Langour ・❥・Joost Klein・❥・

45.

Malmö was beautiful. The coastal city was a strange mixture of seaside views and Scandanavian architecture. The people were polite, friendly and smiled when they caught a passing gaze. Even though the city had gained traction for the song contest, flooding its streets with tourists, the locals were happy to give directions and did their best with translations.

'I want to live here,' Hanna gawked. Their taxi passed a clock tower with dark red bricks and a cute walkway through its middle. From beside her friend, Fenne leaned to peer out the window and cooed at the small shops and stalls lining the streets.

'Maybe Malmö could be your honeymoon destination,' Fenne suggested and Hanna whipped her hopeful gaze to her boyfriend. Sitting opposite the two, Apson surpressed a groan and put on a strained smile for his girlfriend.

'Sure. Whatever you want, schatje.'

When Hanna glued herself back to the window, Apson sent Fenne a glare. The girl snickered, knowing that Apson secretly entertained the idea of marriage. His arrogance towards the idea was all for show; mostly to make Stuntje feel the better.

Arriving at the hotel, they were greeted by an ECU organiser. The man was slim, tall and had a flamboyant aura as he ticked their names off his clipboard. His English teamed with a Swedish accent, making it difficult for Fenne to follow. But thanks to Joost's fluency, they were able to get checked in to their rooms and head up to their floors.

'There's a lunch tomorrow for all the contestants to get to know each other. I'll see you all at nine tomorrow!' the organiser informed, before leaving down the hallway with an unmatched sass in his hips. Fenne watched him go and turned to Joost with a wide smile.

'I like him.'

Joost shook his head and started unpacking. His suitcase was neatly packed and the hotel room was spotless. But it was short lived, because within seconds, Joost had managed to dump his entire suitcase out and cover the floor in clothes, hats and god knows what else. Fenne watched in awe as he pulled out his toothbrush, put it in his mouth and threw the emtpy case carelessly into the corner.

'Joost, please,' Fenne started and he looked up with raised eyebrows.

'What?'

'Can you try to keep it tidy in here? Hang your shirts up, at least!'

With the silence of a scolded child, Joost started searching through the piles for his shirts. He grabbed the hangers from the wardrobe and slipped them into the shoulders.

In an effort to not cave and apologise for making Joost act like an adult, Fenne turned on the television. The Swedish news was the first thing that came up and after putting on Dutch subtitles, Fenne watched as the anchor started a story on the Eurovision song contest.

There were a handful of contestants that had already been labelled as fan favourites. Baby Lasagna from Croatia was mentioned, as well as Bambie Thug from Ireland. The Switzerland representative was alongside them and it wasn't long until a familiar blonde came up on screen.

'Joost! It's you!' Fenne cried and the man whipped around with a coat hanger in hand.

'That's me!'

Excitedly, the two watched as the anchor spoke in Swedish with a picture of Joost next to them.

'Dutch representative, Joost Klein, touched down in Malmö today. He will hit the stage with Europapa on Friday night and is already causing quite the stir on social media.'

Clips of Joost in his blue suit from Instagram and TikTok took over the news report. Europapa played in the background, it's melody and Dutch lyrics hard to ignore. Fenne remembered filming the short clip of Joost dancing and was amazed to see how many people were copying the steps. People of all ages, from all over the world, were singing Europapa, and Joost hadn't even performed it live yet.