“You could also show me the neighbourhood first,” I suggested.
She nodded excited, but then calmed down a little.
“There’s not much to show.”
“Depends on what you’re looking for. I mean, I’m not interested in the nearest disco or cinema. I’m here to enjoy the scenery and tranquillity. You must know some beautiful spots around here, right?” I said.
She smiled. She had a very cute smile indeed.
“This is the best spot,” she said, then hastily added: “But I’ll show you some of my other favourite spots if you’d like.”
“Let’s go then! You lead the way.”
We walked for a couple of hours, looking at Ulrika’s favourite spots, both when she was younger and those she preferred now. There was a lot to see. Picturesque rock formations, small creeks and gurgling stream. One of the streams formed a very small waterfall. It didn’t look like much, but my interest grew when Ulrika told me that she sometimes had showered in the waterfall. I tried to picture her standing under the cold, falling water and it was a beautiful sight that formed in my inner eye.
It was getting very hot and thinking about her in the cold waterfall didn’t cool me at all. I pulled my T-shirt off and put it casually over my shoulder as we walked back. I could see Ulrika staring at me, when she thought I didn’t see it. Since I’d had the privilege of admiring her long, tanned legs and lovely back for most of the walk, I certainly didn’t mind that she showed some interest in me.
“So, does you mother expect you home for lunch? You can eat with me if you want to,” I said.
“No, I can stay out until dinner. She’s used to that. I don’t think she thinks I’d ever meet anybody out here.”
“You’re free to go as you please and bathe in the pool and whatever?” I asked.
“Yes, but mom would probably be very upset if she knew I was swimming around . . . nude.”
She blushed as she said it. Actually, it didn’t take much to make her blush.
“Why on earth would your mom be bothered about that? You’re all alone!”
“It’s a sin to show yourself nude,” she said.
“Oh, so she’s religious. Guess it’s a sin to talk to me as well, right?” I said.
“I think so. I mean, I don’t think so, but mom and dad do. If it were up to them, I wouldn’t go to school. They would teach me at home. They don’t want me to meet boys or even other girls. They are so afraid that other people will have a bad influence on me.”
Ulrika sounded very annoyed, just like yesterday, when we talked about going places.
“Do you think that your friends from school have a bad influence on you?” I asked.
“No . . . maybe. I mean, I don’t think I believe in god the same way that mom and dad do. I don’t think he’s so strict, you know. All the other kids are allowed to be together and have fun. It’s not like they are drinking or doing drugs or things like that. They . . . can do things that I can’t do and they know a lot more, you know about . . . things.”
“That’s why you became so embarrassed, when you saw me come out of the water yesterday. You’ve never seen a man before?” I asked.
Ulrika hesitated a little before she answered.
“No,” she whispered.
We walked in silence for a while. Not only was she living out here in the middle of nowhere, but on top of that, her parents tried keeping her away from other people as well. I didn’t know what to say. I felt sorry for her but I couldn’t really do much about it. I mean, I couldn’t go down and talk to her parents or anything like that.
“Do your friends treat you nice? In school and such?” I asked her.
“They do. My best friend tells me . . . a lot of things. That’s good, because I know then but it also makes me . . . a little sad sometimes. To think of all the things I miss and only hear about,” she said.
“I’m really sorry for you. I mean, it must be terrible to be locked up like that. Don’t you ever consider running away?”
“No. There was this girl in the congregation who ran away. To Gothenburg. She ended up on the streets as a . . . whore and she became addicted to drugs. She died from an overdose. I don’t want to end up like her. When I finish school I can decide for myself and want to go to the university. I’m good in school. Dad doesn’t want me to, but he can’t stop me. I can get a scholarship and share an apartment with Gunilla. She’s my best friend. It’s only one more year and I don’t want to blow it all now.”
“That sounds very wise. I’m sure you’ll be a lot happier that way,” I said.
We reached the pool soon after. Ulrika was very quiet and I could understand why. I just didn’t know what to say to cheer her up. I began to prepare lunch for us with Ulrika following my every move.
I served the boiled, fried food with fresh herbs and we ate in silence. I didn’t have a full service for two, so we had to share my plastic dish. Ulrika had the fork and I ate with the spoon.
When we had finished eating, we washed the plate and cutlery in the pool. Suddenly, Ulrika splashed some water at me. I splashed water at her. One thing led to another and suddenly Ulrika lost her balance and fell into the water. I tried to grab her, but I couldn’t hold her. The result was predictable: me on top of Ulrika in the pool.
Her head was pushed under and she came up, huffing and puffing. She didn’t waste time to get her breath back. As soon as she was out from under me, she threw herself at me and pushed me under.
She was giggling excitedly, when I resurfaced, her eyes full of anticipation. I waded towards her and she back away, giggling even more.
“So, you did have a bathing suit after all,” I joked.
I lunged forward but I missed her arm. Instead, my hand caught the leg of her shorts. It wasn’t my intention to try to undress her, but when she let herself fall backwards to escape me, her shorts were pulled down over her hips. I let go immediately.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to . . .”
Ulrika pulled up her shorts and looked down timidly.
“You’re . . . nice. If we . . . I mean, I’ve got to dry my clothes before I go home.’ She bit her lip.
“If we take off our clothes then . . . you won’t rape me or anything, will you?
I was shocked at first that she even could think that I would rape her, but then I thought about what her parents might have told her about men.
“No, of course not. I’ll even take a walk while you dry your clothes, if you don’t want me to see you nude.”
Ulrika stared at her own hand, moving in the water.
“You’re so nice. Not like . . .” She took a deep breath. “We were on a school trip in the spring. For once, my teacher had managed to convince my parents that I had to go along. Gunilla had fixed me up with one of the boys from my class and . . . When we were alone, he was suddenly all over me, kissing and all and I got so scared. I mean, he . . . I didn’t want it that way. You know, he was so fast and . . . I panicked and ran. You’re so . . . considerate.”
I thought about it for a second.
“You were with him, because you wanted to, you know, be with him, right. I mean, he though you wanted it, didn’t he?” I asked.
“Yes, but . . . He was all over me right away.”
“If you hadn’t told me about your parents and all, I might have thought as he did and thought that you wanted me to pull your shorts off just now. I mean, I only stopped because you had told me how . . . you were brought up,” I said.
“But he knew too and he wasn’t gentle at all,” Ulrika protested.
“I don’t know, maybe he didn’t think the same way I do. He knew you and didn’t think much about it. Perhaps Gunilla had told him that you wanted to. It’s so easy to misunderstand each other.”
“Gunilla would never! Why do you defend him?”
“I’m not defending him. I’m just trying to explain why it happened. Don’t get upset, I just want you to understand that sometimes your body say something different than your mouth and a boy may interpret what your body say and thinks that’s what you really mean. Get it?” I said.
Ulrika continues to stare at her hand in the water.
“When you came back today and kind of, you know, acted like you did, I was sure you wanted to, you know, do something. When you told me about yourself, I thought that maybe you didn’t really know what you wanted. We talked about, you know, rape and young people in school and, you know, it’s often because the girl acts like she wants to and then when she says no, the boy is kind of not thinking straight any more. We boys have to learn that a girl can regret, but girls also have to learn how their body language works on boys and not act like they want to do something they don’t want to when it comes down to it.”
“But I do want to . . .” Ulrika whispered. “I just don’t . . .”
She stopped in the middle of the sentence. The drops that formed on her cheeks were not water from the pool.
“Please, don’t cry. It’s ok,” I said.
I put my arm around her shoulder and helped her out of the water. We sat down and she buried her face in my neck. It was difficult for me to imagine how her life was, but I felt really sorry for her.
It took her a while to calm down again. A lot of thoughts ran through my mind. I was very pleased that I’d taken off my boots before I ended up in the pool. It would take some time to dry them out, had they been soaked. Ulrika was wearing sandals and they would dry quickly in the sun.
Finally, Ulrika raised her hand.
“I’m sorry,” she sniffled.
“It’s ok.”
She dried her eyes with the back of her hand and tried to smile.
“I better get out of this and hang it up to dry.”
She tried to sound determined as she said it, but didn’t really succeed.
“Tell you what; I’ll turn my back and you can take it off and slip into the water. Then we can swim a little and see how you feel about it, OK?”
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