“Yeah,” said Ida. “And we need some whiskey bottles too. And an old barrel for our moonshine still.”
“Moonshine!” said Otis. “When did the two of you take up with the bad guys?”
Ellie giggled. “It’s just pretend,” she said.
Daddy came out of the house just then, and the girls started begging to go to Otis’s house to look for an old car seat. Before Daddy could say no, Otis spoke up. “I don’t mind,” he said.
So after supper Daddy took him home and let the girls ride along. From the sound of their voices when they came home later, I could tell the twins had had a good time.
“Momma!” hollered Ellie.
“Ann Fay!” yelled Ida. “Come and look what we got.”
It was getting dark by this time, so we could barely make out what was on the back of Daddy’s truck. The car seat the girls wanted was there, but another seat was there too—shining in the dark. It was a toilet! And a sink too. And some pipes and a pile of boards.
Daddy put his arm around Momma. “Looks like our dream is coming true,” he said. “All this time we’ve been hankering after a bathroom and Otis had one in his backyard.”
Momma’s mouth was open so wide you could’ve practically filled it with that bathroom sink. “Did you pay for it?” she asked.
Daddy shook his head. “Otis wouldn’t hear of it. He said this is his way of thanking you for that good home cooking. And in case you think he hasn’t eaten enough mashed potatoes to pay for it, I expect he’ll be back for more.”
And that’s how it happened that on Saturday, Daddy and Otis started closing in the back porch to turn it into a bathroom. But first they went to town and bought a kitchen sink and a pump. And Junior Bledsoe helped them pick a heavy old bathtub with fancy feet on it out of the weeds at Otis’s place and unload it off the truck at our house.
“A body just can never tell when a dream might come true,” said Momma. She was rubbing her big tummy, so it was hard to know which dream she was talking about.
42
Nothing Finer!
July 1946
Bessie Bledsoe gave us about two weeks with Daddy back at home. Then she started making plans for the whole family to come to her house for supper. “And she wants the Hinkle sisters to be there too,” said Junior. He’d come down special to inform us.
Then all of a sudden the plans changed. Miss Dinah dropped in to invite us to their house instead. “I’ve already talked to Bessie,” she said. “She and Junior will join us. And Bessie will make fresh peach pie from those trees in her yard.” Somehow she managed to get her words out between kisses from Mr. Shoes.
Daddy told Miss Dinah that he would be working on our bathroom that Saturday. “So Otis Hickey will be here too,” he explained.
“Sure,” said Miss Dinah. “Bring Otis along. The more the merrier! When supper is over you men can all go back to work while the women visit.”
So that’s what we did.
When I came home from working at the store on Saturday I just couldn’t believe how much of that bathroom was done. The pump wasn’t hooked up yet and the pipes weren’t in place, but the room was closed in and there was a commode, sink, and bathtub all set in place.
My family was actually going to have a real bathroom! We could get rid of the chamber pot for good, and even though the outhouse was still in the backyard, we wouldn’t have to go out there. “Unless,” said Daddy, “we start missing old johnny!”
Daddy and Otis were fixing to put the pump into the well when Junior had to leave to take his momma and the food she cooked up to the Hinkle sisters’.
“Well, that’s our cue,” said Daddy. “Time for us to get ready for supper.” So they put their work aside for a while, which almost made me want to skip the supper altogether.
Momma felt the same way. “It would be so easy to stay home,” she said, and she gave out a big sigh. It seemed almost like she was in pain or something. But she hadn’t been comfortable for the last couple of weeks, so I figured she was just ready to get the baby out of there.
Well, I didn’t have any idea just how ready she was, or how quick something like that could happen! It seemed like it wasn’t more than five minutes after we sat down at the Hinkle sisters’ table when I noticed that Momma had only taken a tiny spoonful of each thing and was just pushing it all around on her plate.
Beads of sweat was standing out on her forehead. That wasn’t surprising, considering how hot it was and how every last one of us was sweating. But it was more than just the sweating I was worrying about—it was the twitches in her face. And the way she would bite her lip and suck in her breath so loud I thought everyone at the table could hear it.
But Otis was telling a story about how when he was a child he got separated from his parents at the Old Soldiers Reunion. And how the mayor of Newton found him and took him up to the stage and made an announcement to everyone at the parade that this child’s parents were lost. And how he boo-hoo’d into the megaphone. So right when a group of clowns was going down the street handing out candy and trying to make little children laugh, he, Otis, was crying louder than any other noise at the parade.
Of course everyone at the table was laughing too, just listening to the story—except Momma, who looked like she was fixing to bust into tears.
You would think that I was the one with a megaphone. On account of all of a sudden I interrupted Otis and said, “Can’t y’all see this is no laughing matter? Momma isn’t feeling good. Are you, Momma?”
That’s when Momma put down her fork and gave up on pretending to eat. She just gave up on good manners altogether. “Leroy,” she said, “take me home this instant. I’m about to have our baby.”
Well, just like that, my daddy jumped up. “Yes, ma’am!” he said. He looked scared. “Someone call Dr. Johnson. Ask him to come to our house quick!”
But Miss Pauline wouldn’t hear of sending Momma home. “What if that baby decides to come on the way?” she said. “No sirree, I’m not about to let you have that baby in a pickup truck. And what if you get home but Dr. Johnson doesn’t get there in time?”
“You can use my bed,” said Miss Dinah. She jumped up and headed in there to get it ready.
But Miss Pauline wouldn’t hear of that either. “Dinah, that dog has been on your bed. It is not a fit place for a baby to be born. Myrtle will use my room.”
She went back to her bedroom door and opened it, but of course, the minute she did, Mr. Shoes ran inside.
Well, you should’ve seen Miss Pauline then. She reached for the nearest thing, which was the telephone directory that Bessie was using to look up Dr. Johnson’s number, and ran after Mr. Shoes. She must have swatted him with that directory, too, on account of he yelped and ran back out.
Miss Pauline took Momma by the arm and told Bessie to boil some water, and then she shooed all the men out of the house. “Go back to work on that bathroom,” she said.
“Maybe I should wait until the doctor gets here,” said Daddy.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Miss Pauline. “Leave the babies to us women. You’ve got men’s work to do. Now go do it! You’re going to need that bathroom more than ever. And take that dog with you!” She gave Daddy a little push and Otis pulled him the rest of the way out the door.
Junior shrugged and then he followed Daddy and Otis. They acted reluctant, but I had a feeling all three of them were relieved to be leaving the baby-delivering to us women. The next thing I knew, they were driving out the lane in Junior’s car. But they forgot to take Mr. Shoes with them.
I don’t know how Miss Pauline knew so much about delivering babies, but you would’ve thought she’d done it before. The truth is, she used to be a schoolteacher and it seemed like her natural bossiness just kicked in.
“You girls go outside,” she said to Ida and Ellie. She looked at me then and jerked her head a little in the direction of the back door.
So I said, “Come on. Let’s go wait for Dr. Johnson. Y’all ca
n stand at the end of the driveway and flag him down so he doesn’t miss it.” I led the way out to the back steps. When I passed the dining room table I thought what a shame it was that most of that good food was still there filling up our plates. But I don’t suppose any of us was in a mood to eat just then.
I sat on the steps and sent up prayers for Momma. And I prayed Dr. Johnson would get there soon.
Which he did. All of a sudden I heard the girls yelling and saw them waving. Dr. Johnson turned into the Hinkle sisters’ lane and stopped his car. He jumped out and shut the door and then reached back inside the open window for his black bag.
The girls started to follow him into the house. “Ida and Ellie, you sit down here,” I said. “He doesn’t need your help.”
But then I heard a baby cry and knew it had gotten there ahead of the doctor. So I didn’t bother making the twins stay outside. In fact, I let go of Mr. Shoes and got up to follow them. Mr. Shoes ran in—right between Dr. Johnson’s feet. I saw that he went straight into Miss Pauline’s room.
By the time I got in there he was snuggled in next to Momma. Miss Pauline hadn’t even noticed on account of she was busy telling the doctor how it all happened.
Dr. Johnson let me and the girls go in and look at the baby. He was all wrinkly, and he had a head of brown curly hair that put me in mind of my momma and my brother Bobby both. And I thought how nice it was of him to come out a boy instead of another girl. I didn’t think I could handle one more girl in this family, and I had a feeling a boy would do Daddy proud.
When Miss Pauline saw Mr. Shoes there on the bed, she swatted him with a coat hanger. “Take that dog home, would you please?” she said to Miss Dinah. But it wasn’t really a question. More like a schoolteacher telling a class to get quiet right now! So Miss Dinah and me and the girls all climbed into her car and we took Mr. Shoes with us.
The girls were out of the car practically before it came to a stop in front of our house. “It’s a boy,” they shouted together. They went running into the house yelling at the top of their lungs, and by the time I made it to the porch my daddy was coming out the front door.
I doubt he had time to put one pipe in place since he got back there. And now he was leaving again—to see his new baby boy.
I went through the kitchen and out to the back porch. Otis and Junior was busy lowering the pump down into the well so we could get water into the new bathroom.
Maybe it was all the excitement of the new baby, but my nerves were just on edge. Every time I watched Junior leaning into that well, I got a real dizzy feeling. In my mind I kept seeing him going headfirst into the dark water. So I started fussing at him the way Momma does at Daddy when he climbs up on the roof to clean out the chimney and she thinks he’s going to fall.
“Junior,” I said. “Would you be careful? You’re fixing to fall right in that well.”
But of course he just ignored me. I know he heard me, though, because he leaned in a little more. Showing off! I couldn’t hardly stand to look. Finally I said, “Junior Bledsoe, if you fall in that well, I promise I will never speak to you again.”
So he pulled his head out and gave me a big old grin. “No point in talking to a dead man. What I wanna know is, would you fish me back out or just leave me there?”
I made a face at him. “I couldn’t just leave you on account of the water wouldn’t be fit to drink after that.”
Junior gave me a big wink then and said, “Who knows—it might taste better than ever.” And then he disappeared into the new bathroom to work on the plumbing on that end.
I sat on the porch and watched the stars pop up into the sky one by one. And the lightning bugs blinking on and off. Like they couldn’t make up their mind what they wanted to do. Shine or not shine.
I felt that way myself sometimes. Like I didn’t know what I wanted either. Sometimes I wanted in the worst way to go back to Warm Springs. To have myself a life that was finer and more interesting than this one right here. But then there were moments like this when the people I loved most were nearby and life wasn’t boring at all. It was wild and crazy and filled with good food and new things to do and talk about and laugh over.
I thought about Imogene and how, if we couldn’t be friends, at least I could listen to the songs of her people any Sunday or Wednesday night when I took a notion. And that was something to look forward to!
It got dark then. Too dark for Otis and Junior to get any more work done. I figured Momma would be sleeping in Miss Pauline’s bed that night and wondered if Daddy would too. I just couldn’t picture that. Where would Miss Pauline sleep? On the sofa? Or with her sister in that bed Mr. Shoes had been leaving his hairs on?
I laughed just thinking about it.
Junior told Otis he’d drive him home and he asked me to ride along. “The girls can come too,” he said.
Well, the thought of being at home trying to get two excited little girls into bed was more than I could handle, so we all piled in. But by the time we were passing the Hinkle sisters’ house, the twins were begging to go see their new brother again.
So we dropped them off. I almost went with them, but Junior talked me out of it. “That baby will be here when you get back,” he said. He was right, of course, so I stayed in the car.
When we got to Otis’s house, the headlights on Junior’s car lit up the odd piles of junk in his backyard. It made me feel like getting out and walking through there to see what other treasures Otis had been storing up. But I just thanked him for hanging on to practically a whole bathroom just for us.
“Not a problem,” he said. “Not a problem at all.” And he got out of the car and went into his house.
As Junior backed out of the driveway, I watched him in the light of the dashboard, thinking how he looked so different to me now. It used to be that he was just an annoying neighbor boy who thought he was an expert on every little thing. I never knew whether to be glad he was there or wish he would go away.
But now it seemed like he had changed. Or maybe I was the one who was different. On account of now I realized that if he did go away—whether he fell into a well or just drove off in his car and never came back—I would not like it one bit.
Junior stepped on the gas until the air coming in the window whipped my hair into my face so that I couldn’t see him so well anymore. The sounds of the crickets and tree frogs blurred into a song of sorts, and for some reason it put me in mind of Junior’s singing.
I started singing myself. “Nothing could be finer than to be in Carolina…”
Junior joined in. And honestly? He really should’ve left the singing to me. But for once I didn’t care that he couldn’t carry a tune.
I just liked that the two of us were singing the same song.
Epilogue
I’m not saying my daddy was all the way better just on account of he and Otis talked about the war.
Or because Momma had him a baby boy.
I’m not saying he hopped out of bed every day singing, “Oh, what a beautiful morning.”
As Otis would say, “He has his good days and his bad days, he does.”
And I reckon that’s the way it should be.
The truth is, if my daddy had come home from war as cool as a slice of watermelon, I’d think he wasn’t my daddy at all.
Someone with a heart like his can’t watch people die (and take part in it too) without breaking right into pieces.
I reckon what happened to him is sort of like me getting polio. Only worse.
Disaster snuck up on both of us and after that nothing was the same ever again.
In that way, me and my daddy are still alike.
Sometimes we both think no one understands what we’re going through.
And maybe they don’t.
But with a little help from our friends, the two of us have more good days than bad ones, we do…
It mostly hurts at first.
After a while it starts to feel better…
Author’s Note
>
I wrote Comfort because I needed to find out what happened to Ann Fay after Blue ended. I suspected that war had changed her relationship with her father, and I knew that polio would have created physical and emotional adjustments for her.
As an author, however, I don’t simply decide what will happen to my characters. I have to read, interview, and listen to history in order to find my plot. In this case I was surprised to discover that my fictional character Ann Fay did not remain at home with her family but instead went to Warm Springs, Georgia, for rehabilitation. As I researched I began to feel that it was a special honor to tell the Warm Springs story.
When Franklin Roosevelt established the Georgia Warm Springs Foundation, he wanted to provide a place where “polios”—as people who had polio often call themselves—could rehabilitate physically and thrive emotionally. At Warm Springs, polios learned physical and life skills, and—perhaps even more important—they rediscovered themselves as people who were not defined by their disability. Many of them later brought their new awareness to the public arena.
Hugh Gallagher was one alumnus who did. He had been at Warm Springs in the 1950s. When he later worked for Senator Bob Bartlett in Washington, DC, he discovered that it was impossible for him to enter many government buildings without special assistance. With the support of Senator Bartlett, he wrote the Architectural Barriers Act. Its passage led to the installation of ramps, elevators, automatic doors, and other accessible features in public buildings across the nation.
In 1962, another polio, Ed Roberts, gained the right to attend college in an iron lung. His efforts to establish accessibility and fairness for people with many kinds of disabilities began at the University of California at Berkeley. From there, an independent-living movement spread across the nation, so that people with disabilities could have what they needed to live on their own, without special assistance.
Eventually, the efforts of Hugh Gallagher, Ed Roberts, and other polios brought about the passage of the ADA, the Americans with Disability Act, which condemned discrimination against people with disabilities. The ADA provided them with equal opportunities for jobs, housing, education, and public services.
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