Page 80 of What Happens in Amsterdam

Wouter’s arm comes around my stomach, pulling me onto his lap. “Weird at first, maybe,” he says. “But now…it’s really incredible having her here.”

I thread my fingers with his as he leans his chin on my shoulder, and while this kind of gesture might typically kick my heart into panic mode, today it only sparks a warmth in my chest. We don’t need to put on this kind of performance—not in front of my sister, not when everyone else on the boat is in their own worlds—but something about the way he holds me feels different now.

Real.

Almost terrifyingly so, and yet I’m not pushing him away.

“I feel like I’m getting a very specific picture of Amsterdam,” Phoebe says to the group. “Dani keeps saying it’s not like this all the time, but…”

“Maybe not quite this orange.” I sit back, tipping my head toward the sun starting to peek through the clouds. “This place is unreal, though. I can’t believe it’s legal to just…live here.”

“Yeah, we’re absolute shit at keeping it a secret,” Bilal says.

Wouter’s thumb skims up my elbow. “They really just let anyone in here,” he says, a hint of amusement in his voice that makes me squeeze his hand.

“Next year we should go to one of the music festivals,” Sanne says. “There’s a huge techno one that happens in Oost.”

Next year.If anything could prick my King’s Day bubble, despite my apathy for techno music, it’s that.

Next year: when Wouter and I are divorced. When I’m no longer friends with any of these people.

“Does it ever get old?” I ask Iulia, eager for a distraction. “Being out on the water every day?”

“Honestly? No.” She tips her bottle of beer toward me. “I’m sure most jobs start to feel boring after a while, but not this. Even if some of the facts I recite sound a little repetitive after a while, thereare always new people, new questions, new ways to make it feel fresh. It’s impossible to be bored when all ofthisis your office.”

At golden hour, the light bends through windows and shimmers across the water, giving this weird and wonderful city an ethereal glow.

Days like this, I am certain this is the loveliest place on earth. There is something dramatically different about life not just on this side of the world but in this specific city, something that goes beyond the metric system and the public transportation and the weather. Despite how foreign all this might have seemed a few months ago, I finally feel like Ibelong.

Maybe this is what Iulia meant about expats staying here forever.

There’s a sense of freedom out on the water that I’m not sure I’ve ever felt on land, but surely this isn’t the something great I’ve been chasing. Unless “something great” seemed so radically unachievable that I set myself on the path of mediocrity early on, and now I’m too far down it to deviate.

I try to see beyond this marriage, once I’ve landed a solid job and proven to everyone back home that I can not only succeed here but thrive.

And I can’t help wondering why the only person I’ve never tried to prove anything to is myself.

—

My next job interview isa couple days later, and given the dwindling balance in my bank account, I couldn’t turn it down. I steer Little Devil through narrow alleys until I can no longer avoid the busier streets and realize waiting for a crowd of tourists to disperse isn’t as terrifying as I thought it might be. Especially when I’m ringing my bell.

When I lock my bike in front of the building, I have to fight the phantom urge to click my keys the way I’d lock a car.

The interview isn’t with a startup but a big-name company I didn’t know had an office here. This would be the same thing I did in LA, just for a competitor and on another continent. There should be some comfort in that, shouldn’t there? If the lobby is a little soulless, that’s just because everyone’s already tucked away in their offices.

Keep an open mind, I tell myself as I smooth my slacks.You are not special just because you don’t love the idea of working in an office.

“Danika, hi,” says the interviewer when he meets me at reception, an American named Todd. “We’re so happy to have you here. Come in, come in.”

Over the next half hour, during which the phrasecore principlesis uttered no fewer than three times, I rattle off cardboard responses about my leadership skills and greatest strengths.

“One of the major selling points for people is that we serve lunch here every day.” Todd seems stoked about this. “Plenty of gluten-free and vegetarian options. We definitely want to make this a fun, cool place to be!”

“Wonderful. I love lunch,” I say, and although this isn’t remotely funny, he laughs.

I even get a chance to experience it after the interview, and Todd’s right: it’s a solid lunch.

But it’s not enough. It doesn’t fill the existential emptiness, doesn’t soothe the part of me aching to be out in the sunshine.

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