Over the summer, Val and her dad had her Jeep tuned and detailed at a place called Otto’s. Otto’s was a client of Henry Goodchilde’s firm, and many of the firm’s partners used him often even though the place was out-of-state – that was how good Otto’s reputation was. They also had the jeep weather-proofed with a removable hardtop and real doors, rust-proofed against the Canadian weather, and, at Val’s insistence, part of the bodywork to get all the rust spots and all the rotted metal out included a color change to canary yellow.

She told her dad the girly color would offset the fact that it was an old “boy’s Wrangler” and make it more appropriate for a girl. Also, though Val wouldn’t admit it to her folks, she found her tastes and preferences have changed and are continuing to change. She worried about that a little bit, but she had resigned herself that she was changing already, and her goal now was to not stop the changes, but rather get used to them, but yet remain true to herself and not allow the changes to, for want of a better word, corrupt her: because she found that she could get her way pretty much whatever she wanted, which was a trip, but could easily make her spoiled and entitled and all those things. She vowed not to let that happen.

Anyway, Val drove her new jeep to Saint John, with the intention of keeping the car with her for the duration of her stay in Troy – that was the point of all the car renovation after all. Her dad followed her to Canada, with all of the stuff Val thought she would need piled up in her jeep and dad’s BMW. But her dad said, with all the money that they were saving on school and tuition fees (and college later on), she could fly back home at least twice a month. Her dad said it wouldn’t be a problem because he’d be footing the bill. So no excuses.

The 21-hour-plus road trip was hard on the two but they did stop over at a motel in Albany for a few hours and got some sleep, and then pushed on in the morning, arriving at Troy House before ten Friday morning.

No kids were around since it was the Friday before the start of term, which allowed the two to bring Val’s stuff into her room. What took a lot of time was the small bar fridge that her dad got from somewhere second-hand, and a small microwave. A couple of janitors helped them with the fridge, and Val didn’t even need to cajole them into helping: they were Canadians, after all, and they volunteered on their own to help carry the fridge to her room.

The registrar's office checked her in and handed over her school documents and class schedule as well as her parking lot card after Dad paid for her CA$ 1,000 parking fee for the fall semester (the fee wasn’t really a fee but a means for the school to dissuade juniors and seniors from abusing the privilege). The RA for her dorm handed over her room key and bathroom key.

For some reason, Val got Momo-chan’s old room: W2-50 - literally the very last room in the dorm - and Dad commented that it was a good-sized room. Later on, she would find that M2-49, M2-50, W2-49, and W2-50 were highly sought after since they were the largest rooms in the dorms because they were at the ends of the building (the same rooms in M1 and W1 were also the same dimensions but since room assignments for first and second-years were alphabetical and swapping wasn’t allowed, there was no competition for them, unlike the third and fourth-year rooms).

It had an identical layout as W2-49 – her old room - except this one was reversed, like a mirror image, with the door to the left of the big window instead of to the right, and everything else totally the same: a closet built into the wall beside the door, a dresser with a mirror, a bookshelf, a study table and three aluminum folding chairs, folded and leaning against the closet door, but all of them on the opposite side compared to the old room.

It had newly painted blank walls – this time it was in pastel salmon – and the three diagrams on the back of the door were the same: a map of the school’s main floor, a fire escape map, and a map of the second floor. The RA said that hanging stuff on the walls was allowed, but the students had to make sure not to use nails or screws, otherwise, they’d have to take them out and repair the walls before the end of the school year, or else they have to pay a fee. Val was glad of that since she had brought some posters she’d like to put up and relieve the emptiness of the walls. But she didn’t have any way to put hooks or hangers on the walls – she’d have to think up something.

Like her old room, the farthest wall also had a large window, with nice sheer curtains in the same shade as the room. It let in the bright sunlight in cheerful shades of peach and made the room very friendly. There was another set of curtains - blackout curtains in a canvas color, but she kept them pulled back most of the time.

The window looked out at the same view of her old room, of the park, and beyond it, the Bay of Fundy. Her dad looked out the window and said the town looked like a pretty place.

Acting like a town local, Val toured Dad around, sticking, of course, to the few spots she knew. For lunch, Val brought her dad to ‘Italian By Night’ again, out in Germain Street (which was, apparently open for lunch and to walk-in patrons). Val said it’s one of the fanciest restaurants in town, and her Dad seemed to approve. Good thing she didn’t offer to pay as she had a limited allowance that she had to stick to, but Dad didn’t complain. Val did have a credit card that her dad gave her, but she was under strict instructions to use it only for emergencies (“And remember,” Dad said, “I’ll get an email every time the card’s used”). The card was a compromise because her folks wouldn’t be around to bail her out of jams. All her expenses were to be under her cash card, which would be topped up with US$500 a week (which was a little less than CA$700), and if she was running low, she would need to give her folks a call.

To experiment, before they left for lunch, she tried withdrawing from the ATM in the school lobby, and the machine spit CA$50 without problems. She was also pleasantly surprised that the school had made sure that at least twenty-five dollars of every withdrawal was in small bills. The ATMs were going to be primarily for the kids’ use, after all.

At around two, her dad brought her back to her dorm, and they said goodbye in the car park. Dad reminded her that she’d be flying home for a visit in two weeks, and she told her dad to give her a text message when he got home safely.

It was a teary goodbye for Val – she had never been away from her folks for more than a couple of days, but she hoped it was going to be okay. She waved goodbye as her dad’s BMW drove away, and wiped away a few tears.

After a quick text to her mom saying they arrived safe and that Dad was on his way back, Val started putting away all her stuff and setting up her itty-bitty little fridge, the microwave, her computer stuff and printer, and all her books. The school had sent them a list of all the references she would need ahead of time and she was able to bring those she already had and buy those that she didn’t. They weren’t that many since a lot of the references for Troy’s students were online, just like in Delos. And just like in Delos, Val also scanned all the paper books (her dad’s firm routinely digitized documents, and she had given Val and Carla permission to digitize their schoolbooks while they were working at his firm). So all her references were now in her iPad Pro. No lugging around any books for her. She brought the hard copies just in case and were just for show in case the teacher asks them to bring a copy to class.

She finished setting everything up by around eight or so and decided on finally getting dinner. She was hoping to eat at the cafeteria but since classes only start next week, the cafeteria was closed. But since she was on her own, she needed to economize starting now. She didn’t need to economize that much, though, since her new daily allowance was equivalent to something like CA$97, which she thought was a lot, relatively speaking. She thought of getting fast food. Later on, Val would find that the school gave all the kids a stipend of CA$500 a month, or roughly, CA$15 a day, but when she told her folks, her dad didn’t change her allowance (“Yay!” she thought in her head but didn’t say anything to her folks).

She decided to look for a fast food place, gas up her jeep, and buy some basic supplies like toiletries, school supplies, snacks, drinks, and such.

On the net, she found a Tim Hortons on, where else? Main Street (and she thought, wouldn’t it be great if Main Street was actually Saint John’s main street?). And she got her jeep gassed up at a gas station called “Irving.” It all made her giggle.

It turned out the Tim Hortons on Main was both a Wendy’s and a Tim Hortons, but she selected what was in her mind “Canadian food” i.e. stuff from the Tim Hortons menu: she got a Tim Hortons BBQ Crispy Chicken Bowl for dinner, plus an Apple Fritter donut and a Vanilla Coconut Cappuccino. She also bought some cream cheese plus six assorted bagels to go, which she could nuke for breakfast tomorrow. Hopefully, her five friends would be arriving by then.

When she was at Tim Hortons, she found the patrons making eyes at her, so she deliberately picked a corner table in front of the picture windows that looked out into the parking area. She kept her back to the other diners and was able to enjoy her dinner mostly in peace. She surfed on her phone but, after a while, when she looked up, she noticed some people gathering outside staring at her but trying very hard to appear that they weren’t. By then, she was almost finished so, after a final bite of her apple donut, she got up to leave and gave the people around her a friendly smile.

She didn’t find any 7-Elevens or any other convenience stores she was familiar with, so she just picked a nearby Circle K. And there she bought a big load of snacks, drinks, and other things that she thought she needed, like soap, shampoo, toothpaste, some notebooks, pads of paper, disposable pens, et cetera. She also bought a supply of tampons and pads (she has had three periods already, and with her mom’s help, she now knew what to do. Ma said she preferred tampons, especially if she was being very active, but she said Val could use pads until she was more used to tampons). The friendly cashier girl helped her carry her stuff to her jeep, and she drove back to the school.

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