The Day I Forgot To Be Afraid

Russians, Nazis, Jews, and Gays, oh my! My dispatch from Budapest

Photo by me

The enemy’s invincible, I hope you let it go. “Hope” by Vampire Weekend

Cowboy Carter played, I slid back and forth between the oven and my laptop resting on the marble island. I was roasting a chicken, sautéing spinach, and FaceTiming with my daughter in Los Angeles — attempting the whole “make this house a home” thing. I’d been in Budapest for weeks, hadn’t cooked unless cutting a hunk of perfectly crusty bread and slathering it with butter is cooking. Anyway, the moment was glorious — my daughter’s shining face on the screen, her sipping coffee, me wine, just the two of us catching up.

I heard a knock on my peephole-less door, looked at my daughter quizzically: who could it be at 8pm in a city I know basically no-one? Then a delicate, worried voice — female, Russian accented English — said urgently, “I’m your neighbor, can you please help me? There’s a loud beeping in my apartment, I don’t know what it is.”

I opened the door just wide enough to see a lanky, awkward, blonde, holding her phone, nervously shifting from side to side. “I don’t smell gas but I can’t figure out what it is, can you please come to my apartment, it’s just there.” She pointed across the courtyard to an open door. I mean, she was…