pits and ill-choreographed fire breathers are useless for lighting purposes, but they add to the heat and chaos. Every couple of minutes, the peacocks scream their protest with migraine-inducing shrillness.

Kjell is the only person who seems to move through this opulent, garish labyrinth of a set with uncomplicated delight. Isak keeps an eye out for the twinkle of his fairy wings. In all these hours of adrenaline and rushing around, Isak slows down just once. He spots Kjell, a small, glinting figure ambling through the orange grove, appearing and disappearing in the darkness between the trees. A stilts walker plucks one of the fruits for him and bends down to offer it to the child. Kjell takes it and, giggling, bites through the skin.

*

All of Isak’s plans to spirit Even away for quick breaks are foiled. Whenever he tries to lead Even away, William will turn up with Kára and Marten and a mobile camera team. Or Mutta and Elias, already fast friends with half of the contestants, will arrive, about a dozen people in tow. Between Marten trying to talk about his gallery, Elias’s pranks, and Kára’s and Mutta’s increasingly acrimonious exchanges, there’s never a moment of peace.

The makeup team descends on Even in shortening intervals, fussing over his costume and packing on powder to nix the thin sheen of sweat on his forehead. Buttons polished to a high gleam, face flawless and immobile, Even moves through the turmoil mechanically, like a beautiful clockwork prince wound too tightly. He is unfailingly courteous, trying to keep peace between his friends and attentive to the contestants, betraying himself only in the smallest of slips.

“Fuck no,” he says in front of several cameras when one of the PAs turns up with his guitar right after the party has moved to the crowded roof garden on the top floor of the boathouse.

Even’s gaze is cool when it finds Isak. Picking up from a much earlier conversation, he asks: “Are you snapping your fingers?”

“No,” Isak says. “You don’t have to --”

Before he can finish his sentence, Kára has plucked the guitar from the PAs grasp. She walks away with it and appropriates the comfy Havana bar stools that Mikael had secured for himself. Perching there, she tunes the guitar unhurriedly, head bent low. Kjell sits on the ground next to her and plays with her ankle bracelet. Kára is still not wearing shoes, must have run around set barefoot all these hours. Her toes are dirty and there’s a beginning bruise on her left shin.

Heads are turning and the din of voices quiets down to a murmur when her fingers pick the notes of the first melancholy chords. It’s immediately clear that she’s a much better guitarist than singer, but there’s a mystery to the tone of her voice, gentle irony dipping in and out of bitterness, that makes people forget their unspooling thoughts, the drinks in their hands.

Whatever Even is thinking is well-hidden. Isak can’t tell if the song is a message or a distraction to draw all these curious, invasive eyes away from Even. He knows the song – all producers and PAs do, because Ingrid compulsively plays this album during night shifts in the control room. Isak is not a fan, but he remembers enough of the lyrics to see the potential.

He sidles over to Sonja just as Kára sings: I will bring you ruin in every thing I do. It’s never my intention but it happens all the same. It starts with love and comfort, becomes a strength of will. But all that strength made rubble of the towers we built.

“It’s a song for two voices,” Isak notes quietly. “You should join in.”

He has spent sufficient time with Sonja to know that neither bullying nor pleading will induce her to do things she doesn’t want to do. It doesn’t matter in this instance, because for once they appear to be in agreement. Sonja nods without turning her head to look at Isak, then makes her way to the front of the little crowd.

Kára smiles when Sonja joins her, tentatively at first, adding the silk of her alto voice to the rising and falling weave of Kára’s rougher, straining soprano.

LASD has taught Isak to assess and sometimes use female beauty to build snares, but he isn’t usually affected by it. Maybe it’s Mahdi working his magic, enveloping both women in a honeyed, intimate orb of light. Or the evocation of age-old fairytale symmetry: two heads, one fair and one dark, tilted towards each other with matching grace, locked together in song.

Their voices lap at and coil around each other until they reach the final iteration of the chorus where the lyrics are subtly rearranged to twist the meaning. At this point, Kára lets her voice recede into the background, allowing Sonja to make the ending wholly her own. Grief transformed into longing: the promise of a string of tomorrows, of courage and hope.

Isak has heard the lyrics before, but wrapped in Sonja’s restrained voice, he feels them for the first time. He wasn’t planning to, but letting his gaze roam across the careless, effervescent crowd, he looks for Even and when he finds him, Even’s gaze locks with his immediately. There’s a strange squirm in Isak’s stomach. He wonders if the emotion in Even’s shadowed eyes is for the woman he once loved or for the woman he might come to love in the future.

“He’s not doing great.” It’s Mutta, turning up by Isak’s side without warning. There’s an implicit accusation in his voice. “He’s not enjoying this one bit. I think he’s kicking himself for joining the show.”

“I’m well aware,” Isak says.

“What are you going to do about it? You’re his chief wrangler, no?”

“Is that what Even said?”

Mutta looks at him strangely. “No,” he says slowly. “One of the PAs. But it’s true, isn’t it? So how are you going to ensure that he’s okay? Provided,” Mutta’s voice hardens, “you want him to be okay in the first place. Maybe you’ve worked all this time to back him into the corner in which he finds himself now.”

The sharp, barbed-wire kind of anger that’s taking hold of Isak demands to be twisted into a weapon, turned inside out, and Mutta is an easy target. Isak is ready to pounce, pulse stuttering.

But then he catches himself at the last moment. Swallows the nasty words on his tongue. “As a matter of fact,” he says, “I haven’t done anything to make this worse than it already is. So, tell me. What… would help him to feel less awful about it all?”

Mutta thinks about it for a moment. Then he says: “Two things really. I think he’d do much better if he had someone here who’s on his side. Like, an actual friend. Not someone who wants to get into his pants, or win this thing, or use him to up the ratings. Someone kind he can trust.” Mutta looks at Isak out of the corner of his eye. “Not you, obviously.”

“Obviously. What’s the other thing?”

“Even always falls for the same type and then disaster ensues, every fucking time. Don’t let him go through this while he’s on national TV.”

Isak licks his lips. “What’s his type?”

“Fiery. Too clever for their own good. And,” -- Mutta’s gaze cuts to Kára, who is dancing with Yousef, arms raised high above her head – “damaged beyond repair.”

Savage laughter rings out. When Isak, feeling a little disoriented, looks for the source, he finds that Elias is playing slapstick Houdini with Magnus’s cables.

Isak shakes it off and turns back to Mutta. “Got it,” he says. “We shall avoid that.”

“Fuck, what’s he doing now?” Whatever shit Elias is up to doesn’t seem to merit the dismay in Mutta’s voice.

Isak turns around. Alarm grips him, like a hundred pinpricks rushing up his arms and neck.

It’s Even. He has climbed over the metal railing that lines the rooftop garden and is picking his way across the asphalt shingles of the downward sloping roof, two-stories above ground. Isak pushes through the commotion, ears ringing with the cacophony of shrill, panicky voices that’s reaching him via comms. He comes to stand next to Kára, whose hands are wrapped around the railing, nailbeds white.

She’s not looking at Even – her gaze is fixed on Kjell who has climbed all the way down to the little ledge between two peaked gables and is sitting there, chewing on the tip of one of his fairy wings. Even seems to make some kind of joke when he reaches the child because Kjell throws back his head and laughs before he lets Even lift him on his shoulders. Even retraces his way, stumbling once but catching himself with an outflung arm.

There’s no end to the shouting and ovations once they’re both safely back on the right side of the railing: the contestants are taking turns hugging Even and shedding performative tears. Whenever Even tries to break through the ring they’ve formed around him, he walks straight into a camera or into William and Christoffer, who are firing leading questions at him like there’s no tomorrow. In the glare of the light, his skin looks ashen. Until the makeup team sweeps in and adds another layer of powder and rouge.

*

It's past one. They wrapped up shooting half an hour ago. Producers and PAs are crammed into the control room. Pushed past the point of overtiredness, high on adrenaline and success, people are drinking too much too quickly, further amping up the jittery energy in the room. Isak is leaning against the wall next to Sana, sloshing around the fizzing liquid in the Fanta bottle she pressed into his hands earlier.

It’s an old joke between them. When they first met, both of them on deeply exploitative runners’ contracts, they’d celebrate each of their tiny successes – a difficult job done well, an idea pitched to one of the PAs – with two bottles of Fanta and Snickers bars. The Snickers is currently shoved into Isak’s back pocket. He’ll get to it once his overstrained nerves have gotten the memo that this near endless shoot is over.

“This went better than expected.” Sana clinks her plastic bottle against Isak’s. They haven’t had time to talk in private, but Isak is pretty sure that they’re on the same page about what’s this night’s real win: seeing Even and his friends emerge from this mess unscathed.

Next door, the loggers are typing feverishly. Between the surprise reveal of Even’s former marriage and the rescue on the boathouse roof, the night has yielded a rich crop for this week’s episode. Isak will have to spend much of tomorrow going through the pods and putting together string-outs for Geir’s approval. He’s dog-tired just thinking about it.

Geir chooses this moment to saunter over. He looks at Isak’s Fanta bottle and shakes his head. “I’ll never understand how you can stomach this vile stuff, Spurv.”

He’s brought two bottles of beer, and he immediately gets started on cracking them open with his teeth. The very first time Isak saw him do this, Geir broke off a piece of his canine. Isak can tell by the flicker in Geir’s gaze that he’s remembering the same moment. He can also tell that this time, just like back then, this stupid maneuver is causing Geir a fair bit of pain to which he’d never admit.

When he offers Isak the first bottle, Isak shakes his head: “Thanks, I’ll stick to the vile stuff.”

“Suit yourself.” Geir takes a good swig of the beer. “Good night, don’t you think? Satisfied with Even’s performance?”

“Sure,” Isak says in his blandest voice. “He did fine. They all did. Gonna be a good episode.”

“We’ll see.” Geir’s fingertips drum against the chilled glass of the bottle. “Hey, I wanted to ask you something. Sana, can you give us five?”

Sana’s gaze skims Isak’s face before she pushes off the wall and walks away.

As soon as she’s out of earshot, Geir leans in a little closer: “When you prepped the files for my budget review the other week,” he says neutrally, “you missed a couple of details.”

“Fuck.” Bizarrely, Isak’s feigned alarm feels like the real thing – even though he made a very deliberate decision regarding the things that did and didn’t go into these files. “I didn’t… Was it bad?”

Geir studies him closely, as if looking for tells that Isak is lying or giving him the truth. He can’t seem to decide either way, and Isak knows enough about Geir’s own tells to see that it’s freaking him out.

LASD’s budget reviews always involve a fair bit of fictionalizing because Geir doesn’t handle money like a normal person. He’s always been invested, body and soul, in his shows. When the network initially gave LASD a budget so measly the contestants had to give the crew a hand between takes, Geir used up all of his private savings to get LASD off the ground. He’s always blowing the budget, always replenishing their funds with obscure donations, always spending money on things the network would never in a million years sign off on. Over the years, Isak has gotten quite good at hiding the truth behind doctored numbers. This time around, he’s been negligent. Studiously so.

“Did you,” Geir asks, “let me walk into a budget review meeting with fucked-up numbers, Spurv?” His tired, watchful eyes are fixed on Isak, so Isak defaults to the oldest trick in the book and follows up his lie with a confession.

“I didn’t screw up your numbers.” He gives a little shrug, makes sure to make it look vulnerable. “But I did throw Christoffer in Ilya’s way. I guess you knew this already.”

Geir’s mouth twitches before it settles into a smirk that looks ferocious. And fond. “I thought so. Well played. Do you –”

They’re interrupted by Sara’s whistle. It’s the most annoying sound in the world: excruciatingly loud and of a weirdly high frequency, like a sonic weapon. She’s keeping an eye on the monitor wall and she’s gesturing to one of the display screens now in jerky excitement.

“Take a look at this,” she yells. “Marten and Kjell are practically passed out in the lounge, but Even and Kára are sneaking off into the garden again! He looks kind of flustered. Something is up!”

Geir is already on his way to the monitor wall, but he glances at Isak over his shoulder, eyes merry. “Bet on me, Spurv? I think I might win tonight.”

Isak stares at the screens and tries to ignore the tight knot in his stomach.

Chapter Text

Sana silently rejoins Isak. Two sharp frown lines etched are into the skin between her brows. From where they’re standing, they can see almost the entire video wall, displaying everything the cameras are capturing in the mansion and on the grounds of Dahlvillaen. More and more people are crowding into this part of the control room.

Sara, not willing to let her moment of perceived importance slip away just yet, points at Even and Kára's small image on one of the screens and says: “This could be big! It’s obvious that they’re fighting!”

Even and Kára are not fighting. It’s not like Isak can see much of their faces as they make brief appearances on different screens, moving in and out of the cameras’ range, but he can still tell by the way Even is holding himself and gesticulating that he’s talking about something that upsets him, not engaging in an argument.

Sara offers one silly theory after the other. Her rapid-fire chatter and the shifting energy in the control room - everyone overstrung and now, suddenly, keyed-up by the unexpected - set Isak on edge.

“Let’s hope,” Geir says, “that they’re headed to a place with microphones.” He’s downing the second bottle of beer quickly, settling down in front of the monitor wall with William and Christoffer by his side.

When it becomes clear that Even and Kára are walking towards the boathouse, Isak breathes out in quiet relief. Even asked him and Sana about camera and mic-free spaces on set. He must be remembering Sana’s words and is most likely taking Kára to the green guestroom to talk in privacy.

Moments later, on the screen, Even and Kára step into a guestroom that’s painted an unambiguous blue.

Sana hisses, then leans in a little closer to whisper: “Slayed by detail, just like my brother. These idiots.” She sounds angry, but Isak catches the worry in her eyes.

There are no microphones in the entire boathouse, so the only person on set who might be able to get the gist of Even’s and Kára’s conversation by seeing them captured on camera is Liv. But what’s broadly happening is clear enough. Even is still talking rapidly, and when he’s not talking, he’s chewing on the skin around his thumb nail or pulling at his hair. Kára rubs her eyes a couple of times like a tired child, but she’s listening intently, nodding along.

Geir turns to Christoffer. “Run. Drag Vilde and Sonja out of bed. Don’t tell them what this is – just take them to the boathouse as quickly as you can and wait there until we tell you to move. I’ll have a camera and sound unit meeting you there.”

Isak looks down when the plastic bottle in his hand makes a crackling sound. He relaxes his fingers, one by one. This is the game. It doesn’t matter what Isak would give up for the power to change it. There’s not a single thing he can do to stop this.

On the screen, Even sits down heavily, letting all his weight drop onto one of the low leather ottomans. He puts his head into his hands and remains like this until Kára steps closer and nudges him. Then, looking ill with exhaustion, he rests his forehead against her belly.

The control room has gone quiet, all heads turned toward the monitor wall. The people here are Reality TV bloodhounds: they may be buzzed and under various influences, but they’re still picking up the scent of an impending, telegenic cataclysm.

Geir is hurriedly putting on his comms set, and a couple of other people are doing the same just so that they can listen in to Geir’s quick exchanges with Chris. Isak doesn’t, but his gaze crosses Geir’s.

Caught in the heat of the moment, Geir raises his bottle and smiles at Isak like he’s done countless times before – not in triumph or out of spite but buoyed by this electric anticipation that Isak instantly recognizes because they’ve shared it so many times. Isak holds Geir’s gaze for a beat, then slowly raises his empty bottle in turn.

When he turns back to the display screens, Even’s forehead is still pressed against Kára’s stomach. She is pushing his hair back. Raises her shoulders a little helplessly and strokes the nape of his neck.

They remain like this, and it feels like the suspended moment between the flick of a lighter and its flame licking into a spill of gasoline.

Isak can’t tell who moves first, only that all of a sudden she’s crashing into his lap and his hands are in her hair, helpless and frantic, grappling for purchase as they kiss.

“Fuck”, says Sana, who doesn’t ever use profanities, just as the control room erupts into triumphant hoots and yells.

When Kára tugs away the bare minimum of her clothes and Even gets to work on his belt, William hollers: “We haven’t gotten this guy to do so much as kiss one of the contestants for the past two weeks and now he’s fucking his ex-wife? Hell yeah!”

“The mother of his godson,” Sara adds, shaking her head with pleased disdain. “I mean, how do you get back from that? Why aren’t Vilde and Sonja in the room yet?”

“Because,” Geir says with his boyish laugh, “we’re waiting for them to actually fuck.”

Isak makes himself watch with the others. He is not prepared for the force of the childish fantasies that assail him. A piece of time neatly snipped out … a few feet of film run backwards. He wants to cheat time, excise from its relentless unspooling what’s about to happen, suture it together differently. He wants to protect them, crawl through the screen and shield them from all these invasive eyes. Half the people in the control room are already shouting suggestions for lurid headlines, indifferent to the relentless pressure and strain that are finding a momentary outlet in what's captured by the inhuman eye of the camera.

What follows looks like a farce and feels like a tragedy.

*

Finding Even on an empty, nightly set that’s studded with cameras should be easy, but it’s not. Everyone has left or gone to bed. Isak has searched the mansion, the garden, the pool area, the pier, and the private beach. No trace of Even. He’s sweaty and out of breath from dashing from one place to the next.

When he finally tracks him down, he wants to kick himself because if he’d panicked less and spent a minute looking at this from Even’s point of view, he’d have found him half an hour ago. Isak wraps his hands around cool metal and takes a moment to steady himself. Then he climbs over the railing that separates garden from roof atop of the boathouse.

There is nothing that he likes about heights, or about traipsing across treacherous slanting surfaces at nighttime. But Mutta’s point about Even needing a friend seems a little more urgent now. Tomorrow, Isak is going to find him someone nice and reliable and laid-back. He has several contenders in mind. They’re currently asleep though, so Isak will have to do. He lacks all the relevant qualifications, but for Even’s sake, he can probably keep it together for a couple of hours.

Even is sitting on the ledge between the gables, knees drawn closely to his chest. He has changed into jeans and a sweater, and he’s wearing the hood half-up so that Isak, easing himself onto the ledge beside him, can’t see much of his face.

Isak’s heart is thumping in his chest. “For the record,” he says, “I fucking hate roofs. We’re not making a habit out of this.”

They haven’t talked since the debacle in the boathouse, and judging from the way Even is staring straight ahead, shoulders hunched, he isn’t too keen on changing that now.

Isak fishes a folded and crumpled cardboard plate out of his pocket. The back of it is covered in Isak’s handwriting, but maybe he needs to approach this in a more circuitous way. He turns the plate around and smooths it out as best as he can. Even, from what Isak has seen, hasn’t eaten all night. So he serves him Sana’s half-melted Snickers bar.

Even’s gaze flicks from the plate to Isak and back. “Just checking,” he says, and there’s a weird tremble to his deep voice, like he’s fighting back hysterical laughter, “that you didn’t bring me a knife and fork, too.”

“Huh?”

“Seinfeld? The Pledge Drive?”

“Er… no.” Isak nudges Even’s raised knees with the plate. “I’m sure it won’t taste half as bad as it looks.”

Even blinks at him. With all the makeup removed, his face looks raw and blotchy in the weak shine of the garden lights. Isak fights the impulse to touch him, smooth his fingertips along the curve of Even’s cheek.

“So,” he asks instead, “Pledge Drive?”

Even still has this haunted, wide-eyed look to him, like he’s just woken up from a nightmare and is trying to fathom what’s real and what’s not, but after a long moment he picks up the Snickers and inspects it. Takes a small bite. Another one as he haltingly lays out the plot of a thoroughly confusing Seinfeld episode.

“These characters are clearly lunatics,” Isak says, when Even trails off. “Then again some of them seem to be working in public television so that tracks.”

Even laughs shakily. It’s like the night air is threaded through with invisible wires, all of them tightening around them at once. Isak thinks how odd it is that you can feel flayed open by another person’s distress. Thinks that he’d be willing to gather more of this wretchedness to himself if that meant that Even would feel it less keenly.

He breathes in deeply and forces himself to be practical. Helpful in whatever little way he can be. “Okay.” He hands Even his phone, flashlight switched on, and says: “Turn around the plate.”

Even stares at Isak’s ugly handwriting: “What’s this?”

“Something that Sana and I came up with. Actually… some of the better sentences are Sana’s. Don’t tell her I said that. It’s…” Isak has to stop himself from squirming nervously, surely not a smart thing to do while perched on a ledge two stories above ground. “It’s a draft. Something that you could say to the contestants if you wanted. To smooth ruffled feathers and shut down this conversation.”

He glances at Even, unsure if he will see this as another intrusion rather than as the thing Isak and Sana were trying to weave for him: a narrative, a protective spell of well-chosen words, that firmly closes the door on what happened tonight and gives him back a measure of privacy.

Even clears his throat when he’s done reading. “Why did you write all of this on a plate?”

“We… had to be secretive about it. Quick, too. Things were a little chaotic after… Anyway. You don’t have to use it, you know.”

“No, it’s… really good,” Even says, still looking at Isak’s writing rather than his face. “Some of it is even true.”

Isak nods. “The contestants will come round, don’t worry.”

“Thank you for this.” Even carefully folds the plate and puts it in his pocket, but he looks as defeated as before. “I mean for them… for the contestants, this will just turn into another bizarre story of their time on LASD. It’s not like… like it’ll make a real difference to them.”

Isak’s gaze drifts out into the garden and lights on the orange trees, painted gray by the moon, stripped of fairy lights and magic. He knows that they’re both thinking of the person to whom this night will make a difference. One day, when he’s old enough to understand this particular kind of betrayal at the hands of two adults he loves.

“I don’t know what to do,” Even says, voice raw. “I just want to disappear. But I can’t because I have to… have to find a way to make this right.”

Isak swallows. “We’re playing for time,” he explains. “Sana convinced Geir that next week’s episode will only feature the kiss between you and Kára. We’re dangling the possibility of something… um… more for a potential future reveal. But Sana made the case that it could be used to greater effect,” Isak is aware how ugly all of this sounds but he pushes himself to carry on, “once you’ve become close with one of the contestants. That’s not what she or I want!” he adds quickly. “It was just the best we could come up with on the spot. And it gives the three of us time to maybe work something out.”

Even is silent beside him.

“Do you… do you believe me?” It comes out sounding rough, like a dare, but only because Isak isn’t breathing.

Even turns his face to him and swallows, once, before he says: “Yes.”

“That’s... good.” Isak nods a couple of times, probably looking like a moron. What was he going to say? He shifts his weight and finds something digging into his backside. Right. He brought more than a scribbled-on cardboard plate because he can be a good friend for a night.

He pulls out the keys that he took from the safe in the control room before he went searching for Even. Dangles them in the air. “Chris is on night shift in the control room. She’ll cover for us if you want to get out of here?”

Even’s gaze, which had been far, far away, returns to Isak and sharpens.

*

Cool night air whips past them as Even speeds up. Isak tightens his arms around Even’s waist and squints through the visor of his helmet, eyes nearly closed to slits, watching all the city lights bloom and unfurl into riotously colored rosettes as they fly past them on Ilya’s Kawasaki. It’s what he loved best about night drives as a kid: the discovery that the night isn’t black but dyed a hundred different shades if you look at it slantwise.

Maybe it’s just that Isak has never ridden a motorbike before, but there’s an unexpected magic to it. He loves the idea that they are invisible to the world – two faceless shadows on a fast, fast ride, a secret moving through the heart of a restless city.

They stop near the Opera, rising from the fjord like a slumbering behemoth of a glacier. Isak is at first a little apprehensive about the danger of someone spotting Even, but there are hardly any people wandering around the ramps at this time of night. Even has pulled up the hood of his sweater and Isak is taken aback by the fact that he looks … ordinary.

Well, that’s a bit of a lie: Isak thinks glumly that a lifetime of looking at Even might render his face familiar, but no less astonishing. But dressed in jeans, hands buried in the pockets of his washed-out hoodie, he looks a lot like a student or someone working a regular, boring job. The few people who are around are unlikely to notice him, or they’ll only start thinking about where they might have seen his face before when Even and Isak have long passed them.

“I didn’t know it would still be here,” Even says, and it takes Isak a moment to figure out that he’s talking about the art installation. Isak read about it when it opened a few weeks back, but he hasn’t taken the time to check it out.

He’s glad he’s doing so now because it’s unlike anything he’s ever seen. A fleet of small, colorful boats is sailing up the white stone ramps, all the way from where the lowest ramp drops into the fjord to the walkable roof of the Opera House. Hidden projectors wash your feet in ghostly swirls of water when you draw near one of the boats.

They spend a long time drifting aimlessly up and down the ramps, admiring dingies, sailboats, and the modern reconstruction of a Viking longboat. Even seems to like the Sami Nordlands best, but he eventually climbs onto what’s hardly more than a wooden raft with an improvised sail, located at the very bottom of the lower ramp, where sea water laps at its outer edge. Isak follows.

They sit back to back, both leaning against the small mast. The water before them looks deceptively flat, like polished stone. Above them, the sail swells and whispers in the breeze.

“Why this one?” Isak asks.

“We’re stranded,” Even says and the laconic, quiet rumble of his voice fits this otherworldly environment where land and sea have become inverted.

“Nah, we’ve made it to the shore.” Isak pauses for a beat. “Where we’ll die of thirst within 36 hours.”

“I think I’d prefer to be devoured by Komodo dragons.”

“They are notoriously slow eaters, so you’d have to be rather patient. Maybe heat stroke first, Komodo dragon lunch second?”

Discussing dumb ways to die with Even is… soothing. He’s got a wicked, dark sense of humor and – shockingly – he’s never heard of the Darwin Awards, so Isak digs out his phone and regals him with the stories of some of the recent winners.

He ends with the tale of a Brazilian sailor who got an honorable mention because he jumped into a pool filled with piranhas on a dare, then managed to pull himself out, thirteen piranhas gnawing on his back, and survived. “Sailors,” Isak concludes, “are tough fuckers.”

Even snorts quietly. “I should know. I was married to one.”

“Kára? I thought she’s a painter?”

“Yeah. But she also spends much time sailing the superyachts that her family builds to where the buyers want them. I’ve tagged along a few times. Once all the way from Søvik to Gibraltar.“

“Cool. Um…” Isak reaches around and offers Even his phone. “Do you want to call her?” He knows for a fact that Kára and Even didn’t get a chance to talk after Vilde, Sonja, and five cameras walked in on them.

When Even takes the phone, Isak gets up and slowly wanders over to where a couple of teenagers are lounging in a small Viking boat further up the ramp. He bums a cigarette but doesn’t light it until he gets back.

It’s a bit awkward sharing a cigarette when you’re sitting with your back turned to the other person, a mast between you, but they make it work.

“Is Kára okay?” Isak asks.

“Sort of. Marten and she are in an open relationship, so in theory, it’s not an issue between them. But it’s me and that means… it’s different.”

Isak doesn’t want to pry so he just hums, giving Even the chance to drop the subject.

After a moment Even says: “Kára and I ended a long time ago. We’ve both moved on. Tonight was just… stupid… I can’t believe that I… it was…it was…” He breaks off and Isak hears the dull sound of Even drumming his knuckles rapidly against the wood.

“Familiar… when nothing else is?” Isak offers. He doesn’t want to pretend to know Even’s exact feelings, but he hopes that his tone will convey to Even that he understands, him and what happened both.

“Familiar, yes.” Even says. “That’s all. But on television, it’ll look like something else entirely. And then… You know, Kára is happy with Marten for the most part, and they have Kjell. I don’t… I can’t… if tonight ruins all of this for them, I don’t know how I can…”

Isak nods, then remembers that Even can’t see him. “We’ll think of something to keep it out of the public eye at least,” he says. “And… I understand that hearing this from me makes zero difference, but: everyone fucks up under pressure and more often than not, even the people we’ve hurt see this and… well, they might not forgive us, but they might also choose not to hate us forever.”

“Your experience?”

“Ha, no. I’ve fucked up so spectacularly in so many different ways, there’s no…” He stops and draws a breath, before continuing more quietly. “Actually, you had a ringside seat to one of my most recent fuck-ups. And I’ve been meaning to apologize.” It’s easier saying this without facing Even, but it’s still excruciating, a painful quickening of nerves. “That morning in your bathroom I… I mean, I’m not made out of stone, even if that would be kinda useful around here. I… wanted you. So much. But I wasn’t… I am not in a good place. And what’s more important: you’ve seen what this set is like. It’s dangerous to get carried away. By sex or shame or… anything. You do that and you bleed.”

When Isak turns his head to the side, he can see that Even is moving the hand that holds the glimmering cigarette up and down, like he’s drawing slow patterns into the night air. “I understand that now,” he says.

“I think…” Isak pushes himself to go on, trying to ignore the throb of his pulse, because this… this is the only thing that he can give Even, and he doesn’t want to fuck it up, no matter what it costs him. “I think there’s probably a parallel universe out there where we meet differently. Like, a good while before you become famous and I sell my soul to Reality TV.”

“I want to hear more,” Even interrupts him, “but just for the record: whatever this other universe is, I’m stipulating that we’re also meeting in a public restroom. Can we do that?”

Isak tips his head back and laughs quietly, chest tight. “Yeah. We can.”

“Mmh.” Isak can hear the smile in Even’s voice and instinctively presses back against the mast, wondering if Even can somehow feel this.

“Anyway,” Isak says. “I’m sure in this other universe, I hold on to your number and we meet again. Or maybe… maybe we even get a shot at something short-termy and stormy that ends…”

“I don’t think we’d be stormy,” Even interjects. “I mean in bed, for sure. But out of it, I don’t want stormy, and I don’t think you do either. I want…”

“Don’t.” The word sounds odd because Isak’s throat closes around it.

Even is quiet for a moment. Then he offers Isak the last drag of the cigarette. “Can I ask you something?”

Isak swallows. “I’ll tell you when I know what it is.”

“Why are you still working on this show?”

He flicks the stub of the cigarette into the sea. “It’s complicated. I did something very stupid at the end of last season and the networks sued me over it. They’ve dropped some but not all the charges. This is my shot at convincing them to drop the rest. But that’s only part of it.”

Even doesn’t prompt him to continue, but Isak can feel his patient interest in the silence between them.

“I have a lot of unfinished business with LASD. And with Geir,” he says eventually. “I want to… wrest control of the show from him. End it, or at least get the network to appoint a new showrunner who’ll do things differently.”

“What’s your plan”, Even asks, “for taking down Geir?”

“Well, if there are hidden cameras in your suite that are recording past the contracted hours, it would sure be nice to find them... That would be a start.”

“I haven’t found anything so far.”

“They might have been removed. But we’ll have to keep looking. Sana and I will also do some more digging into LASD’s finances. We’re only just getting started. We’re still… trying to figure this out.”

Even is silent for a long moment. Then he asks: “And afterwards?”

“What do you mean?”

“When it’s over and you’re free,” Even says. “What are you going to do?”

“Oh…” Isak has never allowed himself to think past the end of the show. Because he won’t be free so much as… reduced to a husk. He’s worked on the show since he was eighteen. Even the Cultural Industries degrees he’s got were mere fillers for his CV and the time between seasons. His talents, his questionable accomplishments, his closest ties - all of them are bound up with the show. Once LASD is gone, there won’t be much of him left either.

“I don’t know,” he admits eventually because he doesn’t want to lie. He wonders what Even will make of this, if he’ll laugh.

Even doesn’t laugh. He says: “I don’t know what I’ll do either.”

“You,” Isak says, rubbing his cold hands together and forcing himself to snap back to a lighter mood, “will be filthy rich. And far-traveled. Don’t forget: it’s not long now before we take the show on the road. This means: less cameras, less awfulness, a lot more privacy. Touristy delights.”

“Did you just say touristy delights?”

“Sure did. You decide which contestants get to join you on these trips. Some of these people aren’t so bad. So, you know, spending time with them off camera doesn’t have to suck. Emma for one would love to reenact Roman Holiday with you. How’s that?”

Even laughs. “Absolutely dreadful.”

“Well, maybe not Emma then. But I mean it: the contestants this season are a lot less awful than the ones we usually get. Eva, Yousef, Sonja, Liv, Adam, Iben… Mikael. I know that you like them, and that you’ve found stuff to bond over with each of them. You can build on this. Get through this together as… friends or fellow survivors or whatever. Turn it into a game. You like games, don’t you?”

“Yes. And where… where does this game leave you?”

Isak licks his lips and glares at the sea stretching out before him. “Just where I’ve been before. Everything continues as is.”

“That’s what you want?”

Isak is so tired, he’s practically delusional, so for the fraction of a second, he imagines saying No. I don’t want that. I want to unmoor this ramshackle raft and sail towards the open sea with you. The thing will probably sink after a handful of minutes, but we can use what time remains to kiss. Because for all that we’ve done, we’ve never kissed. I think if you kissed me, I’d be okay with whatever comes after.

But this way lies disaster. Isak knows this. He forces himself to replay Mutta’s words in his mind a couple of times until he’s sure that his voice won’t waver when he says: “I have my own game to play. But I will… I’ll be your friend. Brace yourself,” Isak adds quickly, “because I promise that I’ll be very, very bad at it. I’ll make fun of you, and I’ll insult you even when I only half mean to. And under no circumstances will I humor you when you feel like waxing poetically about Mikael’s locks.”

Even laughs. It doesn’t sound particularly happy. “That’s okay. I’d still want you as my friend.”

“Cool.” Isak reaches his hand over his shoulder so that they can shake on it without changing positions. Afterwards he fishes something out of his pocket and offers it to Even: “Here, have a token of my friendship.”

Even gasps quietly when he recognizes the beat-up iPod that Isak took from him the very first day on set. A moment later, he presses a single earbud into Isak’s hand. “We’ll share.”

Isak has to be careful not to let on that he has rather detailed knowledge of Even’s horrifically eclectic taste in music. Sleepless nights in a stuffy trailer, with nothing but the suitor’s iPod for company, will do this to you. At least he manages to prove himself a terrible friend right away when he raps along with Nas in his atrocious English, soundly ruining The Message for Even.

Later, Isak feels a tug on the headphone cable and realizes that Even has fallen asleep. He carefully shifts around to Even’s side of the raft. Even’s head keeps glancing off the mast, body pitching to the side before Even, with a little jerk, rights himself without properly waking, only to do the same thing again when sleep claims him once more. Isak sits down next to Even and slots his shoulder against Even’s to keep him upright. Then he balls together his jacket so that Even has something to rest his head against.

He gently removes Even’s earbud. But instead of switching off the iPod, he keeps listening to the familiar sequence of songs. After a while, Even’s body grows more heavy against his own. They’re huddled together so closely that Isak can sense Even’s deepening breaths, the ebb and swell of it, and it feels like the momentary peace Even has found is flowing through his body, too.

Isak looks up at the stars, barely visible in the summer-pale night sky, and keeps watch.

Chapter Text

Isak thinks of himself as pretty untalented in the friendship department. It’s a relief though to recast this raw, aching thing between Even and him as friendship. He’s glad that he came clean to Even the night they snuck away from set, after the debacle with Kára, and that he owned up to two truths: the first truth is that whatever has been happening between them wasn’t one-sided; the second is that it cannot continue.

Whenever his mind strays back to their hushed conversation on the raft, he tells himself that everything is as it should be: he has finally managed to force shut a door that, for long weeks, has been dragged forward and backward discordantly on its hinges, teasing and taunting Isak with what might lie on the other side.

He cannot afford to be unfocused, and he won’t be. LASD’s set is a combat zone: navigating Even to safety, bringing down Geir, and avoiding having the skin ripped off his own back in the process feels like a nearly insurmountable task as is. He needs to eliminate distractions, pull himself together. Stamp out whatever little sparks are still singeing his skin whenever Even is close.

Sometimes, being Even’s friend is easy. Right now, for instance, Isak gets to laugh at Even’s third disastrous attempt to share with Sonja a gloriously greasy slice of Neapolitan pizza, piled high with tomatoes and grilled artichokes. Magnus’s first take was ruined by an errant piece of anchovy; the second by a gust that blew Sonja’s scarf right into Even’s face. When Magnus shakes his head and cuts off their third attempt because Sonja can’t repress a yawn, Even howls and wolfs down the pizza slice in two seconds.

“No offense,” he mumbles with his mouth still full.

“Some taken,” Isak says. “You’re not supposed to eat the props!”

“That’s what happens when you drag me out of bed and push me in front of a camera before breakfast!”

“We can’t lose the early morning light.” Isak nods to Sonja and Mikael. “Look: everybody else is starving gracefully. Take note.”

But he lets Even eat a second slice and allows the others to take a short break too. He even ends up sitting down between Even and Magnus on the surprisingly comfortable rim of the cracked marble fountain they’ve chosen as backdrop for the shoot.

They’re in Naples for three days with just a handful of crew, Even, and four contestants. Temperatures are pushing 40 degrees and the city is a sizzling, spitting pan, filled to the brim with sun-burnt tourists and locals. Nothing’s been going according to plan: the AV in their shitty Airbnb snuffed it on the day of their arrival. One of their cameras got stolen. They’re badly behind schedule. Isak is fully aware of all these things, but he lets them slide for the moment. He leans back on his arms - enjoying the sun, the stretch to his muscles - and allows his eyes to fall closed behind his shades.

It’s like every kilometer of distance between Naples and Oslo registers. He’s sleeping better. He doesn’t have to remind himself to relax his shoulders three dozen times a day. He can even afford to let his attention - usually a tightly wound, thrumming wire - loosen so that he’s able to take in the city. Its cacophony of sounds: aged scooters rattling up the steep alleys; noisy church bells; illegal street vendors hawking their wares with the same aggressive gusto that also echoes in the cries of the hovering sea gulls. Its smells: admittedly, that’s the rank stench from the sewers a lot of the time, but also freshly ground coffee beans, panzerotti, and the ever present garlands of dried red chili peppers.

When Isak cracks open his eyes, he’s caught in Even’s blue gaze. Isak tries to look back at him calmly, ignoring the weird, nervous pulse that runs through his body. He hadn’t noticed that he’d turned his head toward Even with his eyes closed, and now Even is leaning forward, elbows on his knees, and staring at Isak, expectant and giddy.

“Fuck,” Isak mutters.

“But Isak…” Even’s smile grows wider. It’s very irritating. “Keep your face always toward the sunshine,” he declaims sagely, “and shadows will fall behind you.”

“No, just no!” Isak is about to shove him, then stops himself. Less touching is better. “Why can you remember this shit so well when you bungled every line of the poem you were supposed to recite for Adam yesterday?”

Even, the fucker, doesn’t even try to contain the victory waggle of his stupidly mobile eyebrows. “Guess my brain wasn’t properly incentivized.” It’s entirely clear what’s serving as incentive now. “You can buy me a minimum of three sfogliattelle,” Even says smugly.

It’s a game they’ve been playing. The kind of game you play with a mildly annoying friend, who’s previously hidden his competitive streak rather well. Practically every wall in their Airbnb is decorated with dumb inspirational quotes in dusty IKEA frames. Stuff like: You have to look through the rain to see the rainbow. Or: Stars can’t shine without darkness. Whenever one of them manages to match one of these slogans to a place or situation, he gets a prize. They’ve defined prize very loosely, although so far their prizes have mostly been consumable.

While Isak queues to buy Even’s sfogliattelle from a tiny bakery at the corner of the square, his phone vibrates. Sana.

look at the polls and storyline I emailed you
viewers are rabid for Mikven
make it happen for next week’s episode
Sonja will get her moment in two weeks’ time, but only that
boys are endgame

Isak sends her an emoji that looks wilfully delusional - at least he hopes that’s the meaning Sana will take from it.

Anything else?

That’s code for Sana’s sleuthing. Before Isak left for Naples, they hashed out their best strategy for pressuring Geir into relinquishing control of the show. They came up with two angles of attack: first, if they can dig up evidence that Geir violated Even’s contract by using hidden cameras and filming him beyond the agreed upon hours, he’s in breach of the law - a fact that should get even the most phlegmatic network bosses to sit up and take notice. Second, Isak has gone through the show’s recent financial records and found some decidedly weird fluctuations in the budget. Large sums appearing, then disappearing again. Sana is on this case, too.

Unfortunately, so far without results. She writes back:

patience, isabell
don’t forget to wear sunscreen
bet your nose is peeling

Isak smothers the impulse to touch his nose and turns back to the task at hand.

Sfogliattelle.

He’s noticed that when Even buys them for himself, he makes moony eyes at the exorbitantly priced, lobster-tail-shaped sugary perversions stacked high behind the bakery’s glass cabinet, then buys the much cheaper shortcrust version. Of course, that’s precisely the kind of thing that Isak would do and, anyway, frugality is a virtue blablabla - but not exactly a virtue that sits entirely right with Isak’s sense of who Even is and what makes him happy.

He looks at the delicately layered lobster tails. You can tell that the crisp, golden-brown shell of the pastry will crackle once you trace a fingertip over its perfect, paper thin ridges. He has a hunch that this is precisely what Even will do.

Isak smiles at the bakery attendant. “Three of these, please.”

*

Isak isn’t sure how much intellectual prowess is actually simmering behind Mikael’s soulful eyes and serious demeanor. But this question is beside the point: from episode 1, they’ve typecast Mikael as the deep, thoughtful type, given to contemplate the complexities of life while staring off into the distance with his frequently bare, lightly muscled arms attractively crossed.

This is why Isak stages Mikael’s one-on-one date with Even at Libreria Berisio, a used bookstore that turns into a speakeasy cocktail bar after night falls. Its floor-to-ceiling book-shelves and Turkish carpets glow dreamily in the burgundy ambiance light. All the cocktails and mocktails are named after avant garde poets with weird Spanish, French and Italian names. Isak is glad he doesn’t have to read any of them out aloud. Mikael, of course, does just that - diligently nasalizing all the vowels when he’s on the French names, trilling his r-sounds when he’s reading out the Italian ones.

Isak takes a big swig of his lukewarm Negroni. Libreria Berisio isn’t kindly disposed to the beer-drinking population, but he was 100% right that Even and Mikael would be right at home with the sexy, sophisticated vibe of this place. When Eskild asked him for the night’s theme, Isak told him to go big on the Scandi fantasy of Mediterranean male hotness. Mikael’s dark, tousled locks are held back by a pair of round, eco-friendly sunglasses with wooden frames. He’s got a vintage-inspired canvas messenger bag slung over his shoulder, and he’s wearing an elegantly creased, sleeveless linen shirt with tight-fitting chinos. The chinos make his generally uninspiring ass look positively provocative. Isak wonders if Even has noticed. Then wonders if that’s a thing that a friend wonders about.

Even is in jeans and some kind of tailored, white shirt with rolled up sleeves. Isak’s sure it’s fine - he hasn’t looked too closely. That’s what he’s got Eskild for.

“Right.” Isak raps his knuckles against the polished wooden counter of the bar, interrupting Mikael’s hymn to Elena Ferrante. They stopped filming three minutes ago but Mikael and Even are still talking, heads closely together, listening intently to what the other has to say. “We only have about another hour that we can film in here,” Isak tells them. “So… from here on, less talking, more action.”

Even and Mikael exchange a confused look, then work out the meaning of Isak’s words with their heads identically tilted to the left. Isak’s stomach clenches with annoyance at the sight.

“Viewers will bay for your blood if you don’t make out on this date,” he explains, making no effort to take the condescension out of this voice. And really, what were these two thinking? “Get it on, but remember that the book shelf to your left…” He points sharply to the correct shelf to avoid expensive misunderstandings. “That’s the only one that won’t collapse if you lean against it while making out. Don’t forget.”

Mikael plays with the strap of his canvas bag. There’s a crease between his eyebrows. “I was…” He looks up and smiles ruefully at Even. “I was kinda hoping that the first time we did this would happen without a camera in the room.”

“That’s heart-warming.” Isak cuts in. “Did you really?” Then he thinks of the motivational words that greet him in the Airbnb bathroom whenever he takes an early-morning piss. “You know,” he tells Mikael, “disappointment has profound value - it’s a stepping stone to resilience!”

He turns to Even, whose mien is hard to decipher: his eyes are very bright, but he’s not smiling. His full lips are slightly open and when his gaze meets Isak’s, a muscle jumps low in his smooth cheek.

“Fairly won,” he concedes quietly. “What’s your prize?”

“Cherries,” Isak quickfires. “Later tonight.” He’s got no idea where that came from - only some burning, angry notion that it can’t be super easy to find cherries in nightly Naples, where supermarkets close around 9pm.

Even nods and holds out his hand to shake on it. And for fuck’s sake - when did Isak turn into the kind of sad wimp who’s afraid to take someone’s hand? Even is looking at him and Isak tells himself that it’s cool - they’re still playing, still competing.

He’s got this.

Easily.

He’s just going to extend his arm, smirk, and bask in the fact that he currently owns Even’s ass. — Whoa, wrong image. Very. Wrong. Ima—

Even’s warm palm slides against his. It’s an innocent touch but Isak’s whole body goes taut and tingly.

He’s watched Even draw, write, cook, smooth his hair, fiddle with blades of grass, and do a hundred things more — and he’s learned that while Even’s movements and train of thought are often impulsive, he’s always careful, always deliberate, when he sets his hands a task. There’s deliberation here, too: Isak can sense it in the confident clasp of Even’s hand, in the way Even briefly strokes his thumb over the back of Isak’s hand before stilling it. Most keenly, perhaps, in the way Even repositions and withdraws his palm ever so slightly after the first, initial contact so that Isak can no longer feel what he knows to be there: calluses and coarsely textured patches, along with spots where the freshly-healed skin is still silky tender.

Isak swallows. He wants to fold his fingers more tightly around Even’s hand and doesn’t. He wants to coax him closer and doesn’t. More than anything, he wants to chase the not-quite-there touch of Even’s palm and he doesn’t - he doesn’t - he doesn’t do it, until it’s over.

The noise of the bar whooshes over him. Magnus is asking him one thing and Linn something else, Even has stepped back, and Isak — Isak can breathe again.

*

There’s a simple, painstakingly mapped out choreography that will upgrade Even and Mikael’s date from romantic meeting-of-minds territory to make-out fest: Mikael is supposed to turn to the book shelf, busy himself with the titles there, let his fingers linger on something with a suggestive title, then turn around and go in for the first kiss.

Mikael studies the bookshelf for long moments, then shows Isak a slim volume. “This okay?”

Isak looks at the black cover: it reads Vintage Barthes: A Lover’s Discourse, and there’s a picture of two oversized, inverted quotation marks that are curling into one another so that they form the number 69.

Isak gives Mikael a thumbs-up. “Perfect. Pretentious but not subtle.”

“That doesn’t,” Mikael says, “sound like a compliment exactly?”

Isak’s smile is tight. “Come on, show us what you’ve got.”

What Mikael’s got is an unexpected bashfulness once he’s supposed to make out with someone in front of a rolling camera. He kisses Even sweetly, shyly, and breaks off repeatedly to put down the canvas bag. Stow his sunglasses somewhere safe. Fix his hair.

Isak looks up from Magnus’s control screen, ready to scold Mikael — and stops cold. All around him, bar patrons are staring at Even and Mikael. They could hardly look more captivated if literal heart-emojis were sprouting from their eye-sockets. A pack of female Erasmus-students - the same girls who’ve fucked with their audio all night - have whipped out their phones and are filming Even and Mikael to a soundtrack of high-pitched cooing.

Isak’s gaze snaps back to suitor and contestant: Even is taller, more broad across the shoulders, and this difference in stature is cast into strong relief by the way Mikael has tucked himself into the cradle of Even’s arm, hands clutching at Even’s shoulders in a manner that’s awkwardly cute. He follows wherever Even leads: when Even changes the angle of his head, Mikael reciprocates, but he waits for Even to deepen the kiss. When Even puts more of his weight against Mikael’s body and presses him against the bookshelf, Mikael blushes and melts against him.

Next to Isak, Linn clucks her tongue. They exchange a glance and Isak mutters: “Living the heteronormative dream in 2024.”

“People are into it though.” Linn nods towards the students. “I think these girls are about to flood IG and get Mikven thigh tats. And Even and Mikael make it look pretty real, too.”

It does look real. But also surreally wrong. In more than one way. Is this what Even wants? A guy who needs to be led through some kind of complicated, sincere seven-step progress of seduction? Who will blush and yield like Mikael?

Rather than someone who’d play a little dirty by hooking a leg around Even’s to flip their positions. Who’d curl a hand into Even’s hair and hold him firmly in place while he kisses him, neither politely nor sweetly, until Even’s smooth facade cracks. Someone who —

“Isak!”

“Hm?”

“What’s with you, man?” Magnus asks. “Mikael just said he wants to try something else for the next take. It’s a surprise for Even. That okay?”

“Course. I’m sure it’ll be riveting.”

Riveting isn’t the right word, but Isak still can’t look away. For the next take, Mikael draws out the part where he trails his fingers over the spines of the books on the shelf. Barthes stays on the shelf. Instead, he slides out a different volume.

Even’s expression doesn’t flicker but Isak sees his shoulders tense, sees his fingers briefly fidget with the pockets of his jeans before he returns his hands stiffly to their former position.

Mikeal beams at Even. “I didn’t know there was an Italian edition!” He turns the book around and reveals to the camera the cover of Kaldt Blått, the graphic novel that made Even famous at twenty.

Mikael goes in for the kiss — and yelps because Even tilts his head to the wrong side and knocks his nose against Mikael’s.

“Careful there!” Mikael sounds a little miffed as well as muffled because he keeps pressing his finger pads against the side of his nose as if checking for lasting damage. “You’re supposed to romance me, not hurt me,” he tells Even.

Even winces. He reaches out to touch Mikael’s shoulder, but Mikael proffers the book instead. “Okay then,” Mikael says, smiling bravely through the pain. “You can make it better by telling me about what happened after Kaldt Blått. I was the biggest fanboy alive of Kaldt Blått when I was nineteen. You know, I had a massive crush on you when the book came out and you were giving all of these interviews. I watched them so many times, all my Youtube recs had your face on them.”

The Erasmus contingent dissolves into squeals of delight.

Even laughs thinly. “That’s…quite a long while ago now. I hope I haven’t…” Isak can see him cast about for some kind of joke and come up empty. “Like… aged too badly.”

Mikael raises his eyebrows playfully. “Under review. After all…” He lets his gaze wander down, then climb back up Even’s body. “There’s much I haven’t seen. Yet.”

“That’s right,” Even says. “Sorry about… about that, I guess.”

Isak is getting whiplash from how fast they’re diving into a full inversion of their former dynamic. Just as Mikael is getting flirty, Even is turning into an overly polite automaton.

“So…” Mikael traces a finger over the sleek author picture on the back of Even’s book. Then he looks up at the man who’s standing before him and draws a breath. Magnus motions for the second camera operator to move in closer and zoom in on Even’s face.

“Do you,” Mikael asks, “do you no longer love it? Creating art, plucking story worlds out of thin air? Isn’t that who you are at the core? An artist?”

“I…” Even is still standing ramrod straight, the way he never does normally, and Isak knows instinctively that this unfamiliar pose is Even shrinking into himself, shuttering door after door. “I don’t know,” he says.

Mikael takes Even’s right hand and curls his fingers around Kaldt Blått so that they’re holding the book together. It looks profoundly awkward, but the people in the bar love it. Some of them are actually clapping.

“Someone as talented as you,” Mikael continues, “doesn’t get to hide from the world. You changed my life with Kaldt Blått. You touched so many people with your art, your writing. You owe it to them to work through whatever made you stop.”

“Do I?” Even’s voice sounds distant. “I don’t know.”

Mikael nods warmly. “I think you do. And it would make me deeply happy to help you in any way I can. Maybe…” He takes a step closer and puts the hand that isn’t holding the book against Even’s chest. His smile turns mischievous: “Maybe you need a muse? Or perhaps someone to send you sternly to your desk and reward you afterwards? I could be any of these things. And a lot besides. I fell in love with the author of Kaldt Blått when I was nineteen. I’m still into him.”

The fact that Mikael can’t read Even for shit, doesn’t mean that he can’t read a room - or the hackneyed fairy tale tropes on which Reality TV trades. He draws himself up to his full height, even rises to his toes a little, then kisses Even on the mouth. It looks like the triumph of sweet sincerity over his former shyness. Isak - knowing that he’s looking at Reality TV gold, knowing that Mikael has just delivered an airtight, glossy storyline to carry them all the way to the finale, knowing that this storyline will require Even to talk about the thing that hurts him again, and again, and again - fights the impulse to hit his fist against something hard.

*

Magnus’s snoring is worse than a brown bear’s, growling and snuffling in his sleep. Isak balls up one of his socks and throws it in the vague direction of Magnus’s head. But he must miss him in the half-dark, or maybe the sock’s been blown off course by the old fan that they’re blasting to cool down the stuffy Airbnb room. Anyway, Magnus keeps sawing logs.

Isak’s t-shirt is damp with sweat when he gets up and walks through the dimly lit flat to fetch a couple of ice cubes. He can hear water running in one of the bathrooms on his way to the kitchen. It’s the one the men are using. Female crew and contestants have taken over the slightly less mildewy bathroom at the other end of the corridor.

Isak expects to find the kitchen empty because everyone turned in early after the shoot at Libreria Berisio. It’s not. Perhaps it’s the heat or empty stomachs, in any case Mikael and Adam have been kept awake, too, and are halfway through two massive Provolone sandwiches. They’re laughing and joking together at the kitchen counter, too distracted to take more than cursory notice of Isak.

The water in the bathroom is still running when he walks back. Isak lies down on the sagging mattress. Outside, a solemn church bell tolls once. Cats are fighting, or maybe fucking, on the roof opposite. Their yowling and hissing reaches a crescendo, then stops.

Isak counts to sixty Magnus-snores. Then he gets up once more.

There’s no answer when he knocks on the bathroom door. Isak’s gaze wanders down the corridor, slowly ticking off the closed doors. He knocks one final time before he presses down the door handle.

Even is standing by the sink, still fully dressed. He’s taken one of the heavy-duty scrub sponges from the kitchen and is cleaning his hands under the running faucet.

There’s a sharp twinge in Isak’s chest. “Hi,” he says and joins Even by the sink.

Even’s gaze just barely glances off Isak in the mirror. He’s pale and his eyes are red-rimmed with tiredness. “I’m not done.”

“Okay.”

Isak looks at the irritated, chafed skin on Even’s palms. He doesn’t say If you keep doing this for ten minutes more, we’ll have to go to A&E to get your hands bandaged because he has a sense that Even knows exactly when to stop, has taught himself to do this in a way that maximizes pain without leaving traces that are dramatic enough to require medical intervention.

The thought makes Isak feel cold, sick at heart, but he doesn’t let any of that creep into his voice when he says calmly: “Pick a number.”

Even looks at him dumbly.

“Do it.”

“Three?”

“I’ll count to three,” Isak says. “In Norwegian, Italian, English, and French. I suck at foreign languages, so… you know, if you can’t make out what I’m saying, just trust that I’m counting for you. And when I stop, you’ll stop as well. You in?”

Even’s gaze meets his in the mirror. Eventually, he nods.

Isak counts and when he’s done, Even does what he promised: he puts the sponge down. Turns off the faucet.

Isak sits down heavily on the rim of the bidet.

Even’s face is pinched, lips pale, but after a moment, he raises a wry eyebrow: “You didn’t lie. That was some proper linguistic violence right there.”

“Very true.” Isak is more than content with being mocked as long as that takes Even’s thoughts off the thing that’s brought him here. He leans backward, still balancing awkwardly on the rim of the bidet. “Hey, do you know what I’ve always wondered? Why are Southern Europeans hardcore into bidets?”

Even studies the bidet thoughtfully. “Maybe there’s a national predilection for… other hardcore things? I mean,” he points to the little basket carrying travel-sized toiletries. “I’ve never seen such a range of intimate care products. Don’t even know where half of this stuff is supposed to go…”

Isak chuckles. “All hail Neapolitan hospitality.”

“All hail Neapolitan hospitality,” Even repeats. There’s a tiny smile swimming in the corner of his mouth. Isak smiles back.

After a moment, he asks: “Do you want to go and sleep?”

Even shakes his head. “Don’t think I can.”

“Well then…” Isak rises to his feet. “I seem to remember that you owe me some cherries?”

*

Their odyssey from one closed corner shop to the next is a mere alibi to keep wandering Quartieri Spagnoli. Even at this time of the night, the cobblestone alleys are buzzing with life. Mopeds honk their horns and zip by. Across the narrow lanes neighbors are chatting while they hang up laundry on the clotheslines that run between the buildings. Old men sit outside and survey proceedings from their plastic chairs, occasionally indulging the cats that are wandering about in search for a late night snack.

Isak feels vaguely responsible to pass on the few things he knows about Naples. So he points out the omnipresent Diego Maradona murals, some of which have little shrines attached to them, complete with plastic flowers and battery operated candles.

Even stops to look at a haloed Santo Diego who’s pictured pressing a kiss to his football. “You like soccer?” he asks Isak.

“I used to play. No one’s ever built me a shrine though. You’re into soccer?”

“Nah. Well… I don’t know.” Even smiles. “Perhaps I might be.”

“What do you like to…” Isak breaks off, embarrassed. Really? Is this where he starts asking Even about his preferred extracurricular activities, like they’re on a seventh-grade date?

But Even looks pleased to be asked and when Isak turns abruptly and starts walking again, he falls into step with him and says offhandedly: “I like to cook. Draw. Watch films. Play my guitar.”

“When no one is listening.”

Even’s lips twitch. “Exactly.”

They round a corner and walk right into what Isak refers to as the exploded-greenhouse-alley in his mind. It’s never where he expects it to be, yet he always stumbles upon it when he’s in this quarter. Naples is not a green city by any means, but this tiny lane has been taken over by creeper plants. Their leaves cascade down the dilapidated walls. In some places, the plants have even woven their tendrils along the web of old clotheslines, forming a natural canopy that stretches across the street.

“Look at that.” Even has turned his face up to the fairy lights that someone has strung up between the leaves.

Isak bites his lip. He’s looking, alright.

Even’s face is enveloped in warm, diffuse light. It makes his hair gleam in shades of copper and bronze, and it gently accentuates his features, catching on his forehead and cheekbones, even tinting his dark lashes a golden hue. Isak isn’t the type to blaspheme against football gods, but Saint Maradona and his halo can go packing.

Even turns and stops. Probably because he’s caught Isak staring like a creep.

He asks: “Can I take a picture with your phone?”

Isak opens the camera and hands it over. “Sure. You must be missing yours around here.”

“I do.”

Even takes the phone and snaps a picture. Of Isak.

“Um. The lights are up there?”

Even laughs and takes another photo. “I’m well aware. Don’t delete these. Please.”

“Whatever.”

Even raises the phone again and that’s when Isak remembers that he didn’t change his t-shirt: he’s still wearing the faded Simpsons shirt he likes to sleep in.

“Fuck.” He can feel himself flush. He probably looks ridiculous, like a teenage nerd. “Can you just not…”

“Hey, wait!” And how is it that Even can always tell what’s going on in Isak’s head? Isak has no fucking clue, but when Even turns the phone around and quickly thumbs through the pics he’s taken, Isak relaxes a bit: the Simpsons are not in the frame.

Just… his face. Looking nothing like Isak normally looks. Maybe it’s the light reflecting back from the walls. Or the residual heat from the day still lingering in the atmosphere.

In the pictures, color is high in Isak’s cheeks. He’s looking up because the incline of the lane subtly elevates Even’s stance. The glow of the lights softens all of Isak’s features. His eyes are wide, their expression startled and happy, and his lips have slid open, like he’s about to speak.

Isak instinctively presses his lips together, like whatever the Isak in the picture was about to reveal needs to be kept in and suppressed.

He doesn’t know what to say, but luckily Even’s got him. “I appreciate the fact that you always dress up in camouflage for our nightly outings,” he says lightly. “Leopard in Oslo, American tourist in Naples. I feel very safe when I’m with you.”

Isak is grateful, but still too flustered - and angry at himself for being flustered - to come up with anything but a repeat of his earlier: “Whatever.”

Even nudges his shoulder against Isak’s and perhaps it’s just the fairy lights, but Even’s smile is so warm it catches Isak off guard. Again.

“It’s always whatever with you,” Even says.

*

They meander further up the hill and eastward, into a maze of alleyways that’s a little rougher. Neon signs are advertising trattorias and bars that look like they’re emphatically not catering to the tourist crowd. Isak’s Italian is severely limited, but even he can tell that the omnipresent graffiti commentary on the walls has been getting cruder - and funnier. On one of the dimly lit squares, kids are playing soccer. They’re running around nimbly, their shouts echoing off the ancient walls of the neighboring church, like they’ve fallen out of time into a curfew-free, endless evening.

Even stops to watch them. He props his back against a deeply-grooved pillar fragment, presumably once hewn by a Roman stone-mason but now nonchalantly integrated into the facade of a run-down apartment building.

“How come we’re shooting here?” Even asks.

Isak shrugs. “We come here every season. Naples is cheaper than many other Italian cities. Plus tomorrow morning we’re taking you to a proper palazzo that we could not in a million years afford under normal circumstances.”

Even whistles through his teeth. “So why does it work out in this instance?”

“The owner is an old flame of Geir’s who’s still holding out hope for some kind of… mid-life revival of their affair, I think? You’ll enjoy meeting him. Can’t tie his own shoe laces but likes to insinuate that he’s the scion of one of the big Camorra clans.”

Even laughs. “Sounds like an interesting guy.”

“Yeah, I think he only says that because he assumes Geir’s into it.”

“And…is he?”

Isak’s usual impulse is not to answer questions about Geir. But that’s the thing about talking to Even: whenever Isak gets drawn into their easy, seamless back-and-forth, he can’t bring himself to stop because it’s just… so good. He always ends up saying more, asking more, because every topic they cover just seems to blossom and branch off into a dozen new ones.

“Nah,” he says. “Geir has his faults but… he finds pampered wannabe mafiosi as ridiculous as the next person.”

“You know a lot about him. About Geir.”

“I do.”

“Why does he call you Spurv?”

Isak didn’t foresee this seedling of a new topic. He considers it, pokes at it a little in his mind to figure out what it might feel like to share this with Even. No sudden revelations manifest themselves. Just the picture of Even scrubbing away at his hands in the sink.

“It’s about how we met,” he says eventually. “During my first year at uni, I was working the dumbest, most boring job ever: sorting thousands of LTO-6 tapes in the network’s off-site archive. It was housed in a crumbling, asbestos-infested office building right next to the E6. Glamorous stuff, you know.”

Even smiles. “I’m imagining eighteen-year-old Isak yawning contemptuously into his fist. Remind me to tell you about my first summer job later - it involved sausage dogs and hair dye. And a full-on assault on my dignity.”

“I wanna hear that right now!”

“Nope, back to the tapes.”

“Being so tall and lanky, you must look utterly ridiculous next to a sausage dog.”

“Sausage dogs, plural. And yes, I do. Tapes, Isak.” His tone is stern, but his eyes have gone all narrow and crinkly at the corners.

Isak clears his throat. Where were they?

Geir.

“Yeah. So here I was, slowly being smothered by a mountain of tapes, when one day, Geir walks in. I knew that he was this hot-shot producer everyone was talking about. At the time, he was actually trying to get a very different show off the ground. The concept was nuts but… you know, the good kind of nuts: daring and smart and potentially hilarious. And he was…”

Isak can still see Geir walking through the door that day, pushing back his sunglasses with a smile and a filthy comment about the network logo.

“He was the coolest, smartest guy I’d ever met. I thought that working on one of his shows must be the dream. So I gave him the wrong tape.”

“You did what?”

“He wanted a 1997 clip of raptor hunting. I gave him sparrows taking a bath.”

Even snorts.

“He only noticed back in the cutting room. It was…” Isak raises his shoulders, a little stunned to notice that despite the years, despite everything that came after, the feelings threaded through this memory - exhilaration, awe, glee - remain unchanged. “It sounds dumb and it was dumb, but it was also… I don’t know. Exciting. Fun. He was fun.”

One of the kids misses the ball. It rolls toward Isak and he sends it sailing back with a precise kick. The girl who receives it strikes and the dustbin goalpost topples over, spilling its contents while the kids shout and cheer.

Isak turns back to Even. “Anyway, Geir came back, we got talking. I joined LASD as a runner the following week. End of story.”

Even shifts against the wall so that he can look at Isak: “Really?”

After a beat, Isak concedes “No.”

Even nods, but he doesn’t press him.

*

It turns out that even just watching other people kick a ball after midnight can make you ravenously hungry. Even gets a tired kitchen hand to sell them a couple of stale panzerotti through the backstreet window of a trattoria, and Isak navigates them to the tiny square in front of Chiesa dei Girolamini that he visits every time LASD comes to Naples. The square is deserted but for an old man whose puppy seems determined to pee in every corner of the square at least twice.

Nestled between the entrance to an old apartment building and a wall that’s covered in a mosaic of tattered posters is another mural. This one is illuminated at night and covered by a pane of plexiglass. Isak’s plan is to be all cool and nonchalant about this, but maybe his self-discipline has already signed off for the night. In any case, he can’t keep himself from glancing at Even every two seconds out of fear that he might miss his reaction. When Even gasps and steps closer, nearly knocking his forehead against the plexiglass in excitement, a giddy rush of warmth spreads through Isak’s chest.

“Is this really…?”

“An original Banksy? Yes.” Isak says. “Madonna in ecstasy with a pistol.”

Even’s smile could easily light up the entire square. “I’ve seen pictures of this, but I had no idea that the original is here in Naples!”

“Now you know. Come on, we can sit on the church steps over there and eat. You’ll still have a view.”

To say that Even is in love is understating things considerably. He keeps getting up and wandering back to the mural. Isak tags along every time because… Even is being ridiculous and someone needs to point that out. Next, Even makes him look up reams of relevant and not so relevant information about the mural. Then he insists that they huddle over Isak’s phone to close-read the endless Wiki-article about Banksy. But even squinting like a mole dragged into sunshine, Even claims that he can’t decipher the small text on Isak’s screen.

Isak groans, but he sits down on the marble steps leading up to the church entrance and starts reading out loud, pausing every once in a while to take a hearty bite from his panzerotto. Next to him, Even stretches out on the marble stone, lying on his back with his knees bent and looking up at the night sky. Not that they can see much of it, given the bright floodlights that are bathing the towering columns and sculpted saints of the church facade in an otherworldly bluish light.

“Gaan me skmmmpr mmphr mmmmh,” Isak says with his mouth full. Miraculously, Even appears to understand that he’s asking if they can skip the section on Banksy’s early career.

“No way!” Even rises to a seating position so quickly, and with such a scandalized look, that Isak starts laughing. Bad idea with all these dry crumbs in his mouth: half a dozen end up in his windpipe.

When he’s done coughing and cursing, Even - doing an appalling job at trying to keep his face straight - says: “But Isak, didn’t you know that It's not the number of breaths we take, but the number of moments that take our breath away?”

“No way! I still haven’t had my cherries!”

“You will. In the meantime, I know what I want for my prize. You know, marble is surprisingly hard.”

Isak looks at him out of the corner of his eye: “Is it.”

“Yeah. I want a pillow.”

“I don’t have a pillow.”

Even moves so quickly, his head is cushioned on Isak’s thigh before Isak has time to protest.

“Just this once,” Even says with closed eyes and a languid wave of his hand, “I will graciously accept this.”

Isak stares down at him. At the soft rise and fall of Even’s chest underneath the fine shirt. He’s so close that Isak can see the delicate, threadlike veins on his closed eyelids. The spot underneath his chin where he always nicks the skin while shaving.

“Your head’s too heavy,” Isak says curtly. “Must be all the hair products. Also: infringement of the rules!”

“Pshaw, this is a quintessential deed of friendship! I use Mutta’s thighs as a pillow all the time. His are more comfortable, by the way.”

Even cracks open his eyes and that’s infinitesimally worse. Because he’s looking up at Isak and there’s nowhere to hide.

The moment stretches and shivers: someone must be passing in front of the floodlights because the marble stones and Even’s face darken, then brighten once more.

“Hi,” Even says softly.

Isak swallows. His “Hi” comes out more gravelly than intended.

“You know…” Even is now peering at the front of Isak’s t-shirt. Given that it’s about two centimeters away from his face, there is no reason to hope that he might miss the penny-sized hole right next to Marge’s towering blue beehive. And why, oh why, didn’t Isak change into a clean shirt? He probably reeks of sweat and panzerotti.

Even doesn’t look grossed out. His gaze flicks up to Isak. He winks solemnly with both eyes. “I will never reveal the secret… but I kinda love the fact that LASD’s most hardass producer sleeps in a Simpsons t-shirt.”

“What did you expect me to wear in bed?” Isak asks before he can think better of it.

Even purses his lips. “I don’t know… Chain mail?”

Isak laughs - carefully, so as not to jostle Even too badly. He’d like to wear chain mail right now: surely a nice layer of rusty metal between them would make everything a whole lot easier.

He busies himself with his phone. “So do you wanna hear more about Banksy?”

Even smiles. He shifts around, adjusting the angle of his neck and getting comfortable like a proprietary cat. “I would lo—”

“Oh fuck.” Isak’s heartbeat is suddenly magnified, throbbing uncomfortably in his chest. “Fuck. Get up.”

Sana’s texts are coming in fast. There’s a download link, too.

When Isak looks up, Even is kneeling next to him, eyes wide: “What happened? Is your mom okay?”

For the briefest moment, Isak’s thoughts, already careening down several serpentine roads at once, are brought to a halt by the fact that Even remembers.

That this is the first thing he worries about.

“She’s fine,” he says slowly. “It’s Sana. She just texted to say that Geir has authorized a new trailer for next week’s episode. It’s bad. It’s…” He can tell from the sudden tension in Even’s shoulders, from the way the lines around his mouth deepen, that he already knows what’s coming. “Sana sent me the trailer. She says Kára isn’t in it, but… the plan is for this episode to feature you guys in the boathouse.”

Even rubs his hands over his cheeks. “Can I see the trailer?”

Isak clicks on the download link and hits play. The trailer opens unsubtly with a running banner reading LASD SEX CONFESSIONS, then barrels hectically through a collage of Even kissing and flirting with different contestants while one of the presenters intones huskily: “Who did the suitor have sex with while the cameras rolled?” - a question that is then repeated about five times with a weird echo effect.

Everything else aside, Isak thinks, this is a really shit trailer. Probably Sara’s work. Recognizing this does nothing to alleviate the cold, queasy feeling in his stomach at the realization that none of the decoys that he and Sana have thrown Geir have worked.

Even is still kneeling on the stone step, frozen in place and looking wan, like a supplicant who knows that no miracle will be granted. “What do I do?”

Isak puts his phone away. He turns so that he’s facing Even. “The episode doesn’t air until Thursday. We’re flying back tomorrow afternoon. This gives us three full days to work something out.”

Even sways a little. “I don’t see how…”

“It’s Reality TV,” Isak says with all the conviction he doesn’t have. “Everything’s possible in Reality TV.”

*

The next morning, they shoot some terrible material at the palazzo of Geir’s friend. It’s barely seven o’clock in the morning, but Even and the contestants have to pretend that it’s late afternoon, and that they’re having the time of their lives learning to mix drinks on the roof terrace. When Isak’s phone vibrates, halfway through the morning, he can’t check it right away because he’s holding Eva’s hair back. She’s leaning over the closest terracotta pot and vomiting Virgin Mojito into the bougainvillea.

Sana’s texts read:

i may have an angle
will meet you guys at the airport

Twelve hours later, when they groggily walk into the arrivals hall, Sana’s there. She shepherds crew and contestants into two vans waiting just outside, before leading Isak and Even to her black sedan parked a good five minutes away. It’s raining cats and dogs and by the time they pile into the car, all three of them are drenched.

Sana wrings out her hijab. Then she turns in the driver’s seat to look at Even and Isak in the back. “How was Naples?”

“Hot,” Isak says. “How was Oslo?”

“Wet.” Isak is taken aback by the fact that for the first time ever, Sana’s usually carefully groomed eyebrows are less than immaculate. “Okay,” she says. “Here’s what happened. Yesterday, Christoffer threw a big tantrum in the control room. Apart from Geir, Sara and I were the only people there.”

“Tantrum about what?” Isak asks.

“Apparently, he walked in on Geir and Anders hanging out in Geir’s trailer. Christoffer said Anders was completely coked up and disoriented.”

“Christoffer would know,” Isak points out.

“Precisely.”

“But…” Even is still wiping raindrops from his face. “I don’t get why Christoffer would be huffy about this kind of thing?”

“Christoffer,” Sana says, “is Geir’s boy du jour.”

“Who’s just realized,” Isak adds, looking at no one in particular, “that he’s got an expiry date tattooed on his forehead now that Anders is on the horizon.”

Sana nods. “That’s why he was tearily stomping his Chelsea boots.”

Even blinks. “Ouch. You two have no mercy, do you?”

“We do,” Sana says. “We’re mercifully trying to save your ass, so I suggest you —”

“You’re right, this might work,” Isak cuts in before Sana’s claws can come out. “Last thing the network would like to hear is that they’re about to face a reprise of last year’s shitstorm and more producers on trial for malpractice.”

“Correct. I think Toril and Niko are due to get their sentences pretty soon.”

“Yeah.” Isak thoughts spool back to an early morning conversation, weeks ago. “We might even have a second witness. Jonas saw Christoffer doing lines with Ilya behind the boathouse. I think if we talked to him, he might help us. Obviously…”

“…we can’t tell Christoffer that he’s in hot water, too.” Sana’s dimples show, but they are all-business, no smile in sight. “The way I see it,” she says, “this is a two-step operation. Step 1 is we use this to twist Geir’s arm so that we can recut the upcoming episode and edit out the boathouse. Step 2 is we get Christoffer to make an official statement about what he saw in Geir’s trailer. We take this to the network. Best case, it’ll take them a week to call in their lawyers and review our accusations. Worst case, we’ll spend a month in limbo. In any case, Geir is history and someone…”

Isak snorts. “Someone?”

“Well… I take over.” Sana fishes her car keys out of her black coat. “We need to get going. More work to do.”

Isak swallows against the tightness in his throat. His mind feels like an ant hill - hundreds of tiny, fragmented trepidations and concerns frenziedly swarming over Sana’s plan. He can tell that he’s missing something, but he keeps getting stuck on details, unable to pull back and look at the full picture.

“What about the trailer for the new episode?” Even asks. “It’s already all over the internet, right? Geir will say you can’t recut the episode because people are expecting sex.”

“Mmh.” Sana’s gaze is glued to the rearview mirror as she maneuvers the sedan out of the parking spot. “That’s the easy part.”

Isak feels crankily compelled to ask how that is, but thankfully Even beats him to it.

“The trailer is completely vague," Sana says, merging into the flow of traffic on the E13. "All we need is a sex scandal.”

Even stares at her, eyebrows raised in confusion. “Um…?”

“The trailer says you had sex on camera,” Sana explains with an air of patient superiority that under normal circumstances would drive Isak up the wall. Right now, his attention is hooked on what Sana’s going to say next. “So this is what we’re going to give them. Only with the added twist that it’s not a contestant on the show, but an older sex tape leaked on the internet. Leaked by us, obviously. And boom!” She snaps her fingers. “Contestants tear their hair out in jealousy and confusion!” Snap. “Even talks apologetically about his man whore phase!” Snap. “Luckily, he’s now a changed man, looking to win back the heart of his true LASD soulmate! Cue episodes 10-12 featuring Even groveling and fighting for Mikael’s love.” Sana catches Isak’s gaze in the rearview mirror. “Dream of a story-arc I say.”

Next to Isak, Even’s fingers tap out the same complicated rhythm that Isak has seen him fall into plenty of times during interviews with Geir in the confession room. “I don’t know if I —”

“If you don’t like this idea,” Sana interrupts him, “you can drag a poor contestant in front of our cameras and have sex with them while we provide helpful instructions. Would you prefer that?”

“What the fuck - no!”

“Okay,” Isak says. “I hate to point out the flaw in this plan. But last time I checked we didn’t actually have a sex tape featuring Even on pile?”

“Course not.” Sana casually overtakes a BMW. “This is why you’re going to go and shoot one now.”

Even says: “What?”

Isak, three seconds later, says: “What?”

“I’m the night guard in the control room and can cover for you until 5 in the morning. It’s all arranged: I’ll drop you off at the back entrance of the Radisson Blu. My cousin works there, you’ll get a room.” Sana takes one hand off the steering wheel and briefly lifts the backpack on the passenger seat. “I’ve brought along two Osmo Pocket cameras and laptops with Vegas Pro.”

Even eyes the backpack. “I think that’s a … a…”

Isak, staring into space, blinks and supplies: “Bad.”

“… bad idea,” Even echoes.

“Please,” Sana says. “All we need is 50 seconds. It can be as shaky and artsy as you want. Give me a flurry of limbs or bodies that are almost entirely out of focus, I don’t care. As long as people can see that Even’s in the video. Oh, and whenever bits of Isak are in the picture, you’ll have to do some digital retouching to edit out his moles. We need a shadowy, faceless second person in the video, but I’d rather not have people identify LASD’s junior producer.”

Isak shakes himself a little. “Sana, this is insane!”

“Why?”

It’s like Isak is back in school, blanking out during the big biology exam he’s spent a week studying for. “Because!” he says with feeling.

Sana reaches back and pats his knee. There are cons to strangling the driver, but Isak very nearly ignores them.

They continue in silence until Sana pulls up close to the hotel. She throws Even the backpack and points outside. “Walk up the stairs and follow the little passageway until you’re nearly at Galleriet. That’s where the back entrance is. I’ll text my cousin to come and pick you up.”

No one moves.

Sana turns around and looks from Isak to Even and back to Isak.

Frowns.

Then she says: “Listen. Isak, you’re… fine. You’re a fairly talented producer. There you have it, I said it! And you,” she turns to Even, “you’ve been making videos with Mutta and my idiot brother for as long as I can remember. I don’t have to tell you that cameras are easily fooled. Just pretend, okay? You’ve got this. Now get out of my car.”

A minute later, they’re standing once again in the downpour. Right in front of them, the Radisson Blu rises into the sky like a majestic shard of gray ice, dwarfing them.

Isak blinks raindrops out of his lashes. The world is out of focus. Or maybe he is. 

Next to him, Even slings the backpack over his shoulder. Looking at him out of the corner of his eye, Isak can see that Even opens his mouth as if to speak, then thinks better of it.

“Were you,” Isak asks, “about to trot out the inspirational bullshit from the Airbnb kitchen or the hallway?”

Even’s mouth twitches. “Kitchen,” he admits.

A storm happens one drop at a time. 

“Thought so.”

They exchange a glance, then turn around and walk up the stairs together.

Chapter Text

The Radisson’s glass elevator ascends swiftly, taking them high up and then higher. Rivulets of rain streak the glass walls. They distort the proportions of the shrinking city below until once towering churches and office blocks appear like twisted miniature replicas of themselves.

The rapid rise, the quiver in his stomach, make Isak think of sneaking on the drop tower at Kongeparken as a kid, wearing Lea’s trainers with extra thick soles to make the height requirement. The terror and thrill once they’d pulled you up all the way to the peak, knowing that you’re about to be released into free fall.

Opposite Isak, Even is leaning against the cold, curved railing. The transparent walls that enclose them in this crystalline bubble only amplify the distance between them. Isak knows that it’s no coincidence that they’ve moved as far apart as the confined, sloping interior of the elevator will allow. With every meter they’re rising higher, floor numbers shifting fast and soundlessly on the display, the warmth and easy understanding that enveloped them in Naples dissipates.

They’ve been given an assignment. Circumstances, Sana’s plotting, the threat posed by Geir - it doesn’t matter where you point your finger accusingly: fact is that someone forced their hand. If word gets out that they did this, if anyone recognises Isak in the video, he’s done. Finished. He knows exactly what this will look like from the outside, what people will say. It’s seedy Reality TV at its worst: coercing the talent into grossly exploitative acts and filming them while doing so. A crass violation of ethics and regulations, the kind of thing that gets you convicted.

No one saw them when Sana’s cousin snuck them in through the Radisson’s back entrance. But Isak knows that if he isn’t careful as hell making this tape, his neck will be on the line. That’s the problem he needs to set his tired, overwrought brain to work on right the fuck now. He needs to strategize. Cover all contingencies. Prepare. But his attention returns to Even like it’s pulled there by a chain.

Even is looking out of the window, face turned away from Isak. The rain has slicked wet tendrils of hair against his cheek and neck. His t-shirt, soaked through like Isak’s, clings to his skin and amplifies the rise and fall of his chest as he breathes, not quite regularly. He looks undone and private, and it’s dangerous how the briefest glance at him makes Isak’s thoughts twist out of his grasp: he imagines stripping Even off his drenched clothes. Licking the wet sheen from his skin. Pulling him between white hotel sheets and keeping Even there, underneath him, until he’s warm all over. Until Isak can draw every shred of tension and strain in Even’s body into one tight needlepoint and make it explode inside him. He wants —

Even shifts, gaze cutting to Isak’s. It feels like an unexpected slap to Isak’s cheek because Even looks like he’s back in the changing room at Mikael’s hippie farm, losing to Geir: wary and beat. Forced, but plainly unwilling, to perform his part in this farce.

For a moment, absurdly, Isak feels nothing but hurt.

Then his brain starts functioning again. It sets out, in cold, precise detail what Even must be feeling right now. How this little scheme is shifting the power balance between them anew, changing who they are to each other. Not friends. Not confidants. They are talent and producer once more, pawns in a much larger power play that they cannot sidestep or ignore if they want to protect the distinct vulnerabilities that come with their roles.

Self-preservation isn’t Even’s strong suit. Even told him so himself, standing underneath the shivering crystals of Blå’s chandelier months ago. It stings, worse than anything that’s come before: the memory of Even in his magenta suit and nose ring, smiling conspiratorially at Isak like they were about to win something.

He can’t change the fact that he’s brought Even on the show. He can’t stop the firestorm heading towards everyone who takes on Geir either. But he can keep Even safe for a little longer.

Isak rests his palm against the transparent wall that separates them from the steep descent into the cityscape beneath. Glass, cloudless and impersonal. He can be like that, take himself out of the equation. Make this as easy as he can for Even.

Over the past weeks, he’s learned that Even is willing to perform with and for a camera, but that he doesn’t like to give himself away.

He won’t do so now. Isak will make sure of that.

*

The card reader on the door to their room beeps, but the tiny LED doesn’t change color straight away. It flickers red and red again, like the recording light near the camera lens, before finally changing to green.

Even walks through the door. His sneakers squeak on the marble floor before he halts abruptly. “The Radisson’s Polar Suite features an actual polar bear?”

Isak looks up from his phone and follows Even’s gaze to the polar bear fur rug, complete with paws and head, that’s mounted on one of the walls. One paw is awkwardly stretching up and across the shiny, reflective tiles of the black marble ceiling.

“Sana just texted to say the beast needs to be in the video. Apparently it’s well known across Oslo. People will be able to figure out that this was shot at the Radisson.”

Even turns to Isak, incredulous: “Sana negotiated product placement for a fake sex tape?”

“Consummate professional. I’d have done the same thing.”

Even toes off his shoes. His socked feet make no sound as he walks over to where Isak is standing. He doesn’t stop when he’s an arm-length away: he steps right into Isak’s personal space until he’s close, so close that Isak can see the tiny water drops that cling to his upper lip still.

“Because that’s how you see yourself too, right?” Even says. “As a pro. Even in this.” His voice is quiet and tight. Isak can feel his own pulse speed up in response, throbbing underneath his skin.

“Yes,” he says, wondering briefly where truth melds into lie in this little word.

He steps around Even and pulls out one of the sleek designer chairs grouped around the oval glass table. The metal frame gleams against the pristine white leather upholstery. It makes a weird squelching sound when Isak sits down in his damp jeans. His fingers leave prints on the glass tabletop. He tries to rub them away with his wet sleeve and just makes it worse. Seriously, how can all of this be so fucking uncomfortable?

He motions to Even to take the chair opposite. “Let’s discuss.”

When Even takes a seat, the backpack is on his lap. Piece by piece, he pulls out the Osmo pocket cameras, flexi microphones, portable lighting, charger, mini-tripod, batteries, two laptops. He arranges everything in a meticulous display that makes Isak think of the tableaus of confiscated gang weapons that police lay out for TV crews.

“Let’s discuss,” Even repeats. The dark circles under his eyes tell the story of the past 36 hours. But his distanced voice, his closed-off mien, are hard to reconcile with Isak’s memory of last night’s Even, ambling through Naples’s crooked alleys by Isak’s side, all laughing eyes and private smiles.

It’s like something palpable in the air, the resistance and tension roiling off him now. Isak can tell that there’s more to Even’s frustration than mere annoyance at having his arm twisted. But he doesn’t know how to broach that topic - how to ask what’s going on without sounding like he’s another prying producer.

“Do you want me to ring Sana?” he asks instead. “Call it off?”

“And then what? You broadcast Kára and I having sex in the boathouse to the nation?” Even’s jawline tightens. “No.”

“Okay.” Isak racks his brain for the right words, for a way through. “Listen, I need to make sure that no one can tell it’s me in the video, but other than that…” He pauses and licks his bottom lip. Then he forces himself to act against all of his innate tendencies. “Other than that, you get to control it all.”

Even’s chin lifts involuntarily. He blinks. “What?”

Isak nods, sharply and just once. “You decide what we film, what material we use. How we cut and edit it. If you want, you can do all of that yourself.”

Even swallows and when he speaks again, the earlier harshness has been wrung out of his voice like dye out of a cloth. “I… I’d like that.”

“Done.” Isak breathes in, more deeply than before. “We should probably talk about stuff that we won’t do, just so that we’re on the same page. Like, we’re going to pretend, not actually fuck in front of a camera. O-Obviously. But that still leaves room for interpretation. People define sex in different ways. So you know, it’s helpful to be specific.”

Even leans back. “Specific?”

“Yes, like there will be touching, but here are the things we won’t do for real: no handjobs, no blowjobs. Definitely no penetration, which also includes no fingering, no rimming…” Isak keeps going, rattling off a fastidiously organized catalogue of sexual acts.

Even stares at him. There’s something odd about the shape of his mouth. “That’s… a very comprehensive list. Should we add fisting, sounding, and tentacle dildos just to be on the safe side?”

Isak has the distinct impression that his dedication to sexual health and safety is not being taken seriously.

He raises an austere eyebrow. “I never whip out the tentacle dildos on a first date.”

Even’s lips twitch. “Good to know. Then again, it’s not…” His voice has gone deeper and Isak can feel it somehow, reverberating through his entire body. “Not our first time.”

“Ah. I was wondering when you’d bring that up.” Isak sounds unruffled bordering on blasé. It’s not at all how he feels.

It’s Even’s turn to say something, but he doesn’t. His face is impossible to read. In the quiet between them, the hum of the AC no longer disappears into the background but seems to swell and distend.

Isak’s mind is a vast, meticulously regimented cabinet whose efficiency depends on the fact that some drawers remain permanently locked. And yet, slyly, one of them slips open now and takes him back to the night they met at Tresor.

There’s Even, stepping into a cubicle, half-turning and extending his hand for Isak to take, like he was offering something far more romantic than a rushed scuffle in a public restroom. Then again, what followed hadn’t been so rushed. It had been good, so very good - for Isak at least, who’d given precious little thought to Even’s pleasure. He’s done his best not to think about it because what happened that night makes him feel hot and a little ashamed.

“I want—” Even starts in the same second in which Isak pushes back his chair and says, brusquely, “Anyway.”

Isak’s impulse to distance himself, put up a sleek professional front, is so excruciating that it takes him a long moment to rein it in and turn back.

“What do you want?” he asks. His heartbeat is intrusive.

“If I get to direct and cut this thing,” Even says, “we’ll use sound delays and dropouts throughout. It’ll sound eerie as fuck, but who cares.”

Isak scrambles to catch up with the swerve in topic. “Why?”

“Because all through shooting this,” Even says slowly, “we’ll talk. And that’s not for the camera. Or anyone but us.”

Isak hasn’t got the first idea where Even’s going with this, but he’s instinctively resistant. “Talk about what?”

“Oh, we’ll think of something.” The way Even says it, offhandedly, makes Isak’s spider senses tingle. “Tentacle dildos, if we can’t come up with something better. I don’t care. I just want to be able to talk to you. That’s non-negotiable.”

Isak meets Even’s gaze. Wonders how much of the calm that Even projects is an act, as strenuously maintained as Isak’s own facade of cool.

Isak shrugs, one-shouldered and only somewhat fractious. “You’re the director.” He glances at his phone. It’s quarter to nine. “We have until the early morning, so there’s no rush. Do you…” He doesn’t want to tell Even what to do, but pitching themselves headlong into this thing seems… unwise. Even should have some time to himself, figuring out if he wants to go ahead, without Isak breathing down his neck.

Isak flaps his hand in the vague direction of the pair of sleek, icy blue mid-century armchairs by the window. “I think I’m gonna go and pass out for an hour or so.”

“Take the bed.”

Isak shakes his head. “We might need it later.”

“True.” Even looks at him with the ghost of a smile. “I guess I’ll let you know when you wake up.”

*

Isak shucks his clingy, soaked-through t-shirt and curls up in the armchair. It’s to give Even space and for show, mostly, because never ever will he be able to go to sleep like this. The room is freezing. He’s folded together in the manner of a human pretzel and his thoughts are a crackling, overheating circuit board. In fact, he…

In fact, Isak’s eyes are closed when his mind swims back to consciousness. His legs are stiff from the awkward position in which he’s slept, but he’s no longer cold. Even must have adjusted the AC setting because the room is less chilly now. There’s also the unexpected, warm weight of a blanket draped over Isak.

Isak opens his eyes to slits. He’s got no idea what time it is, still suspended in this bone-tired, languid, almost pleasant sense of disorientation that you get from catnapping after having gone without sleep for far too long.

Even is standing in the far corner of the room, fiddling with the mood lighting controls. He is barefoot on the cold marble tiles, and he’s replaced his drenched t-shirt with the dress shirt he wore in Naples, hanging loose and unbuttoned from his shoulders. His eyes, like Isak’s, must be gritty with tiredness because he is wearing his glasses.

Even’s fingers move over the control panel and the light shifts through a spectrum of colors before it settles, washing the walls and white marble tiles in a honeyed amber glow. Isak can tell from six meters away that Even is not a fan. He twists the dial and the light morphs into a deep, surreal purple. This mood seems to be more to Even’s taste because he picks up one of the fancy hotel notepads and starts sketching. There’s another slow slide on the control and the light transforms into an ethereal blue, turning the white marble and gleaming metal of the furniture into moonlit ice fields.

As Even continues to experiment the room seems to expand and contract around them with each change in color. Even himself is caught up in these metamorphoses. The blue light gives his skin a cold, porcelain-like smoothness that makes Isak think of the gorgeous martyred saints keeping watch over Chiesa dei Girolamini. Red and purple tones dab dramatic, shadow-dark smudges around his eyes and underneath his cheekbones. A lighter pink restores gentleness to his features and brings out the softness of his lips.

Isak watches Even, watches him turn into all these different men and thinks, drowsily and incongruously, I’d know you anywhere, any time.

This is when Even raises his head, gaze locking with Isak’s across the spacious room.

“There you are.”

“Mmh.” Isak rubs his neck. “Only just woke up.”

Even pads over. Isak expects him to take the other armchair, but Even settles onto the marble floor before Isak’s chair. He pulls up one of his long legs and rests his chin on his knee. The posture makes his shirt fall open wider. Isak, determinedly, doesn’t look.

“Hungry?” Even asks, and it’s only now that Isak notices the food on the little side table next to his armchair. Burgers and fries, seemingly untouched. And… a bowl of cherries.

Isak uncurls his legs and sits up straighter. The blanket slides to the floor. He’s never seen cherries this big or dark. Their skin, polished to a high sheen, is the hue of expensive, velvety red wine. What poison do they put in the soil on which rich people’s cherries grow?

Isak picks up one of the fruits and plays with the delicate, slender stem. “Honoring your debts?”

“Always.” Even looks up at him. The rain has diluted the product in his hair and now that it has dried naturally, the strands that are usually styled to stand tall gently fall forward, brushing against his forehead and drifting across the rim of his glasses.

Isak prudently redirects his gaze to Even’s notepad.

Or maybe not so prudently. Turns out Even has drawn a storyboard.

Isak clears his throat. “You’ve been busy. Tell me.”

Even gentlemanly swivels the notepad around with two fingers so that Isak gets a better view of his pornographic sketches.

“It’s a three-act structure. The acts are color-coded for the mood light settings that we’ll use and… Actually, I think I should start differently.” He leans back on his hands. There’s a slight frown between his pale eyebrows. “I want the people who see the video and who know me to have no doubt about the fact that I directed this. That it’s not… not the real me they’re allowed to watch.”

His gaze is keen on Isak, and Isak nods. “I get that.”

“The whole thing will be built around mirrors. But, you know, mirrors as illusion makers rather than truth tellers.”

“How do you mean?”

“All shots will be indirect, via the actual mirrors in the bathroom and reflective surfaces in the other rooms. One of the recording cameras will always be in the frame. But then we’ll also shoot every sequence twice.” He looks up from the storyboard. “We’re built differently, but nearly the same height, with similar hair colors. People will only ever see you from behind or the side so that they can’t make out your face. We’ll intercut the sequences so that watching it will feel like you’re gazing into an infinity mirror with the two bodies in the video forever changing places.”

“Huh.”

Even’s eyes search Isak’s face. “What do you think?”

“Not sure this would get many views on Pornhub. But…” Isak can feel his face warm with a smile, a real one. “I think it’s perfect.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. It’s…” He was going to say It’s very you, but that feels like dangerous territory. “As far as sex tapes go,” he says instead, “this sounds pretty fucking weird and artsy and…well. Beautiful,” he mumble-adds.

“Mmh.” Even is busy scribbling something in the margin of the storyboard, lashes lowered, but Isak can tell from the curve of his lips, the faint flush in his cheeks, that he’s pleased.

He starts talking Isak through the locations he’s picked in the suite, the types of shots they’ll need, specific angles. Problems they’ll have to work around - such as the fact that one of the Radisson’s most luxurious suites unaccountably doesn’t boast a walk-in shower. Instead, it’s outfitted with a modest shower-bathtub that probably looked like the lesser of various evils to a budget-strapped interior designer in the early 2000s.

“What about the polar bear?” Isak asks. “Have you figured out when it’ll get its big moment?”

“Tricky.” Even glances up. The shirt has slipped off one of his shoulders. This happened about five minutes ago, and it’s been fraying the tightly stitched edges of Isak’s focus ever since. Even’s soft, unruly hair is once again tumbling across his forehead. He’s so close.

Isak puts one foot on the ground because his still damp jeans have recently become uncomfortable in an entirely new way. But this only makes matters worse, because now his traitor brain tells him that if Even were to shift his weight to the side, even just slightly, his chin would come to rest on Isak’s thigh.

Even, oblivious or maybe not to Isak’s state, bites his lower lip. “The practical solution would be to shoot the sequence where we’re fucking against the wall right there. You know, up against the wall is always good - god knows what it’s like to do it up against a polar bear… But all of that comes earlier and my preference would be to have the bear at the very end. Because that would be exit —”

Isak groans. “Pursued by a bear!”

Even grins and nods, a bit sheepishly. His glasses have slipped down his nose. He distractedly pushes them up with the end of his pen and Isak is appalled by how hot that is.

He shakes his head, firmly. Tries to drain the fondness from his voice. “You’re such a dork. Ruining a perfectly good fake sex tape with a Shakespeare reference!”

“Mmh. That’s not a ‘no’ though, right?”

Isak rolls his eyes all the way to Bohemia and back. “We’ll see.”

In Isak’s palm there’s still the cherry he picked up earlier. He gently tugs the stem free and slides the fruit in his mouth. When his teeth break through the taut, smooth skin there’s a burst of flavor - tart and summery sweet and perfect. Definitely cultivated with poison, but delicious.

“Can I have that?” Even plucks the stem from Isak’s fingers and pops it into his mouth.

Isak makes a disgusted sound. “You know, the cherries are my prize, but I think I could be persuaded to share them. You don’t have to gnaw on wood fibre.”

“Nah. It’s for the video.” Even goes quiet. There’s a frown of concentration on his brow. Isak can tell that Even has stopped chewing, but it looks like he’s still turning the cherry stem around in his mouth.

“What on earth are you doing?”

Even smiles, then slides the stem out of his mouth. He shows it to Isak on the palm of his hand. It’s tied into a neat, if somewhat crooked knot.

Isak picks it up. “How did you do that?”

Even raises his eyebrows slightly. “With my tongue.”

“Right. And how is that… er…” There really is no point in staring at Even’s mouth. And there is even less point in allowing his mind to stray to memories of other things that Even can do with his tongue. Isak very deliberately shifts his weight in the armchair so that his jeans apply uncomfortable pressure where it’s needed. “How is that relevant to the video?” he asks in a more strapped down tone.

“It’s to mark off the three acts. A bit like in The Colour of Pomegranates.”

“Course. Now it makes sense.”

“Hey, that’s a really good film!” Even shoots him a quick smile. Then he goes and fetches one of the cameras. He kneels with it on the floor and shows Isak what he’s planning to shoot on the display panel.

“We’ll start with a shot of three cherries. Then we’ll have the first sex scene. Cut to two cherries, one knotted stem. Shower sex. Cut to one cherry, two knotted stems. Sex. At this point, all that’s left are three knotted stems. Exit pursued by bear. Done.”

“I think we’re quickly transitioning from charmingly quirky to off-the-wall whacky.”

“Isak.” Even is still kneeling before Isak, but somehow he’s now doing so more or less between Isak’s legs and it’s making Isak feel hot all over. “Cherries are pretty sexy, wouldn’t you say?” Even looks at him questioningly, with his lips slightly open. He touches his tongue to his canine and surely now he’s just fucking with Isak.

The thing is… two can play this game. Isak narrows his eyes and slowly slides his legs further apart. It tightens the unforgiving fabric to a painful degree. It also leaves little to the imagination.

Even’s gaze flicks down. It’s very gratifying to see the rapid rise of his naked chest, the tensing of muscles in his abdomen.

This is when Isak, having made his point, whisks them back to safe territory by saying something laconic and carefully judged. At least that’s what he’s planning to do. He’s got the words lined up like pearls on a string.

Even locks eyes with him once more and the string snaps, clever words skittering away.

The change in Even's posture is so subtle that Isak would be hard-pressed to define it. Something about the incline of his head, the way his hands are resting against his thighs, purposely passive. Even blinks slowly, like he’s half-dreaming. If Isak was aware of his position before, he’s a hundred times more aware that Even is kneeling before him now. Like he’s waiting, waiting and Isak is burning up with it.

No, Isak thinks. Don’t. But he’s already lifting the hand in which he’s holding the knotted cherry stem. The tip of Even’s tongue darts over his lower lip and it looks instinctive rather than calculated. Isak’s pulse skids.

He flicks the stem away and notes, voice as casual as he can manage: “The knot was a little lopsided.” Then he reaches for another cherry and puts it in his mouth, tugging the stem free to hold it out to Even. “I think you can do better.”

There is a shift in Even’s gaze. Uneven streaks of color creep up his neck. Isak has no doubt, no doubt at all, that Even will do as he is told, but there is a long deliciously drawn-out moment, measured by the count of Isak’s thudding heartbeats, before Even inclines his head and allows Isak to feed him the stem.

The moment Even’s gaze drops back down to Isak’s crotch, Isak places a cool, impersonal finger underneath Even’s chin and lifts it. “No,” he says quietly. “Look at me.”

Even’s eyes are dark. Isak finds no acquiescence in them, just the same heedless, thrumming intensity that he feels coursing through his own body.

He’s hyper-focused on Even, to the extent that he can’t taste the flesh of the cherry he’s chewing. He can feel the weight of the pit on his tongue though, trace the minutely raised ridge of its seam.

Soon, there is a perfectly shaped knotted stem glistening in Isak’s palm. Isak takes the next cherry and holds it out, deliberately angling his arm too low so that Even has to bend his neck and wrench the stem free with his teeth.

Even hesitates, warring impulses briefly chasing each other across his face. When he leans forward, a tense muscle jumps in his jaw. By instinct, Isak reaches out and passes a soothing thumb over Even’s hot cheek.

He can hear Even inhale, feels him still underneath Isak’s touch.

“Go on, you’re not done,” Isak tells him, still in the same tone of husky command, but instead of withdrawing his hand, he holds Even’s gaze and keeps caressing his cheek, his lips.

Even makes a small, needy sound. He turns his face minutely into Isak’s palm, like he’s seeking more of his touch, and this might be the sexiest moment of Isak’s life. He is so turned on, his attention narrows and blurs.

Something inside him is trembling with the effort to steer them both along what feels like a precipitous cliff path. It would be so easy to lose himself in this. Spark and tinder. He’s got no idea what he’s doing, but he senses, intuitively and fully, that they complement each other, that Even likes this game as much as Isak does.

But this is wildly the wrong moment for an experiment in this vein. He doesn’t want Even to feel vulnerable or exposed. Or actually, he wants him to feel precisely these emotions, just not here. It’s the kind of thing that could maybe happen between them in a parallel universe. A parallel universe in which Even’s so safe, so secure in whatever they are to each other in this distant place, that being like this with Isak gives him nothing but pleasure. Not here. Not now.

Isak clings to this thought. Then he missteps.

When Even neatly spits a third knotted stem on his palm, Isak asks: “Have you done this before? Made a sex tape?”

The question is supposed to return them to the night’s project and predicament, but it seems to take Even somewhere else entirely. Isak’s fingers, that had just been cradling Even’s jaw, are suddenly empty.

Even sits on his heels. The fifty centimeters that separate them feel vast enough to accommodate half the suite.

“Yes.” The way Even says it is plainly not an invitation to ask further questions.

But there’s something there, something barbed, buried deep, that Isak feels should be addressed given what they are about to do. It’s just that he can barely form a coherent thought right now: his jeans are still strangling his rock-hard cock, and while he can tell that things are going sideways, his dazed brain doesn’t have the right words, only a dumb joke that feels wrong even before it’s fully left Isak’s mouth. “Did someone interfere with your artistic vision?”

Even laughs, eyes flat. “Not quite.” He picks up the camera and storyboard. Comes to stand so quickly Isak is feeling dizzy by proxy. “We should start shooting this thing.”

Isak’s disoriented gaze roams the suite but finds no place to settle. With its polished, immaculate surfaces, it looks like a showroom. All this space and no comfort.

Chapter Text

The reflective canvas of the black TV screen nearly swallows them. Isak watches his reflection emerge as if from deep water, then dissolve, as Even fine-tunes the mood lighting. When he’s done, the screen still absorbs most of the light, but the deep purple in which the room is lit creates a faint, eerie halo effect around the edges of their moving silhouettes. They’ve arranged some of the small table lamps in the area where they’re filming. In the screen’s reflection, each lamp creates a tiny pool of light, small points of brightness within the dark, glossy surface.

Even takes a long time adjusting the lamps until their positions are just right. Then he sets up the cameras with fastidious attention. But when it’s time to undress, he hurriedly sheds his clothes and throws them beyond the frame without care.

“We’ll swap places halfway through,” he tells Isak, resting his naked back against the wall they chose before. “I don’t care how we start.”

Isak looks up from where he’s stooping to pick up Even’s clothes. “Your choice.” He puts the clothes away with his own stuff on one of the leather chairs. Then he joins Even.

It’s awkward as fuck. Isak is still half-hard from before. Even isn’t. Isak notices, but otherwise he doesn’t allow himself to look at Even’s body the way he wants to, forcing his gaze to skip over the graceful, sharp lines of shoulders and collarbones, over the glint of Even’s nipple piercing, like a throwing stone passing over the glassy surface of a lake.

Even has vanished inside himself. He’s rubbing his bony elbow absentmindedly, gaze constantly gliding from Isak to their reflection in the television screen and back, while he gives Isak exacting instructions on how to angle his body, when to shift into the path of a lamp’s light, the speed at which he’s supposed to move. Isak feels like he’s been demoted to the status of a prop, which could probably be hot under different circumstances. It’s not now.

“I’m not sure how your catalog of no-go moves plays out in practice,” Even says. “But the point is to make it look like you’re pressing me against the wall and jerking me off.”

Isak’s voice is more raspy than normal but calm when he says: “I can do that.”

He steps closer. Watches Even flinch with surprise when Isak, fingers gentle, slides Even’s glasses off his nose.

“I… forgot,” Even mutters.

“For the record,” Isak says lightly, “I’m into your glasses. But that’s not for the world to see. Plus, the light glints off them in the reflection.” He puts the glasses away, then turns back to Even. “Ready?”

Even opens his mouth as if to speak but no words come out. He nods. Isak, thinking of his own initial opposition to talking during the shoot, feels wrong-footed by a sudden, raw longing to hear Even speak to him, laugh with him about the absurdity of it all.

“Okay,” he says, stretching the syllables, hoping that maybe Even will jump in with something. He doesn’t.

Stalling is not going to make this any better. Isak pictures the two cameras trained on their reflection in the television screen. His shoulders rise against the strange tingle at the back of his neck.

“There we go,” he murmurs, not sure if the words are meant as a warning for Even or himself. He can tell that they’re both holding their breath when he puts his palm against Even’s chest, resting it there for a moment before sliding it down.

Technically, what’s required of Isak isn’t difficult. The dark television screen captures rhythm, urgency, but none of the specifics. When Isak crowds Even against the wall, one hand braced against it, no one watching their reflection in the screen could tell that Isak’s hand is wrapped not around Even’s but around his own cock, stroking himself off with demonstrative, almost aggressive tugs that look hot while actually doing very little for him.

The problem is Even’s hands. Even doesn’t seem to be able to decide where to put them, how and when to touch Isak, and as a result they mostly hover around Isak’s shoulders and back. It looks deeply weird on the screen. What’s worse is that Isak is so tense he’s extra-ticklish, so whenever Even’s cold fingers brush his skin, Isak’s body stiffens cartoonishly to suppress a shudder.

When it happens for the fifth or sixth time, Isak takes a step back. Allows his breath to even out before he takes Even’s arms and lifts them up over his head. He crosses Even’s wrists so that he can secure them single handedly, cradle them in the palm of his hand while he presses them lightly against the wall.

Isak can feel Even stir against his thigh, but he keeps his eyes trained firmly on Even’s face. “This okay?” he asks, voice roughened. “I’ll let you do the same to me when we swap places.”

Even’s hooded gaze slips away from him, but he gives a small nod. When he adds “Yes”, Isak fights the impulse to close the distance between them, nuzzle his cheek against Even’s, bite his chin.

It’s different now. For one, the way Even’s arms are stretched up means that their bodies are much more intimately aligned. Isak can smell the rain on Even’s skin, his cologne, the faintest trace of tobacco. He tries to police his greedy gaze, but he can’t, he can’t stop himself because here are Even’s shoulder muscles, moving and pulling tight whenever Isak fastens the hold on his wrists. Here is a glimpse of the dusky, matted hair in his armpits that, frankly, Isak wants to rub his face all over. Here is the silky skin on the inside of Even’s lower arm, gradually warming as Isak’s rougher skins rubs against it.

Isak has to remind himself every couple of seconds that he’s meant to perform for the camera, keep up a fast, ruthless rhythm, because all he wants is to slow down, to actually let himself feel. The pleasure simmering up through his body. The way Even’s smooth stomach heaves against his knuckles every time Isak’s hand brushes against his skin. The thrill of Even hardening against his hip.

He sneaks another peek at Even’s face. Falters for a moment because he can’t read the expression on Even’s face at all. Physically, Even’s into this, no doubt. When Isak experimentally alters his grip on his cock to let Even see more, Even jerks against his stomach. Isak can’t help himself then: he slows down even further, circles the head with his thumb and ring finger, teasing himself while also showing off a little because the position of his fingers accentuates the girth of his cock. Even moans at the sight, low and ill-repressed, cheeks reddening further. But almost right away, his gaze strays back to the cameras. Stays there. All the places where his body had started to soften into Isak’s tense and stiffen once more.

Isak’s arousal curdles. What is he doing? This is supposed to be an act from start to finish. Allowing themselves to be drawn into the rip current, where it feels real, is dangerous.

He makes himself think of all the people who are going to watch this, gorging themselves on what’s supposedly a private moment. It helps him to regain his focus and hold on to it when they move to shoot in the bathroom.

Thankfully, there is less scope for getting distracted under the cold, white glare of the bathroom lights, because it feels like they’re having the world’s most complicated threesome with the fogged-up shower screen.

The screen is supposed to be covered by nothing but a fine, cloudy haze at the beginning of the take, when Isak is leaning with his back against it and Even, stepping into the frame, joins him. When they film the same sequence with Even in Isak’s place, they need to wait for the glass to take on a frosted appearance to hide Isak’s face. Everything that comes after is basically a counting game because they’ve worked out exactly how long it takes for the glass to become opaque, blurring the outlines of their bodies just enough to obscure some salient details while they’re moving together.

Blurring them, that’s to say, until one of them - on cue - places his hands against the glass, leaving imprints in the condensation. Hands are followed by forearms, locked together and pressed insistently against the screen. The warmth of the skin creates sharply defined transparent areas. At their lower edges, trails of water begin to form and snake down the glass pane, leaving clear streaks in their wake. When, serendipitously, enough of these rivulets appear in the right moment, in the right place, they reveal curlicue-like glimpses of fingers clasped tightly around hips, straining thighs, the outline of someone’s hard cock.

The whole thing, shot indirectly via two of the bathroom mirrors, looks a hundred times better on camera than it feels. The slick floor of the shower makes it tricky to maintain their balance. They’re both too tall, too long-limbed, and definitely too tense to share such a confined space.

The awkwardness doesn’t fade, but its quality changes. There are moments while the camera records, when Isak - counting in his head with single-minded focus - tightens his grip on Even’s hips and pretends to push him back on Isak’s cock. But the next moment - when Even grabs a soggy towel to wipe down the shower screen for the umpteenth time so that they can start afresh - Isak still scoots to the side and presses his back against the cold tiles just so that Even can pass without touching him.

It’s like they're hiding in their skin, completely naked and completely unavailable to each other.

Even is considerate, fiercely concentrated on the technicalities of the shoot, and so reserved Isak’s thrown off kilter once more. That’s not just true of Isak’s head - his boner is pretty confused, too. Ready to get with the programme once they’re pretend-fucking, but flagging immediately when Isak has more than two seconds to think.

He’s vaguely embarrassed by it. Surprised too, given that two hours ago, he very nearly came in his pants just from having Even kneel between his legs. But if he’s honest, what happened earlier wasn’t so much about seeing Even on his knees and taking the reins - although he’s discovering that he’s definitely into that. It was more that it had felt intimate in a way sex never had before. Like he was so attuned to Even he could intuit and touch this intensely private part of him, and Even had let him.

Isak hates the distance between them now. He’s not sure how to bridge it, but he’s ready to do almost anything to try. Which is why the next time he puts his forearms against the shower screen, arching his back, he says: “On the topic of tentacle dildos: have you ever seen the Star Trek episode where Kirk smacks an alien android around with something that looks like a massive, sucker-covered dildo?”

Behind him, Even goes still mid-push: “Kirk… what?”

“Man, it’s famous. Season 1, episode 7. They’re in a cave labyrinth and Kirk is trying to fight off this hulking, weirdly sexy android. The only thing he’s got to hand is a broken off piece of stalactite. But I swear it’s shaped like a giant alien dildo. And Ruk, that’s the android, looks like he’d love to get to know this thing up close and personal.”

Even’s laugh is surprised, quiet, but Isak can feel the soft, warm vibration of skin on skin in all the places their bodies touch.

The take is a disaster because Isak’s arms keep slipping down the shower screen, but they’re no longer touching like two rival ships scraping together in the fog. Even’s hands slide more naturally over Isak’s skin, steadying him every time he loses balance.

Afterwards they sit next to each other on the floor, backs leaned against the tub, gooseflesh slowly spreading across their naked skin. They go through everything they’ve filmed until Even decides that they’ve got sufficient material for the bathroom scene.

Isak hums in agreement and reaches for his phone. He shoots Even a glance out of the corner of his eye. “I know you want to see it, but you have to ask me nicely.”

Even turns to him. His hair is wet again, and the movement shakes free a drop that’s been clinging to a tendril by his temple. It falls on his chest and slides down. “Please Isak. I’m asking you nicely to show me Kirk’s giant alien dildo.”

“Ask and you shall receive.”

The scene is as surreal and brilliantly campy as Isak remembers. God knows how it got smuggled past the censors. They watch it twice, taking turns in narrating Ruk’s horny interior monologue. By the time they stop, they’re both chuckling. The tension between them has mellowed.

“First the Simpsons shirt and now Star Trek…” Even muses. “Are you secretly a bit of a nerd?”

“Mmh. I hide it well.” Isak absentmindedly picks at a scab on his knee. “Normally.”

He raises his head and finds a small smile playing on Even’s lips. He looks so tired, so lovely. The longing inside Isak’s chest is not a gentle pull but a hook lodged deep, sharp and unrelenting.

“I’m sorry,” he says without thinking. “Sorry that I pushed you to sign up for the show. Sorry about all the shitty things that have happened since. Sorry about … oh - what the fuck!? Did this happen when I dropped the shower head earlier?”

He’s staring at Even’s big toe, red and swollen, nail split in the middle and lifting up slightly at the edges.

“It’s nothing,” Even says, trying to pull his foot back. For which Isak – pointedly but gently – swats his shoulder before he goes to get a band-aid from his rucksack and two cold cans from the mini-bar to ice the swelling.

“This is very disappointing,” Even comments while Isak sees to his toe. “I’d have expected at least five different digs about my monstrous feet at this point.”

“Oh. You know, they are...” It would be hard to come up with a medical rationale for the way Isak is still running his fingers along the side of Even’s foot. He looks at the pale knob of Even’s ankle, at the slender tendons that meet above it like a river delta, and wonders if he’s a pervert for wanting to lick Even there. In truth, he wants to lick him absolutely everywhere, but maybe his ankle wouldn’t be such a bad place to start. “I mean really… they’re just terrible,” he mutters.

“Uh-hu.” Even smiles at him over his crossed knees. The smile slowly recedes, but the warmth in his eyes doesn’t. “None of this is your fault. You never lied to me, I don’t think. Never tricked me.”

Isak shakes his head, throat tight. “I didn’t.”

Even nods. “It was my choice to come on the show.” After a long moment, he continues. “Just like it was my choice, years ago, to make a video with two people I was seeing then.”

“Oh.” Isak carefully puts down Even’s foot and shuffles over so that he sits next to Even once more, thinking that if Even chooses to talk about this, he might prefer not to do it with Isak staring at his face. “Not… um… not a good experience?”

“No,” Even says dryly. “We were all three massively into film. Massively into sex, too. I was stupidly in love with one of them. Very fond of the other one. Hypomanic inching towards manic and thinking what better way to come out to the world as pansexual than by reinventing the sex tape as an artform.”

“Huh.”

“Yep. We had a grand vision. Zero inhibitions. And I was also – and for a very short time – flush with money because my first book had just come out.”

Even shifts his weight and the can they’ve been using to ice his injured toe rolls away. Isak stops it with his own foot and nudges it back into position, resting it gently against Even’s toe.

“What happened?”

Isak can feel rather than see Even shrug next to him. “What happened is that we shot this thing and I… sort of gave it my everything. Creatively, but also financially because the equipment and places we rented to shoot were hella expensive. Sexually, too, because the other two were into a couple of things that are pretty out there. And when I’m manic, I will likely tell you that I’m into everything under the sun. Which… I don’t know… is maybe even sort of true while I’m manic? But it’s not something I would choose for myself the rest of the time. And they knew. They knew this thing about me but didn’t care enough to do anything about it. Because while they were directing and fucking me in front of several cameras, they were pretty busy falling for each other.”

Isak growls softly in his throat. “Assholes.”

“I didn’t realize what was going on between them until we started to cut and edit the material. It was… pretty blatant. About as blatant as how bad the stuff we’d filmed was.” Even laughs, quietly and humorlessly. “It was atrocious. As a film, I mean, but also…” He trails off.

Isak passes his fingertip through some droplets of water that sit on one of the marble tiles. He merges them into a ring, giving Even time.

Eventually, Even says: “It’s hard to explain. You know, I love film so much. I feel it can capture and reveal things that no other medium can. I’d been so sure that if I worked hard enough, if I pushed beyond vanity, insecurity, conformity, you name it… then the film would be a sort of self-portrait. All the pieces of me that normally don’t make sense assembled into something… into something… Well. I don’t even know…” He rubs a hand across his face. “Ugh. It sounds like pure narcissism.”

Isak shakes his head. “It really doesn’t.”

He can feel Even tilt his head to watch him. “Anyway,” Even says. “If anything, it felt alienating to see myself caught on camera like this. I hated every second of it. And I sort of knew beforehand that I’m not good at keeping people in my life. Terrible with money. So the fact that the whole thing burned two relationships and a mountain of cash hurt, but this part didn’t really come unexpected. The thing that came as a surprise was that I failed so profoundly at the one thing I was supposed to be good at.”

“What’s that?”

“Taking a bunch of ugly things and turning them into art.”

“Right.” Isak bites the nail of his thumb, thinking. After a moment, he says: “I don’t know much about art. But I still get to speak on this because I’m pretty certain we can call me a connoisseur of ugly things.”

Even huffs out a quiet laugh.

“I’m thinking of the first night on set,” Isak continues. “When you got everybody dancing on the pier before leaping into the water. How genuinely happy everyone was that night. I remember the incredible blindfold sequence with Eva on the meadow – the one you directed when I was called away. What it felt like…” He hadn’t planned to say this bit out loud, but now it’s too late and so Isak, feeling his neck grow warm, hastens through the rest of the sentence: “… to walk with you through nightly, stinking Naples.” He raises his shoulders slightly. “I know this won’t help, but if we’re talking about turning ugly things into art, then I think you do this all the time, even without a pen or camera in hand.”

Beside Isak, Even has gone very still. Isak draws a breath because there’s one more thing he’s got to say. “As an expert on ugly things, I also have to tell you that you’re a big-ass failure.” He turns to meet Even’s gaze. “Because I see none of that in you. You’re a good person. Empathic and kind. Generous to a fault. The fact that this comes from Reality TV scum doesn’t mean that it’s not true.” Isak gives Even his best evil-producer smirk to hide how flustered he feels. “We wouldn’t be so good at manipulating you guys if we weren’t also experts at seeing people for what they are.”

There’s a faint flush to Even’s cheeks. Eyes bright, lips sharply defined. He’s not smiling, but his face looks… he looks like a cup filled to the brim with something too precious to spill.

Even swallows. “Careful, Isak. You’re coming dangerously close to being a good person yourself these days.”

There’s a smile spreading across Isak’s face that he’s powerless to contain. Stunned by the swell of happiness inside his chest, he scoffs. “Ha, never. I just thought of an excellent line about your feet.”

*

They go back to shooting and turn transparent. Even sets up the cameras to film their reflections in the floor-length window, two ghostly figures overlaid over the image of the sleepy city. In the window, the interior of the suite, lit in charcoal blue, blends surreally with a bird’s eye view of Oslo. It’s a world without depth where everything seems close and distant at the same time. Buildings are abstracted into uneven, endlessly layered rows of iron and muted grays, veined with the glowing twinkle of streets.

Watching Even move from camera to camera, no longer wearing his nakedness like a shield, makes Isak oddly shy. He feels like some of his own layers have been peeled back, and he isn’t sure if he wants to avert his face or push closer.

He’s about to walk over to help Even when his phone vibrates on the glass table. Isak picks it up. His surprise at reading the caller’s name is a sharp energy that rips through his body, leaving an anxious, persistent buzz behind.

Isak doesn’t answer the call, but a moment later Geir – never one to take no for an answer – texts him.

Call me, Isak.
It’s time that we talk.

Isak carefully puts the phone down. Tries to step back from his rising panic. Once he leaves this suite, he’ll have to take on Geir. Fight. He knows in his bones that he will lose.

Isak curls his fingers into his palm and breathes through the pressure and the fear. He will deal with it, all of it, in the morning. Tonight, maybe for the last time, he gets to hide from the world with Even.

Even, who will soon return to his life and his friends and his godson. Who’ll be keen to put the LASD horror show behind him and move on.

“I’ve disabled audio input for this scene,” Even says without looking up. He’s mounting the second camera on its little tripod, oblivious to Isak’s agitation. “I want nothing but street sounds for this scene. I can pull a couple audio clips from the internet later. Traffic, voices, a few distant sirens - that kind of thing.”

“Good.” It’s not that Isak isn’t intrigued to see what the overall effect is going to be. But when he tries to imagine the scene with the city sounds layered over, all he can hear in his mind are sirens.

Standing naked next to the blue armchair they’ve dragged to the window, Even asks: “Who goes first?”

“You sit in the chair,” Isak says. Nerves make his voice sound husky, a little testy. “I’ll start.” Just get it out of the way, he thinks. Stumbling around in a slippery shower, fighting gravity every second, is not going to make him lose his cool. This, though… this comes dangerously close to what he’s imagined plenty of times, alone at night, drifting in and out of restless sleep in the trailer.

When Isak lowers himself into Even’s lap, Even looks up at him. The ironic glint in his eyes fades and is replaced by something much more vulnerable and entranced. His nose is shiny, hair still damp and in disarray from vigorous toweling. Isak’s gaze drops to Even’s mouth. He wants to run his finger over the small indentation in Even’s lower lip. His tongue, too. Unthinkingly, he shifts forward and hisses as his erection brushes against Even’s.

“Everything about this is stupid,” Isak complains.

Even looks up at him. The corners of his narrowed eyes crinkle as he smiles. “Care to elaborate?”

“No.”

Isak draws back, lifts up. He’s got one hand braced against Even’s abdomen. Feeling the quiver of tightly clenched muscles under his fingers, Isak decides that counting prime numbers to distract himself may not cut it this time. He resorts to running through South American countries and their capitals in his mind. Gets stuck on Bolivia’s Sucre when Even murmurs: “Would it be this slow if it was real?”

“If this was real,” Isak snaps, “I would have rushed through prep. So you’d have to…” He glances down at Even’s cock, already big and still swelling to full hardness against his own, skin hot and fragile. Isak stifles another sound before he spits out: “Control yourself. Hold back. Even though I’d curse you out and tell you to go deep right away.”

Even’s mouth falls open, muscles seizing up underneath Isak, and it’s such a rush to be brazed above him, to hold this kind of power. Isak wants to wrap his fingers around Even’s cock with crude, greedy possessiveness. He wants to brush his nose against Even’s in the most tender, most innocent almost-kiss – and he wants both things at the same time. He feels wrecked, turned inside out, by the intensity of everything that he feels.

As soon as he can, he slides from Even’s lap. “Scene change,” he says, voice hoarse with arousal and the effort of controlling it. Surely, this will be easier. This, after all, is foreign territory. Less material for the imagination to work with.

It’s a lot though, having Even straddle his lap like this, folded knees wedged into the small room between the sleek chrome armrests and Isak’s thighs. Even’s skin is still cold from all the time they spent sitting on the bathroom tiles. Isak thinks about how long it would take for it to warm and grow mottled if they were doing this for real. If he’d accomplish this faster by telling Even to go for it and fuck himself on Isak’s cock. Or by denying him precisely that, pushing inside, then holding Even down, forbidding him to move while Isak takes his sweet time licking and biting at the delicate skin of Even’s throat.

To distract himself, Isak glances up at Even. “What are you waiting for?” he asks.

And Even, seemingly as close to Isak’s thoughts as he is to his body, says in this gravelly, uneven voice: “I’m waiting for you to tell me that I can.”

Isak can’t stop the shiver that wends its way down his shoulders at Even’s words. He stares at Even, trying to gauge if he noticed. He is flooded by the strangest mix of feelings, self-consciousness commingling with this surge of warmth, because one look in Even’s eyes tells him that he knows, that he is plucking the strings of Isak’s unarticulated desires as deliberately as Isak is manipulating Even’s.

“Go on then.” Isak lets himself melt deeper into the chair, lays his head against the headrest. He wraps his hands lightly around Even’s flanks to steady him, then snatches that steadiness away again by letting Even feel his fingernails. Glories in Even’s gasp, in the heedless way he pushes against Isak. “Work for it,” Isak says.

Even bites his lip, looking down at Isak like he’s contemplating a new wager, a new challenge. Then he fake-rides Isak with smooth, controlled movements and Isak, staring at the play of slender thigh muscles, at Even’s straining cock, can’t for the life of him remember the capital of Brazil.

“The night we met at Tresor,” Even says suddenly, “you didn’t fuck me.”

“I did,” Isak says, voice indignant, “most definitely fuck you.”

The corners of Even’s mouth quirk up. “True. But not with your cock.”

“I…” Isak doesn’t know how to talk about that night. When he’d entered the club, angry and tense, he’d felt like a freshly sharpened blade, dangerous to handle, ready to cut whoever brushed up against him incautiously. But then everything about Even had been a surprise. The way he’d flirted with shameless, gleeful directness. His unexpected kindness. The fact that he’d paid attention, real attention, to everything Isak said so that talking to him reminded Isak of the fastest, most electrifying squash match he’d ever played. You’d never know from where the ball would strike, how many walls it would hit in the process, only that Even would catch it, return it with interest. Isak had been intrigued, wide awake. Dangerously responsive to the pleasure of Even’s warm, appreciative gaze on him.

The flare of attraction between them had felt real, and it had made Isak feel real, too. Terrifying, after the oppressive blur of living the past months almost exclusively in his head, suspended between unrelenting thought spirals and helpless, directionless plotting, to suddenly find himself stranded in the now. To be reminded of the weight and volume of his body. Of this hungry, lonely part of him that wanted to hear Even tell him another story. Watch his eyes brighten once more, catching on to Isak’s joke. See Even smile, just one more time, into the pauses between their rapid-fire exchanges. Quiet and expectant, like they had all the time in the world, like this was only the beginning.

Even didn’t know the first thing about him, and Isak wasn’t going to wait for him to find out and turn away. He’d hurried the night towards its inevitable conclusion, and he’d acted callously, selfishly, by taking this quicksilver reciprocity between them and manipulating it into a power play.

He’d made Even kneel on the dirty floor and bring him off with his mouth and fingers, one of Isak’s hands clasped tightly and controlling around the back of his neck. The moment Isak had come, he’d let go of Even and zipped himself back up. Motioned carelessly to Even’s crotch and said, still catching his breath: “Why don’t you take care of that yourself.”

As a get-away strategy, it had fallen short. Even hadn’t moved an inch. He’d just remained there, kneeling at Isak’s feet, gazing up at him with not even a hint of submission in his posture. He’d run his long, strong fingers over the pronounced bulge in his jeans, giving Isak an idea but no view of his length. By the time he’d made himself come, head thrown back, white throat exposed, and still fastened in two layers of clothing, Isak had trembled with the effort of holding back from touching him.

When it was over, Even had unzipped his jeans to let Isak watch his unhurried, entirely futile clean up. Isak had known then and there that he was outclassed.

Remembering this moment, Isak swallows. He makes himself meet Even’s eyes. “I was an asshole that night. I’m sorry.”

Even slows down. His hand lands on Isak’s shoulder, fingers gently curling against his skin. “What we did totally worked for me.” His gaze is curious, not peeved. “You know, I’d gladly have brought you off, again and again, that night with no release for myself. Do you know what would have made it perfect for me?”

Isak’s throat is parched. “What?

“If you’d kissed me at the end of the night. Let me take you home.”

Picturing what they might have had if he hadn’t ruined things, if he’d held on to Even’s number, leaves Isak with a dull ache, but he doesn’t say anything back.

Even breaks the silence between them: “I noted that kissing is not on the no-go list.”

“Mmh.”

“An oversight?”

Isak can’t take his eyes off Even’s mouth. His lips are red, looking slightly swollen and tender in this overripe way that Isak is dying to taste.

“Kissing isn’t sex, so it doesn’t count,” he hedges.

Even laughs softly. “I think that depends vastly on context.”

Isak glances at their reflection in the window. Weightless and without substance, their bodies encompass the city. It’s like the desire thrumming through Isak’s body is becoming visible in the glowing lines of the streets, the erratic flicker of the city lights, that glimmer in his reflection.

Even puts a hand on the armrest and lazily rolls his hips in a way that makes Isak grit his teeth. “I’ve been wondering,” Even says casually. “Is this your preference?”

Isak breathes in sharply. “Topping you mean? Tell me what’s yours.”

One of Even’s eyebrows tilts up, but he answers promptly: “Depends on who I’m with.”

Isak rolls his eyes. “Really? Like depends on how manly the other guy is?”

Even laughs. Isak is so surprised he doesn’t react when Even puts his palm against Isak’s cheek and gently turns his face back to him. “No, Isak. I’m talking about trust.”

“Oh. Right.”

“What about you?”

The throb of Isak’s pulse is uncomfortable. The only alternative to ducking his head is to glare at Even. The urge to lie prickles him all over, but instead he says coldly: “I lack the required information to tell.”

Even isn’t quite fast enough to hide his surprise. “You mean… you haven’t…?”

Isak shrugs, shoulders tense. Sounds are strangely heightened, his own breath loud in his ears. He’d like to withdraw bodily from this moment. But Even is still straddling his thighs, probably thinking that Isak is a sexually stunted weirdo.

“So what?” Isak retorts tersely. “I had my first boyfriend at the end of high school. We were a lot hornier than competent. He wasn’t out, had a lot of hangups about anal. I let him do me a couple of times but mostly we did other stuff. And then I was with someone, for a long time, who wasn’t into switching.”

Even nods. He doesn’t look judgemental or creeped out. Not at all, but Isak’s heart is still hammering and he hates this, hates the idea of Even maybe thinking less of him now.

“I just turned twenty-three,” he snarls. “I’ve got about six decades left to top the entire gay population of Oslo! I bet I’m better than most at…”

He’s stopped by two of Even’s fingers, pressed gently against Isak’s lips. Even’s murmur is urgent, strained. “I have no doubt that you could top all of gay Oslo if you put your mind to it. But please… please can I kiss you now?”

The yearning that’s unraveling Even’s voice is the same feeling that Isak has suppressed for hours, for weeks if he’s honest. Still feeling on edge from everything he’s just shared, Isak doesn’t pause to consider what it means.

He slides his finger beneath the damp hair at the back of Even’s neck and tugs him down until he can press forward blindly, find his mouth. The first press of lips is a frantic jolt. They don’t have the angle right and there is a tremor running through Isak’s body that makes him feel like he’s not in full control of himself, holding on to Even’s neck too tightly, kissing him with bruising urgency. Even shudders, chest brushing against Isak’s, and he’s so close that Isak can hear the smallest sounds, like the uneven, rabbit-quick breaths that Even draws through his nose because he’s not breaking contact with Isak, not even to gasp.

Even’s lips are warm and velvety soft except for the small, tender-rough patch where he habitually chews on his lower lip. Isak is obsessed with the difference in texture. He runs his tongue along Even’s lip before nicking the exact spot that Even tends to worry with his teeth. He can’t see but feels Even’s lips curve into a smile.

There’s nothing hard, nothing crushing, about the way Even kisses him back. The inside of his mouth is silky smooth and he coaxes Isak’s tongue deeper into his mouth, hums with pleasure at the slow, lush slide of Isak’s tongue against his.

It feels like a continuation of all the games they’ve played before. A thrilling, delicious loop of anticipation and counter-move, both of them gradually upping the ante. Tallying wins in involuntary shudders, groans, and this one moment that makes Isak feel about a thousand inches tall, when he licks into Even’s mouth and hooks the tip of his little finger into the captive bead ring of Even’s piercing, tugging lightly. Even sucks in a shocked breath. Then he says in this deep, scraped-raw voice that Isak has never heard from him before: “Please.”

Isak wants his response to come out imperious, detached, because he thinks Even might be into that. He fails, utterly. Then again, the fact that he can’t stop nuzzling his nose against Even’s probably gives the game away even before he opens his mouth, sounding nearly as wrecked as Even. “Again?”

“Yes. Please, yes.”

When Isak doesn’t go back to kissing him right away, Even’s eyes blink open, bluer than blue and a little lost. “Isak?”

Isak lets his hand briefly rest on Even’s, squeezes his fingers. “Let me up. I’ll be right back.”

The confusion plainly visible on Even’s face transforms into a burgeoning smile as Isak sweeps up the cameras one by one and switches them off. He walks to the other side of the room and throws them into a cabinet drawer. He doesn’t want Even to be in any doubt about the fact that this is private, unrecorded, just for them.

On a whim, he goes back and picks up his phone, too. There are several new texts waiting. Isak knows that he’s making a mistake when he opens them, and still he can’t stop himself.

Geir’s messages read:

Sana has clearly lost it, but I’m wondering if you’re in on this, too
Did you throw Chris into Ilya’s crackhead clutches as part of this little scheme?
What’s one more boy or girl under the bus, right?
You’ve wrecked so many of them
You do it like no one else

Isak’s fingers are numb. They tremble slightly as he clutches the phone, struggling to steady his grip.

They’re with him always, these boys and girls. His very own glammed-up, garish Greek chorus, led by Håkon and his little daughter, voices thick with betrayal and fury. Telling him that he’s a liar and a cheater whose sole talent is to manipulate people and leave them broken.

Mechanically, he puts the phone away with the cameras. Then he walks back to Even. Even, who’s gorgeous and naked and looking at Isak like he’s a fucking wonder. Isak’s stomach clenches.

Just once, Isak thinks. A parting gift before they go their separate ways. He can make this good for Even. Help him forget for an hour. Give him the pleasure and care Isak should have given him that night at the club.

He motions for Even to join him, straddle him once more in the armchair.

“Are you alright?” Even asks, looking down at Isak with his brow furrowed. He touches his fingers to the curve of Isak’s cheek. “You seem…”

“No,” Isak says, and pulls Even in for a kiss that turns lewd and desperate almost immediately. He makes sure that Even is groaning into the kiss, rubbing his hard cock against Isak’s stomach like he can’t help himself, before Isak draws back. “Can I make you come?”

Even’s lips slide apart. He studies Isak for a moment, and Isak wouldn’t have thought that someone who looks so gone can still see him so clearly, have the mental acuity to quote Isak’s own words back at him. “Honoring your debts?” Even asks.

Isak nods. “Exactly.”

“I see.” Even takes Isak’s hand and kisses across his knuckles. “There are no debts. Never were.”

Isak clears his throat. He says, voice low with honesty, “I still want to.”

Even bites his lip. There’s a smile nestled into the corners of his mouth, ready to break free. He looks happy, entirely at ease, and seeing him like this makes Isak’s throat ache.

“Are you going to make me come,” Even asks, “while respecting all the rules and regulations previously stipulated?”

The tightly balled fist inside Isak’s chest loosens minutely because this is something he can work with. It’s safer to think about this as another game, another challenge.

Isak gives Even a mock-haughty look. “Obviously.”

“Obviously.” Even leans in and kisses him, slow and deep. He doesn’t seem to be in a hurry for Isak to exert himself. Instead, he keeps kissing him, strokes Isak’s neck, nuzzles his smooth cheek against Isak’s rougher one.

“And what about you?” Even murmurs, trailing his fingers down Isak’s abs.

Isak sucks in air through his teeth. “This isn’t about me. I don’t need to come.”

Even looks down at Isak’s cock, throbbingly hard and neglected between their stomachs. “I disagree.”

Even’s hand is very close and Isak wants his touch – wants his fingers, his rough, battered palm, on his cock, wants it so much it nearly drives him out of his mind.

He tears his gaze away. It lands on the sash that ties back the curtain. Isak stares at it for a moment. Then he grabs it.

The sash is slim, midnight blue. Isak takes Even’s hand and places it on his palm. Thinks that it’s almost funny how they’ve come full circle.

The sash’s supple, sumptuous texture makes it perfect for a blindfold. “Do you,” Isak asks, “want to wear this?”

It’s very quiet, the only sound the soft click in Even’s throat when he swallows. “I do. I really, really do. But I… um…” He searches Isak’s eyes. “I also want to be with you, you know? I won’t be able to see you.”

Isak makes himself smile. “Wear it for me, then.”

“For you?”

“Yeah. Imagine it’s my hands taking away your sight.”

Even’s blush slides down his neck. He lifts his eyes to Isak and lets him see his desire and nerves, his trust. “Yes.”

Isak’s relief doesn’t settle, it wavers and billows inside him, shaping itself into something that feels strangely like loss.

His fingers are clumsy when he ties the blindfold. Partly because every drop of blood that isn’t already swelling his cock seems to be rushing there now. But also because Isak is a competence freak and tying this thing is trickier than expected. He wants the fit to be snug but comfortable. The first time, he doesn’t pull the knot tight enough and the moment Even tilts his head, the blindfold slips down his nose.

Isak tenses, thinking of more advanced depraved things that highly-skilled depraved people have probably done with Even in the past. But Even doesn’t seem to mind. He steals a quick kiss, then bows his head once more, patient and steady.

When he’s done, Isak takes Even’s hands, moves them behind Even’s body, and wraps them around the cold chrome armrests so that Even is bent backward slightly, spine curving, tendons straining because it’s not an easy pose to hold.

All the gorgeous planes and lines of Even’s body are taut and laid out for Isak’s hungry gaze. He looks unbelievably decadent. The dark blindfold offsets the paleness of his skin, draws the gaze to his mouth, breath rasping in and out through lips that are damp and bitten-red. His nipples are drawn tight, and his cock stands hard and tall against his stomach, skin blood-darkened, wet at the tip. Isak wants to touch him there, rub his stubbly chin against tender skin, lick and tease him until he screams. He wants it so bad, he’s glad that Even can’t see that Isak is clutching the armrests himself because he doesn’t trust his hands.

“Am I…” Even clears his throat. He moves his head a little, like he’s seeking Isak without being able to see him. “Am I doing it right?”

“Perfect.” Isak doesn’t recognize his own voice so throaty and hoarse.

He strokes his hands up Even’s thighs, spreading his fingers slightly, lets them glide in a firm caress up Even’s flanks and over his stomach to his chest, then onward to the balls of his shoulders and down his back. He's feeling possessive as fuck and yes, some of this is born out of his fever-hot need to claim every centimeter of Even’s body. But more than that he just wants Even to feel good, wants to make sure that he’s aware of, present in, each part of his body.

He does it a couple of times more before he lets one of his hands slide further down, resting it in the small of Even’s back, just barely grazing the swell of his ass. There’s nothing particularly daring about the position of his hand, but Even responds to it immediately, pressing back against Isak’s palm, thighs trembling slightly.

“Hold still,” Isak says, scrambling to map out a course of action while his pulse is running away from him. If Even likes this feeling of being controlled, then Isak can turn himself into the fucking master of control, finesse this into an encounter that Even won’t forget, no matter how many people he takes to bed in the future.

Isak hunts through the disordered welter of images in his memory – stuff he’s seen in porn, stuff he’s read or heard about – but it’s impossible to concentrate on that when there’s Even right in front of him, looking like he was made just for Isak. The slender, long muscles on Even’s arms and shoulders are sharply defined from the strain of steadying himself. His skin looks rougher and gilded where goosebumps make the hairs stand on his arms. Soft on his chest and in the hollow of his throat, where the first beads of perspiration shimmer.

Isak leans in and gathers them up with his tongue, tasting sweet skin and salt, and then he’s just all over Even, seeking out all the secret, trembling places of his body with his mouth and fingers: the soft dips at the top of his flanks. The hollows above his collarbones. The long, raised scar on his knee, and the skin on the inside of his thighs, sleek and white like the polished lining of an oyster shell.

Hickeys are juvenile but Isak doesn’t care, doesn’t care one bit, because when he sucks and bites at Even’s skin, Even moans and shudders all over, straining against the hold into which Isak has put him, trying to get closer to Isak. Isak scoots lower and presses his open mouth to the juncture of Even’s thigh and groin, leaving him a string of throbbing, reddened marks. He can feel Even’s cock twitch against his cheek, skin tight and hot, and the thought of drawing him into Isak’s mouth makes his own cock pulse with need.

Just then, Even gives a garbled, desperate sound.

Isak cups a reassuring hand around his cheek. “I will not violate the rules, you know. But I’m not above doling out some mercy.”

He strokes two fingers over Even’s wet lips and pushes inside Even’s mouth without warning. Even groans, surprised and eager. He caresses Isak’s skin with his tongue as best as he can while Isak slides his fingers slowly in and out, not rough but relentless.

Isak is glad that he only needs one hand to keep Even’s mouth occupied, because it leaves him free to trace another finger across Even’s skin in a slow, swirly pattern that starts where hip meets thigh, meanders over Even’s smooth stomach, lingering near his cock but never touching it before winding its way down to his other thigh. At first, Isak uses his fingertip, then he switches to the blunt edge of his fingernail. He doesn’t use pressure, just follows the exact same pattern in a steady, repetitive motion that’s soon painted in pink on Even’s skin.

The muscles in Even’s lower belly are trembling with the effort of holding himself up. He's moaning brokenly around Isak’s fingers, sucking and licking them, and it’s so good Isak can feel the tell-tale tingling sensation in his tightly-drawn up balls.

He slides his fingers out of Even’s mouth and kisses him. Makes the kiss dirty and playful, just a little bit vicious. Then he lets his hands glide down Even’s back until he can cup his ass in his hands, fingers stroking over but never dipping into his crack. Even pushes into his touch. He rubs himself shamelessly against Isak’s palms to get his fingers to more interesting places, but Isak lightly slaps him and says: “No.”

Even’s answering whine transforms into a gasp when Isak starts teasing his tight, erect nipple with his tongue. He’s never had sex with someone with a nipple piercing before, and he’s a bit shocked by how much he loves it. The captive bead of the piercing makes him remember the feel of the cherry pit on his tongue, but this is infinitely better.

When Isak flips up the piercing with his tongue and makes it capture Even’s nipple in a tight ring, then scrapes his teeth over the aureola, Even curses. When he catches the ring between his teeth and gently pulls on the oversensitive, pierced skin while rapidly flicking his nail against the tip of Even’s nipple, Even starts begging. He stumbles over half of his words, hips thrusting upward with no coordination.

Isak clasps his hands around Even’s flanks and holds him firmly in place while he ghosts his lips over Even’s sharp hip bone. Then he traces with his tongue the still-visible pattern he’s drawn on Even’s stomach, igniting the reddened, abused skin once more.

It makes Even frantic, spreading his legs wider and moaning. Isak can barely keep it together himself because everything, every little thing, is so good: the choked-off sounds falling from Evens lips. The taste of sweat on his skin. The way all of his muscles are trembling now, barely keeping him upright. He’s desperate and not holding back, letting Isak see everything, and Isak thinks that he might burst with all this raw joy and tenderness rising in him.

Even keeps saying his name and Isak nuzzles his cheek against Even’s. Whispers “Right here” in his ear. Then he grazes his teeth over the juncture of Even’s neck and shoulder. Holds back for a couple of rapid heartbeats before he presses his mouth to Even’s skin, sucking sharply and letting him feel the edge of his teeth.

Even howls – a wild, rapturous sound that’s part protest and part pleasure. He pushes up, stomach rubbing against Isak’s cock, and Isak is caught up in the surge, everything drawing tight. Pleasure sweeps through his body and roars to a helpless crescendo, vision going blurry at the edge, breath snatched away. Isak doesn’t have the presence of mind to catch his jizz in his hand, so it goes everywhere, spurts landing on Even’s stomach and chest, on his cock.

There’s no post-orgasmic haze for Isak. None.

Just stinging mortification because you don’t put someone in a blindfold and promise to bring them off, then come all over them without asking.

Isak is about to scrape the words together to apologize, but Even is moving in his lap, shifting his weight so that he has use of his hands and can rip the blindfold from his eyes. He stares down at his own body, flushed skin covered in smears of Isak’s jizz.

Isak’s cheeks are burning. He sucks in a breath and says “I didn’t… I’m really s-” but he’s stopped by Even’s mouth on his, kissing him fiercely, no technique, just a desperate need to be close.

He feels Even’s fist bump against his stomach twice and then he’s coming too, mostly into his hand, but some of it drips onto Isak’s stomach. Isak has never liked being marked in this way but it’s different in this moment: he almost wants to tell Even to uncurl his wet fingers, touch them to Isak’s skin.

He doesn’t. He lets Even catch his breath and tries to etch little details into his memory. The smell of them together, sex and sweat, and Even’s own scent that he wants to keep, like a secret, on his skin. The purring, slightly achy sound that Even makes when he rolls his overstrained shoulders. His small, satisfied smile when he looks down his body and presses a finger against the darkening marks that Isak has sucked into the skin near his groin.

Even looks up. “This was…” He leans in to kiss Isak, but Isak draws back.

“Um, can we not…” The twinge in Isak’s stomach is back, and so is the fear. What comes now? He needs to pull himself back together and doesn’t know how to do that, still feeling stripped raw and shaky.

He has to go check his phone, call Sana to find out what is happening. Make a plan. Start to – The rush of his thoughts is interrupted when Even gently nudges his chin. He asks: “What is it?”

Isak tries for a smile. The look on Even’s face tells him that he fucks it up.

“We don’t have to talk about it,” Isak says. “It happened. You’re…” He can feel himself blush again and wants to slap his own cheek. “I will not forget this, like ever. But we’ve got work to do.”

Even’s eyes narrow in confusion. “Yeah but I’d like to -”

“We’re both vile,” Isak interjects. “We should shower.” He gently pushes Even off his lap and stands up too quickly. The walls seem to close in on him, then pull away.

Isak vaguely motions to the laptops waiting for them on the glass table. “This thing will be a bitch to cut and edit. Have you worked with Vegas before? A nightmare for color grading.”

“Is that so.” Even’s tone is dry, but he looks stumped. Smaller somehow with his drawn-up shoulders.

They shower, one after the other, then pitch their work tent on the king-sized bed they haven’t used all these past hours. For a night that hasn’t been short on surreal moments, this might be the strangest of them yet. Isak stabs at the keyboard of his laptop, watching himself fake sex for the camera with Even, thinking about the very real sex he had with him afterwards, while Even – skin freshly scrubbed and fully dressed like Isak – is holed up behind his own laptop. They only talk to discuss technical stuff.

Isak doesn’t allow himself to look up unless they’re speaking, but it’s like all of his senses have been siphoned into this blurry outline of Even at the edge of his vision. He can smell the expensively generic hotel soap on his skin. Hears the tiny sound of teeth clicking against nail when Even bites his thumb. Knows exactly how long it takes for Even’s glasses, just pushed up his nose, to slip down again so that he can predict when Even, with an impatient flick of his wrist, will raise his hand to adjust them once more.

Isak feels the tension between them like a physical weight pressing against his skin. Meanwhile, Sana isn’t responding to his texts. Geir has sent him a picture of the antique snus box that Isak gifted him a couple of years ago. Isak had paid for a silly engraving etched into the bottom of the box, but mainly it was meant as a joke because Geir likes to tell the mostly made-up story of how his family got rich on importing snus from Sweden in the nineteenth century. Geir had used the box quite a bit, but for crack instead of snus. He sent this picture because he wants Isak to remember, but Isak can’t figure out if it’s meant as threat or entreaty.

He pulls one of the blankets around his shoulders because he can’t get warm. He tries to eat a cold burger to calm his empty stomach, but one bite is enough for his throat to tighten in revolt and he nearly gags. Isak attempts to be discreet about it, but Even still gets up and returns with a glass of water. When Isak blinks at him dumbly, he puts it on the nightstand where Isak can easily reach it.

It’s a fucking glass of water that Even has given him, not the Eiffel tower, but it still leaves Isak dangerously adrift. He’s not used to this kind of care, particularly not from someone he’s currently having a wordless disagreement with.

Even says: “Try to sleep a little. I can take it from here.”

“But I had a nap earlier and you haven’t slept at all! I should-”

Even rubs two impatient knuckles over his eyebrow. “You’re unwell. I’m not too tired to pull together the edit, but I’m far too tired to debate this with you. Send me your stuff and just sleep, Isak.”

Isak stares at him in silent protest until Even reaches over and takes the laptop out of his hands. He puts two fingers against Isak’s sternum and shoves him. There’s not much force behind it, but Isak doesn’t fight, just lets Even push him over until he’s looking up at the glassy sheen of the black marble ceiling.

“No getting up until I’m done cleaning up audio,” Even says.

Isak doesn’t answer. After a moment he turns over and raises himself on an elbow. He looks at the expanse of white sheets between them. It’s ridiculous to be so afraid of something so simple, but his skin is chilly, heart thumping fast and painful in his chest.

“I said no getting up, and –” Even snaps but breaks off when Isak shuffles over. He doesn’t look at Even, just lies down curled up like a ball next to him, with his head just barely touching Even’s thigh. He keeps his eyes firmly shut.

Beside him, Even holds very still. Eventually, Isak hears his fingers return to the keyboard. They sound different, slower. Isak is puzzled by this, but only for a moment. Then he feels Even’s other hand by his temple, brushing back some stray curls.

The light, slow movement of Even’s fingers through Isak’s hair doesn’t cease. He plays with the strands and occasionally brushes the pads of his fingers against Isak’s scalp, tracing unhurried, soothing patterns.

Even’s touch and the sound of his quiet typing on the keyboard gentle the storm inside of Isak, ease the tension in his muscles. Eventually, he allows his body to sink into the steady softness of the mattress. Sleeps.

When he wakes to the feeling of Even squeezing his shoulder, it’s nearly morning. Isak’s gaze falls on the backpack, waiting for their departure with the rest of their neatly arrayed stuff at the end of the bed.

The only thing that Even hasn’t put safely away is one of the laptops. He sits down next to Isak and opens it. “I’ll show you what I’ve got. Then we’ll have to delete all the other files. I’ve saved nothing on the laptops, so we just need to overwrite the cards.”

It’s strange for Isak watching himself on the laptop screen because he’s there and he’s not: they’ve chosen shots and angles that obscure his features, even his build. Tall and indisputably male, he could be one or several ghostly strangers. Maybe it’s just a projection, memory layering itself over moving images, but while his body is little more than a spectral presence, the emotions conveyed by tempo and lighting, sound and fast-paced cuts, are his. And perhaps they are also Even’s, given that he’s made the final cut: desire and disorientation, nerves and longing, culminating in this one scene near the end of the video when they’re in the armchair, heads tilted toward each other and leaning in, cutting away just before the kiss.

Isak turns to look at Even. He nods because he can’t find the right words, but maybe Even understands, because his eyes meet Isak’s and then he nods, too.

“I don’t think overwriting the cards is enough,” Isak says.

He picks up the microSDs and holds the tiny black cards in the palm of his hand. What he should worry about is the incriminating information stored on them. But he thinks about their kiss, the immensity of that feeling, funneled into such a small, fragile compass.

Isak gives Even one of the cards. “On three?”

They don’t count, but their fingers still bend the brittle cards in the same moment, snap them in half.

On his way to the door, Isak passes the polar bear and skims his fingers over the rough fur. Exit pursued by bear. There are hungry bears waiting for them outside, but if this beady eyed specimen is the dissolute guardian spirit of the suite, it’s kept them from harm all through these wild, fraught hours.

He walks by the glass table. Before his mind’s eye, he sees Even and himself taking their places opposite each other at the beginning of the night. Now, Even is standing by the door, unstyled hair sticking up at the back. He’s carrying the backpack, Isak’s jacket slung over his shoulder. His shoelaces aren’t tied. “Coming?”

Isak nods. That’s when he notices the three knotted cherry stems lying on the glass table top, gently wilted. Isak passes his finger over their frayed edges.

Looking at Even, he puts them into this pocket.

Chapter Text

Isak hasn’t seen the sun since Naples. He’s not being melodramatic – it’s just a fact, shifty climate and logistics conspiring against him. Oslo’s low summer sky looks like it’s brewing in a witch’s cauldron, layers of thunderclouds bubbling to the surface in ever new formations, occasionally torn apart by gusts of wind.

Not that Isak has had many chances to scan the sky. He hadn’t even properly set foot on set after Naples and the night at the Radisson before William whisked everyone away to the plush bat cave that is Deichman’s basement theater.

The library is hosting a stop-motion animation workshop for youth offenders, and the basement theatre offers just enough seclusion to keep everyone involved from wandering off. The network timed its handsome donation to the program with the court appearance of Niko and Toril, two former junior producers, on drug-related charges. Now, LASD’s current crop of talent has been shipped in for three days to ‘inspire’ Oslo’s wayward youth. Going on the confessionals they’ve collected from the kids so far, inspiration seems to have fizzled out somewhere between Adam’s motivational high fives and the stale sandwiches. Still, they’re stuck here until the early afternoon.

The kids are shooting a low-fi horror short. The walls of their miniature set are made from jagged pieces of cardboard, painted with peeling layers of gray and partly covered in mirror shards. The puppets have outsized paper-mâché heads with sunken eyes and crooked mouths. Isak has spent too much time watching their copper-wire limbs being twisted out of joint in excruciatingly slow increments.

He’s been sick with nerves ever since Sana and he fired the opening salvo in their ill-prepared guerilla operation against Geir. So far, the element of surprise has worked in their favor. Isak wasn’t around when Sana talked to Geir and threatened to expose his drug habit – including his habit of letting contestants join in the fun. But whatever she’s said to Geir must have cut to the bone: he didn’t put up a fuss when Isak and Sana barricaded themselves in the editing room for a full day. The latest episode of LASD aired just as they had planned, scrubbed clean of every trace of the Kára story line and neatly rebuilt around the leaked sex tape.

Now they’re on deadline to deliver the actual coup: in three hours, Isak has a meeting with the network’s head of programming, and he’s going to drag Jonas and Christoffer along as witnesses. They’ll lay open that drugs are still woven deeply into the fabric of the show, with the showrunner himself issuing crack to vulnerable contestants and junior members of staff.

That’s the plan, at least. Jonas is game and it hadn’t taken much to convince Christoffer – heartbroken, volatile, and not the sharpest knife in the drawer – to agree to testify against Geir. However, half a day has passed since Isak talked to Christoffer. He senses that ever since Geir swanned into the basement theatre about an hour ago, Christoffer’s conviction has been spiraling downward, then snapping back up, like a yo-yo on a string.

Geir has set up shop in the final row of seats, the highest perch in the intimate theater. He looks relaxed in his favorite hoodie, settled into one of the light-brown leather seats with a coffee cup, his phone, and two of his various super thin laptops – one has never been quite enough to contain the whirlwind drift of his attention.

No matter the distance between them, Isak’s pulse starts hammering whenever Geir’s eyes are on him. He tries to distract himself, tries to cling to reason. But each time, it feels like his skin thins underneath Geir’s gaze until there’s no place to hide the betrayal Isak is planning. The panicky, bloody pulse of his heart.

Isak takes a deep breath and turns back to Magnus’s control screen. The camera is on Even, who’s kneeling behind the miniature set so that he can help with repositioning the puppets between the frames. It’s tedious work to manipulate all ten fingers of an ugly puppet for the hundredth time, but Even shows no signs of impatience. Isak looks at his tired eyes, follows the deft, careful movements of Even’s fingers on the monitor, and feels the tightness in his stomach loosen minutely.

Eskild has dressed Even in faded jeans and a simple white t-shirt that is a very deliberate smidge too narrow across the shoulders. Even keeps pulling on his collar in a futile attempt to get more comfortable, and every time he does it, Isak wants to chide and kiss him both.

They’d agreed that there would be no lapses once they returned to set – nothing that Geir could exploit or use against them: no private conversations, no late-night visits to Even’s suite, no sneaking away to plot their next moves. To this list, Isak silently added strictly no mooning over Even. Because he doesn’t trust himself on that front, he’s mostly limiting himself to looking at Even via a panoply of screens.

Keeping a safe distance between them is the right thing to do, but Isak finds it unsettling how hard it’s been to stick to his own rule. It feels like the last time he took a real breath was 18 hours ago when he’d spent an undisturbed, quiet moment standing next to Even before climbing into the van outside Dahlvillaen. When they’d crossed paths, Even was patting down his pockets, an uncharacteristically clumsily rolled cigarette tucked behind his ear. Isak had passed him his lighter.

It had just started to rain and all the once glass-like puddles around them began to ripple as the drops fell. Isak stood there stiffly, wordlessly – stunned by how much he wanted to reach out and light the cigarette for Even. He could picture it: he’d lean in closely to flick up the lid of the lighter, then shield the flame with his cupped hand like the broodingly gallant lead of an old black-and-white movie. It was a stupid fantasy – standing there in the rain, he was fully aware of that. It didn’t lessen his longing to be allowed this small intimacy.

He doesn’t have a clue how Even is feeling, what he’s thinking: about Isak, about the night at the Radisson, about being sucked back into the relentless rhythm of the show after the relative freedom of Naples. Isak would give his right hand to know. Which is ironic, given that he shut Even down the minute he tried to talk things through after they slept together at the Radisson. Isak has handled this so badly; his behavior must have woven every single doubt Even has ever had about Isak’s feelings into one taut thread.

William – suddenly by Isak’s side – snaps his fingers. “Time to play cupid. Let’s get Mikael and Sonja up there with Even and the baby thugs. Everyone’s briefed?”

Isak blinks and calls himself to attention. “Bribed, coerced and briefed not to puke.”

If you think of LASD as a third-rate buffet serving up the same Reality TV fare every season, this fan favourite is easily Isak’s most-hated offering: every year, suitor and contestants have to play matchmakers for an attention-hungry extra. In this instance, William has paid one of the teenagers to talk about her long-term crush on her best friend, another kid currently doing community service.

The girl speaks haltingly and has an odd habit of interrupting her own words with a nervous snort. Mikael’s sage advice is that she might want to read Sally Rooney’s early novels. Sonja asks lots of sensible questions. Even listens.

“Do you think he knows how you feel?” he asks eventually.

The girl’s pierced eyebrows knit together. “Fuck no.”

“Well, he’ll know now,” Mikael points out.

“He won’t. He doesn’t watch this shit!”

The corner of Even’s mouth twitches upward. “Good for him. Tell him though. Being honest with someone who’s that important to you is worth it, even if it’s scary.”

“Not sure I agree,” Mikael says. “What if she tells him and he freaks out and bolts?”

Even’s smile is small, a little worn out, and the feeling that Isak has been shoving down down down rises and wraps a tight band around his chest.

Even says: “Then he’ll come back. A relationship can survive all sorts of things, but not silence on the stuff that matters the most.”

“Cut!” William yells. “That was close but I think we can do better. I want you all to really dig into the emotions, alright? Let’s give it another go and make it pop!”

“Hold on a sec,” Isak says. “I think the problem is…” The problem is that Isak is a coward, who’s acutely aware of his uneven heartbeat. “The problem,” he continues slowly, “is that they’re all looking squeaky clean. No one will believe they’ve done any real work here at all. Give it a moment.”

Eskild rushes in. While he busies himself with messing up Mikael’s man bun and rubbing the lipstick off Sonja’s mouth, Isak hops onto the stage.

Running his fingers over the grimy floor planks, he picks up a thin layer of dust. He’s a bit dizzy with how shallowly he’s breathing, but he steps right in front of Even and lifts his hand – knowing that Even is micced, which means that anyone with access to the channel can listen in.

Even stares right back at him, and when Isak doesn’t say something right away, his lips part slightly in confusion.

The words that are flitting around in Isak’s mind are raw and honest, but what he says, coolly, is: “Your whole look is a bit too immaculate.”

“Right.” Even’s voice is always deep, but it’s a little deeper, a little lower, now. He glances down his body – pristine white shirt, well-fitted jeans. You can’t tell what’s going on in someone’s mind merely from staring at the downward sweep of their lashes. But Isak knows, he just knows, that they’re thinking of the same thing: Even’s body bare, well-used, and flushed with pleasure at the Radisson.

Isak takes a small step forward. Then he presses two dirty fingers to the exact spot, close to Even’s collarbone, where his thin t-shirt is covering a love bite that Isak left him that night. He can feel Even suck in a breath, chest and skin-warmed shirt briefly rising against Isak’s fingers as he draws them down Even’s shirt in one swift motion.

“Hold still. I know this is something you can do,” Isak says, surprised at how controlled his voice sounds when he’s feeling everything but.

Something bright and startled flashes in Even’s eyes, but he remains perfectly motionless, hardly drawing a breath, when Isak scoops up a little more dust. He rubs it on Even’s cheek with pretended carelessness, touch gentle.

He can’t allow himself to drop the mask, not with the whole auditorium watching and three cameras trained on them. They’re both playing so many games at once, but this one is theirs and theirs alone. Isak is all in. He hopes that Even can somehow feel this.

“That’s better”, Isak says, surveying his handiwork on Even for a strained second before stepping back.

He can feel an unwelcome flush rise into his cheeks and doesn’t look at Even again, but he hears the word, spoken softly, right before he jumps off the stage. “Yes.”

They run a few more takes, but the details blur past Isak. He keeps his gaze glued to the control screen, relieved to see Even focus all his attention on the girl and the contestants. And yet he can sense the change in Even’s energy, picks it up like a charge that thrums between them, invisible to everyone else. Or maybe… maybe that’s just Isak’s longing fooling him into hallucinating things that aren’t real. Because the moment they break for snacks and scene changes, Even is gone.

Isak notices right away, but he doesn’t allow himself to do anything about it before Sara stalks over and swats her clipboard against his shoulder. “Are you in on this? What is the idiot doing now?”

“William’s bullying the kids who’re in the next scene. He’ll be right back.”

“Ha, bloody ha. You know I mean Even. We need to prep him. I saw him step out. He hasn’t come back.”

“Then send a runner after him.”

“I sent out five. No trace. We’re already badly behind schedule. Geir is livid.”

Isak steals Sara’s untouched coffee cup out of her hand and sighs. “If I find him, I’ll dump half of my b-roll on you.”

Sara’s manicured nails – a set of uniformly pink plastic claws – twitch once, twice. But she takes Isak’s hand and shakes on it. And just like that, he’s finally free to chase after Even.

Where would he go if he wanted to flee from the claustrophobic war-bunker atmosphere of the basement theatre, the glare of the stage lamps?

On instinct, Isak takes the elevator to the fifth floor, where the library’s ceiling – crafted from vast, sand-coloured concrete slabs arranged in a hexagonal honeycomb pattern – allows three shafts of light to filter down and illuminate the floors below. From this height, the entire library fans out beneath him. All the floors have diagonal voids and suspended walkways, but their layout differs on each level, creating unexpected pockets of space that open and connect like a forest of concrete. The effect is organic, as if the building itself grows and breathes in irregular rhythms. It’s the perfect place for someone to get lost in.

Isak slowly spins around in a circle, clueless as to where he should start his search. That’s when he notices that a section of the far wall isn’t covered in bookshelves, but crafted from pale wood and curving inward to form an unassuming doorway with a rounded arch. A sign requests visitors to remove their shoes before entering, and just beneath it, Isak spots a pair of familiar sneakers.

Walking through this portal feels like stepping into the spiral of a snail’s translucent shell. Walls and ceiling are fashioned from the same warm-toned wood, layered in thin, delicate sheets stacked one over the other like tree rings. The corridor winds in a looping curve before unfurling into a small room whose walls and ceiling bend and fold inward, cocooning but not closing in on whoever steps into their hold. The little chamber would hardly fit more than a handful of people and yet the gentle curves of the walls, paired with the slivers of light that emanate from between the thin sheets of wood, make the room feel open, almost airy.

“What is this place?” Isak asks, voice instinctively hushed.

Even is standing with his back to Isak, head tipped back as if to read the script that covers the thin, softly lit glass panels that are embedded in the wood here and there. At Isak’s words, Even’s stance changes – shoulders rising as he breathes in, head subtly tilted to the side just the way he does when he smiles – but he doesn’t turn around, not right away.

“It’s called the Future Library,” Even says.

“Well, it does look a bit like an eco-conscious spaceship…”

Even shifts and glances at Isak over his shoulder. A strand of hair has fallen out of his deflating quiff, and his cheek is still marked with the dirty smudges that Isak drew on him. His gaze is warm, hopeful.

Locking eyes with him, Isak’s whole body comes alive with a quiet, humming intensity and yet this, somehow, is enough: if he were allowed to stay here, just sharing this intimate, otherworldly space with Even, never talking or touching, just looking at him, he knows he’d be content.

The lines around Even’s eyes deepen. “Hi,” he says in a low, sure tone.

Isak matches him. “Hi.”

“I like this about us.”

“What’s that?”

Even turns around fully. “That you always find me.”

Isak briefly pulls his lower lip between his teeth. “I also keep losing you in the first place. Because I’m not good at…” What did Even say to the girl earlier? “I’m really not good at being honest when it matters.”

“This…” Even touches his hand to his soiled t-shirt. “This felt pretty honest?”

“It was.” Isak steps closer. He feels strange, a little winded, like he’s been running from a place far away. But he doesn’t hesitate before he reaches out and cradles Even’s jaw in his hand. And Even tips his cheek into Isak’s palm like this is easy, like they’ve done it hundreds of times before.

He lets Isak wipe the dirt off his cheek. Isak uses his sleeve to begin with. He’s methodical about it, careful, but when he’s done, he replaces his sleeve with his fingers. Just for a moment, he lets them linger, caresses the reddened curve of Even’s cheek, his lips, the way he did at the beginning of their night at the Radisson. “It is,” he murmurs.

Even’s lips move underneath Isak’s fingers as he smiles. Isak never wants to stop touching him. He wants to step even closer, lift his face to Even’s. But they’re not quite there yet – he knows this, too.

So he lets go, steps back. “Tell me about this place,” he says.

Even’s eyes are luminous as they sweep the room. “It’s a time capsule.”

“Like how?”

“It’s a public art and preservation project. The library runs it in conjunction with an artist. Back in 2014, they planted 1000 spruce trees in Nordmarka Forest. A hundred years later, in 2114, the trees will be felled and provide the paper on which a hundred books will be printed.”

“But isn’t that how books are printed anyway?”

“Yeah. It’s more about the kinds of books they’re gonna print.” Even points at one of the illuminated glass panels. “They’re books written to the future, by people who will long be dead when their works are read for the first time. Every year, another manuscript is sealed inside one of these panels where it’ll remain untouched until 2114.”

“Presuming that we won’t have nuked ourselves into oblivion, stripped the planet of its remaining forests, or long moved away from books printed on paper. Not sure which is the most likely scenario for 2114.”

Even lets out a soft, amused sound. “I know. It’s almost absurdly hopeful, this project. Expecting people to safeguard these trees, these books, for a future they will never see.”

“Have you been to this forest?”

“Not yet. I’d like to go at one point.”

Maybe it’s the resinous scent of the timber walls. Or the soft, fragmented light, scattered like through a woodland canopy. The picture forms in Isak’s mind in a flash: he sees Even with wind-tumbled hair, hiking up a steep incline seamed by rows of spruce trees. Even’s half-smile, the question in his eyes, is so vivid it’s almost like Isak must be there, too, to see it so clearly.

The feeling lingers for a moment. When Isak reorients his attention to the room, his gaze lands on one of the illuminated glass panels, inscribed with an author’s name Isak has never heard before. It’s a mononym, sounding vaguely Icelandic.

It seems that glass drawers already carrying sealed manuscripts are lit up brightly, while drawers linked to authors who’ve been selected but who haven’t yet submitted their work just emit a soft glow. The names on these drawers are harder to decipher.

Isak drops to his haunches to get a better view of one of these unoccupied drawers nestled into a curve of wood. He stops short – the moment of recognition a vivid, unexpected stab of joy that comes before his brain has fully parsed the words on the drawer. Half-twisting, he stares up at Even.

Even looks back at him. Isak sees the tangle of emotions in his eyes: Fear. Doubt. So much longing. He is standing with his back to this wondrous room that makes you feel like you’re nestled safely inside a pine cone, with all the light trickling in through the cracks.

Isak places the tip of his finger against the drawer and traces the mounted letters to each of Even’s three names.

This, Isak thinks, is a good place. For the safekeeping of unwritten words. For the people who are feeling their way toward writing them. If a room can exude patience, this one does. But he doesn’t know how to express any of this without sounding weird.

“2114 is a long way off,” he mutters, which is blunt and totally inadequate, but maybe Even – with his uncanny knack for reading between all of Isak’s lines, no matter how smudged or faded – gets it. Because he looks a little bit lighter when he repeats Isak’s earlier words, “Better prepare for the nuclear apocalypse.”

“Shame we’ll have to cut down all of the spruce trees to carve commemorative doomsday figurines.”

Even huffs out a laugh. “No one will care about stories, then.”

“No, they will.” Isak comes to stand and turns fully to Even. He’s smiling, not as an attempt to persuade, but because he’s sure: “And they’ll care about yours.”

“Mmh.” Even purses his lips. It looks vulnerable rather than sardonic. He’s gazing at Isak and the quiet between them feels vast and soft. Isak reaches out. His fingers are barely brushing Even’s wrist when Geir walks in.

“Boys.” Geir’s gaze lingers just long enough to feel measured. “Time to climb out of your little treehouse.”

Isak can feel his heartbeat in his throat. When did Geir turn up? Did he overhear them? Was there anything damaging to overhear in the first place?

Geir leans against the timber wall of the corridor and calmly motions for Even and Isak to go ahead: “You should know better than to keep us waiting.”

When Even passes him, Geir’s hand darts out and catches Even’s chin, halting him mid-step. Isak sees Even’s shoulders tense up as Geir turns his face to get a better look at Even’s cheek.

Geir says, pleasant enough: “I wonder who cleaned you up.” Then his fingers release Even so abruptly that Even’s step falters for a moment before he presses on.

As they enter the expanse of the open-plan library, Geir lingers behind. Isak doesn’t want to wait for whatever is Geir’s next maneuver. Doesn’t want him to set the terms of the confrontation that’s coming. “Go ahead,” he tells Even – and Even, after a tiny, fraught pause, nods and heads to the elevator.

When Isak turns back, Geir is walking towards him, placing each foot precisely in front of the other in a straight line. It looks odd, but also weirdly graceful, like Geir can’t decide if he wants to mock or impress him. It makes Isak think of the times he’s seen Geir on a dance floor. Geir spent his teenage years hanging out with a break crew and it still shows. He will tell people that he hates dancing, and it’s probably true, though he certainly doesn’t hate the fact that he’s better at it than anyone else.

Once he’s standing right in front of Isak, Geir smiles and asks, “Did you fuck him?”

With the measured control of someone drawing a weapon, Isak smiles back. “Did I fuck your suitor inside a public art installation while every last runner scours the building for us?”

The faint scruff on Geir’s face gives his lips a darker tinge. “You’d enjoy that.”

“I enjoy many things. Doesn’t mean I do them.”

“Right. I’ve always admired your self-control. Walk with me.”

Geir steers them towards the panorama windows that look out on the steel gray fjord. The reading areas are designed like terraces whose jagged, irregular edges recall the glacier that once gouged the fjord into existence. Right by the windows is a sloping walkway.

“What is it that you want from me, Isak?”

Once, the answer to this question was so evident, so urgent, it could have been carved into Isak’s bones. Now, Isak doesn’t know. He wants… distance. Ease. He wants to wake up and just get on with his day, without a part of him observing and commenting on all his actions with Geir’s brilliant, merciless voice.

Isak breathes in to ensure his tone is calm, detached, when he answers. “This,” he says, “is a professional clash of interests, nothing more. You’re bored and frankly doing a shit job. Step aside. Let Sana and me run the show for what’s left of the season. Get on with whatever you’ve lined up next.”

Geir runs a hand over his mouth. Isak isn’t sure which emotion he’s trying to hide. “Why are you so invested in taking over?” Geir asks.

Because he wants to undo at least a small part of the damage. He wants to protect Even and the remaining contestants. Bring the season home, give it an ending that treats the people involved as humans rather than prey.

Geir has stopped walking. He’s waiting for Isak’s answer, but he’s looking at the yawning expanse of the windows.

“You’ve trained us up as a wolf pack,” Isak says lightly. “Did you really expect we wouldn’t turn on you?”

“The others, yes. You though… You –” Geir shifts back to Isak. His expression is tight before, for the blink of an eye, it turns bewildered. A thin streak of red emerges from one of his nostrils and slides over his upper lip. Geir’s hand darts to his face, fingers coming away smeared with red.

“Fuck.” Isak spins around and snatches a tissue box from the nearest reading desk, waving away the protest muttered from behind the student’s laptop.

“Don’t tip your head back,” he snaps at Geir. “It never works, and you know it.”

Geir is bleeding profusely because of his blood thinners. When, reluctantly, he lowers his head and pinches his nostrils shut, blood still drips down and leaves a faintly grotesque pattern on the concrete floor.

Isak steps forward before he can stop himself. “You should sit down before you keel over.”

Geir snorts. It’s an ugly, wet sound. “Not necessary.” He sways to the side.

Isak puts a hand against his shoulder and presses him back against the railing. “Hold on to that with your other hand. If you’re too stupid to sit, I’m not catching you if you fall.”

Because Geir is still leaning forward, the angle of his head is strained. He’s looking at Isak from behind his bloodied tissue. Isak can’t see his mouth, but he can tell from the light in Geir’s eyes, the tilt of his eyebrows, that he’s smiling. And why the fuck would he do that? Is he laughing at Isak? Is this --

Geir gives a ragged chuckle. “Relax, Spurv. This isn’t a ploy. I haven’t managed to make my nose bleed on command yet.”

“If you keep using so much, you soon will. You shouldn’t.”

“So you are worried about me.”

“Worried about the sweater is all.” The words are out the moment Isak notices the blood stains that bloom, like morbid Rorschach inkblots, on Geir’s snow-white hoodie.

Isak bites the inside of his cheek, hard. Too late – he’s made a glaring, painfully stupid tactical mistake.

Geir eats it up. “I’ve been told it doesn’t wash well.” The person who told him this was nineteen-year-old Isak. He’d helped Geir pick the hoodie, thrilled out of his mind that Geir would let him, when he knew fuck all about clothes. Isak remembers standing in the snooty Balenciaga store near Domkirke one lazy Saturday morning, shit-talking Geir and feeling happy, so happy.

“I don’t lose,” Geir says. “Ever. Do you want me to take Sana and Christoffer out of this equation? Because I can. Give me an hour, and you’ll have lost your allies. What will you do then?”

Fear, like a familiar knife, slides into the hollow of Isak’s chest. “You’ve already lost, don’t you get that? You can bluster and threaten as much as you like. The evidence is there. The witnesses, too.”

“Really? Christoffer won’t give you shit, and Anders’s mom is about to run for City Council. He lives in mortal fear of her disapproval and would rather eat glass than get dragged into court.”

Isak is desperate to get out of this conversation, but with every step that he’s moving further down the sloping walkway, Geir looms taller over him. He needs to shore up the ruins of his position, give Geir as little information as possible. “I don’t need them.”

“Liar.” Geir laughs. Bizarrely, it sounds fond. “Your little insurrection is doomed, but this doesn’t have to be ugly, you know. I don’t give a fig about Sana, William, Christoffer or any of the others. We can cut them loose. Ditch the games and run the show together. Co-producers – isn’t this what you’ve always wanted? Shared control of the artistic direction of the show?”

Isak shakes his head. “Not what I want.”

Geir drops the hand with the bloodied tissue. He’s pale, and he’s staring at Isak with vicious intensity, but the confusion in his eyes isn’t acted. “No?” he asks.

Deliberately and slowly, Isak retraces his steps up the walkway, closing in, until they’re standing on equal footing. “No,” he says.

“Right.” Geir takes him in. His tongue absently runs along the brittle curve of dried blood along his upper lip. When he speaks again, his tone is different, steady in a way it hasn’t been before. “Do you want to see if I’d give up the show for you? Is this your price? Because I’ll pay it.”

Isak doesn’t reply right away. He hopes that Geir will misread his hesitation as yearning when what Isak is really calculating is whether he can steel himself to go through with it: slip back into the fold, amass undeniable evidence, then bring Geir’s empire crumbling down around him. He can almost hear Sana whisper to him, urging him to take this chance. It would be an easier route to success.

But he’s let Geir set his price once before, and it’s still eating him alive.

He finds that he cannot lie. Not about this. “No,” he says simply. He turns, the walkway rising underneath his feet as he makes his way back up the incline.

*

Their plan collapses. Not all at once, but incrementally and painfully. Christoffer pulls a disappearing act. When Isak and Jonas turn up for their meeting with the network’s head of programming, having come straight from the shoot at the library, the head’s not alone. The chairman of the network’s advisory board stands by the window.

Isak freezes, nearly tripping Jonas, before he forces himself to keep walking.

The chairman’s name is Vidar. He and Isak aren’t exactly strangers, Vidar being a close friend of Geir’s. But he doesn’t greet Isak, just observes him with his unusually pale eyes. Isak was startled by Vidar’s gaze the first time he met him, and he’s been so every time their paths have crossed since. He’s a fit, chiselled-looking corporate type, but the strange, hazy blue of his irises makes them seem blurry and clouded, like a much older man’s eyes. He wears his cologne, cloying bergamot and liquorice, too freely. Isak fights the urge to turn away.

It’s like someone has reached into his mind and excised the sentences he’s prepared with such care. He knows that if he could just summon the first line, everything else will fall into place, but the words aren’t coming. Something gets in his eye – grit or a stray lash – and no matter how violently he blinks, he can’t rid himself of the irritation.

As soon as he tries to explain the rampant drug problem on set, the head of programming interrupts him. “Spare me the noble whistleblower act,” he says. “If this is your idea of helping your friend, you should know that you’re only making matters worse.”

“No, you need to listen to this.” Jonas, thick brows tilting together in affronted sincerity, leans forward and launches into a fiery condemnation of Geir’s drug use.

Isak barely follows. The sick churn in his stomach hardens into a stone fist. “Which friend?” he cuts in. “What do you mean?”

“You’re annoying when you’re being a smart ass, but you’re even worse when you’re acting clueless,” the head says. “I strongly advised Geir against taking you back on after last year’s blow up. He wouldn’t listen.”

“Which friend?” Isak repeats.

The head’s look of frustration melds with disbelief as he stares Isak down: “A significant amount of drugs were found stuffed in Sana Bakkoush’s locker this afternoon. More than just a bad mistake or coincidence.”

Isak’s pulse hammers. “But that’s –”

“I’ve already passed the situation along to the authorities,” the head speaks over him. “The police are handling it from here on out. I expect you both to let them do their job.”

*

On their return, the set at Dahlvillaen is in meltdown. Chris and Eskild sprint towards Isak from two different directions, faces drawn and white. They bundle him into Eskild’s trailer.

“I know. I’ve heard,” Isak cuts through their torrent of simultaneous explanations. He glances from Eskild to the others crammed into the messy trailer: Mahdi and Magnus are sitting silently on the floor, half-swallowed by an overflowing clothes rack. Eva, clearly here on the pretence of getting ready for the next shoot, looks at Isak in the mirror while her fingers twist sections of her hair onto rollers with jerky, impatient motions. Jonas leans against the door of the trailer, arms crossed like he’s barricading it against invaders.

“Where is Geir?” Isak asks.

As if on cue, Sara’s disembodied voice, loudly transmitted via Eskild’s comms, is in the room with them: Geir wants Isak in the control room and Magnus on the pier. Now.

“Isak,” Chris says. “What do we do? Sana is at the station. They found enough coke in her backpack to reopen Hacienda Nápoles. Sara called in police and told them she’d witnessed suspicious interactions between Sana and the contestants. Ingrid backed her. It was… It was…”

“A complete shitshow,” Mahdi offers from the floor.

“Happened at lightning speed, too,” Eskild adds. “Before we knew what was happening, it was over.”

Sara’s voice comes through comms once more. Isak, where the fuck are you? And Chris, if you’re listening, I’m tired of doing your job for you. Get your ass over here.

“Sana wanted you to have this.” Eva turns around and fishes a memory stick out of the pocket of her bathrobe. She drops it into Isak’s palm. “We were shooting when the police arrived. She dropped this into a flower bed right next to me. And then she did something odd.”

“What was it?”

“There were mics everywhere, so I guess she couldn’t really say what she wanted to say? Anyway, she took my palm and drew a letter on it with her finger. An A, I think. Like this…” She traces the letter on Isak’s hand. “And she said really quietly: Tell Isak to get to the bottom of his most hated rumour. Tell him to fucking hurry up.”

“She said fucking hurry up?” Magnus asks.

“I may have added fucking.” Eva gives a tense shrug. “It’s definitely what her face said.”

“Right.” Isak turns the memory stick between his fingers.

This time, it’s William’s voice bellowing on comms: Isak. Control Room. NOW.

When Isak looks up, Jonas’s eyes are on him. “Call Ken and his allies,” Isak tells him. “Call every journalist and media activist influencer you can think of. Get the word out about a massive drug violation on the LASD set.”

“Why?”

“I can’t–” He stops himself. He’d always expected to be alone at this juncture. Looking at the faces around him, it’s a jarring, warm surprise to find that he’s not. “We can’t chase after evidence mid-shoot. We need to create sufficient media pressure for the network to halt production and send people home.”

*

It’s a waiting game, cold and torturous. When Isak steps into the control room, Geir doesn’t tear him to pieces for ratting him out to the network. He’s kind – which is worse.

“Sorry your little plan burned to ashes,” he says, moving around his desk until he’s standing right in front of Isak. He’s changed into a clean sweater that Isak has never seen before. Geir holds out both of his hands. “Let’s forget about all that, yeah? Shit you did. Shit I did. I want to start over. Clean slate.”

Isak ignores Geir’s hands and picks up a heavy box with props for the picnic scene in the conservatory that he’s scheduled to run. “I want Sana’s name cleared.”

“But didn’t you hear? They found…” Geir lowers his voice to a shocked whisper. “Drugs on her! Sara can tell you all about it. Ah.” Geir snaps back to his normal voice and demeanour. “Look who’s back.”

Christoffer works his way through the maze of hot desks. He doesn’t pick the direct route. Isak can tell that he has put considerable effort into his hair. He’s clutching an energy drink in his hand and avoiding Isak’s gaze, but it’s obvious that it’s not him that Christoffer is afraid of.

“Christoffer had some very important things to attend to in Grünerløkka,” Geir says to Isak. “I’m sorry he couldn’t be of service to you.”

Christoffer flashes his teeth in a smile. Like his chuckle, it’s a strained imitation of the real thing. “I’ve returned. You know, like the prodigy s-- … I mean the prodigal son.”

Geir’s laugh, by contrast, is all authentic amusement. “You’re neither. Certainly not a prodigy and I don’t think anyone here was yearning for your return.”

Isak hears Christoffer’s sharp intake of breath. Looks at his bland, smooth face smiling, smiling with eyes that are full to the brim. Once, Isak might have felt satisfaction seeing him like this. Not now. He finds that he’s not even furious with Christoffer for bailing on him.

Geir opens his mouth again but Isak cuts in. “Carry this.” He shoves the box into Christoffer’s arms and starts walking. “Technically, you’re still my assistant. About time you did something for your money.”

On their way to the conservatory, they speak only once. Isak takes the box from Christoffer and nods to the restroom door. “Clean yourself up. No wallowing. I want you in the conservatory in three.”

Christoffer blinks at him. His lashes, like his cheeks, are wet. “Why? I mean… I thought you were just giving me an escape because… because yeah…” He shuffles his feet, looks away. “You’ve never let me help before.”

“Well,” Isak says without any real bite, “I’m not saying I won’t regret it.” He nudges the bathroom door open. “But we’ll give it a go. Hustle up.”

*

Shooting a romantic candlelit moment in broad daylight, gloomy and overcast though it may be, is no easy feat and requires a heavy helping of ND gels and scrims smothering the glass walls of the conservatory. Lit by three dozen dripping candles in addition to Mahdi’s arsenal of softbox lights, the room is also stuffy as hell.

When Isak enters, some of the crew is standing huddled together in a corner, casting wary glances at Sara who kneels next to the picnic basket with an atomizer, spritzing the champagne bottle to make it bead with condensation. Isak resists the urge to step on her ankle.

For reasons that are perfectly logical in the universe of dating shows, everyone is dressed to the nines for a rustic, seemingly improvised indoor picnic. Even stands near the double doors that lead to the garden, firmly shut against the outside. He’s shucked his tuxedo jacket, and he’s drawing shapes into the condensation on the glass panels that look a lot like the melancholy, NSFW cactus-figures that have tripped production before: these doodles tend to turn up in the background of a crucial shot, unnoticed until post-production, when it’s far too late to reshoot without blowing the budget.

When someone calls Isak’s name, Even turns around. His worried gaze finds Isak immediately. As if on instinct, he starts walking towards Isak, then stops himself.

Isak forces himself to look away, but he’s never been so aware of Even’s presence. And yeah – Even looks scorching hot in his fine shirt and tailored trousers. But it’s not about that: for all that Isak cares, Even could be wearing jogging slacks or oilskin rain gear, he’d be no less magnetic to him. He’s never felt such a sharp, relentless desire to be close to someone. Not just to take Even to bed (even though – god, yes – he wants that, too), but simple stuff: he wants to cross the room, put his chin on Even’s shoulder, and rest his tired body against Even’s for a moment. He wants Even to talk him through his obscene windows drawings until the howl of rage and fear that’s ripping through Isak softens into something bearable. He wants to hear what Even’s thinking about everything that has happened since the morning. Find an unobtrusive way to check on his hands. Touch his cheek. Kiss him. He really, really wants to kiss him.

Instead, Isak gets to direct Even kiss and make out with other people on a photogenically rumpled gingham blanket. He tries to give Even and the others as much leeway as he can. Bites his tongue whenever he wants to bark at people (people mostly being Mikael). It takes a long time. At the end of it, Isak feels like an apple that’s been carelessly handled, skin still waxy and intact, but bruised underneath.

He’s on duty until the evening, but everyone gets an unexpected hour off when Sonja, critical to the next scene, complains of a raging migraine and retreats to her room. Isak sets up his laptop at a secluded table in the conservatory, logs into the shared storage server, and feigns editing b-roll – just enough to ensure anyone else on the server can see him listed as active. What he’s actually doing is frantically scouring the files on Sana’s memory stick. It’s a mix of production materials and personal clutter: call sheets, shot lists, budget reports, and vendor contracts alongside scrappy Word documents with To-Do lists. A file with an unfinished pitch for a show catches Isak’s eye, but he dutifully shuts the file before he can read further – he’s not here to snoop.

He opens the budget spreadsheets, the familiar grid of cells filling his screen. The monthly budgets stretch back nearly a year, covering the period after Isak left the show and the months since his return. Isak scans the rows of neatly itemized expenses, department labels, and totals for May. He’s seen this budget before – in fact, it’s the budget Geir had asked him to fudge. Isak hadn’t complied, which had led to their brief, subdued row in the control room the evening Kára was on set.

The thing is, this budget looks nothing like the one Isak prepared and submitted to the network.
There’s a 140,000 kr charge for location permits from a week when they’d shot everything on set. The catering budget is oddly high – like they’d been feeding everyone caviar when the crew had lived off lukewarm toasties and vending machine coffee. He clicks into the next tab: equipment rentals are another incongruity. They’d supposedly paid 184,000 kr to a vendor Isak doesn’t recognize – for lighting rigs Mahdi had already purchased in April.

Isak flips back to earlier months, from before he was rehired. The same vendor appears repeatedly, charging similar amounts each time, as if the invoices had been copy-pasted with only the dates changed. There are plenty of other oddities, including a tab innocuously labelled Miscellaneous Expenses that lists hefty charges for “social media strategies consulting” from a company Isak has never heard of. Freyja Connect. Absurdly, it makes Isak think of Geir’s cat.

He logs into SAP Systems and quickly pulls up the budgets approved by the network over the past couple of months. The breakdowns of the monthly allocations and the sums transferred align with their typical spending patterns - completely at odds with the bloated figures on Sana’s memory stick.

Isak squints at the screen. This makes no sense. Why go to the trouble to invent an inflated fantasy budget when the network has already approved the correct figures? Who stands to gain from this – and how?

Tell Isak to get to the bottom of his most hated rumour – that’s the message Sana had passed on through Eva. He’s got no clue what rumor Sana was referring to. Like a wasp nest, the cosmos of Reality TV is always swarming with rumors - constant, industrious, never without a sting. Isak has crafted plenty of these rumors himself. Does he hate any of them more than the others? What if he can’t figure this out? What if...

Thoughts darting wildly and uselessly, Isak peers over the rim of his laptop. The conservatory is still cluttered with the detritus of the shoot. Christoffer is making a half-assed attempt to gather empty champagne flutes and half-eaten deserts on a plant stand. One of Magnus’s guys is wheeling out his rig, muttering curses under his breath that blend with the nervous murmur of crew gathering their gear.

Even, Iben, and Eva are still sitting on the picnic blanket, joined – in a rare moment of crisis-driven solidarity between crew and contestants – by Mahdi and Eskild. They’re playing magic cups with Aurgelmir, hiding parsley and other tasty morsels underneath the cups and letting Iben’s over-enthusiastic rabbit figure out the fastest way to bowl them over.

As Isak’s gaze drifts over, Even lifts his head and casually raises his voice to be heard over the din. “Yo, join us and take a break.”

Isak looks away. He feels the stress and pressure as physical onslaught: a claw hooked into Isak’s shoulders, squeezing. An oppressive weight pressed down on his chest, thinning and tightening his breaths.

When he risks another glance, Even has drawn up his knee, like he’s already making space for Isak by his side. Isak feels hollowed out by his yearning to stumble over and plonk himself down next to Even. Let himself be grounded by his closeness and deep, familiar voice.

He’s pushing back his chair when Sara walks in and starts talking to Even right away. She’s standing half-turned away. Isak can’t make out what she’s saying, but he can still tell that she’s pleased to be the conveyor of bad news.

Something about the smug tilt of her head, the way she’s drumming the tip of her pencil against her clipboard, takes Isak back to Even’s first morning on set, when he eavesdropped on Sara feeding Even rumors in his suite. Rumor has it that Isak…

He sits back down. His hands are cold. Automatically, he puts them back on the keyboard, but when he tries to add tags to a random b-roll clip, his fingers keep missing the correct keys. Isak pulls up the next clip. Stares and stares at a frozen image of Christoffer hiding his face behind a burdock leaf.

Isak fucks with people, but he doesn’t fuck them, if you get my meaning. Unless… His thoughts run around the edge of what he remembers, skim the memory of Sara’s words, then veer away. There’s no point going further. This is not the rumor Sana meant. It can’t be. He needs to focus.

Focus.

There’s a smudge on the screen of his laptop that’s been irritating him for days. He doesn’t have a tissue – of course he doesn’t have a fucking tissue. The smudge looks like a frayed letter P, tilted to the side. What was the letter Sana drew on Eva’s palm? He tries to draw the shape on his own palm. Is that an A without the little crossbar? Does he know any rumours about people or things starting with an A?

He is still so cold. He keeps drawing the letter. Again and again, until it’s become little more than a physical compulsion. It looks like a pyramid or an A from his point of view. But Sana must have stood before Eva when she drew the letter on her hand. And so… He twists his hand around awkwardly, tries to look at it from Sana's perspective. The angles of the lines shift, revealing a V instead. Isak looks up from his palm and stares blankly at the intricate veins of the bergamot leaves brushing against the table’s edge.

V.

His foot and shin hurt, and it’s only when he peeks down, studying his own leg like it’s a stranger’s limb, that he becomes aware, all at once, of his ankle hooking around the metal chair leg, the sharp edge digging into flesh and bone. He shifts his weight and, slowly, presses harder. Lets the ache hold him in place.

He’s starting to grasp the mechanisms in play. How Geir might have been using the inflated budgets. The arrangement that persuaded a high-up person to avert their gaze. In exchange for a reward.

Caught in the relentless loop of his thoughts, Isak loses track of the minutes that pass until he grows conscious of something else: sound swelling slowly, single notes plucked with care. He doesn’t notice the moment the music catches him, only the pull of it now, tugging gently at his thoughts, reeling him in from where he’s been cast adrift.

Head bent over his guitar, hair ruffled by the breeze sneaking in through the conservatory doors thrown wide open, Even sits with the others while he plays. Isak’s first response is alarm – worry that someone has pressured Even into this, knowing how firmly he has resisted playing publicly in the past. But there’s no camera or producer in sight, nothing performative or tense in Even’s posture. The others are chatting quietly. Eva is resting her head against Eskild’s shoulder; Aurgelmir is dozing on Mahdi’s lap. No one appears to pay much attention to Even.

No one except Isak.

Even’s gaze is fixed downward, soft and serious. He switches to a different song, and now there’s a halting, hesitant quality to the movements of his pale fingers on the fretboard. Shifts in the chords that come a little too early or too late as the melody stumbles into existence. The sound is lovely, familiar even though Isak can’t quite put a name to it.

He allows himself to look at Even. Really look, like this is the first time he’s laying eyes on him. Or the last. The technicians have started to remove the scrims covering the glass panes of the conservatory, and the light filtering down streaks Even’s hair with dusty gold. He’s opened the top buttons of his dress shirt, collar parting and faintly revealing the hollow of his throat. His fingers are unrushed as he picks his way through the sequence of chords, gaining more ease as he returns to the bittersweet refrain.

They’re separated almost by the length of the room, once more caught in a glass-walled cage. But while in the Radisson’s elevator Isak had felt a wordless chasm open between them, this time Even’s playing draws him close, like he’s by his side, just a breath away. It’s this feeling that slowly, slowly returns Isak to himself.

“Attention everyone!” Chris’s voice, urgent with relief, on comms: “Effective immediately, the network has decided to place the show on a temporary hiatus.”

*

“So…” Isak falls into step with Even, who’s trailing behind the group of contestants that Sara is herding to the parking lot for pick up. It’s past eight, far from dark: the long Scandinavian twilight will linger until midnight. “You’re about to head off?”

Even looks up from the multi-page release form, stamped with LASD’s logo, in his hand. “I’m not meant to understand the legalese, right? Can I sign this without risking losing, I don’t know, my kidneys or something?”

“Your kidneys are safe as long as they don’t start a podcast about what happened here.” Isak taps the form. “You’re agreeing not to talk to the press, not to post anything on social media, and not to breathe a word about your time with LASD — not to friends, not to family, not even to your dog.”

“I don’t have a dog. Yet.” Even stops walking and looks at Isak. “What happens now?”

“Sana found… evidence of something. Embezzlement, I think. I’m going to try and dig into it. The others will help. First thing we need to do is retrieve…um…” Isak scrubs his palm over his face. He’s fucked up in so many ways, but this particular fuck-up might turn out useful yet. “Well, I need to go and hunt down a laptop I stole from Geir last season. It’s been sold in the meantime. That bit is a bit of a bummer…”

When his gaze shifts back to Even, Even’s eyes gleam with amusement. “I think you will need a driver.” He pulls out keys from his pocket and shows them to Isak on his palm. “Do you know who had one too many glasses of champagne, can’t drive, and asked me to ‘safely deliver’ his precious little toy?”

“Ilya,” Isak says with great sincerity, “we heart you and your questionable life choices. Let’s go.”

*

“I wouldn’t have put it past you to steal a motorcycle from set. But now you’ve gone and stolen the suitor, too?” Marianne says, smiling. She stands in the brightly lit entrance to the residential care home, tucked between older buildings, in a quiet, leafy street in Groruddalen. The woolly cardigan she’s rarely seen without hangs loosely around her frame. Her shoulders are hunched forward. There’s a familiar guardedness to her posture, as though she’s always bracing for something.

Isak looks from her to Even, a few steps behind. It hits him now that he’s never once hesitated about bringing Even here. He hugs his mom. “I don’t think he’ll stay long,” he murmurs. “But you’ll like him, I promise.”

They’ve come straight from set to retrieve two of Isak’s old external hard drives. He’s not sure any of the old budgets and vendor contracts saved on them will be useful, but who knows what might come in handy. All of Isak’s stuff fits into three worn cardboard boxes, stored in one of his mom’s messy wall cabinets.

It doesn’t take him long to find the hard drives. But when he returns to his mom’s small, crammed kitchen, he finds Even chopping celeriac and debating lapskaus ingredients with Marianne and the two neighbors she frequently cooks with.

Isak leans in the doorway and watches them. His mother is tending to the scraggly looking potted herbs on the windowsill. Alva, the younger of Marianne’s friends, wears a minimum of five layers at all times, but right now she’s rolling up all her sleeves to show Even the flower tattoos that wind around her hands and forearms.

“Stop that, we were talking about parsnips!” Bente, Marianne’s other neighbour, raises her cooking spoon in mock indignation. It looks like she’s aiming for Alva’s arm, but the tremor in her hand betrays her, and a flick of the spoon sends a piece of fried parsnip flying, landing squarely on the back of Even’s hand.

He lifts his hand and pops the parsnip into his mouth. “Not bad, but I’m still team carrot.” Gaze snagging on Isak, his beaming grin softens into a smile that’s quieter but no less warm. It contains a question. “Hey you,” he says. “Do you want me gone? I hear you guys have dinner plans….”

Isak shakes his head. “Stay.”

It’s a strange, lovely evening. It takes a while before they can sit down to eat because Alva has a thing about aligning the glasses just so, nudging each glass a millimeter at a time until the table feels right to her. While they wait, Isak walks over to where Even is leaning against the counter. He mirrors Even’s position, resting his weight against the countertop and curling his hands around the edge of the lip.

They don’t speak – it would be pointless to compete with the racket of Marianne and Bente’s good-natured clash over Robyn’s late-90s hits. To bolster her point, Marianne keeps cranking up the volume on her beloved, battered radio player, held together in more than one place by tape.
Even bops his head to the music, seemingly distracted, but after a moment, he casually covers Isak’s hand with his. His palm is warm against the back of Isak’s hand, fingers curving over Isak’s.

Isak doesn’t move, doesn’t turn his head, just lets the feeling thrum through him, steady and undeniable. Slowly, he slides his fingers apart and lets Even’s fingers slot between them.

Out of the corner of his eye, he catches the curl of Even’s smile.

Marianne’s pre-dinner prayer meanders through an impressive range of topics, covering everything from global warming to hopes for Bente’s sick cat. When they finally start eating, conversation is choppy, derailed by unexpected swerves and loops. Isak wonders briefly if Even is peeved that no one is asking him questions or consulting his opinion. But even if he can only snatch little sideway glances, he’s so familiar with Even’s energy and body language – the way Even only ever allows himself to take up space when he’s fully relaxed and content, stretching out his long legs and wrapping an arm around the back of his chair – he knows it’s all good.

There’s a weird moment when Bente bustles off for the sixth or seventh time to fetch something. This time it’s one of Marianne’s old baking books and when Bente cracks it open to show Even “the only Kransekake recipe worth the name”, a photograph flutters out. It’s a shot of Marianne, Geir, and Isak, grinning widely in front of a burst of hyacinths in the Botanical Garden.

Even leans down. He calmly picks up the photo and slides it back into place in the book, words about Kransekake flowing steadily as though nothing has shifted.

Later, when he’s doing the dishes with Even while Marianne and her friends have moved to the living room, Isak scrubs at a stubborn crust of gravy. “I’m glad you’re here,” he says without looking up.

“Thought so. I have a way with gravy stains.” Even gently takes the wet plate from Isak’s hand and scrapes at the dried smear with his fingernail.

Isak wipes his hands with a towel, eyes on Even. He draws in a breath. “I’ll tell you about Geir,” he says. “Anything you’d like to know.”

Even puts the plate down. “I want you to tell me when you’re ready. Not when you feel pressured because I saw something I wasn’t meant to see.”

Isak blinks at him. There are all the things he knows about Even. And then there are all these other things that are still a surprise. “You’re patient.”

“Um… I’d hope so.” Even cards a hand through his hair, gaze darting away. “You have no idea how much I rely on the patience of others.”

From the living room, the opening strains of a Hozier song drift over. Isak looks at Even, who’s worrying his lower lip absently, leaving behind a faint pink mark.

Inside Isak, something locks into place, warm and certain. “The song you played for me today.”

“Hm?” Even raises his chin in question. Nothing about his relaxed posture has changed, but there’s a rise to his chest, a flicker of something – nervousness? expectation? – in his eyes that tells Isak that he’s been waiting for Isak to return to this moment.

“I didn’t recognize it right away. But.” Isak shuffles a little closer. Not close enough to touch Even, but close enough to catch a faint reflection of himself in Even’s eyes. “It was Cherry Wine.”

Even’s lips curve into a small smile. “I need to practice though.”

“I hope you will.”

“Yeah?”

“Mmmh. I’d like to hear it again.”

There is no world outside this cluttered, warmly lit kitchen. No sound now apart from the amplifying thud of Isak’s heart. There’s only Even’s face, expression unguarded and hopeful in a way that makes Isak realize, with a pang, how much of himself Even has hidden before.

“Thank you,” Isak says. “For playing for me. For knowing that I needed…” It’s the truth, finally. Finally easy to admit. “You.”

Even draws a little closer, dips his head to erase their small difference in height. “I’m here.”

The words sound straightforward, but they ripple outward and draw other things into their compass.

Here is the scuffed old table, its varnish worn away in uneven patches, that Isak saved from the Grefsen house. Here are eleven- and seven-year-old Lea and Isak, squabbling over a melting ice cream cone in a faded picture on the wall. Here is his mom’s medication plan, written in Isak’s graceless, painstaking hand and taped neatly to the fridge.

Here is Isak, stepping forward to close the final distance between them. His hand trembles with nerves and he thinks that if he has to ask, he’ll botch this - he’ll probably botch it even if he doesn’t have to utter a single word.

He smooths his thumb down Even’s cheek. Even’s lip is still tender and pink from when he bit it earlier. Isak can’t breathe with how much he wants him, and still he hesitates, feeling like he’s poised at the edge of a storm so fierce it will strip him bare.

“Isak?”

Isak wants the note of uncertainty in Even’s voice gone. Longs to replace it with joy. Heat. Laughter. He wants this so much for Even, his fear ebbs away.

He slides a sure hand around Even’s neck, brushes his nose against Even’s before drawing back minutely. He doesn’t want to stop looking at him, wants to commit to memory each fleck in his irises, each freckle dusted over his nose.

He tells himself that they’ll have time. He’s always thinking about endings - it’s a reflex he can’t shed - but their time together hasn’t run out yet.

He finds Even’s bright gaze.

“I’m here, too.” And with that, he lifts his face to Even’s, slants his mouth against his.