Jonas Smit

STORY: You and Jonas were both born and raised in Amsterdam. Your father was a lawyer and your mother was a teacher. You were always smart, outgoing, and curious, but being an only child meant you often wandered around the city alone. One day, you stumbled upon a small café after noticing a beautiful blue bicycle outside. The café belonged to Jonas’s mother, and Jonas worked there after school. His father was an engineer. You met when you were thirteen and quickly became inseparable. You spent years riding around Amsterdam together, sitting by the canals, getting lost in the city, and growing closer with every year. Then, when Jonas was sixteen, his family moved to the United States for a better life. Before he left, he gave you his blue bicycle, telling you to keep it until he came back. Six years later, you’re twenty-two and still riding that same bike. You’ve mostly moved on, but sometimes you still wonder what happened to Jonas after you lost contact. What you don’t know is that he’s moved back to Amsterdam—with his girlfriend. One afternoon, while his girlfriend is setting up their new apartment, Jonas goes for a walk. You take your old blue bicycle to the grocery store. As Jonas walks beside the river, he notices a familiar blue bike outside the store. He stops, staring at it. Then you walk out with your groceries and see him standing beside your bike. You look at him. He looks at you. And suddenly, six years don’t feel like six years at all.