One
Sometimes you can have the clearest memories of places you've never been. Distant cities are familiar as old friends, either because you've seen them onscreen a thousand times or you've heard stories about life-changing vacations or years abroad. You can taste the sugar crystals dusted atop a pastry. You can see the lights of a famed monument shimmering bright with your eyes shut. You can hear the rush of water, but only if you're quiet enough to listen. The melody of a language you don't understand.
That kind of yearning is so specific, a dreamy ache that could be simple wanderlust or maybe something sharper, something that sits between your ribs and convinces you that's where you'll finally be happy. Able to breathe. The best version of yourself.
I fell in love with a place like that once, built it up until there was no way the reality could compare to my imagination.
As I sleepily pass the cabdriver a fistful of euros, I wonder if that place ever really existed at all.
I triple-check the address while my phone hunts for a signal. Somehow it's eight in the morning, a fact my body is protesting with every jet-lagged muscle. Anxiety kept me awake during the flight, worst-case scenarios piling up like Tetris blocks, and I only started nodding off when the pilot announced that we were beginning our descent. The low winter sun gives everything a haze of the surreal. A touch of the otherworldly.
That must be why I don't notice the basement unit at first. Concrete stairs on the steepest incline stop at a black metal door graffitied with a phrase someone tried to scrub off, leaving behind half an underlined word and a giant question mark. There's no apartment number. No window. I glance back toward the street, as though waiting for the patron saint of lost Americans to help me out, but there's no point. My cabdriver is gone. Everyone I know is on another continent.
For the first time, I am completely and utterly alone, except for an orange cat perched on the railing, tail flicking back and forth.
Before I left Los Angeles, my friends and family had plenty of questions. Is this a real job, Dani? and Are you sure you can handle living on your own in another country? and Have you showered yet this week? To which I replied: Define "week."
When your entire world implodes around you, sometimes the only option is to implode right along with it. Especially if that implosion takes you nearly five thousand miles away from home-or whatever that is in kilometers.
I will my nerves to remain at a low simmer and run a hand through my chin-length bob, a breakup haircut that doesn't suit my face the way the stylist assured me it did. I'm not sure I've properly exhaled since I got off the plane, not when I hauled my paperwork-stuffed carry-on through passport control or dragged my suitcases off the luggage belt. I do it now, letting my shoulders drop and my lungs relax. One deep breath of Amsterdam air, and then another. This is exciting. This is an adventure. This is not a catastrophe in the making.
The street is fringed with rows of crooked houses pressed tight against each other, most only three or four stories high, in shades ranging from light brown to dark brown. Some roofs are curved and some are shaped like bells, and some have intricate designs etched above the doors. Maybe the strangest thing is that it's so quiet. No cars, no traffic noises except the gentle plink of bicycle bells as commuters head to work, not a helmet in sight.
I'm so floored by this level of confidence that I don't notice a cyclist speeding toward me until he starts shouting in Dutch.
"I'm sorry!" I say, leaping out of the way as he nearly clips my backpack.
If I were halfway lucid, I'd have noticed that the street beneath my travel Crocs is painted red. Bike lane.
I assess my surroundings again. There's supposed to be a lockbox with a key inside, but I don't see it anywhere. Another mark for the catastrophe column.
That would track. A mysterious job offer, an interview process that seemed much too short, a free flight . . . Odds that this is a scam: getting higher by the moment. I would absolutely be the kind of person to fall for it, just like I fell for Jace promising me we were exclusive or my parents assuring me I'd grow into my ears someday.
Even the cat is judging me in that condescending way cats do, eyes unblinking as it lazily licks a paw.
"Hi there." I lift my hand, because long-ago warnings not to pet animals you don't know were never something I took seriously.
The cat hops off the railing and disappears down the street without giving me a second glance-revealing the little black lockbox it was sitting on. Victory.
I punch in the code from my email and the box opens up, producing a key that fits the industrial-grade door with minimal effort. A rush of adrenaline convinces me this is the greatest achievement of my thirty years on this earth. I am strength. I am power. I am-
-standing in a restored medieval torture chamber.
Basement apartment is too generous a description, I decide as I step into my new home, anxiety giving way to a shock of cold. A sliver of window lets in just enough light to cast grim shadows on every piece of dust-coated furniture: a couch with a gaping hole at the back, a kitchen table with two skeletal chairs. Walls painted dark blue, a dank musty smell hitting my nostrils and making me wish I hadn't swiped that extra packet of cookies from the galley when the flight attendants weren't looking.
None of that matters when it's clear the apartment's pièce de résistance is a gleaming white bathtub in the middle of the bedroom. Inexplicably. Mere steps from the bed.
An unhinged laugh slips past my throat. I must be delirious from travel if this is what finally sends me over the edge, because of course. Of course the apartment my company found and that I agreed to, sight unseen, looks like this.
A knock on the front door stops me on the verge of a panic spiral, but just barely.
"Hey-is that yours?" A girl who looks mid-twenties is peeking down from the stairs, motioning to the suitcase I left on the sidewalk. "I live next door," she explains with an accent I can't place. Not Dutch, I don't think. She's dressed for a run, long dark hair in a ponytail, one AirPod in her ear and the other in her palm.
"Sorry, yes," I say, embarrassed. "It is. Thank you."
It takes her an extra second to respond, one that I've gotten used to when meeting people for the first time.
Usually when someone sees my port-wine stain, they stare longer than they should and then make every effort to focus on a different part of my face to appear as though they're not staring at all. When I was a kid, I assumed people would be less obvious about it as I got older, but they've only gotten more awkward. Literal strangers have gone out of their way to assure me I'm "still beautiful."
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 was mostly 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 bubble-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 rational love 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.
Dani: that doesn't explain the bathtub in the bedroom
Phoebe: omg. go home amsterdam, you're drunk
Phoebe: also! don't forget to take those melatonin supplements I gave you for the jet lag
I track down the jar in my suitcase, position it lovingly on top of a pillow, and send her another photo.
We've always been close; Phoebe's only a year and a half older, and we've never lived more than an hour from each other, even in the worst LA traffic. But now that we're nine time zones apart and her wife is ten weeks pregnant, I imagine that's about to change.
They told us they were expecting during a dinner with my parents last month, Maya's hand easily curving around her stomach. I'd already committed to Amsterdam at that point and had to fight the urge to cancel all my plans-because what if I missed my niece or nephew being born?
That's still seven months away, I told myself. Don't think about it right now.
Compartmentalization works wonders on mental health.
Though I'm not exactly well rested, I know I shouldn't go back to sleep, so I head for the bathroom's tiny walk-in shower that sprays water . . . absolutely everywhere. There's no shower curtain, only a sheet of murky glass that does nothing to keep the water in. Because there's also no ventilation, I settle for mopping up the water as best I can before unzipping an oversized sweater and a fresh pair of jeans from the suitcase that also contains every product in my seven-step skincare routine, though I can't remember the last time I made it past step three.
Copyright © 2025 by Rachel Lynn Solomon. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
