#45: Lou's Unhappy Surprise.

Lou arrived home from work, having been promoted for the second day in a row.  She went directly to the refrigerator.

Peter was eating dinner at the bar and, although there were empty seats on either side of him, Lou dug into her plate standing up, with her back to him.

Peter took a deep breath.  "Wanna make up?" he asked, teasing her.

"I'M not mad--YOU'RE the one who's mad," Lou replied (clearly still mad).

(Peter and Lou had disagreed a few days earlier on how to split up the Utopia House's funds.  Lou--who was in charge of managing the household's money and getting the bills paid--had seemed to take for granted that all the housemates would get an equal share, while other Utopians, including Peter, were okay with giving Derek and Kelly a bigger share so that Derek could fix up the house he wanted to buy for himself and Kelly.

(And, since Peter earned by far the most money of all the Utopians, Lou had felt she didn't have the right to overcome his objection.  And Lou was earning very little money by comparison.  And she wasn't happy about ANY of that, and had fumed about it for days.)

Lou sat down next to Peter and stabbed at her food.  "So, I have a proposal for you," he began.

Lou flinched at the word "proposal", but said only, "What's up?" but was unable to keep an icy tone out of her voice.

Bill was bringing dirty plates over to Regina, who was washing dishes.  'Geez, I sure want to get the heck out of here!' he thought.

"So, I was thinking," Peter continued bravely, "that, well, it seems some of our housemates are about to move out.  For Derek and Kelly, I think it's any day now, and for Regina and Bill--"

"What do you mean--'Regina and Bill'!" Lou demanded.

Regina whirled around.  "We were going to tell you," she said sheepishly.  "I was just waiting for the right moment."

"The 'right moment' to tell me WHAT???" Lou asked, already getting angry.

"Monday night, Bill and I decided we would get married," Regina said nervously.

"We've been keeping it quiet, because we didn't want to get in the way of the whole Derek-Kelly thing."

Lou looked stone-faced, and in shock.

"And you didn't think this information was worth telling your best friend?" Lou said, sounding hurt.  "For TWO FREAKIN' DAYS?"

Regina dried her hands and sat down next to Peter.  "I'm sorry, Lou," she apologized (though she didn't really think an apology was warranted).  "We didn't plan to tell anyone.  If Alice hadn't figured it out on her own--"

Peter could sense that Lou was working her way up to an epic rant, and tried to defuse it in advance.

"Look, Regina, I think Lou understands, and appreciates, your consideration of Kelly's feelings, and--"

Peter was, however, NOT successful in his efforts.

Lou jumped out of her chair.  'Oh, geez,' Peter thought.  'This is NOT going to go well.'

"Are you telling me that ALICE--drunk, stupid, hopeless, freakin' shiftless ALICE--knew you two were moving out BEFORE I DID???"

"Hey, Lou, calm down!" Regina pleaded.  "We're not about to move out, just because we bought a house.  It needs a LOT of work, so--"

The "bought a house" reference was all Lou needed to hear, before she stormed out of the Utopia House into the night.