A bizarre sound from Aaron’s car transforms into a story with two surprise endings…
*If you're experiencing abuse, you can get help with just a call at 800-799-7233 or visit the National Domestic Violence Hotline’s Website.
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Story created & performed by: Aaron Calafato
Senior Audio Engineer: Ken Wendt
Additional vocals: Cori Birce
Art: Pete Whitehead
Original Music: thomas j. duke
Transcript
Trigger Warning: This episode contains elements of a domestic conflict. If you have young children, you might want to skip this one. If you are sensitive to this topic, please be mindful and know we have provided resources in the episode notes.
We heard an awkward sound. Cori and I were in the car, driving to the restaurant. Now, this wasn’t a typical car sound. We know the car. This was an awkward, potentially dangerous sound. I knew I had to figure out what was going on, and eventually, I would. But what I didn’t realize was that this sound would lead to two separate, unexpected endings to this story. I'll share both with you right after the music.
It was late summer, and Cori and I were in the mood for barbecue. Now, I don’t know if we have a great barbecue culture in Northeast Ohio—I don’t think we do. No disrespect to anyone in that business, but it is a thing in late summer here, even mid-summer, to feel like having some barbecue.
Sometimes, in the best-case scenario, this works out great. As a person who doesn’t like the heat, I’m looking for a barbecue rib-off or something like that around September. Cori and I have hit a couple of gold mines where we'll go to a place in early to mid-September, and the weather is cool, like 55 to 60 degrees. You get that amazing barbecue—still warm enough to cook outside—and it isn’t that crowded because for some reason, people love to eat barbecue in the heat.
That’s when it’s at its best for me. When it’s at its worst, it’s late August, and someone says, "Hey, let’s go to a giant black asphalt parking lot with a bunch of different vendors, pay an extreme ticket price to get in, and let’s sweat and die of heat exhaustion while people sweat over some barbecue, and you go bankrupt afterward." That’s the worst possible scenario. We didn’t want either one of those. But Cori suggested this barbecue spot we hadn’t tried. It’s on the west side of the city in a rural spot. So, we called her parents, made a reservation, and made our way there.
As I was telling you, we were in the car, and this weird sound was happening. I’m thinking, "I gotta find out what this is." My dad mode kicks in, and I start auditing the situation. You know what I’m talking about? I’m looking in the rearview mirror—check, nothing suspicious. Side mirrors—check, nothing suspicious. I’m looking, thinking, "I haven’t seen my muffler come off in the street"—check. As I’m going through my checklist, everything’s checking off. I’ve got green check marks everywhere. No check engine light—I’m good. But still, the sound persists.
We shrug our shoulders and decide to see what happens when we get there. We were only a couple of miles away. We pull up to the barbecue spot. Of course, I don’t just pull in nose first. I’m backing up these days—for an easy out, you know what I’m saying? So, I back the car up, park, and as we get out, Cori’s parents show up at the same time. Perfect timing.
I come around the car, and Cori’s eyes are wide open. My eyes are wide open. On the front of the car, in the grill, there is a bird. A bird is stuck in the grill. It’s alive. Its wing is caught, and it’s flapping around, going crazy. It’s in pure panic mode.
I wanted to help this bird immediately. As I moved towards it, I had a flashback to when the bird flu was rampant. I was interning in DC when the bird flu emerged and spread everywhere. I got symptoms of the flu and thought I had the bird flu. I have to be honest—I think I fought off the bird flu that year. I made it through, but I thought it off. So, that popped into my head as I was approaching the bird, and I thought maybe I should get some gloves on first.
Before I could do anything, my father-in-law, Jim, the original gangster, walks by me and says, "Step aside." With his bare hands, he quickly dislodges the bird, holds it in his hands, and the bird flies off into freedom. It’s like this guy does this every day—just freeing birds from grills of cars. I was so impressed. It was a beautiful moment to watch this bird get rescued from a perilous situation. Jim holds it for a brief second, and the bird, I swear, almost looked at all of us, nodded like in a movie, and said, "Hey, thanks," then flew away.
We go inside and get some really good barbecue. I gotta be honest, it was a little overrated—not going to say the place, but a little overrated. But we were lucky, right? First-world problems to complain about barbecue.
We leave the restaurant, and when we come outside, there’s another awkward noise—this time, it was the screeching of tires. My father-in-law and I, of course, are first on the scene. We watch this car screech up right in front of the restaurant. There’s a lot of screaming and arguing in the car. I noticed a young woman in the passenger’s seat trying to get out of the car. She’s pushing the door open, and the man in the driver’s seat is grabbing her by the arm, saying, "Get back in here." A lot of profanity—F-you, F-you, F-you. She’s saying, "Let me go, let me go. I want to get out, let me go." He’s saying, "You’re not going anywhere," and pulling her back in the car.
It was jarring. This time, I didn’t need gloves, but I walked forward and said, "Hey," to the guy. "Get your hands off her. I’m calling the cops." She looks at me and says, "No, no, it’s okay." He says something like, "Shut the F up." She gets back into the car. The tires squeal, dirt comes up, and they’re off.
I was able to, even through the dirt, click a picture and get the license plate. By this time, Cori’s out, my mother-in-law Vicki’s out, Jim’s out. I’m there, and I’m like, "We gotta do something." So, I call the cops and make a police report. I share the license plate number. For a second, I felt good.
Have you ever been in a situation where you thought you did something right, took the extra step, but it’s killing you because you don’t know how the story is going to end? I think about that woman and hopefully how her story is still going. I hope she was able to get out of that car. I hope a police officer pulled him over and something good came out of it. But you never know. I don’t know. Now you don’t know, but we can hope.
At least that day, a bird got free from a perilous situation. The one thing I do know is that being a human is complicated. Sometimes I wonder if being a bird would be a little bit easier.
