*Author's Note: Any and all persons engaging in any sexual activity are at least eighteen years of age.
Disclaimers: This story has been edited by myself, utilizing Microsoft Spell-Check. You have been forewarned; expect to find mistakes.
*.*
Bobby Broussard raised an eyebrow when he entered the apartment. Michelle was in the kitchen, making his favorite dinner. He could smell the chicken frying, could smell the zucchini and squash cooking in a mix of onion and bell pepper and garlic, could smell the dirty rice.
"Hi Sweetheart," Michelle called out.
That was another warning; Michelle never used pet names unless she wanted something. Most of the time, she addressed him as 'Bobby.' On those occasions when she was irritated with him, she called him 'Broussard.'
"Uh huh," Bobby said.
"Momma's got the girls," Michelle said, letting Bobby know something monumental was on the horizon. Dropping Samantha and Nicole off at her mother's meant she wanted Bobby's undivided attention.
"Maybe she's pregnant again?" Bobby wondered as he went to their bedroom.
He changed out of his dirty jeans and pull over shirt and pursed his lips; the hamper was full again. Unless Michelle packed clean uniforms for Samantha and Nicole with her mother, they'd have to run down to the apartment laundry room and hope that the three Latin women in the back had not claimed the entire laundry room for themselves.
Bobby suspected that the three women actually took in laundry for others, washed clothes as a way to supplement their income. He simply did not believe that the three loud, overbearing women had that much laundry to do nearly every day of the week.
"And sure as I'm standing here? They speak perfect English," Bobby muttered, checking that there was a roll of quarters on the low dresser.
Michelle and Bobby ate the meal, chattering lightly about the work day, about their children, about their finances.
"Know when we got married, didn't expect still be in this apartment ten years later, huh?" Michelle commented lightly.
"Mm-mm," Bobby agreed, gnawing the meat of his chicken bone. "But when we had that cancer..."
"We uh, our tenth, Bobby, Sweetheart, we going be celebrating ten years next month," Michelle suddenly declared.
"Uh huh, just said we been here ten years," Bobby agreed.
"One oh. Ten years. Ten years," Michelle said, nervously.
"Uh huh," Bobby said, waiting.
"And you been a good husband," Michelle said.
"'Cause you been a good wife," Bobby said.
She smiled and patted his large, calloused hand. Then she looked at the wall of the kitchen, at a small stain on the wall. The source of the stain wasn't apparent to either Bobby or Michelle. It seemed to have just appeared and no amount of scrubbing would remove it.
"And I been faithful, one hundred and one percent faithful to you whole time," Michelle suddenly blurted.
"Uh huh," Bobby said slowly. "And me too, that what you getting at."
"Know Debbie?" Michelle said.
"Debbie, Debbie, oh, that girl, one works counter with you?" Bobby guessed.
"Uh huh," Michelle said.
"One up and married that, damn what his name was, that black guy?" Bobby clarified.
"Uh huh, that her," Michelle agreed.
"Uh huh, and what 'bout her?" Bobby asked.
"I ain't never had no black guy," Michelle said.
"Makes two of us," Bobby agreed.
"Broussard, huh?" Michelle said, pursing her lips.
"So what you saying?" Bobby asked.
"Saying, been talking to Debbie, you know, just girl talk," Michelle said, again studying the stain.
"Uh huh, and?" Bobby said when she lapsed into silence.
"Since we been married, it been you and me and Samantha and then she ain't even out them diapers and then we got Nicole," Michelle said. "I mean, I ain't complaining, but man! I mean, when I'm going be able have some fun?"
"You was twenty when we married," Bobby said. "Time having fun before we get married.
"Listen, I'm, before we get our tenth? You know, before our tenth anniversary, you let me go out, Debbie's husband, he got him couple of cousins, you know, then we celebrate our tenth, man, maybe even start looking at couple houses," Michelle pleaded.
Bobby now regarded the stain on the wall. He'd been twenty four when Michelle had run into him. Literally. She had not seen the stop sign and had run right into him, t-boning his brand new truck. At the time, he had been too upset to notice the beautiful red hair, the bright green eyes, the adorable sprinkling of freckles. He had been too upset to see the 30D breasts stretching the thin tee shirt, the narrow waist that he could nearly get both hands around. He did not see the cute bubble butt bursting out of her cutoff shorts.
The frame was bent, so his insurance had no choice but to declare the truck totaled. Michelle Trahan's insurance covered the replacement cost, minus the deductible; Michelle's father covered the deductible.
Bobby went to the Trahan house to thank Mr. Frank Trahan; a cousin of Bobby's had been in a similar incident. The cousin had to take the other party to court and sue them in order to get them to pay the deductible.
"Hello," Michelle said as she stood behind the screen door. "Oh! You got you a new truck?"
"I uh, yeah, I, your daddy home?" Bobby stammered, looking at the cute young lady.
Frank shook the polite young man's hand, invited him in for coffee. Before he left, Bobby had a date with Michelle Trahan.
"Man, had run into him get a date?" Frank teased his daughter.
Now, staring at the stain, Bobby remembered they had a laundry hamper full of clothes. He abruptly got up from the table.
"Bobby, Sweetheart, what, where you going?" Michelle demanded.
"Got bunch of wash need do," Bobby said.
"But what about..." Michelle demanded.
"Michelle, need let me think 'bout this yeah," Bobby said, grabbing the bottle of laundry detergent from underneath their kitchen sink.
"What there think about?" Michelle demanded.
"Okay, I say 'aw don't worry 'bout it; you just go on 'head there' and you do it," Bobby explained.
"Uh huh?" Michelle asked.
