13 Little Blue Envelopes(54)

Once again, Ginny found herself thrust into a group. But one thing was clear from the start—these were not the Knapps. Their policy seemed to be this: they got up when they felt like it, and they had no idea how long they were staying. Every night, they went out. They were thinking of leaving Copenhagen soon, but they weren’t sure where they were going next. Tonight, they had very special going-out plans that Ginny had to be a part of. But first, they had to nap and eat more Stroopwaffle and give Ginny a nickname, which was Pretzels.

Ginny could live with that. She climbed into her bunk,

dropped down on the thin mattress, and fell asleep.

244





The Magical Kingdom

There was a lot of excitement in the room when Ginny woke up.

“Here we go!” Emmett said, clapping and rubbing his hands together.

“Don’t ask,” Carrie said, rolling her eyes. “It’s a long story.

Come on. There’s someplace ridiculous these morons want to go.”

Again, there was no night. The sun hung steadily in the sky, only condescending to drop to a twilight level but never disappearing from view.

Copenhagen, her new friends explained to her as they

walked, was the Disneyland of beer. And wherever they were going tonight was Copenhagen’s Magic Mountain.

They wound up in a huge, open hall. They found seats at

one of the long picnic-style tables, and Emmett signaled to one of the women that they wanted five of what she was carrying.

The woman set five of the massive glass steins down on the table. Carrie passed one down to Ginny, who had to pick hers 245

up with both hands. She sniffed at it, then took a sip. She didn’t like beer that much, but this tasted pretty good. The others happily tore into theirs.

Everything was fine for about half an hour, despite the fact that she seemed to be living a poster from her school’s German room—

which made no sense, considering that she was in Denmark. And she was pretty sure they were supposed to be different.

Suddenly, some lights came on at the back, and Ginny

became aware of a stage at one end of the room. A man in a sparkling purple jacket came up to a microphone and spoke in Danish for a few minutes. This seemed to get everyone very excited, except for Ginny, who was totally baffled.

“And now,” the man said in English, “we need a few

volunteers.”

All at once, Ginny’s four new friends exploded out of their seats, jumping up and down in a frenzy. This galvanized the Japanese businessmen who shared their table. They too sprang to their feet and started yelling and calling. Ginny, who was the only person sitting, looked down and saw dozens of empty mugs littering their half of the table.

The bandleader couldn’t help but notice the international near-riot that was breaking out in their corner, and he grandly pointed to them.

“Two people, please!” he said.

It was immediately decided, through some nodding between

the two parties, that since the whole table had made an effort, each group would be able to send one person. The Japanese men fell into a serious discussion, and Ginny’s friends did the same. Ginny caught bits of the conversation.

246

“You go.”

“No, you.”

“It was your idea.”

“Wait,” Carrie said. “Let’s send Pretzels.”

Ginny’s head shot up at that one.

“For what?” she asked.

Bennett smiled.

“Full contact karaoke,” he said.

“What?”

“Come on!” Emmett yelled. “Pretzels . . . Pretzels . . . Pretzels . . .”

The other three picked up on the chant. Then the Japanese businessmen, who had already selected their representative, joined in. A few people from other tables chimed in as well, and in a matter of seconds, the whole corner of the room was calling her name. All in different accents, all loudly, all in a steady, thumping time.

Without really meaning to, Ginny found herself getting up.

“Um,” she said nervously. “I don’t really . . .”

“Brilliant!” Emmett shouted, helping her into the aisle

between the tables. One of the Japanese men peeled off his suit jacket and joined her.

“Ito,” the man said. At least, that’s what Ginny thought he said. He was slurring in Japanese, so it was a little hard to tell.

Ito stepped aside so Ginny could go first, even though she didn’t really want to lead. The host was waving her up, and the crowd clapped its approval as she progressed toward the stage.

Ito looked delighted, loosening his tie and bouncing around, waving to the crowd to keep up the applause. Ginny quietly accepted the host’s hand to mount the stage. She tried to stand 247

off in a corner, but he led her firmly to the edge, where Ito held her in place by clapping an arm over her shoulders.

The host was yelling in Danish at the crowd. The only word Ginny could make out was “Abba.” He produced (seemingly

from his pocket) two wigs—one a shaggy man’s wig and one

long and blond. The long blond one was dropped onto Ginny’s head, while Ito had grabbed the other and was pulling it on crookedly. A black boa was thrown over from the direction of the bar. Ito grabbed for this first, but the host wrestled it from him and placed it over Ginny’s shoulders.