“Tell me if you want to see/ A world outside your window/ A world outside your window isn’t free/ And tell me if you want to catch that feeling of redemption/ That feeling of redemption doesn’t do much for me.”

– Tanita Tikaram –

Cecilia stood in front of the mirror with her green eyes wide open. Conscious of her breath, she inhaled and exhaled, as she did in her yoga class.

“Can you press the cappuccino button for me?”

Her voice seemed to vanish in the big house, but a reply followed quickly. “Oh, like I am not getting ready for work as well?” His voice made her want to cleanse herself – of his voice, the situation, or him.

“But you are downstairs, right next to the machine. Please.”

He paused for a few seconds. “I’m not anymore. Walking upstairs.”

“Oh, damn, you started walking when I asked you to press the button.” 

She passed him in the hallway and he gave her a smirk. Two seconds after that, she pressed the round silver button on the cappuccino machine. In two more minutes, she stepped on the gas pedal. Life was good again. 

*******************************

Airports held a special place in Cecilia’s heart – the life, hope, happiness, and sadness they brought. Her final destination’s airport was smaller than the one she left behind, but what she truly left behind was a big ball of nothing. She smiled at the thought of being away from that colossal void and took a deep breath, observing the impatient crowd at the carousel. The luggage arrived late, giving her time to ponder the lives of couples with excessive baggage. They almost stepped on each other as they grabbed the luggage, yelling at their spouses or kids. She spoke very little Romanian, but their body language was enough. They had a lot of luggage, a lot of words and even more gestures. She thought about how her friends back home concealed a troubled marriage. No public yelling, just silent bickering. 

Her luggage arrived late and she had the time to imagine a few of those couples’ lives as she watched them. It brought other images as well. Her friends back home had a marriage on the rocks, but nobody knew. There was no yelling, not in public at least. the constant yelling reminded her of her own marriage. There is a certain dignity in the lack of yelling. There is not much happiness, but bickering has to be way more acceptable than yelling. She shook her head left and right, like her old dog used to do, letting go, as she grabbed her luggage. None of the men tried to help her as she struggled to lift the big blue suitcase. She did not think much of it right away, but she remembered it while in the cab on the way to the hotel. The cab driver knew only a few English words and she found him to be quite skilled in the way he used them. He helped her with the luggage and then yelled something at the bellboy. Cecilia smiled, wondering if yelling was simple yelling or the only way they knew how to communicate.

Cecilia shook her head, reminiscent of her old dog, letting go as she grabbed her suitcase. None of the men tried to help her as she struggled to lift the big blue suitcase. She did not think much of it right away, but she remembered it in the cab on the way to the hotel.  The cab driver, with his limited English, helped her put the suitcase in the car, but then yelled at the bellboy once they arrived at the hotel. She wondered whether yelling was mere communication or the only language they knew.

“Welcome to the Intercontinental Hotel Bucharest!” The city outside sparkled with lights and contrasts. Old-world buildings stood next to new glass buildings in a kitschy, mesmerizing way. 

Checked into her room, she changed while turning on the TV. Despite her modest knowledge of Romanian, the news seemed incomprehensible. Gunshots and tanks? The location of a protest on TV looked like it was the boulevard right down below her. She heard gunshots; she saw tanks and people offering flowers to the soldiers. That was not the image she had of this city. Cecilia sat down on the bed, petrified to look outside. With the phone in her hand like a magical weapon, she opened the curtains. All she could hear was the city noise. All she could see was the bright light coming from the boulevard, no tanks and no sign of a protest. Confused, yet relieved, she left the room right away and found herself on the sidewalk. 

“It’s midnight on a workday, and people are still out. There must be something about this city that I don’t quite understand,” she texted her girlfriend. She looked around with intense and almost painful joy. The street lights were bright and she welcomed the unexpected, but beautiful light. Downtown, amidst the constant car and wind noise, in a city with 2 million people, feeling trapped in an allegory was a surprising feeling. 

Near a subway station, she entered an underground passage, following a group of young people. The light accompanied her, drowning their words. Emerging onto a cobblestone street, she discovered terraces and people. Without consulting reviews or social media, it just felt right to sit at one of the tables. Nearby, a tall man and a young woman talked in English.

“Did I fuck up your feng shui?”

The girl had a nervous, but loud laugh:

“You are the one who is fucked up.”

“Excused me then that I am fucked up and I fucked up your feng shui.”

The man put his cigarette down, and got up to leave. The girl looked puzzled and a little embarrassed.

“Sit down, please!”

He grabbed his backpack and started walking away. Cecilia noticed his beautiful, large hands effortlessly moving through the air. The girl ran after him.

“It was a joke, but you should have not embarrassed me in front of my friends, and now this …”

The man stopped to light a cigarette, ignoring the girl, and then resumed walking. The girl kept talking, not yelling, but trying to make a point. Too far away, Cecilia couldn’t hear anymore. She went back to the table and paid, only to leave minutes after with tears in her eyes. Cecilia sensed the girl’s pain somehow, enough to lose her appetite. She got up and started walking towards the hotel.

Jet lag took its toll. At a nearby kiosk, they were selling warm pretzels on a string, with salt and that perfect brown color. She bought a few and sat down on the steps in front of the hotel. The pretzels were warm, the air too, with a hint of cigarette smell that did not bother her. 

“The entire Romanian nation seems to be raised on those pretzels.”

It was the man from the terrace. He was smoking.

“Oh, are they? I was hoping for sophisticated cuisine. I heard good things.”

He stood up.

“Hey, you’re a fellow American. What kind of good things? As in everything-that-is-good-makes-you-gain-weight-and-maybe-it’s-a-sin kind of thing?”

She smiled. “Are we still talking about Romanian food here?”

“Ha, ha, who knows, this city is hard to understand. It’s friendly and always alive, but it brings up your own hidden drama and mixes it with its own problems.”

“Hidden drama? I assume you are not a therapist.”

“No, I’m not.”

He threw his cigarette into the trash and glanced at her briefly. “Have a good night, OK?”

“Oh, sure, I am jet-lagged, so yeah, sure.” Her mention of jet lag seemed like a subtle invitation for further conversation.

“You’ll get over it. We all do.”

“Are we still talking about jet lag?”

He did not answer and started walking towards the hotel. 

*****************************

“I can’t remember the joy. And if I can’t remember the joy, it might as well have never happened.” 

The only link from across the ocean that she kept while on the trip was her weekly call with her girlfriend, Leila. 

“With my history of joyless years, I figured I’d recognized joy when it smacked me. Last night, I heard a scream inside of me when this guy left in the middle of our conversation, but I stood there and did not move. Inside, my many mini clones chased him, but I stayed put. Emblematic of my entire life – either I absorb whatever comes, proving over and over that I am strong enough to handle it, or maybe I am as lazy as my mother told me I was.” 

“Or you are afraid you are going to be rejected or humiliated in some way.”

“Yeah, that, too, although, how many men rejected me, really?”

Leila laughed. “None that I remember, girl.”

“Wait, you know what, how about I call you from the lobby so you can see this place versus my room?”

She quickly threw on flats and a skirt, taking cues from the city’s vibe. Holding up her phone, she showed her girlfriend around. “This place is like no other city I have been to; it screams home somehow and I have not even left downtown yet.”

“Your roots are calling, I guess,” Leila commented.

“Yes, and I will meet a cousin tomorrow. I want to hear about my family, of course, but I want to discover the city on my own as well. Hey, I will take off now and will send pics later.”

She was standing in front of the hotel with the phone still in her hand when a car honked. 

“Hey, your cab is here.” She turned around and there he was.

“I did not order one, because I don’t get in cars with strangers,” she replied, trying to be both funny and sarcastic. However, the moment she uttered those words, her entire body quivered with the fear that he might be put off by her comment.

“Fair, I guess, and I am parking my car anyway.” He got out of the car and the valet grabbed the keys. He held only a water bottle, in time for her to think how American that was. People did not drink a lot of water in Europe. She felt she had to say something or the conversation could have ended abruptly again. 

“Must be crazy driving a car in this city.”

“Crazy, crazy, many things or people don’t deserve that label. I would say more like uncomfortable at times, but doable.”

He looked very tall as he was standing there with his water bottle. She felt his words slapping her somehow every time he talked. She definitely wasn’t empowered by what he was saying, but she liked that he was listening to what she was saying. The imaginary slapping was not putting her down, but waking her up. 

Standing with his water bottle, he appeared very tall. His words seemed to land with a subtle impact each time he spoke, not exactly uplifting her, yet there was something intriguing about the way he paid attention to her words. Rather than diminishing her, the imaginary slapping sensation she felt every time he replied served as a peculiar awakening. 

“I’m going to drop off some stuff in my room and what do you think, do you want to take a walk after?”

She nodded, “We could do that.” He disappeared inside the hotel, catching her attention with his peculiar walk, with oddly deliberate and unhurried steps, almost as if he were awaiting a red carpet. 

She lingered outside the hotel and eventually found herself in a wingback chair inside. People watching was entertaining, but waiting wasn’t her favorite game. It was getting dark and the city had an almost serene feel, with shimmering lights and people moving like pawns on a chessboard. He wasn’t going to come. She started walking away, occasionally glancing back. Her map application was a good guide, but she could have done more research before the trip. Her decision to travel was more spontaneous than she thought she was capable of and now she was not prepared. The more she walked, the more she could hear her steps on the cobblestone streets becoming the loneliest steps in the world.

Her cousin, Sonia, had big blue eyes that sparkled with excitement about pretty much  everything. She also insisted on taking Cecilia to a restaurant, saying “Oh, you will love it. All foreigners do.” And Cecilia did. The Neo-Gothic architecture of Bucharest’s oldest brewery building was captivating, but she loved more her cousin’s coming-of-age stories about her life in the ‘80s in that city, which to Cecilia, still seemed stuck in the ’80s with its familiar nostalgia. “I’m meeting some of my high school friends in a couple of hours if you want to join us. It would be good to meet locals.” Cecilia realized she hadn’t really met any locals other than the hotel staff and the driver who brought her from the airport. She briefly thought about her American friend with his Romanian girlfriend – or ex-girlfriend – and Johnny Depp-like attitude. She had heard that Johnny Depp was actually spending time in Romania. With that random thought, her other jet-lagged thoughts became overpowering and suddenly that old migraine resurfaced. Luckily, they walked outside and started walking.

The boulevard was so familiar to her somehow that she wanted to take everything in, put her wings on and fly away on top of the cars and buildings. She felt she had been there before and came back only to revisit and make new memories. They passed another Neo-Gothic building surrounded by a big park. “It’s the Cretulescu Palace. They built this park around it in the 1900s. It’s a happy place for many. We will meet my friends here near the lake.”

Grateful for the impromptu tour, Cecilia forgot about her migraine and looked around to absorb every detail. “They say that Hotel Cismigiu is haunted by a student who fell into the elevator room and died there.” They passed by it. “Americans like ghost stories, don’t they? There are plenty here, but I don’t think we market them very well.” Cecilia smiled. “Oh, there is a market for that kind of stuff for sure. Taking about paranormal, I have a feeling I have been here before.” Sonia stopped: “But you did. When you were little, we visited this park. I remember it because I was slightly older. You don’t, I guess?” 

Cecilia let go a surprised sound. “I don’t know, I thought my mom never went back and I had no pictures to prove otherwise. I was starting from scratch but then the more I walked around, the more it felt familiar. How old was I?”

“Oh, you were probably 4-5 and I was already in elementary school. I just remember playing here at the playground. My high school memories take over after that. But I still remember our time together.”

They continued walking. The park had a vibe of old and new together that she actually liked. The old statues and benches contrasted with the playful sounds of the kids playing. Then there was… Monte Carlo.

“Here is where we will meet my friends,” stated Sonia, while she checked her phone. “We are way too early, but I have to make a work call quickly. Do you want to sit down and wait here?”

Cecilia looked around. Although early in the evening, the restaurant was full. She felt that the park did not tell her a complete story though and she needed more. “ How about I walk around more?” I can just get back here maybe in 30 minutes or more. 

“Sure, just say Monte Carolo restaurant if you get lost.” 

Cecilia started walking down the path and felt free and happy like the park was her own backyard. The fallen leaves crunched beneath her feet as she wandered along the paths with beautiful statues and beautiful people, not really knowing where she was going, but not afraid to find out.

At the end of one path, she saw what looked like some ruins. She ran her fingers along the weathered stone, imagining the walls that once stood centuries ago. That’s when her foot caught on an uneven paver, ankle rolling painfully. She gasped as she lost her balance, tumbling forward. Time seemed to slow as she braced for impact. Her head struck the hard path before everything went black. The black turned into a bright light shortly after or who knows how long. As her eyes fluttered open, she was surrounded by an eerie silence. The playful sounds of children had vanished, replaced by an unsettling stillness. “Just my luck, to hit my head on this trip!,” she exclaimed as she tried to get up. “Are you alright, miss?” a boy in a school uniform asked. “I saw you fall. Here, let me help you up.”

Cecilia’s head spun as the boy reached and grabbed her hand. Something wasn’t right – his outdated uniform, and the shift in atmosphere in that park. “I’m supposed to go back to the Monte Carlo restaurant.”

The boy furrowed his brow. “We are high school students. They don’t like us hanging out there. Actually, they would not like me hanging out with a foreigner either, but you probably know that. 1987 in Romania is probably years behind Western Europe or America, so I apologize for that.”

Cecilia’s eyes widened as the realization sank in. She had somehow traveled back decades into the past – to communist Romania. She nodded solemnly, understanding the implicit restrictions on fraternizing with outsiders under the repressive communist regime.

Boy: “You don’t seem to be from Bucharest. Where are you visiting from?”

Cecilia hesitated, wondering how much to reveal. “I’m from the U.S. I guess so, I don’t really know what is going on…”

Boy: “Regardless, you look like you could use some help. I’m Andy.”

Cecilia: “Thank you, Andy. I’m Cecilia. And you may be my only hope of making sense of…whatever this is.”

“You must have hit your head pretty hard.” Maybe we will go to the hospital around the corner. 

1987? Cecilia’s mind reeled. As she took the boy’s hand, she couldn’t shake the feeling that she had stumbled into a living remnant of Bucharest’s past, a time warp to the city’s communist era…

“This is my friend, Paul,” the young man said, gesturing to his friend. “We were here smoking when we saw you hit the pavement.”

Cecilia looked up at them, a sense of disorientation washing over her. “Well, I really appreciate you helping me out. Is there a bathroom here where I can find a mirror to assess the damage?”

“You’re not bleeding,” Paul commented. “But there is no mirror close by. Maybe we can go to Monte Carlo and you can check there in the bathroom.”

Cecilia perked up at the mention of Monte Carlo. “Monte Carlo, yes, that is where my cousin is waiting for me.” She felt a surge of relief,  hopeful that her cousin was indeed there waiting for her. 

As they started walking, Cecilia couldn’t help but notice the changes in her surroundings. The alley looked the same, but the people seemed different. She felt like she had stepped into a time capsule, a kaleidoscope of youthful energy, timeless elegance and nostalgic fashion. There were teens in uniforms, well-dressed elderly couples, and young women with big, teased hairdos and iconic flat shoe

“Are you hungry?” Andy, asked, his thick Romanian accent sounding strangely comforting to Cecilia.

“I could eat,” she replied, “but I need to make sense of everything and find a mirror first. My head doesn’t hurt, but the mirror is still very much needed.”

When they arrived at Monte Carlo, Cecilia was surprised to find the restaurant layout slightly different from how she remembered it. As she had suspected, her cousin Sonia was nowhere to be seen.

As they entered, the waiter greeted the boys with a playful question about whether they should be in school. Andy explained that he was joking because he knew them and that the staff were happy to have them there, even letting them smoke.

Cecilia smiled and nodded, but her mind was focused on one thing – finding a mirror. Finally, she spotted the bathroom and hurried inside, gasping at the reflection that greeted her.

Staring back was the face of the 1989 Cecilia. A wave of emotion washed over her, and she couldn’t help but laugh hysterically. “Oh, I will make the best of whatever this is!” she exclaimed. “As long as I’m not dead, and I don’t think I am, I want to leave this like it’s 1989!”

With a renewed sense of purpose, Cecilia burst out of the bathroom, ready to embrace what was coming her way. Andy and Paul stared at her as she made her way to the table. Being a teen again felt as good as the first time. 

Paul offered her a cigarette. 

“You know, these are bad for you, like really bad.”

Paul laughed while Andy smiled as he lit his cigarette. “I know, I know, but I am not aiming for a long life, just a good one filled with love and travel” he said.

She almost wanted to explain how he really does not know and how years from now, people will truly know how bad cigarettes were, but she didn’t. 

“It would be good to have love, travel and a long life, no?”

Paul chuckled and nudged Andy, “You’re inspired, Andy. Go ahead and write the letter.” He added: “Andy’s got a letter to write for a girl who wants to impress her out-of-town crush.”

Cecilia leaned in, intrigued. “Love letters as a service? Now that’s a fascinating idea.”

Andy nodded with a mischievous glint in his eye. “It’s easy money, and the girl used to pay per letter. Now I charge her upfront – it’s a win-win for everyone involved.”