WHAT CAME before or after, I cannot say, only that the SUV pulled up to the parking payment kiosk and it was expected that I would get out and pay. This was the kiosk just outside the doors to the Rahva Raamat bookstore in Tartu’s Tasku shopping center. It was a sunny day, as much as I could see from the light beyond the second floor of the parking garage, but whether it was spring, summer, or fall, I had no idea. It was about midday. But how did I even get here?
The SUV was being driven by a woman. She was shorter in stature and had an airy, almost amorphous quality to her. I could only catch glimpses of her, even though she was sitting right next to me, a strand of brown hair, the slope of a chin. She was wearing a gray outfit, loose pants, a loose shirt. Her shirt was open at the top and restrained her bust from sliding out. Her skin had a smooth, cocoa-colored quality and texture. But she was an Estonian. A bronzed one.
Somehow she had managed to get tan by 2 June.
“If you’re going to stare at me like that,” she said, “you might as well just …” I didn’t hear any of the rest. But while we were kissing there, in that parking garage, with the car door still open, I knew that I was in trouble. Big trouble. That kiss was going to mean something. She was going to capitalize on that kiss. But it was a good parking garage kiss, a tasty, sensual, satisfying one. The kind you remember for years to come.
north! 