Page 8 of Cooly

She was quiet for a moment. Then she let out a breath.

"I was engaged," she said finally. "About two years ago. Nigerian doctor. Yale undergrad. Harvard Med. His father is a judge, his mother's a professor. Exactly what my daddy wanted. What I said I wanted."

"But? I can hear the 'but.'"

She shrugged. "He was perfect. On paper. Good job. Good family. Pretty teeth. No golds. Good manners. He brought my mother flowers when we visited. Called my father 'sir.' Never raised his voice. Never got angry. Never felt any-fucking-thing."

"He was boring," she said. "Not just boring—safe. Like he'd been manufactured in a lab to be the perfect Nigerian husband. He didn't have a single edge."

I frowned. "Ma, what the fuck do you want then? I was too much, he was too little? You Goldilocks?"

She rolled her eyes. "That's not what I said."

"Nah, that's exactly what you said." I pointed at her. "You left me because you couldn't stomach what I was, then went and found yourself some squeaky-clean doctor and couldn't stomach his ass either. Wishy-washy ass."

"Chinedu—"

"And now you're a criminal defense attorney." I laughed, but there wasn't shit funny about it. "That's the part that really gets me."

Her expression tightened.

"You ain't like criminals when you were fucking me."

"I didn't leave you because you were a criminal."

"The fuck you didn't."

She raised her voice. "I left because your entire family operates a fucking international criminal enterprise."

"And now somebody gets caught operating one, they call you," I rebutted.

"That's my job."

"Right." I nodded slowly. "So the difference is they pay you six hundred dollars an hour to tolerate them."

"Six-fifty."

I stared at her.

She fought a smile.

"See? This is the shit I'm talking about."

"Being a defense attorney doesn't mean I approve of everything my clients do."

"But you stand next to them."

"Yes," she scoffed.

"You fight for them."

"That's literally my fucking job, Chinedu."

I gave her a long look. "Funny. I remember asking you to stand next to me, to fight for us."

That wiped the smile off her face.

For a second, neither of us said anything.