39

When Monica stepped into her house from work some time after nine o’clock, she found Lewis in the living room, his feet kicked up on the coffee table, watching BET music videos, smoking a joint.

“Dammit, Lewis,” Monica said, closing the door and walking into the room. “I told you I didn’t want you doing that stuff in this house.”

“What are you talking about?” Lewis said after blowing smoke from his nose and putting out the joint. “You weren’t saying that when we were doing it together.”

“That was once,” Monica said. She grabbed the remote from beside him on the sofa and changed the channel to MSNBC. The wisecracking Keith Olbermann was talking about the 2008 presidential elections.

“I was watching videos.”

“That’s all you ever watch,” Monica said, sitting.

“Well I don’t want to hear about no damn presidential elections. That ain’t got nothing to do with me.”

“It would if you voted.”

“Well I don’t, so can we watch something else?”

Monica clicked the TV off. “What was up with you this morning?”

“Nothing.”

“No. It was something. You didn’t say a word to me at breakfast.”

“Everything was cool.”

“No it wasn’t,” Monica said. “Why can’t you ever just tell me what’s on your mind?”

“Because there was nothing on my mind.”

“Fine,” Monica said, standing. “I’m getting a bottle of water. Do you want anything from the kitchen?”

“No.”

When she returned, Monica sat back down next to Lewis, took a swallow from her water, and said, “So how’s school going?”

“It’s good.”

“You doing okay in your classes?”

“Yeah,” Lewis said, sounding the slightest bit irritated.

“Do you not want to talk about this?”

“There are a thousand other things we could talk about.”

“Suggest something.”

“I don’t know. I’m just sayin’.”

“How about what you plan on doing once you finish school.”

Lewis turned to Monica, gave her an incredulous look. “You serious?”

“Yeah, I’m serious. Have you thought about what your plans are?”

“I don’t know. Freddy and I are thinking about starting a real-estate company, or maybe I might open up my own barber shop. I haven’t given it much thought.”

“You think you might want to start?”

Lewis pulled himself from the sofa, stood in front of Monica. “What the hell is this? Are you my counselor now? Is this career day or some shit?”

“No. Nothing like that. I just think the future is important, and I thought we’d talk about it, considering we’re going to get married.”

“Well, I’m fine, alright. Just let me worry about my own future, okay?” Lewis said.

“Okay,” Monica said. “I won’t ever ask you about it again.”