“Water? How can a sausage be cooked in water?”
“It’s a hot dog, not a sausage.”
Of course it was a sausage, whether or not they called it the ludicrous name of “hot dog,” and so she fried two in a little oil as she was used to doing with Satis sausages. Dike looked on in horror. She turned the stove off. He backed away and said “Ugh.” They stood looking at each other, between them a plate with a bun and two shriveled hot dogs. She knew then that she should have listened to him.
“Can I have a peanut butter and jelly sandwich instead?” Dike asked. She followed his instructions for the sandwich, cutting off the bread crusts, layering on the peanut butter first, stifling her laughter at how closely he watched her, as though she just might decide to fry the sandwich.
When, that evening, Ifemelu told Aunty Uju about the hot dog incident, Aunty Uju said with none of the amusement Ifemelu had expected, “They are not sausages, they are hot dogs.”
“It’s like saying that a bikini is not the same thing as underwear. Would a visitor from space know the difference?”
Aunty Uju shrugged; she was sitting at the dining table, a medical textbook open in front of her, eating a hamburger from a rumpled paper bag. Her skin dry, her eyes shadowed, her spirit bleached of color. She seemed to be staring at, rather than reading, the book.
AT THE GROCERY STORE, Aunty Uju never bought what she needed; instead she bought what was on sale and made herself need it. She would take the colorful flyer at the entrance of Key Food, and go looking for the sale items, aisle after aisle, while Ifemelu wheeled the cart and Dike walked along.
“Mummy, I don’t like that. Get the blue one,” Dike said, as Aunty Uju put cartons of cereal in the cart.
“It’s buy one, get one free,” Aunty Uju said.
“It doesn’t taste good.”
“It tastes just like your regular cereal, Dike.”
“No.” Dike took a blue carton from the shelf and hurried ahead to the checkout counter.
“Hi, little guy!” The cashier was large and cheerful, her cheeks reddened and peeling from sunburn. “Helping Mummy out?”
“Dike, put it back
,” Aunty Uju said, with the nasal, sliding accent she put on when she spoke to white Americans, in the presence of white Americans, in the hearing of white Americans. Pooh-reet-back. And with the accent emerged a new persona, apologetic and self-abasing. She was overeager with the cashier. “Sorry, sorry,” she said as she fumbled to get her debit card from her wallet. Because the cashier was watching, Aunty Uju let Dike keep the cereal, but in the car she grabbed his left ear and twisted it, yanked it.
“I have told you, do not ever take anything in the grocery! Do you hear me? Or do you want me to slap you before you hear?”
Dike pressed his palm to his ear.
Aunty Uju turned to Ifemelu. “This is how children like to misbehave in this country. Jane was even telling me that her daughter threatens to call the police when she beats her. Imagine. I don’t blame the girl, she has come to America and learned about calling the police.”
Ifemelu rubbed Dike’s knee. He did not look at her. Aunty Uju was driving a little too fast.
DIKE CALLED OUT from the bathroom, where he had been sent to brush his teeth before bed.
“Dike, I mechago?” Ifemelu asked.
“Please don’t speak Igbo to him,” Aunty Uju said. “Two languages will confuse him.”
“What are you talking about, Aunty? We spoke two languages growing up.”
“This is America. It’s different.”
Ifemelu held her tongue. Aunty Uju closed her medical book and stared ahead at nothing. The television was off and the sound of water running came from the bathroom.
“Aunty, what is it?” Ifemelu asked. “What is wrong?”
“What do you mean? Nothing is wrong.” Aunty Uju sighed. “I failed my last exam. I got the result just before you came.”
“Oh.” Ifemelu was watching her.
“I’ve never failed an exam in my life. But they weren’t testing actual knowledge, they were testing our ability to answer tricky multiple-choice questions that have nothing to do with real medical knowledge.” She stood up and went to the kitchen. “I’m tired. I am so tired. I thought by now things would be better for me and Dike. It’s not as if anybody was helping me and I just could not believe how quickly money went. I was studying and working three jobs. I was doing retail at the mall, and a research assistantship, and I even did some hours at Burger King.”