“Like what?”

“I just told you, I ain’t sure! But I’ll put it this way. I saw a commercial on television for this international correspondence school and I sent away for some information. I’ma look it over and see if I might wanna try something they got.”

“Like what, Charlotte?”

“Why you keep asking me the same damn questions? Go! Leave!”

“All right, all right. But this is what I gotta say about this: I’m sorry. I didn’t do this to hurt you. I thought I was protecting our marriage by doing it this way, but I was wrong. Sometimes, people make bad decisions, Charlotte, but that don’t mean they bad, do it?”

“I don’t know, Al, but I don’t even know if I really know you no more. I don’t know if you really the same man I married. And to be honest, right now I could care less. Good night,” I say, and head up the stairs past the kids’ rooms. I go in our room and lock the door behind me. I get in the bed with my clothes on and wrap myself inside the covers. I lay here listening, waiting, to see how long it’s gon’ take him to do what he’s gon’ do. I’m wondering if he gon’ come up the steps and try to fight for me, or if he gon’ be a coward and leave. When I hear his engine turn over and the garage door open and close, I guess I got my answer.

Cancer

The guy who built this house was stingy when it came to landscaping. The shrubs are downright dwarflike; the trees are sparse and nothing more than tall twigs. I can just about count how many flowers there are on one hand. The backyard slopes upward, and because the ground cover never quite took off, the sun and heat have turned the dark-brown bark to a grayish beige. He swore the evergreens would be at least twenty feet by now, but I’d be afraid to put Christmas lights on them. When we moved here two years ago, I promised myself I’d get around to sprucing it all up, and today is finally that day.

I’m basically killing time, waiting for two things to happen. After finally making the time to work on and finish what I thought was still a working draft of my proposal, I was shocked when the agent representing me for my cookbook told me that two or three publishers might be interested. She’s supposed to let me know sometime today or tomorrow which one makes the best offer. I almost shit when she told me she wanted “six figures.” But I’m not freaking out. I’ll be happy with any amount that would help Mama get her condo and car and send her on her cruise. I want her life to improve. Want her to have some fun. Want her to stop worrying so much. Since submitting the proposal, I haven’t managed to eke out enough time to write any of the text; haven’t even started narrowing down the recipes. All I have is a concept: how to eat healthy and delicious gourmet-type meals in little or no time and for even less money than you’d think. The agent said they’d want to see a polished introduction within a few weeks. That I’d need to give them a better idea of the structure the book would take.