BERNIECE: You ain’t keeping me up. I couldn’t sleep after that Boy Willie woke me up.

LYMON: You got on that nightgown. I likes women when they wear them fancy nightclothes and all. It makes their skin look real pretty.

BERNIECE: I got this at the five-and-ten-cents store. It ain’t so fancy.

LYMON: I don’t too often get to see a woman dressed like that.

(There is a long pause. LYMON takes off his suit coat.)

Well, I’m gonna sleep here on the couch. I’m supposed to sleep on the floor but I don’t reckon Boy Willie’s coming back tonight. Wining Boy sold me this suit. Told me it was a magic suit. I’m gonna put it on again tomorrow. Maybe it bring me a woman like he say.

(He goes into his coat pocket and takes out a small bottle of perfume.)

I almost forgot I had this. Some man sold me this for a dollar. Say it come from Paris. This is the same kind of perfume the Queen of France wear. That’s what he told me. I don’t know if it’s true or not. I smelled it. It smelled good to me. Here . . . smell it see if you like it. I was gonna give it to Dolly. But I didn’t like her too much.

BERNIECE: (Takes the bottle.) It smells nice.

LYMON: I was gonna give it to Dolly if she had went to the picture with me. Go on, you take it.

BERNIECE: I can’t take it. Here . . . go on you keep it. You’ll find somebody to give it to.

LYMON: I wanna give it to you. Make you smell nice.

(He takes the bottle and puts perfume behind BERNIECE’s ear.)

They tell me you supposed to put it right here behind your ear. Say if you put it there you smell nice all day.

(BERNIECE stiffens at his touch. LYMON bends down to smell her.)

There . . . you smell real good now.

(He kisses her neck.)

You smell real good for Lymon.

(He kisses her again. BERNIECE returns the kiss, then breaks the embrace and crosses to the stairs. She turns and they look silently at each other. LYMON hands her the bottle of perfume. BERNIECE exits up the stairs. LYMON picks up his suit coat and strokes it lovingly with the full knowledge that it is indeed a magic suit. The lights go down on the scene.)

SCENE 4

(It is late the next morning. The lights come up on the parlor. LYMON is asleep on the sofa. BOY WILLIE enters the front door.)

BOY WILLIE: Hey, Lymon! Lymon, come on get up.

LYMON: Leave me alone.

BOY WILLIE: Come on, get up, nigger! Wake up, Lymon.

LYMON: What you want?

BOY WILLIE: Come on, let’s go. I done called the man about the piano.

LYMON: What piano?

BOY WILLIE: (Dumps LYMON on the floor.) Come on, get up!

LYMON: Why you leave, I looked around and you was gone.