Cheek against his, she squinted. “Almost nine g’s, huh? Not bad.”

“A drop in the bucket.”

“Better than nothing.” When she pressed herself upright, her belly grazed the back of his head.

“Yeah, no,” he said. “Nothing.”

Time to start shaping this morning into their day. The air inside was musky with Michelle’s buttery farts. Pregnancy had made her gassy and irritable, and by now he knew better than to comment on either. With one fist pressed into her kidney and arching her back, she went through the kitchenette smacking cupboards open and closed, saying she was hungry, fucking starving, like, but they ain’t got shit to eat so’s they’d better head to the grocery store before she killed somebody. Then they could swing by the bank, too. It’d be a good idea to deposit that check and to, she didn’t know, maybe talk to someone about investing it, like.

“Invest?”

She sniffed. From the side, her stomach swollen with their daughter had the same curve of a sickle. “Did I stutter? Take money to make money, and look who got some now, right?”

“All I got is debt.” He waved the check like a white flag. Looked from the digits to their home, crowded with a fortress of brown boxes holding his parents’ books. The maple two-by-ten planks that he’d cut, sanded, and lacquered last weekend were leaning against the wall next to a dense bundle of black pipe and couplings. “Debt and things to do.”

“This your chance to get out of both, Hen.”

He ignored her, started counting the hours it would take to finish the shelves this afternoon.

“You hearing me? You got to take risks to get ahead, Hen. Smart risks, like. Stock market, feel me?”

“You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“More ideas than you. Just saying. Ask the bank.” She grabbed the truck keys and her phone, then started heading outside. “Ask your friends.”

“What friends?” he said, and the screen door slapped shut.