I'm begging you to

Chapter 4 - Flashback (1974)

Flashback (1974)

"You have to keep still or I'll prick you."

Frida knelt beside Agnetha and tried to attach a pin to her dress. Actually, you couldn't call it a dress. Until now, it was really just a piece of fabric. It was reddish with little white dots on it. Frida wanted to try her hand at dressmaking again. After all, she was the only one of the four who really knew how to do it, who had some sense of fashion. It's only been a few months ago that they had won the Eurovision Song Contest and besides the song everyone was talking about their costumes. So the two Abba women had arranged to meet this afternoon to work on costumes while the boys worked on new songs in the studio.

"I'm going to do some stitching down here. One moment. Don't move."

"Yes yes. I'm not moving."

Frida rummaged in her bag and pulled out some sewing materials. She sat down on a chair at the table that was full of fabrics, painted designs, scissors, pencils and much more. Agnetha watched her while she was fiddling with something.

"Argh." Frida exclaimed in frustration.

Agnetha just looked at her questioningly.

"I can't get it through the hole."

"What?"

"Even when I wet it, it won't go through. Can you try?"

Agnetha looked at her in horror. Completely at loss for words. These words made her feel a little uneasy for some inexplicable reason.

"The thread. Through the pinhole."

Frida stressed again, lifted her head and looked into Agnetha's horrified face. With a laugh she said,
"Did I say something wrong? Why are you looking at me like that?"

"Oh. Um. Nothing. Yeah, sure. Give it to me. Am I allowed to move now?"

It took Frida about half an hour to stow away all the needles and make the few stitches. Sometimes she had to crawl around on the floor in front of her, which made Agnetha burst out laughing.

"Don't laugh. Or I let you do it on me."

She got up and added, "Now I have about the length I want the dress to be."

She looked the blonde in front of her completely up and down a few times until she nodded in satisfaction. Then suddenly, without a warning or a word, she took a step closer. And another. Until she stood so close that the one long hair that was spacing from Agnetha's fringe could almost touch Frida's forehead. Agnetha was so shocked that she didn't even dare to breathe and yet she noticed how Frida's scent rose slightly in to her nose. A kind of intoxicating scent she'd never really smelled from up close. Always only from afar like when you walked past houses in the evening and could easily smell the dinner from far away. It would make you want to inhale it and suddenly you'd be so hungry that it makes you wish you could enter one of these house immediately.

She was not allowed to move an inch now. What was Frida up to? She could be so unpredictable sometimes. You never knew what she was going to do next or how her mind worked. Sometimes she wished she could crawl into the slightly older woman's mind and watch her. Just out of curiosity. Nothing else. What else could there even be? She didn't dare to look Frida properly in the eye, so she tried to focus very hard on her forehead instead. She was almost a little intimidated. Agnetha noticed how her cheeks began to burn and she thought she would faint any second if she didn't start breathing again immediately. A slight grin appeared on Frida's lips. Then she lifted her hand and placed her index fingers under Agnetha's chin. Very slowly. The nail gently pressing into the skin.

"Up," she commanded. Her warm breath brushing Agnetha's face. Her green eyes fixing her.

"W...what?" The words came out of her like a breath. Barely audible.

"Up. Your head. I need to measure by your chin along your neck. So I know at what height to place the neckline of the dress."

Agnetha's mind was blank. Just brain fog. It was so quiet in the room that she thought she could hear the blood rushing through her body. She realised that the woman opposite her had never come so close before. During "Waterloo" there was this moment when they looked at each other, but still maintained a distance.

They never looked at each other for more than a few seconds. However, even there it was sometimes difficult for Agnetha to look her in the eye. On stage they performed. It was their job. That was where she liked to play. It was only acting. They did it for the audience only of course. Just the audience.

How long had Frida been standing so close to her now? It must have only been a few minutes. Why did it feel like hours? Why did it feel so incredibly intense? So incredibly wrong? Even though there was nothing wrong with it? Her insides were screaming. Wishing she would distance herself again. Stop touching her. Stop making her so nervous. Stop playing with her. Let her breathe again.

How did she even dare to come so close? Was that necessary? She cursed the absence of distance. The safe distance that allowed her not to take any of it personally. What was her excuse now? The dress.

She admired Frida so much. Since the first day they met. The way she performed on stage, the way she moved, her voice. She was so much braver. Sometimes she wished she could be her. She wondered what Frida thought about her. If she liked her...

And suddenly, the second Frida put her finger under Agnetha's chin, something happened inside her. Something new. Unknown. Scary. It was a part of her that she had buried so deep that she no longer knew it existed. That it had ever existed. That it was a part of her. A part that caused her goosebumps, choked her throat, forbade her to breathe, made her heart beat faster, because of this touch and the proximity. A part she did not understand.

Agnetha still hadn't said anything, let alone moved, so Frida slowly pushed Agnetha's head up, reached with her other hand for the measuring tape lying on the table next to her and put it to her neck. She released her finger from Agnetha's chin and slowly - much too slowly - stroked the tape along her neck. Her finger tracing over it and then slightly moving to the side so that her fingers weren't only touching the plastic but also her bare skin, making Agnetha's hair stand up, wondering if she had done it on purpose or if her fingers had just slipped?

Before Agnetha could even react, Frida loosened the tape again and took a step backwards with a jerk. Far away from her. She walked over to the table, where her little booklet was laying, to fill in the measurements. Agnetha followed her with her eyes and breathed a sigh of relief. Frida had to laugh, turned around and leaned against the table behind her smirking.

„You know you're allowed to breathe. I wouldn't want you to faint."

„I- I was breathing."

"You are completely pale as if you had just seen a ghost."

The blonde was glad of the distance. However, without really being aware of it at that moment, this one part inside of her was longing the closeness back.