on a narrow brick bridge over a wharf-lined canal, behind her the far gable of a stepped Dutch facade turning amber in flat eastern morning light, the color running down into the water as broken planes of orange and dark — moment after a cyclist passed — the wake still spreading, the amber reflection dissolving, her gaze still on the water watching it go
The canal had a name by day three.
I looked it up and didn't write it down. A name would have made it a destination, and it was never that — it was just the place I ended up on the first night, not knowing where I was going.
I went back this morning with the bag. Once it was off the floor the day had already decided.
I stopped first at the place near the Oudegracht where I'd had coffee twice before — counter seating, the machine running before the chairs were out. The man working it didn't look up when I came in. The coffee arrived in a small white cup with a rim that had been chipped at some point and smoothed. I stood and drank it and outside a delivery van idled and then moved on and the street went quiet again.
a single espresso in a small white porcelain cup with a slightly smoothed chip on the rim, sitting on the counter
The light at the canal came in lower than all week — flat, from the east, catching the far gable at an angle that turned the brick almost amber, the color running down into the water and breaking apart where the surface moved. I stood on the bridge and watched it until a cyclist came through and the wake spread and the amber went with it. The bag hung from my hand. I didn't put it down again.
amber-lit Dutch gabled brick facade reflected in the Oudegracht canal below, the reflection breaking apart in slow moving water
The same skirt from the first day. The crossbody on the same shoulder. There's something about arriving and leaving in the same clothes — not a ritual, just a fact.
on a wide wharf-level walkway beside the same canal, the wharfside brick wall rising to her left, stepped gable tops visible above and their reflections intact in the still water to her right, the bridge she stood on visible in the distance behind her — she has turned back from the water and is walking toward the station end of the canal — caught mid-step, one boot lifted, the crossbody riding forward on her chest
The station was colder than the canal. I pulled the sleeves down.
On the platform a pigeon walked the yellow safety line with total conviction, back and forth, until the train came in and the air shifted and it went somewhere else.
a train platform, a yellow safety line painted on grey concrete, a pigeon walking it, the open shed roof above letting in cold flat light, the arriving train visible as a blurred mass of silver at the far left edge of frame — train just entering the station — the air pressure shift has lifted the pigeon; she watches it go, sleeve pulled down over her wrist, bag in hand
What she wore
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I put on the same things I arrived in, more or less. It felt right for a morning that wasn't supposed to be anything except the last one.
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I picked up the bag. That was the signal — not the time, not the train, just the bag off the ground.
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The sleeves are back down. Utrecht was colder in the station than it was at the canal, which I should have expected but didn't.