Page 2 of What Happens in Amsterdam

The birthmark is a mottled pink that starts above my right eyebrow, drifts along my nose, and covers half my right cheek. My own little Rorschach test. I hid it under makeup in high school and used to think I’d try to get it lasered one day, but I made my peace with it years ago—mostly. Even if I still sometimes pose with the left side of my face forward in photos.

“You should be more careful,” the girl says as she helps me carry the suitcase down the stairs. “It may be the offseason, but I’ve even seen phones stolen right out of people’s hands.”

Once it’s safely over the threshold, I hug the dinged-up polycarbonate as though the bag and I have been reunited after an arduous journey. “I will. Thank you so much. I just got off an international flight, so I’m not entirely myself. I…live here now, I guess.”

This makes her soften. “Rough time of year to move. Get ready for, like, eight hours of daylight each day.”

I peer into the depths of my apartment. The sky was still dark when the plane touched down; the sun rose on my taxi ride into the city. “Love to live in complete darkness. I’ve been worried lately that I’ve been getting too much vitamin D.”

“The summers are amazing, though,” she says. “They make the winters worth it.”

“You’ve lived here a while?”

“Almost seven years.”

“And are all apartments…like this?” I ask with a flourish of my hand.

She takes another step down. Grimaces. “I think you got unlucky,” she says, then gestures to her left. “I’m Iulia. I live right next door, if you need any help.”

“Dani.”

With a wave, she pops her AirPod back in, and before I can tell her I’m worried I might actually need quite a lot, she sets off jogging down the block.

I’m alone again, surrounded by disappointment and chipped dishes, my Crocs sticking to the floor.

Then, blatantly ignoring every piece of advice about how to adjust to a new time zone, I collapse onto the too-thin mattress and pass out.

—

Until yesterday, my passport wasmostly blank, used for a friend’s bachelorette in Montreal and one regrettable college spring break in Cabo. This move wasn’t a measured, calculated decision. There were no pro-con lists, no extended conversations with family or friends. There was just the implosion, where I lost both my job and my boyfriend—they say women are great at multitasking—and the jobs I drunkenly applied for because they weren’t in LA. Some nameless fear urged me forward, convincing me I couldn’t stay in the city that raised me.

Four weeks later, I packed my bags, sold my car, and moved halfway across the world.

When I open my eyes at three thirty in the afternoon, the apartment is somehow colder than it was when I got here. My head throbs with a dull, insistent ache, my throat dry. Groggily, I force myself into a sitting position, reaching for my phone on the nightstand before remembering it’s tucked into the front pocket of my backpack on the other side of the room.

I grab my phone and the water bottle that was always a little too big for my car’s cupholder and settle back in bed. Now that it’s almost—I quickly count backward—seven a.m. on the West Coast, the Dorfman family chat is waking up.

Mom:How’s your apartment? How’s the weather? How’s the food? We miss you already, send pictures when you can!

Dad:Is Amsterdam as charming as it is in photos, or are they all just a very well-crafted tourism campaign?

Mom:Be sure to make a doctor’s appointment and refill your prescriptions! I read online that they might have different names in the Netherlands.

The messages come with a pang of homesickness I wasn’t expecting to feel this soon. My parents have always regarded me with an extra sense of caution, as though I’m forever the micro preemie born three months early with lungs that didn’t work properly. Severe asthma meant no contact sports, waivers from gym class, an urgent call to our family doctor if I experienced so much as a hint of discomfort. It’s much more manageable than it used to be, but that never stops the constant check-ins. Sometimes I think they’d have plastic-wrapped me if they could.

I answer them with enough detail to put their minds at ease:Extremely charming! Cold but sunny. Haven’t eaten anything yet that didn’t come from an airplane, will report back once I do. I have plenty of meds with me, but I’ll make an appointment soon. Miss you too, will call when I’m a bit less jet-lagged!

My father immediately replies, asking if I have digital copies of my medical records or if I need them to scan anything for me. And even though he’s punctuated it with a handful of emojis—a doctor, a stethoscope, a grinning face—I can’t help drawing the conclusion that they think I’m too fragile to do this on my own. I decide I’ll reply to that one later, thumbing over to a separate thread with my sister, who’s texted a much more rationallove you take your time but please know I want to hear everything!

oops I tripped and fell into a dungeon, I type, sending her a few photos of the apartment.

Phoebe:nooooooooo

Phoebe:maya says dungeons are very in this year. perhaps an intentional design choice?

Maya, her wife, is an interior designer, while Phoebe owns an independent bookstore in Pasadena. I’ve always loved that they managed to turn their passions into careers, in part because it’s something I’ve been chasing for years, never quite able to get there.

Maybe that’s why it was so easy to say yes to this move—because I haven’t put down the same roots.

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