“Okay. Bye.”

He tries to close the door. She stops him with her arm.

“And then we wanted to thank you for backing up our trailer. That was very kind of you!”

Ove grunts. Reluctantly he keeps the door open.

“That’s not something to thank me for.”

“Yeah, it was really nice,” she protests.

“No, I mean it shouldn’t be something to thank me for, because a grown man should be able to back up with a trailer,” he replies, casting a somewhat unimpressed gaze on the Lanky One, who looks at him as if unsure whether or not this is an insult. Ove decides not to help him out of his quandary. He backs away and tries to close the door again.

“My name is Parvaneh!” she says, putting her foot across his threshold.

Ove stares at the foot, then at the face it’s attached to.

As if he’s having difficulties understanding what she just did.

“I’m Patrick!” says the Lanky One.

Neither Ove nor Parvaneh takes the slightest notice of him.

“Are you always this unfriendly?” Parvaneh wonders, with genuine curiosity.

Ove looks insulted.

“I’m not bloody unfriendly.”

“You are a bit unfriendly.”

“No I’m not!”

“No, no, no, your every word is a cuddle, it really is,” she replies in a way that makes Ove feel she doesn’t mean it at all.

He releases his grip on the door handle for a moment or two. Inspects the box of cookies in his hand.

“Right. Arabian cookies. Worth having, are they?” he mutters.

“Persian,” she corrects.

“What?”

“Persian, not Arabian. I’m from Iran—you know, where they speak Farsi?” she explains.

“Farcical? That’s the least you could say,” Ove agrees.

Her laughter catches him off guard. As if it’s carbonated and someone has poured it too fast and it’s bubbling over in all directions. It doesn’t fit at all with the gray cement and right-angled garden paving stones. It’s an untidy, mischievous laugh that refuses to go along with rules and prescriptions.

Ove takes a step backwards. His foot sticks to some tape by the threshold. As he tries to shake it off, with some irritation, he tears up the corner of the plastic. When he tries to shake off both the tape and the plastic sheeting, he stumbles backwards and pulls up even more of it. Angrily, he regains his balance. Remains there on the threshold, trying to summon some calm. Grabs hold of the door handle again, looks at the Lanky One, and tries to quickly change the subject.

“And what are you, then?”

He shrugs his shoulder a little and smiles, slightly overwhelmed.

“I’m an IT consultant.”

Ove and Parvaneh shake their heads with such coordination they could be synchronized swimmers. For a moment it makes Ove dislike her a little less, although he’s very reluctant to admit it to himself.

The Lanky One seems unaware of all this. Instead he looks with curiosity at the hammer-action drill, which Ove is holding in a firm grip, like a guerrilla fighter with an AK-47 in his hand.