Chapter 50: Karin Malin Andersson

June, 1985, Chicago, Illinois

On the way back to Chicago, we listened to reports about the hijacking. Sixty-four more passenger hostages had been released in Algiers, and then the plane was flown back to Beirut. The ping-pong flights between the two cities seemed odd to me, but I suspected it was to try to keep the police or military from storming the plane. At some point that day, the rest of the hostages were taken from the plane, leaving only a small contingent of the crew. Shi'ite militias in Lebanon were now involved, and the demands were escalating.

We made reasonably good time back to Chicago, arriving late in the afternoon. There was a note on the board from Jorge saying he was out and would be back around 9:00pm. There was a letter from Aimee which I'd answer after dinner. I called home to let my dad know we'd arrived safely, but more importantly, to find out how my mom had reacted. Badly, it turned out.

"You can imagine what she said, Son. I don't think I need to repeat it for you."

"I can," I sighed with resignation, "but go on, tell me."

He sighed as well, "That it served you right that one of your, well, girls, got pregnant and now you were going to pay the price for being promiscuous."

I knew he'd substituted 'girls' for 'sluts', because like me, he couldn't stand that term being used for Jennifer, or anyone else for that matter.

"You did tell her that this was planned?" I asked.

"Of course. But she thinks that's just a story you're telling. She also ranted about Jennifer being unworthy of having her grandchild because of her, well, sinful lifestyle."

I shook my head, "Dad, you know what mom can do with her morality, right?"

He chuckled, "I know your opinion on the matter quite well. I think your mom might change her opinion when the baby is born."

"Whatever. When he is, we'll invite you to visit. It's up to you if you want to bring Mom, but she's not going to react well to anything about my lifestyle. She doesn't know the half of it."

"We'll worry about that in February. For now, just take very good care of my daughter-in-law and future grandson."

"Daughter-in-law?" I asked.

"I don't know what other word to use. I know you two aren't married, but it just seems right to use that word."

"I like it. You've always been cool about all of this craziness that surrounds me. Thanks."

"You're welcome. Keep me posted. And keep an eye on your little sister!"

"I will!"

After I hung up, Stephanie and I prepared dinner for everyone. After we ate, Cindi, Dave, Julia, Bethany, Elyse, Stephanie, and I went to the sauna. Dave looked a bit concerned when he saw Stephanie joining us, especially given that we'd declared that the Summer would be permanent weekday rules.

"Dave, relax," Elyse said when she noticed his look. "Steve and Stephanie have been naked in the sauna together at Melanie's parents' house since they were teenagers. It's no big deal to them."

"It's just a bit weird, you know?" he replied.

"Only because you make it weird, Dave," Stephanie said, looking him directly in the eyes, and standing only a few inches away from him, totally naked.

He looked at Julia, who just smiled, then he shrugged and we all went into the sauna to relax in the steam. About ten minutes later, the door opened and Josie and Jennifer walked in. They were only just arriving because they'd had gone back to Melanie's house and spent some time with Frank and Trudy before heading back to Chicago.

"I can't believe how much you two look alike," Cindi said to Stephanie and Josie. "I mean, usually, there's some obvious difference, but even naked, you two are nearly identical twins!"

"They used that to play a trick on Melanie at her wedding," I said. "It worked pretty well."

"Wait! I know you were with them, you know, when you made the baby. That must have been a bit strange. I mean, she looks just like your sister!"

"I can tell the difference," I chuckled. "But let's change the subject, please. You're talking about one of the mothers of my baby!"

"So how is this going to work, Josie?" Julia asked. "Do you like adopt the baby, or what?"

"The law is pretty murky on stuff like that," Josie replied, "and a lot of states ban it outright. The law in Illinois is, well, unsettled. Jenny will list Steve as the father on the birth certificate, so that solves that part of the equation. We're going to sign a document, a kind of contract, that says that I have all the rights that Steve and Jenny have with regard to the baby. The lawyer I talked to in California said that will help, but in the end, I have to trust Steve and Jenny."

"It would be a hell of a lot easier if they could just get married," Elyse said. "But the 'enlightened' people of the United States don't see it that way."

"I'm not sure that I see it that way," Dave said. "Isn't marriage supposed to be a man and woman? I have no problem with Jennifer and Josie being together, but married? I'm not so sure."

"Why?" Cindi asked, sounding slightly aggravated. "Because some dusty old book says so?"

"Cindi," I warned. "Be polite. We know you and Dave differ on religion. Just let him have his opinion. Notice that he didn't object to them being together, and that's a hell of a lot better than my mom's response to this whole thing."

"Steve," Dave said, "Cindi and I have been down this road before. Don't worry about it. I can handle her!"

Everyone, including Cindi, laughed.

"As for marriage," he continued, "it's complicated. I think it's kind of like your opinion on abortion, where you have serious difficulties with it, but you also won't interfere in a woman's decision to have one. But, and this is important, it does become an issue if someone wants to insist that Orthodox priests have to perform such ceremonies. That simply can't happen."

"And I still say that dusty old books and celibate old men aren't the best sources for rules for your life," Cindi said.

"We do have married priests," Dave countered, "but it's true that our bishops are celibate. Of course, it's possible for a widower to become a bishop or a monk. The celibacy vow only comes when you're ordained a deacon when you're single. If you're married then, you stay married. But you can't marry after you're ordained."

"That at least makes more sense than the Catholic church," Stephanie said. "I never understood how a priest was supposed to counsel people for marriage when they were never married. Or, and thank heaven I missed it, having a nun teach sex education!"

That comment brought giggles from Cindi, Julia, and Elyse.

"I'm curious," I said. "How would your priest respond to my situation?"

"I'm sure he'd tell you to marry one of the girls and stop being with the others," Dave said. "I suppose your lifestyle would present a significant problem if you wanted to become Orthodox."

"I suspect so," I replied. "But that's a problem for another day. Speaking of problems, Karin is arriving on Friday morning and she'll be here all of next week. I'm going to need to spend some time with her, which means I'll have to limit my hours working on the programs. I'll do my best, but given the situation, I don't see that I have much choice. I'll put in extra hours this week and the week after she leaves to make up for it."

"The speed at which you code will help," Julia said. "As Scott advised us, we estimated based on Dave or me doing it, not you and Penny. We'll be OK."

"Thanks," I replied.

"Naked staff meetings?" Elyse exclaimed. "I think I'm REALLY going to like working for Steve!"

Everyone laughed.

"We can't do that with Penny around, though," Julia warned. "Her mom might not be so understanding of that."

"I was teasing!" Elyse grinned.

When we finished in the sauna, we all showered individually, and I got my pipe and a glass of bourbon and went to the back yard.

"Double relaxation?" Elyse asked, sitting down in the chair next to mine.

"I figure I'm going to put in fifteen-hour days for the next four days. That way I can limit what I do when Karin is here to a few hours a day. She won't object to that."

"I talked to Bethany, and she actually apologized for hogging your attention. We had a good talk. Did you know that she's concerned about Karin coming here?"

"I didn't know, but I'm not surprised. Kara thinks that Karin's trip here is to, as Kara put it, capitulate to my terms and see if I'll marry her."

"And would you?"

"I don't think so. Honestly, we've tried this over and over and it has never, ever worked. Maybe it's the distance, but I don't think that's the only thing that has stopped it. Sofia thought distance was the problem and look how that turned out."

"True. Though Sofia's plan for her education was the true driving force. You were an added bonus!"

"That does appear to be the case. From all the conversations that I've had with Sofia, I am positive she knew the score. She did everything she could, but in the end, the whole one-woman, one-man idea that she has is something that she couldn't overcome. That is true of Tanya, Penny, Stephie, Katy, Anna, and quite a few others. In fact, the only ones who are OK with it turn out to be you, Bethany, Kara, and, it seems, Jessica."

"Seems?" Elyse asked.

"She says that she can accept it. We'll see if she feels the same way when she comes back from her stint with Doctors Without Borders in Ethiopia."

"You and Jennifer are done now?"

"Yes. She did ask me to sleep with her and Josie occasionally before the baby is born. She wants both of us close to her and the baby, at least from time to time. Jennifer managed to set aside her feelings about men for a week. I'm not sure that she could do it again."

"But she was fine with sex with you for years," Elyse protested.

"I'm not even going to try to explain it," I replied. "Bethany tried to explain it to me, and the only thing I can say is that Jennifer was confused. She isn't now."

I finished my bourbon and tapped out my pipe, and Elyse and I went up to bed.

On Monday and Tuesday, other than when I went to karate or had my meals, I was in front of the computer from the time I got up until I went to bed. Penny left at her usual time each day, and I simply kept working. On Wednesday, I did the same, though I had to take a break for the first meeting of the NIKA Consulting Board of Directors.

Stephanie had picked up my dad and Joyce at Meigs, and Beth had driven up from Champaign. Wilbur Lambert and Richard Dalton arrived as well, and at 1:00pm, Joyce called the meeting to order. The first order of business was approval of amended corporate bylaws, and approval of the stipends for the board. Julia, Elyse, Cindi, and Dave each made a short report, and then we discussed the business plans. The longest discussion was about the purchase of the laser printer, but it was eventually approved.

An hour later, Elyse handed checks to each of the directors for their small stipend, as well as a larger one to my dad to give to Patrick Shaughnessy to cover the fuel for the flight up and back, as well as the landing fees. Stephanie took my dad and Joyce back to Meigs and I got back to work. I invited Beth to stay for dinner, but she had to get back to UofI. As I had the previous days, I broke only for dinner and karate.

After dinner, I finally checked my mail and saw a letter postmarked in Ethiopia. I quickly opened it and read Jessica's description of her first week in Addis Ababa. Checking the postmark, it had taken nine days for the letter to arrive, which frankly didn't seem bad, given it was coming from a famine-stricken country in Africa. I sat down and wrote out a reply, describing for Jessica what had happened since she'd left and letting her know that I missed her. I checked my postal guide, put enough stamps on the envelope, marked it 'Air Mail/Par Avion' and walked to the Post Office to mail it.

I worked hard on Thursday, though I took a short time out to watch CNN's report on the funeral of Petty Officer Stethem at Arlington National Cemetery. The hijacking had turned into a hostage situation, with the passengers spread out around Beirut in the hands of various Islamic militias, and it didn't seem to me that anything was going to change soon. The head of the Amal militia, a man named Nabih Berri, explicitly said that the hostages were split up to prevent a rescue attempt.

Late that afternoon, Cindi received two calls about installing computer systems. One was a referral from the IBM store, the other from the accounting firm where we had done our previous work. It seemed that her idea was going to generate a decent amount of revenue while we were working on our software, and that was a very good thing.

On Friday, I worked for a couple of hours, and then drove out to O'Hare to meet Karin's flight. She had called early Thursday afternoon to confirm her flight number and arrival time and I arrived about twenty minutes after her scheduled arrival time to allow for her to clear customs and immigration.

Because of the construction, international passengers were still arriving and departing from the temporary Terminal 4, which was actually the ground floor of the main parking garage, and passengers had to be brought by bus. That created an additional delay, and in the end, it was nearly an hour after her plane landed before I saw her.

"«Hej!»" I said, taking her into my arms for a hug.

"«Hejsan!»" she replied, squeezing me.

I grabbed her suitcase and carry-on and we walked to my car for the drive back to Hyde Park. We talked about her flight, about her parents, and about her plans for university in the Fall. She had been accepted to the University of Lund and would be studying sociology, with the plan to work for a Swedish social services agency as a career. When we arrived at the house, we walked inside and I asked her where she wanted her bags.

"Your room," she said. "One way or the other, that's where they belong."

I took her bags upstairs while Stephanie introduced her to the people she didn't know. I came back down and took her hand and we went to the kitchen to make some tea, and then took it to the Indian room.

"Do you need to work while I'm here?"

"Only a little. I put in a lot of extra hours during the week and I'll do that after you leave. It's OK. Penny can make good progress while I'm with you."

"Are you two still together?" Karin asked.

"In a manner of speaking. We're co-workers, but not lovers. She can't very well sleep with her boss!"

Karin laughed, "She COULD, but it's probably a bad idea."

"What did you want to do while you're here?" I asked.

"Just be with you. That's why I'm here. Isn't Bethany here?"

"She's in class, and then she has physical therapy for her arm. She'll be here sometime later this afternoon."

"And Kara?"

"She's in Milford. She'll be back tomorrow."

"I guess Jennifer is working?"

"Yes, she and Josie are both working, though I think they're taking the afternoon off to visit the OB to confirm that Jennifer is pregnant."

Karin nodded, "I wondered when that was going to happen. You're happy?"

"Ecstatic! The baby is due sometime around the end of February."

"How are things with Bethany?" Karin asked.

"Pretty much where they're supposed to be. You know that she and I have had all kinds of things that have come between us over the years. We both want to get married, but we're not sure we should get married. Does that make sense?"