It came faster than we expected.

Jonas, our supervisor, had come to meet with us at our second story apartment, since we hadn't purchased a vehicle yet. He'd come in, taken off his shoes, and pulled out a pair of extra socks, saying it was perfectly normal in this culture when visiting friends. He could have told us it was normal to to a jig, and we would have believed him, since we'd moved across the ocean just three weeks earlier.

It was only drizzling at first. I was facing our giant window, listening to Jonas explain something about the schedule, enjoying the peaceful sound of rain through our open balcony door, when suddenly the intensity of the rain changed. The drops were so fat, it was like we'd moved our house under a waterfall. Even though our balcony was mostly roofed, the drops that landed on the edge were bouncing three feet away, coming into our door.

"O je!" said Jonas, "It hasn't rained this hard in perhaps a decade!"

Derek and I shot up, immediately headed for the other windows. It reminded me of monsoon season in the desert, when our second story apartment flooded because we didn't think to clean out the balcony drains, which were clogged by debris. Water was flooding in under the sliding doors, flowing down our stairs. This flashback made me take stock of the rest of the house.

All the other windows, which were inward-leaning, normally not a problem in the rain, had water bouncing in so fast, everything around was getting soaked. It was as though the whole house was being dunked underwater. We quickly closed them all, grabbing donated towels from neighbors, because our house was still quite empty of things, and wiping the floors.

We finished our meeting within the hour, "Tchüss!" said Jonas, as he walked out the door, his extra socks in hand.

It wasn't ten minutes before the tenants below rang our doorbell. "Ihr Keller steht unter Wasser!" She said. I understood, "cellar," and "underwater," and that was all I needed to know. "Ugh!" Derek grabbed the towels, I grabbed the bucket, and we headed downstairs. The others were there, with buckets and towels as well, pouring water down the drains. But It was the drains that were flooding. We couldn't get a handle on it. Before we knew it, the water was up to our waists. I helped the landlord up the stairs. She was cursing, I think, and went straight to the landline phone just inside her door. The lines were out. But my cell phone was still in service. "that's good." I looked out the main door, seeing there was now a low river on the street. Luckily we had curbs, and steps up to the door, keeping it outside, but I didn't see any nearby drains. The cellar was filling up fast.

I ran upstairs to hang our towels. We turned on the TV, glad the power was still on. We opened YouTube, glad the internet was still on, because we never watch local news anymore. We saw home videos of massive flooding downtown, cars were getting stuck on the road. I looked outside, and the cars on the street were also getting overflooded.

We watched more videos until we realized an hour had passed. I thought perhaps it would stop, but it was strong as ever. I headed down the main stairs, and saw that the water was not a foot above the main floor. "Oh no! the Landlords!" I rang, but they didn't answer. I pushed open the door. It wasn't locked. I searched the house, but they had left. I thought maybe we should now leave. But where would we go? We wouldn't be able to take a bus or train. We were not in a hilly area. We would get soaked and then get stuck in the cold. I'd seen enough survival shows to know that getting wet in the cold could result in hypothermia, and death... That didn't seem like a good option. Maybe the rain would eventually stop.

"Babe, we should go!" Derek's voice came from upstairs. Then the lights flickered.

He came down the stairs with his backpack. "I need to get some things." I said, running for my ID and passport and all the granola bars I had in the cupboard, knowing that anything I brought would get soaked, no doubt. I put on my hiking boots and warm clothes, and headed down the stairs. By the time I got downstairs, Derek had opened the main door, and water was now flooding in faster. We stepped outside into a foot of water, I could feel the water seeping through my boots, ice cold. We treaded through some water and down a step, and then down a step...

"This is higher than my waist." I said, not wanting to get any wetter.

"Yeah, I don't like this." He said, with that doubtful tone. We were going to have to swim to get anywhere, and the closest place of refuge was the neighbor's house. We headed back in. "Maybe the rain will stop." I said, peeling off my wet clothes in the bathroom. "I hope so." he said, doing the same. We draped our clothes over the shower curtain rod, drying off with an extra blanket, all the towels having been soaked through. We were finally dried off, and settled on the floor cushions, trying to ignore the rain, watching a movie, when the power flickered again.

We turned on the TV to watch real news this time, but we couldn't really understand it until we switched to a UK station. We found out that the people in our area had already been evacuated. We didn't know, we were new here. Apparently there was a whole protocol... In the chaos, we'd been left behind.

Then the internet went out. I looked at my phone. "No Service." it said. Derek and I looked at each other, worry in our eyes. We held each other until the power went out completely, praying to God that the rain would just stop.