The Fish Fry Widow

Mama Ruth's Fish Fry has been a Jackson, Mississippi institution for forty years.

My husband Clarence started it in our backyard with a single fryer. By the time he passed last year, we had three fryers, a permanent tent, and a line that wrapped around the block every Friday.

I'm Ruth. I'm fifty-eight. And I'm trying to keep his dream alive.

"Miss Ruth? Need some help with that propane?"

Walter James. My husband's best friend since childhood. Sixty years old, retired from the post office, widowed himself five years back.

"I can manage, Walter."

"I know you can." He takes the tank anyway. "But you shouldn't have to."

He started showing up a month after the funeral.

Just appearing on Fridays, rolling up sleeves, helping with the heavy work Clarence used to do. Never asking for payment. Never expecting anything.

"Why are you doing this?" I finally asked.

"Because Clarence would haunt me if I let you struggle," he said. "And because watching you work that fryer is the best part of my week."

I didn't know what to say to that.

Weeks turn into months.

Walter becomes a fixture—arrives at four to help set up, stays until ten to help break down. The customers love him. The church ladies gossip.

"That man is courting you, Ruth."

"We're just friends."

"Mm-hmm." Sister Johnson gives me a look. "That's what I said about my third husband."

Tonight the crowd is light.

Summer rain, unexpected, driving people home early. By eight, we're done—sold out of catfish, only hushpuppies left.

"Might as well close up," Walter says.

"Help me bring in the fryers first."

We work in comfortable silence, rain pattering on the tent. When everything's secure, we're both soaked.

"Come inside," I say. "Dry off. I've got coffee."

My kitchen still has Clarence everywhere.

His fishing photos. His favorite mug. The chair at the table that no one sits in.

Walter notices. "You don't have to keep it like a museum, Ruth."

"What do you mean?"

"He's been gone a year. It's okay to... move things. Change things." He meets my eyes. "Live."

"What if I don't know how?"

He crosses to me.

Stands close enough that I can feel his warmth through our damp clothes.

"I'm not trying to replace him," he says quietly. "No one could replace Clarence."

"Walter..."

"But I've been in love with you for forty years. Since before he married you. And if there's even a chance—"

I kiss him.

It's tentative at first.

Neither of us has done this in a long time. But then his hands find my waist, and mine find his shoulders, and suddenly it's not tentative at all.

"Ruth." My name sounds sacred in his mouth. "Are you sure?"

"I'm tired of being alone, Walter. I'm tired of living in a museum."

"Then let me help you live."

We make it to the bedroom.

Not Clarence's side—mine. That matters, somehow.

Walter undresses me like I'm fragile, which I'm not. But I let him, because no one has touched me with this much care in years.

"You're beautiful," he says.

"I'm old and thick and—"

"Beautiful." He kisses my forehead. "Every line tells a story. I want to learn them all."

He lays me down and takes his time.

Kisses my neck, my collarbone, the swell of my breasts. His mouth traces lower—my belly, my hips, the stretch marks from children grown and gone.

"Walter—"

"Let me." He settles between my thighs. "Let me show you."

His mouth finds me and I gasp.

Clarence was never much for this—said it wasn't natural. But Walter... Walter eats me like I'm his last meal.

"Oh—oh Lord—"

"That's it, Ruth. Let go."

I haven't let go in so long. Haven't felt pleasure that wasn't memory. But his tongue is persistent, patient, and when the wave finally hits—

I cry.

"I'm sorry," I manage through tears. "I don't know why—"

"Shh." He holds me, naked and trembling. "It's okay. It's all okay."

"I feel guilty. Like I'm betraying—"

"You're not." He kisses my forehead. "Clarence wanted you happy. He told me before he passed—said if anything happened, he wanted someone to look after you."

"He said that?"

"Said if it was going to be anyone, he hoped it would be me."

That changes something.

I pull him close, feel his readiness against my thigh.

"Then show me," I whisper. "Show me what he gave us permission for."

He enters me slowly.

Different from Clarence—not better or worse, just different. Walter is patient where my husband was eager. Thorough where Clarence was quick.

"So good," he groans. "Forty years, Ruth. Forty years of wanting this."

"Show me. Show me all forty years."

We make love slowly, then faster, then slow again.

He finds rhythms Clarence never looked for. Hits spots I forgot I had. When I come—really come, the way I haven't in decades—I scream his name loud enough to wake the neighborhood.

He follows me over, buried deep, and I feel alive.

"Stay," I say afterward. "Tonight. And tomorrow."

"And after that?"

"We'll figure it out."

He smiles—the smile I've seen at fish fries for forty years—and pulls me close.

"No more museum?"

"No more museum."

Mama Ruth's Fish Fry gets a new sign the following month.

"Ruth & Walter's Fish Fry," it reads.

The church ladies talk, of course. But they buy catfish anyway.

And every Friday, when the last customer leaves, we close up together.

Go inside together.

Live together.

Clarence's chair finally has someone in it.

Not a replacement. A continuation.

A second chance at the life he wanted for me.

I think he's smiling somewhere.

I know I am.