Home Run

We stand in the foyer of a large house, sunlight streaming across the floor. There are pocket doors and there are stained glass windows and there are staircases with carved finials. It is a house far too grand--far too grown-up--for the likes of me.

"So," says the real estate agent. "Do you need time to think? Would you like to make an offer?"

I look to Spiceboy. The hardwood floors creak as we shift from foot to foot.

I think of our tiny New York apartment. The apartment we lived in when we got married. The apartment where we had our baby girl. How did we fit so much hope into such a tiny space?

Do we have enough hope to fill an entire house?

Spiceboy's expression is perfectly blank--from the smooth planes of his cheeks, to the corners of his mouth, to the depths of his eyes. But I know what he's going to say before he says it.

I am trying to keep my poker face. He gives me an imperceptible nod, then turns to the agent.

"We'd like to make an offer."

There are handshakes and paperwork and promises. And then it's just the two of us, standing the middle of the sunlight and the creaking floors, and he folds me into his arms and whispers in my ear:

"We are going to have a wonderful home."