The snow in January poured down on the city. Traffic almost came to a standstill, cars moved slowly and silently. The snow absorbed all sound. The few who were out on foot moved slowly, it was icy under the snow. The snow removal service had not been able to clear the snow. Rachel pulsed her way along the street. She was dreaming of warmer places. She was certainly used to snow. The winters at home in Rochester could be both snowy and bitter. She had come to Sweden when she married a Swede five years ago. She had now been divorced for two years and has acquired Swedish citizenship. It was a challenging time in a new country. Luckily, she is a social person and can easily make contacts. But it is difficult to make new true friends when you are 35 years old. One way to do this was to participate in different projects and courses. Thankfully, she has some funds that her grandmother bequeathed to her, so she doesn't have to work. However, just doing nothing was no fun. She did some work in a café while she studied art history and architecture.
As part of her studies, now at master's level, she was about to start a course at the Open Lab at the Royal Institute of Technology. Luckily, she did her reconnaissance a couple of days ago, otherwise it would have been difficult to find the venue when everything was white, in the air, on the ground and in drifts against the building façades.
She entered the building where the course was taking place, brushed off the snow and walked up the stairs. Many participants had already arrived. Everyone seemed much younger than her, probably around 25. There were many foreign students, some spoke Swedish, but most spoke English. Still others came from Africa and spoke languages she had never heard before.
"Typical," she thought. "All the girls are clustered around a couple of tables. The Africans sit at their own. But there is also, strangely enough, an older white man. I wonder what he's doing there, not like a Swede."
She lingered in the doorway, then walked over and sat down at a table with boys. "Might as well start mixing a bit," she thought.
"Hi, my name is Rachel," she said in English. The language of the course was English, everyone was expected to communicate so that they all understood.
The others around the table introduced themselves and then there was silence, as is usually the case in Sweden. After a while, three teachers entered and started the course. Everyone was asked to stand along a wall, and they had to interview the person on the right. After a while, they would then present the person they had interviewed to the rest of the class. Rachel interviewed a woman from Ukraine, Natasha, a young pretty girl with big breasts, which she had squeezed into a slightly too small sweater.
Once the presentations were done, there were several other exercises to get to know each other. At the end of the first day, they were divided into project groups, six to seven in each group. Rachel's group was made up of a man from Kenya, one from Botswana, a girl from Sweden, a dark girl from Ethiopia and the older man who had sat with all the men from Africa. Their project was to investigate how an industrial area outside Stockholm could be developed and made more attractive.
At first everyone sat in silence. Then someone started talking. After a while, everyone talked, except for the older man, who sat and listened. Rachel became intrigued, wondering what he was doing on the course. He seemed to have a lot of experience, having been involved in many previous projects, she realized when they presented themselves. But he didn't make any fuss and let the others talk.
He would look at the person who was speaking, sometimes nodding his head. He had an open expression on his face and occasionally his eyes would sparkle. When someone said something that was a bit unusual, his face opened into a smile that spread to his eyes, sometimes he laughed when something was amusing.
On the second day of the course, most people brought lunch boxes with them. They warmed them and ate in an adjoining room. Rachel had noticed how the older man had disappeared the day before at lunch. She thought she wanted to accompany him.
"Where are you going to eat? Can I tag along?" she asked.
The man looked a little hesitant. Did he not want company, perhaps he preferred to eat by himself?
"Yes, welcome. I was thinking of going to a little pasta restaurant nearby." He didn't say more, but Rachel followed him.
Once they had ordered and sat at the table, Rachel started talking, telling him who she was and where she was from.
"Rochester? Hmm, I haven't been there, but I know that IBM had a big plant there. I worked for IBM several years ago, spent some time in the US, but never made it to Rochester. Was mostly outside New York, in White Plains. How did you come to Sweden; you are almost fluent in Swedish?"
The ice was now broken, and they chatted, told each other about themselves. Rachel was the one who talked the most. Her father had held a high position at the IBM factory, understood the company and its unique culture. The more they talked, the more interested Rachel became in Sten, the man's name.
In the group sessions, Sten was still quite quiet, but when he did speak, it was often worth listening to. He apparently wanted to give the others as much space as possible, he didn't want to be in the lead, as he had probably always done before in his work. Rachel tried to get him to participate more, asking him what he thought. Then he would say something, give some advice and input, without being intrusive. Rachel became more and more interested in him. She almost always joined him at lunch, it gave her a nice warm feeling to talk with him.
He listened to her a lot, nodding and looking at her when she talked. She mentioned her relationship with a couple of men, her mother, who wanted her to come home and give her grandchildren.
"I don't want children. It's hard to explain, but I just don't want to. My sister will have to take care of that."
"Yes, it is strange that it should be so hard not to want children, to choose not to have them," he agreed.
"I enjoy making babies, as long as it's not a consequence," she added.
"How do you mean?"
