The store is closed when we pull into the parking lot, but there’s an orange hue coming from behind the glass front window. It’s easy to imagine Terry humming at the ovens in the wee morning hours.

We take the second door right next to the bakery’s entrance and climb a narrow set of carpeted stairs that lead up to a rather large apartment with yellow-painted walls and frames all around, knickknacks on every shelf. The air smells of tea, just like at the Troys’ but a different, spicier flavor, maybe.

“Bienvenue! Welcome! Mi casa es su casa. Look at that; three languages right there! They might have room for me at Princeton, huh, Riri?”

She laughs at her own joke. It’s both corny and the laugh a little infectious, and Corinne shakes her head as she removes her scarf and lets herself fall into a couch. She is fully at home here, whereas I find myself lurking, taking it all in.

There’s an American flag magnet on the fridge that reminds me of Ma’s Haitian flag-patterned oven mitt. A touch of home in the room that sustains the house.

“I told you we were only going to be here for less than forty-eight hours,” Corinne says, stealing a glance at me when she thinks I’m not looking. “I told you not to make a fuss for us.” She points with her socked toe to the kitchen table filled with tinfoil-covered trays. “This qualifies as a fuss.”

“Calm down, Mini Chantale.” Terry waves her off, checking the oven. “Half of this stuff is for a food fair at the end of the week. Henri, sweetie: stop standing by the door like a butler. You’re stressing me out. There’s no grand tour; make yourself at home. Go have a poo or something.”

By the time the three of us settle in for dinner in the living room and the coffee table is packed with tray after tray of food—roasted carrots, mac and cheese, and rosemary turkey fresh from the oven, all dishes that Aunt Terry waves off as being whipped up in a few minutes—it’s clear that Terry is the sort of person you believe when she says something like “Make yourself at home.” We end up watching French-Canadian news about America’s upcoming elections.

“You people sure know how to take the fun out of a country that has Las Vegas, Miami, and New York City.” Terry sighs, and neither Corinne nor I can exactly argue with that. “So, Henri: is McGill your dream school, as you kids put it?”

“And exactly what’s wrong with dream schools?” Corinne says. Terry doesn’t seem to mind her niece’s eye roll, laughing along with it.