The Simple Reality

Bedtime Stories

"He kissed her cheek once and that was all it took. Slowly she wiggled herself on top of him and their blue eyes blazed against each other in the darkness. 'The pillows never work, do they?' he commented in a voice tired and coarse. 'No,' she admitted. 'They don't.'"

There was a soft smile that conveyed the pleased feeling she held after listening to a voice she wholeheartedly loved. She had a head that rested on a fluffy white pillow with hands that hugged the covers to herself, a leg that casually linked over his, and eyes that were met with his when he finally glanced to her. There was silence among them, but comfort and a peace of mind. He waited to hear her thoughts, and tiredly she curved her lips.

"I love it." She bit her lip blushingly after he'd read with her two chapters. "But you know that I couldn't let you publish it. Not any of it," she breathed, and there was a smile on her that was relaxed and in love with all of the man he was beside her. He had questioning eyes at her through his black frame glasses as he peered over. "It is us," she went on to explain. "It's intimate. Can we really let people read about us like that?" she wondered. "No way. Now I like it just for us to read only," Agnetha laughed. "Who am I to complain if you read it to me every night?"

"With all that, I've left so much of us out," he laughed. "Why not give them a fairytale like we said, and we keep our reality?" Björn locked the iPad and placed it on the nightstand which was a little more out of his reach. He'd turned back quickly to face her and he'd seen her sleepy face glow with the warm light that shined against her from the ceiling just above them.

"But I do wish that we had a wedding like that," she told him. "That we could ever have a honeymoon like that, too."

"And I wish you are my wife just as much as I feel that you are," he stated. "But you've always been my wife. If we weren't busy with the abbatars at the time... We could have made it happen. I'd have planned for things to happen at a faster pace." Her smile was light as if her thoughts had gone elsewhere, and it unsettled him again. He was reading to her tonight to let her anxiety settle, but he wasn't sure that it worked completely. Agnetha's small hand was against the side of his waist and her soft exhale confirmed it. "Are you still nervous?" Her nod was the short answer.

"A little. I'm going to be nervous up until we get off the stage," she admitted. "It'll be fine," Agnetha eased him. "It's just the fact that this is the biggest thing we have ever done... the world hasn't seen us all together since forever and now it'll be hundreds to see us in person. They probably think I don't want to be there." He shifted better to support her with words but she didn't even give him the chance. "And your divorce is now public, so they will see it... They'll see us. It's only been a few months–" He heard it before but now he knew the root of her issues.

"So let them see us," Björn told her, stroking a palm gently over her cheek and against her hair, again and again. "It's time for us to have this together. I've waited a lifetime to do it again. I want to walk with you, and I want you on my arm, Anna. I want it like we used to have it."

"I want it more than anything. But the more I think, I don't want the night to be about us, Björn. If I walk with you, they won't hesitate to write how we are now back together. And I worry because it's about ABBA and Voyage and our work, not about me and you, or whether I am the reason you divorced or not, whether we are back together or that we have something. If I walk with you, it'll steal the thunder of everything we worked hard for and it isn't fair." She sighed and briefly took a moment to collect her mind. "Maybe I don't make any sense and I'm overthinking. But I've read the articles, Björn. They already assume. They're waiting for us to confirm it." His chest grew with an inhale.

"No, you're right. All the points you made make sense. But Agnetha, they always will have something to say, whether it's one way or the other."

"I just don't want to give them more to write about. It makes me feel safer knowing this is between us, between me and you, our family and our friends. It's untouched and it's protected. Like nothing will harm us. And it's peaceful." He'd gazed at her eyes for a while, silent and understanding. He was searching for any other way to justify that it isn't like that, but there was nothing. He knew what she meant fully. A strong huff emerged, between a sleepy and a tired one.