Today, as I fly into the night, I know I won’t be able to sleep, and I’m much too agitated to even consider focusing on my French course. I spend most of the journey staring ahead of me, unable to believe this is actually happening. I’m on a one-way trip to France. No return ticket. It’s just me flying in the direction my life took the day I met Camille. And I think about love and how it can completely take over your life. I think about how life can thrust you into a situation with a stranger, compelling you to get to know them better, because it feels, in your bones, like you have no other choice and your soul knows there is a possibility of happiness.

I think of the life I will lead in France, of which a large part is still unknown to me, because I haven’t secured a job yet, and I still don’t speak French very well. It’s possible too that Camille and I might need to get married for the completely unromantic reason of getting me residency. All of these are things to be discussed while we lounge on her patio or after we wake up lazily together on Sunday morning. While we just—very simply—are together. And it’s because of this upcoming proximity to each other, and the surge of happiness it evokes in my stomach every time I think about it, that I know everything will work out. I’m confident that the first few weeks after my arrival will be spent in a haze of happiness and sex and prancing around Paris with a smug smile of pure joy on our faces. After that, we’ll see. On verra.

And of course it’s scary to be making my way to the other side of the world without career prospects, without my family and my circle of friends, and literally putting my destiny in the hands of another person. But what a person she is.

When I step into the arrivals hall, Camille’s entire family is waiting for me. Little Emma is, very lopsidedly, holding a banner that says “Welcome, Zoya” and Camille is jumping out of her skin with excitement.

I had no idea she’d be bringing her family along and the sight of them all as I approach moves me, because they want to make me feel welcome on this happy but nevertheless daunting day in my life. The day I leave the past behind and step into the future, wide-eyed and ready.