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Hope

There’s a gnome wearing a thong and a pair of lacrosse goggles in our front window.

I pause in the middle of the sidewalk, the clatter of my suitcase wheels on the pavement coming to an abrupt stop. My Uber driver takes off up the darkening street, and I turn to watch the car round the corner before looking back at the gnome.

His name is CJ Junior, and my whole face splits into a grin as I raise two fingers to give him a salute.

“It’s good to be back,” I mutter as I charge through the little patch of dirt and struggling weeds we call a yard. My suitcase bumps against the wooden stoop as I haul it along behind me up to the front door.

Even if there weren’t a gnome dressed in my old lacrosse goggles and a cherry-red thong donated by one of my roommates staring out the window, it wouldn’t take a stranger long to realize a bunch of UNS athletes live here. The butter-yellow row house is so narrow it looks like it was squeezed onto the street as an afterthought, but that hasn’t stopped us from pimping it out. Besides CJ Junior, the front window is decorated with strings of pink mini lights. We’ve been told the sultry pink glow makes it look like we’re running a gnome brothel, but I kind of like the effect.

The upstairs window is covered with the huge University of Nova Scotia banner Iz, one of my three roommates, uses as a curtain. Our miniscule excuse for a yard has some UNS pinwheels we may or may not have stolen from an orientation event stuck in the ground amidst all the terra cotta pots that house Paulina’s perpetually failed attempts to grow an herb garden.

Under my feet is the custom welcome mat Jane had printed when we first moved into the house in our second year. The black block letters spell out ‘Welcome to the Babe Cave.’

I remember when we rolled the mat out one August night just like this. The four of us sat on the stoop for hours drinking spiked lemonade in the heat, smacking mosquitoes off our arms and breathing in the faint trace of salty ocean you can usually catch on the breeze in Halifax. I don’t know if it’s true, but I always think I can smell the ocean more at night.

I fill my lungs up with briny air and take a minute to let the day roll off me: the goodbye with my parents, the rush and roar of the airport, the flight in a tiny tin can of a plane. I let it all go.

One thing at a time. First thing’s first.

Phrases like that have kept me on track for years: little reminders that there’s always a next step, and I always have what it takes to get there.

I reach for the tarnished brass doorknob, but before I can grab it, the door is jerked back so hard it slams against the wall inside.

“HOPE IS HERE!”

Jane and Paulina scream and squeal as they throw their arms around me, and I’m screaming and squealing too. The three of us start jumping up and down with our arms woven around each other like a complicated Celtic friendship knot and come dangerously close to falling off the stoop.

“You guysssss!” Paulina gushes from above me and Jane. She’s six foot one, so she’s pretty much always above us. The ends of her long blonde hair are currently in danger of suffocating me. “I’m sooooo happy!”

She folds herself nearly in half to lay her head on top of mine and nuzzles into me. We stand there swaying and laughing for long enough one of my arms starts to go numb, but I don’t care. We’ve all been in and out of the house throughout the summer, but this is our first real reunion. Lacrosse training camp starts tomorrow, and the fall semester starts a week after that.

The Babe Cave is officially back in business.

“Hey, wait!” I say, twisting my head so I’m not speaking into Jane’s shoulder. My glasses have been knocked out of place, but I can’t extract my hand to fix them. “Where’s Iz?”

Our fourth roommate normally would have joined the pile by now.

“They’re picking up dinner,” Jane answers.

“You guys didn’t eat yet? It’s almost eight!”

Paulina lifts her head off me. “Oh, we had dinner. This is second dinner. We thought you’d be hungry after your flight. Iz is getting pizza!”

My mom made a giant early dinner before I left, but my mouth still waters at the thought of pizza.

“From Davy Jones?” I ask.

I can’t really see Jane’s face, but I feel her nodding. “Of course.”

“Fuck yeah! I’ve been craving Davy Jones pizza all summer. You guys are the best. You know that?”

“Oh, we know.”

I start strategizing about how we’re going to get out of this group hug without landing in the yard when Paulina lets out a wail.