“How do you like our house?” he asked me lazily one night. It was three months after the wedding, and we’d just painted the upstairs guest room a soft, green color. It would be the nursery and we wanted to avoid pinks and blues.

Since the wedding, I had felt like we lived on our own island, in our small house in University City, far from South Philly where my friends lived. Where Mama and Baba lived. Mama and I had not spoken or seen each other, except for a few tense telephone calls when I’d tried to check on Baba, who was feeling sick more and more often.

“I love our house,” I replied to John, gently lifting his head off my lap and stretching out beside him on the rug. “I’ve gotten used to it.”

“But it’s a longer commute to your job, right?”

“Sure,” I answered, “but I can always find something closer.” I worked at a clothing store on Passyunk Avenue, next to an Italian bakery and a furniture store that had both been there forever. I remember, as a kid, spending half of my $1 weekly allowance on a vanilla-cream topped cupcake with colored sprinkles, eating it in front of the furniture store window while dreaming about the kind of furniture I would have in my own home some day.

“Why don’t you think about finishing your degree instead of working?” John said.

I remained quiet, then said, “Maybe soon, but not now. Not until after the baby comes.”

We didn’t speak for a while, but then he continued, “Why don’t we have your parents over for dinner soon?”

I looked at him in such a way that he became quiet. “You know I’m not supposed to get stressed out.”

“You need to reconcile with your mother, Hanan,” he pressed me. “It’s the only way to become a successful mother yourself.”