Epilogue
“…and if you take a look at these houses, you can see that a lot of them are tilting slightly forward,” I say, motioning to the row lining the Spiegelgracht. “Most of these used to belong to merchants who lived on the top floors and worked downstairs. They had hooks attached to the tops of the houses so they could bring up their goods with a pulley system, and the houses were built this way so that those goods didn’t smack into the building on the way up. And over the years, the leaning got more and more dramatic until we have…this.”
“They’re beautiful,” says an American tourist with short blond hair. “Is the pulley system still used today?”
“Actually, yes,” I say. “Although most of the time, they use elevators, but you can always tell when someone’s moving house because there will be an electric contraption out front. When you have incredibly narrow stairs and no elevator inside the building, you have to get creative. And that’s really where the Dutch have excelled, in everything from architecture to water management.”
The blond American leans back against her husband, a ginger guy who looks strikingly familiar—a little like this actor from a werewolf TV show I watched years and years ago. Probably just a coincidence.
In the off season, when it’s chillier out on the water, my tours aren’t always full. Six months after I accepted this job, I still love going to work in the morning. Every day, I get to see this awe on people’s faces, and I don’t think there’s anything that could fill me up in quite the same way.
“Where in the US are you from?” the American asks, and when I tell her LA, she and her husband exchange a grin.
“Small world,” he says. “We’ve spent quite a bit of time there—I lived in Los Feliz for over a decade.”
The woman nods, giving his hand a squeeze. “And I flew back and forth between LA and Seattle before we realized Seattle was a better fit for our personalities.”
“You’d probably be able to handle the weather here easier than I did at the beginning,” I say with a laugh, and then gesture to the gray clouds above us. “We’re going to be drenched in about ten minutes.”
When the guy triumphantly holds up an umbrella to show that they’re prepared, I’m almost certain it’s him. I wonder if there’s a casual way I can ask for a photo. “What brought you to Amsterdam?” he asks.
This question comes up on just about every tour, and my answer is always the same:
“I fell in love,” I say.
With a person, and with a place.
Ultimately, Wouter and I decided not to get divorced, and the reality of dating while married wasn’t as awkward as we worried it might be. We were both in it for good, and if the worst-case scenario happened, we figured we’d deal with that when we got there. His friends still tease us all the time, because though they easily forgave him for the lie, they could tell we were madly in love when we couldn’t yet see it.
We’ve made marginal progress on the apartment, enough for it to feel like ours. Along with the backsplash in the kitchen, we’ve added more art to the walls—some of it his, some of it mine—and we converted my bedroom to a combination guest room–slash–office. The remodel is an ongoing process; one of these days, we’ll get around to the floors, but we aren’t in any hurry. The apartment will wait until we’re ready.
A few months ago, Wouter and I traveled to LA and visited my niece, Hazel—who is so adorable I could have watched her sleep for hours—and Phoebe and Maya were more than happy to let us take over so they could have a date night. I brought her too many tulip-printed onesies and enough tins of stroopwafel to get me flagged at security, and I’ve been sending home Dutch picture books whenever I find one I fall in love with—which is often, since I only just moved beyond that reading level. It was Wouter’s first time back in the US since his foreign exchange, so we filled it with trips to In-N-Out and long afternoons at the beach and at the Getty.
And this time when we stepped inside my parents’ house, we held hands.
—
At first we joke that it’s because neither of us can resist the sight of George Costanza in a bow tie.
But then I find the dress, a sunflower-patterned sheath staring back at me from the window of a vintage shop, and it’s not very hard at all to find Wouter a matching tie.
It still isn’t white, but then again, we’ve never gone the traditional route.
We wait until the summer to rent a house for all of us in Zeeland, a coastal province in the southwest of the Netherlands. Hazel is almost a year old, and everyone coos over her, though she spends most of her time chasing after George on the sand.
A gauzy tent sways in the breeze, and flower arrangements mark every row of chairs. I’m in my sunflower dress, waiting at the back of the beach house for my husband—because we decided we want to walk down the aisle together.
Wouter appears in his floral tie and a charcoal suit, unable to hide his smile when he sees me. And I wouldn’t want him to.
“You’ve got to be kidding,” he says. “I can’t believe I get to look at you for the rest of my life.”
My cheeks grow warm at his words, because somehow we’ve never run out of ways to make each other blush. “Hopefully more than just look.”
Even in my heels, I only come up to his collarbone, so he still has to lean down to kiss my right cheek. “So much more.” But before he gives me his hand so we can head toward the tent, he pauses. “Wait. Something’s wrong,” he says, brow furrowing.
I hoped it wouldn’t be obvious, but he’s always been able to read me. “I’m nervous,” I admit. “We haven’t done this before.”
“Nervous…because of me?”
“ No . Never.” I tug him closer by his tie. He’s stubbled and messy-haired, thanks to the wind, and that’s exactly the way I like him. “Everything was such a secret last time that it’s hard to believe we can be completely out in the open.”
“Completely,” he confirms, his hands landing on my waist while his mouth slides to my ear. “And by that, I do mean I am going to maul you on the dance floor later.”
“As long as you save some mauling for the honeymoon.”
We’re spending two and half weeks as tourists in our own country, from charming bed-and-breakfasts to remote cabins. We’ll explore a bookstore nestled in a medieval church, a town where boats are the primary method of transportation, a village shaped like a star.
“I understand what you mean, though,” Wouter says. “Part of me is worried some government official will be sitting in the audience waiting to object.”
“I’ll share a jail cell with you.”
When he smiles, it drags out his dimple. “Danika—it’s unreal how much I love you. I never imagined I’d be so lucky to do this with you twice.”
“And this time, we don’t have to do any of the paperwork,” I say. “All we have to do is stand there and look pretty, which you’re already excelling at. And then eat cake.” He lets out a low hum of a laugh as he holds me closer, fingers linked with mine while his chin rests on my hair. “Ik hou het meest van jou.”
For a few quiet seconds, we take it all in. We inhale the present, exhale the past. The innocence of first love, the crushing heartbreak, the thrill of rediscovering each other as adults. Sometimes this journey felt endless, spanning two continents and a decade and a half, and maybe what’s most surprising is that I wouldn’t trade it for anything. This will probably be the last moment we have tonight, just the two of us, but that’s okay—none of it has to be hidden anymore.
I glance toward the beach, where all our favorite people are waiting for us.
“What do you think?” I ask. “You want to marry your wife?”
Then he gives me the look that I love more than anything else in this country, more than every sugar-dusted pastry or the sun glinting off the canals at golden hour. “Yes,” he says, bringing my hand to his mouth and kissing my wrist, my palm, the shimmering gold band that I never feel whole without. “I do.”