They said their goodbyes and left.
“Nice girl,” Tass said.
“Pretty too,” Fish added with a wink.
The doorbell rang, and when one of the younger children opened the door, Aida was standing there.
“I forgot my pocketbook.”
She walked back into the dining room and reached for the purse, which was dangling on the back of a chair. Before turning to leave, she looked right at Emmett and offered a soft, knowing smile.
Emmett gasped with surprise.
Later on, in the darkness of the movie theater, Sonny and Aida shared a large tub of buttered popcorn. On the screen, Pam Grier pulled a gun on her would-be murderer and pressed the nozzle into his groin.
Aida stared at the screen, but her mind was on the spirit in the May home. She reached for her cup of Coca-Cola and slurped until the brown sweetness filled her mouth.
For most of the film, she pondered whether or not she should share what she knew with Sonny. Finally, when the credits began to roll, she turned to him and whispered, “Do you believe in ghosts?”
Sonny laughed. “No, why, do you?”
Aida nodded her head yes.
He shrugged his shoulders and said, “I guess to each its own,” then stood to leave. Aida followed him out of the theater.
As they walked down the street, Aida grabbed hold of his hand and began: “Well, the reason why I asked is because …” She launched passionately into her explanation, using her free hand in an animated way to describe what she had seen.
Sonny first thought Aida was joking, but the seriousness in her voice told him otherwise.
When she was done, he looked her and blurted out with a laugh, “A ghost? In my mama’s house?”
“Yes.”
He’d had crazy in his life before, and was not eager to invite it back in.
When he dropped Aida off at her home that evening, he shook her hand at the front door. Aida knew then that he didn’t believe one word she’d said and that she would never see him again.
They were thirty years into their marriage when Fish’s sight began to fail.
Diabetes.
It was bound to happen. You can’t escape a disease like that if you drink Coca-Cola with your breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
Tass had to inject the insulin into his veins, because he couldn’t bear to stick himself.
They now had grown children and grandchildren who owned cars and lived close by, but they had their own jobs and families, and not much time to chauffer Fish and Tass around. And so after an entire lifetime of being a passenger, Tass decided she would learn how to drive.
Sonny was recruited to teach her. Fish supervised from the backseat.
Sonny pointed to the pedals. “Okay, Mama. That one is the gas and that one is the brake.” He handed her the ignition key. “Push it in, press down on the brake, and turn the key.”
Tass did as she was told and the car roared to life. The younger children watched silently from the porch.
“Now,” Sonny said, “shift the gear into dri—”
“See, already you telling her wrong!” Fish barked. Sonny turned around to meet his father’s angry eyes.
“How am I telling her wrong, Fish?”
“Did you tell her what the gearshift was?”
Tass was gripping the wheel so tightly her fingers went numb. Her eyes were glued to the wide, open street before her, and when she spoke, the words came from the corner of her mouth: “I know where the gearshift is. I put it in drive, right?”
“Yeah, Mama.”
Tass grabbed hold of the gearshift. “How do I know when it’s in drive?”
Sonny leaned over and tapped the arched glass embedded in the dashboard.
“D is for drive,” Fish grumbled.
Tass ignored him. “Do I keep my foot on the brake?”
“Yep!”
She pulled the gear down and watched as the dial clicked to D.
“Okay, now ease your foot off the brake and step on the gas—”
“Gently!” Fish yelled.
The car jerked, Tass shrieked and slammed both feet down on the brake.
Sonny sighed. “Okay, Mama, let’s try it once more. This time, keep your foot on the gas.”
“Okay.”
Tass eased her foot off the brake again and placed it on the gas pedal. She gave it a little pressure and the car began to roll forward. A cheer went up from the children.
The car inched along at a turtle’s pace until it reached the corner. Tass stepped down on the brake and looked at Sonny.
“Which way should I go?”
“Whichever way you want.”
Fish let off a long, loud yawn. “Left.”
Sonny placed his hand over Tass’s and together they steered the car left.
“It turned, it turned!” Tass squealed with joy.
“Imagine that,” Fish muttered.
A year after Tass learned to drive, Fish suffered a stroke, rendering his left arm and leg useless, and slurring his speech.
At the hospital, Tass and the children cornered Fish’s doctor and pelted him with dozens of questions, including the one that was the most difficult to ask: “He still got his mind?”
“Yes.” The doctor’s response was emphatic. “Luckily, he only suffered some physical fallout, but his mind is still as sharp as it was before the stroke.”
Understandably, Fish was frustrated and angry at how his body had turned on him. No soft or comforting words from his wife could expunge the indignation he experienced every time she had to assist him with the handling of his own penis or bend him over the toilet to clean his behind.
The constant humiliation ravaged his ego and Fish began to turn mean.
At first Tass ignored the way he watched her, pointedly
