A Year Of Hope

The air was much colder in Canada than back at home.

Back home, it had already been warm enough that you could sometimes wear a T-shirt, and the grass was already green. But here there was still now, and Jane and I had to wear jackets, and there was snow on the ground outside.

Her family was all waiting for us outside. Jane was taller than all of them. Her mom was darker than Jane, with tight dark curly hair, dark brown eyes. I had originally thought Jane looked like her dad, but now I could see the resemblance between them. They had the same oval face shape, their eyebrows were both slightly rounded and in a permanent raised position as if permanently amused, and the same fuller lips that turned ever so slightly downwards in the corner.

 Jane's younger brother looked almost nothing like her. He looked to be about 17 or 18. He had a rounder face shape, and had peach skin and freckles, and his tight curls were cut short. He had very dark eyes, and thinner lips than Jane. He was the shortest one in the family. Her grandmother was a bit taller her brother, but shorter than her mom. She had dark smooth skin, golden eyes, and her dark curly hair was pulled back into a headband. She wore a blue dress, black dress shoes, and a white cardigan. Her grandfather was the same height as Jane's mom, with same dark, smooth skin as Jane's grandfather. He was mostly bald with a thin strip of white hair. He wore a blue button up and khaki slacks, a pair of loafers, and thin rimmed glasses.

Jane ran up to meet them excitedly. "Jane, oh my goodness you have gotten so skinny!" Jane's grandmother said first as she came into hug Jane. Jane went down the line and hugged the rest of her family and greeting them all hello, telling them how much she had missed them all. Then Jane's grandmother came up to me, and folded her arms as she looked at me and said to me with a bit of an accent that sounded as if it originated from Southern Africa, "So, you must be Jane's fiancé?"

"I- uh..." I began, thinking at first Jane had told her family up here that we were engaged as well. I looked over at Jane for an answer, and she began to laugh.

"She's joking. She knows I told me dad we were engaged."

I laughed nervously, and Jane's grandmother chuckled and slapped me on the arm. "Oh lighten up!"

"Guys, this is my boyfriend, Mordecai Evans."

I blushed and I went in to shake everyone's hand, as I said, "You can just call me Cai."

Jane's grandmother smiled as she shook my hand. Her grandfather gave a short, "Hello." 

When I shook her mother's hand, she gave me a warm, welcoming grin and said, "It's very nice to meet you Cai. Jane has told me a lot of great things about you. Call me Elizabeth."

Jane's brother went in for a fist bump instead of a handshake, and then looked at Jane and said, "I thought you said he was 'just a friend' Jane!"

"We just started dating Aaron," Jane said, with a playfully annoyed turn as she smiled at him. "I told mom."

We drove from the airport through Toronto in her grandparents Van. Jane and I sat in the back, and Jane's grandmother was insistent on sitting in the middle section in the middle section so she could speak with Jane and I, but she made a point of saying she particularly wanted to speak to me. Jane's brother sat in the middle section too listening to music on his Air Pods. And Jane's mother sat in the front passenger seat.

"How was the flight, Jane," her mother asked. "I know it was your first time."

Jane giggled a bit, "I was on Xanax, so I suppose not bad." Jane's mother gave Jane a peculiar look that Jane often gave me when she was searching for me to continue. "Don't worry it was prescribed."

Toronto was a large and beautiful city, much larger and enticing than Atlanta or Charlotte. They had some chain restaurants there that we had in America, like McDonald's which each one had a little maple leaf in the middle of the M, but they had some we didn't have, like Tim Hortons and Harvey's and Swish Chalet. The gas stations and stores were all different too. The city was also far more diverse culturally than in America, and all the street signs were in English as well as French.