Page 94 of What Happens in Amsterdam

“Isn’t this picturesque,” my mother remarks once we’re seated, and then asks the server, “Could we get three glasses of tap water, please?”

“I remember that from our last trip to Europe,” my father says. For their thirtieth anniversary, they went on a Danube River cruise. “They don’t always give it to you when you sit down. Maybe California could learn a thing or two, what with all the droughts.”

We fall into silence while three glasses and a carafe of water are placed on the table.

“So,” I begin after taking a sip, “yesterday did not go well.”

“It’s possible we all could have handled some things better.” My mother reaches across the table, brushing her fingertips along my arm. “How did this happen, Dani? That’s what I want to understand. Not just the marriage—all of it.”

They’re less combative today. Ready to listen.

I take a deep breath. “I guess…I guess it started a long time ago. You remember all those articles that came out when I was born?”

I swear I see the headlines, the photos play across my mother’s face. No matter how fierce a mask she puts on, that trauma has never quite left her. “Yes,” she says quietly. “I don’t think we could ever forget. You were our miracle baby.”

“Right. And for the longest time, I’ve just felt like…I had to do something great in order to live up to that.”

Her brow furrows. “That’s not what anyone meant at all. The fact that you’re alive, that you’re here with us—that’s always been more than enough.”

“Theoretically, I understand that. But those follow-ups that happened, the reporters checking up on me, looking for a feel-good story—it was overwhelming,” I say. “Everyone around me seemed to find what they were good at so easily. It felt like I could never find it, and that created all the more pressure to achieve something. Even in college, I really just fell into UX design, and sure, I liked it…but I always expected I’d have this great passion. Something so uniquelyDanika.”

When I say it out loud, I can hear the ego in it. Because isn’t that what everyone wants, really? To be lucky enough to spend their lives doing something that makes them happy?

On the bridge in front of us, a group of college-aged girls ask a stranger to take their photo. “Make sure you like it,” the stranger says after snapping a few. “I can take more if you want!” The wholesomeness of it reminds me of Roos, her lack of judgment when it would be so easy to roll her eyes at scenes like this.

Sometimes you’re the tourist; sometimes you’re the photographer.

“You felt that pressure from us?” my mother wants to know.

“Not directly,” I say. “But your jobs have always seemed so meaningful—public health, teaching. And Phoebe adores her bookstore. It was impossible not to wonder…why not me?”

With the hem of his shirt, my father polishes the lenses of his sunglasses before putting them back on. “You know it took me a while to find teaching, right? I had plenty of aimless years, plenty of jobs that didn’t lead where I thought they would, until I went back to school for a teaching degree. For those people who find their passion immediately, that’s fantastic. But it doesn’t happen that way for many, many more of us.”

“I guess I’m starting to understand that. The company I’m interviewing for—it’s a boat tour company.” I wait for some kind of outraged response, but it doesn’t come. “I’d be a tour guide. It doesn’t have to be my forever career—just something I’d like to do right now.”

Neither of them answers right away—but only because the server’s returned to take our order.

Once she leaves, a slow smile spreads across my mother’s face. “That sounds like a lot of fun,” she says. “Think of all the different people you’d get to meet every day, from so many different places. And I’m sure you’d learn even more about Amsterdam, too.”

“Itisa beautiful country,” my father agrees. “Don’t get me wrong—a weird country. I still can’t get over all the bicycles! They really are everywhere, aren’t they?”

“So fast, though,” my mother says. “Like they could come out of nowhere. I hope you’re careful when you’re crossing the street.”

Here we go.“That’s another thing we should talk about.” I straighten in my chair, though I’m surprised to discover I haven’t been slouching through this conversation. I’ve said exactly what I’ve wanted with as much confidence as I can muster—I can’t backtrack now. “I know you think I’m still that fragile baby who wasn’t supposed to survive, but I’m not. I don’t need to be coddled. I don’tneed to be protected from the big, bad world. I might be flailing sometimes, but I’m figuring it out. At my own pace.”

My mother’s jaw tenses. “It’s just hard,” she says, with that unfamiliar wobble in her voice that I’ve now heard twice in twenty-four hours. “You weresotiny, Danika. When I saw you on that ventilator, I thought—I’ll do whatever it takes to protect her. Anything at all.And we tried our absolute best. Now, well…you’re an adult. You don’t need as much protecting, even if that’s always my first instinct.”

“I’m grateful for all of it,” I say, my heart squeezing, and for the most part, I mean it. I believe that they did their best. “I know my health has been precarious, but I’m in a much better place than I was four years ago. I take my medication, and I’ve started researching therapists, and…I can talk about it now. I’m not in denial about it, and I can breathe easier than I ever have.” They don’t protest any of this—they let me keep speaking. “There’s more. We can keep having regular phone calls—maybe every other week once you get home. And obviously we can text. But I don’t want the constant check-ins about my health, or where I am, or how long I’m going to be there.”

“I think we can handle that,” my mother says, and my father echoes his agreement.

“I need to learn how to be truly independent,” I continue. “And that’s part of why I moved here. I know it was drastic, and that I probably didn’t need to go this many miles to do it—but I wanted to do something fully on my own for the first time. Whatever does or doesn’t happen with Wouter…that’s completely different.”

They fidget uncomfortably in their seats, as though this is the part of the conversation they’ve been dreading the most. Our plates of eggs Benedict and pancakes and French toast arrive, but no one makes a move to dig in.

“We didn’t realize it was so serious between you and Wouter,”my mother says. “When he was living with us, I mean. We thought it was just a teenage infatuation—not that those can’t be strong. Maybe we should have intervened, but it seemed innocent enough, especially with him eventually going back to Amsterdam, and we trusted you to be safe.”

A teenage infatuation.That’s what it was, in the plainest terms, but even looking back from over a decade later, it never felt that way. We were young and overly optimistic, but the love was real. Weighty, like something you could hold in your palm.

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