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[GG] "I don't want to with him!"
🕑 Added 2019-01-30 18:26:31 +0000 UTCAnders was so kind as to translate the text with hopeless Jens, stubborn Piet, hyper Levi and strict Alexandra. Thank you!
(Please ignore any mistakes since we're both no native english speakers :))
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The door to Jens' (32) office swings open.
A little boy sqeezes up through his left arm and the chair.
Jens pulls his headphones off.
Jens: Who is that there, paying me a visit?
Levi (5): Mommy said you have to take a bath with me.
He is half lying on his father's lap and gallops a dino over his leg and up his arm.
Jens stands up and grabs the boy.
Jens: It's about time, no?
Levi laughs and twists in his arms.
He glimpses shamefully at the clock. He had promised Alexandra to take care of the boys that evening. He is, of course, too late. He was always bad at tearing himself away from work.
Jens: Then we'll put you under the waterfall! Together with your dino as well!
He lifts the squeeling Levi onto his shoulders and leaves the empty office.
In the living room he finds Piet (7) sunk into the couch with his legs pulled in tight. He is staring intently into a book.
Jens stops and smiles. His eldest is such an earnest little guy. Since he started school he had gotten somewhat quiet. Not always – Piet still likes to talk a lot and is interested in all sorts of things, but Jens can't shake the feeling that he has lost some of his joy about him.
Jens: Hey, big guy!
Piet looks at him.
Jens: Bath time.
Piet grimaces.
Jens: It's about time. Last time was, um …
Levi rests his chin in his hair and had put his hands on his cheeks.
Levi: The-day-before-the-day-before-yesterday.
Jens: Yes, thanks. (Had no idea when the last time was.)
Piet is still pulling a face.
Piet: I don't want to with Levi.
Jens: Just come on up now, and we'll see what to do with you two.
Piet shuffles over with a groan, and follows them up the stairs to the bathroom.
Upstairs, Levi sprints into his room to get toys for the bath.
Jens turns the taps on the bathwater.
Piet stand sullen against the door frame with crossed arms.
Jens sits down on the toiled lid.
Jens: What bothers you about Levi?
Piet: He fools around and sprays water everywhere.
Jens feels the water.
Jens: You were also like that a year ago.
Piet: But not anymore.
He kicks lightly against the door with his foot now and then.
Jens: And if you went in after him?
Piet: In his icky used bathwater?? He probably pees in it!
Jens (sighs): Alright. But when both of you has their own bathwater, it will be a big waste of water.
Piet (defiantly): But I don't want to with him!
Levi presses past him into the bathroom with a plastic chest.
Jens: You want to take all of those with you?
Levi: The dinos and the whale atleast.
He fetched a couple of animals and threw them into the water.
Jens helped him undress.
Piet looked pouty faced at his brother without moving.
Jens lifts Levi into the water, who starts playing with the animals and the foam right away.
Jens looks helplessly at his eldest.
Jens: Come, I'll tell Levi not to be so wild.
Piet: No, I don't wanna!
And with that, he stomps into his room.
Jens sighs again.
He can't do it. He can't be strict towards the boys. Firstly it breaks his heart and secondly it is far too strenuous for him.
Jens (into the house): Alexandra!!
Alexandra stands in the hall opposite him. Leaning on the bathroom door.
Alexandra: You are such a weakling, Jens! It's like this every time. Every damn time!
Jens stands there like a wounded dog.
Alexandra: It is not often that I ask you to take take the kids off my hands, but every time you fetch me to help because you cannot deal with it.
Jens: You just manage them so much better. What are you supposed to do with a stubborn child?
Alexandra (hissing): Raise it, you fantastic father!
Jens: That is very helpful …
Levi (from the bath): Daddy!
The parents remain standing across one another, both of them unsatisfied and frustrated.
Jens breathes in and reaches for the door handle.
Jens: Levi calls me.
Alexandra: Oh, you're so useless!
Downtrodden, Jens enters the bath. However he puts on a smile for his son right away and listens to him tell stories.
Alexandra knocks loudly on Piet's door three times, then enters. Piet looks up startled, when he catches a glimpse of his mother from the corner of his eye.
Alexandra crosses her arms and nods towards the door.
Alexandra: Into the bath. And quickly.
Piet hesitates for only two seconds before standing up from his hanging chair and silently following his mother's orders.
Jens is rendered speechless as Piet, without a word, turns up in the bathroom, undresses and – although somewhat repulsed, but still – climbes into the water with Levi.
He looks towards his wife with raised eyebrows and a bewildered look, standing in the doorway. She gives no regard and quickly disappears.
Piet shuts his eye as the warm air of the blow dryer breathes across his head. Jens takes care to get the hair dry, and runs his fingers through to get it all.
With the other eye, Piet examines his brother, who is already dry (though his hair looks a bit wild). Levi stayed with them, and rummages through the toy box. He puts all the animals on the edge of the tub in order of size.
Piet: … The dog is larger than the fox.
Levi (looks): That's not right.
He raises the tiny hand over the two animals to measure them. Piet squints again, as he feels a comb pulling on his hair.
Piet: You either push both heads down or both up. And then the dog is bigger.
Levi gives it a thought and then pushes both their heads up and then down again.
Then he grabs a reindeer and a horse and reaches them towards Piet.
Levi: And these ones?
The animals poke Piet in the stomach.
Piet: Stop it!!
He twitches and stumbles a bit.
Jens: Oi, careful.
He turns the blow dryer off and ruffles Piets hair one more time.
Jens: You're also done.
Piet goes down into the living room with a surly face.
Jens sighs and wipes sweat off his brow.
Levi (shouting from downstairs): Read to me, daddy!
Jens (slightly miffed): I'll be right there. Have to clean up your mess first.
When the bath is straightened out again, Jens shuffles downstairs.
Levi is leaning over the couch and has a book in his hand. Piet sits on the other couch, at the back, in the corner, and looks into a book of his own.
Jens goes around the couch and sits down next to him.
Jens: Now, show me what you've got. Oh, the little mole who wanted to know who had left him a surprise.
Levi giggles.
Jens looks to Piet.
Jens: Don't you want to come here? There are still front row seats.
Piet (snidely): That baby crap doesn't interest me.
Jens: Oh, wow. Be glad mommy didn't hear that.
Piet turns red and Jens chuckles.
Piet lets loose a bit when he's around his dad. He goes against his instructions and uses words he is otherwise not allowed to say.
Levi cuddles next to Jens, who puts an arm around him.
Jens: Well then … the mole who wanted to know who had pooped on his head.
Piet (mumbling): Why hasn't mom burnt that book a long time ago?
Jens: Because you hate it?
Piet: No, 'cause it's about … shit.
He goes red again and gleams carefully across to his father to see if he would reprimand him.
But Jens just smiles.
Jens: *I* chose the book and she allows it, because it was my favorite book growing up.
Levi: Mine too!
Piet: Not mine.
However, he grins into his own book.
Jens: Well … from the beginning. The mole who …
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