by Ginny Aiken
Visions of mayhem dance in my head. “And how did the tour lead to your broken leg?”
“Let’s just say that it did.” She sniffs. “It’s not the kinda thing a lady likes to talk about.”
Now she has my curiosity in a headlock. “Come on, Aunt Weeby. Tell me what happened.”
“Fine! I wrassled me a stable hand for his pitchfork, and lost on account of that big, nasty horse standing up for his human pal.”
“Huh?”
“That’s what I said. I had me a close encounter with the business end of a horse’s snout. He didn’t like that I wanted to . . . what do they call it? Oh, that’s right—muck out his stall. Silly thing.”
I still don’t get it, a common occurrence around Aunt Weeby. “Did the horse spook? Did he trample you?”
“Pshaw! ’Course not, Andie. He just lowered his big fat head and . . . ah . . .”
“He shoved this busybody’s butt out of the stable hand’s way!” hollers Miss Mona.
My mind conjures up myriad images—all ridiculous, none flattering. “Okay. Let’s get back to what really matters. How are you? Really, now. No goofy stories. I want the truth.”
“Oh, all right. I didn’t want to worry you, but this big galoot here wouldn’t let me be until I called.”
My aunt’s sudden seriousness tells me the situation isn’t quite as good as she would have me believe. “Go on, Aunt Weeby.” I make my voice super gentle and extra reassuring— no trouble at all. I love her. “Tell me what’s going on.”
“Well, sugarplum, the doctor’s operated already and he stuck one a’ them metal plates in my ankle. It looks like something outta that Frankenstein’s monster kinda movie. There’s all these metal gizmos what stick outta the plate right through my skin. But the cast he put up the rest of the leg’s a real pretty purple color.”
My torn-up gut chooses a belly dance for this occasion. Surgery, plates, pins, plus a cast—multiple fractures, you understand—are bad, very bad. And Aunt Weeby lives alone in the Adams three-storied family mausoleum . . . er . . . home.
“Is Luke in this hemisphere?” I ask.
“Not right now.” Aunt Weeby’s voice shakes just a touch. “My boy’s somewhere out in the Middle East, sugarplum.” Cousin Luke is a career military officer—Special Forces, no less. His deployments are never to peaceful hamlets populated by happy folks.
“How about Mom and Dad? When’s their next furlough?” “Andie! Did you forget already? They were home over the summer. They won’t be back for another two years.”
Sure, it slipped my mind. Keeping up with Aunt Weeby doesn’t leave much leftover mental nimbleness. But before I can come up with a comment, Miss Mona regains the phone.
“What your aunt’s trying real hard not to say is that she’s all alone right now, and she needs help. She’s mule stubborn too. I told her to move in with me while her leg heals, that it’d be fun, like a running pajama party, but noooo. She has to stay right in her own home, no matter what.”
I know where this is going. And I waver . . . oh, for all of about a nanosecond. You see, when your perforated digestive system starts in on a samba with a touch of rumba, you know you have to seize the moment.
“Roger can go to New Delhi himself. I’ll see you both bright and early tomorrow morning.”
Between Aunt Weeby’s objections and Miss Mona’s thanks-filled effusions, during the exhausting call to my now former boss, and through all my haphazard packing, I find myself reaching for assurance—I no longer have any visible means of support, you see.
Lord? Have I done the right thing?
Since he doesn’t answer right away, much less out loud, I squash a twinge of unease and accept reality: I’ll have to find out as I muddle along.
With Aunt Weeby in a cast and pins.
Oh, and armed with my BS in rocks and that paper from the GIA. Not to mention in Louisville, of all places. No Mecca for the gemstone trade, our lovely Louisville.
Sure, sure. Is this my wisest career move or what?
2 00
Nine whirlwind days later—I couldn’t get it all done overnight, like I’d told Aunt Weeby—find me staring at a hospital room door. I pause, take a deep breath, knock, and enter after Aunt Weeby’s “Come in.”
Medieval torture equipment attached to the bed from one end to the other makes me hit the brakes. “Whoa! Those are some fancy toys you have there.”
“Sugarplum!” The shiny metal quivers and rattles. “You’ve just brought the smile to my day.”
A rectangular, inverted chrome U rises from the headboard across to the footboard of the bed. I maneuver around the triangular trapeze thingy that hangs from it over her middle, and lean down for a hug. In spite of where she is, Aunt Weeby, as always, has her lipstick and eyebrows on, and the classy floral scent of Joy gives me the feeling of everything right with my world.
I chuckle. “You are too much. A broken leg, surgery, all those . . . those . . .” I wave at the shocking hospital bling. “And you look ready for a gala night.”
Aunt Weeby pats the perfect champagne knot on her crown. “I’ve told you since you were little, Andrea, my girl. A lady’s always gotta look good. You never know who’s going to see you, and that first impression . . . it’s awful hard to change, sugarplum.”
I plop her another kiss, this one on her forehead, and then drag the slime-green vinyl chair over to the side of the bed to collapse into its not-so-welcoming embrace. “What’s all that stuff for?”
“You just try to sit yourself up when your leg’s been crunched into bitty pieces—and honey? They get you up on your feet right after they’ve patched you back up around here. No mercy at all.” Aunt Weeby reaches up and waggles the trapeze triangle at me. “This is what I need to help myself sit.”
“Okay. So that explains the fixed metal bar over the bed. What’s the other one all about?”
“That one’s kinda fun, you know? They used it with the nicest woolly slings to hold my leg up, and now . . . well, I see it like it’s some kinda award. On account of my surviving all the other, you see.”
I see no medal of valor; I see a free-arm chrome rod with a chain that ends in a bar that separates a wicked pair of open-ended, bent metal rectangles. Each thick wire end curls up onto itself, and I can see where something can be hung from the hooks they form. I shudder.
“It’s been rough, hasn’t it?”
Although Aunt Weeby tries to hide it from me, the slight wince tells me more than her words. “Oh, it wasn’t so bad.
It broke and had to be fixed. But let me tell you. Once I get my hands on that farmer boy . . . whoo-ee! I’m fixing to give him a good piece a’ my mind.”
Poor guy. “Maybe stables, pitchforks, and farm hands aren’t your kind of gig. I’d stay away.”
“Pffft!” She crosses her arms. “Enough of that. Now that you’re here, mind telling me about that corroded gut a’ yours?”
I take a second to check in on its current condition. The dumb thing surprises me. “It’s an ulcer. It’s there. But not so bad today.”
“Humph!” The blue eyes never leave my face. “If you say so.”
I rattle my purse. “Never fear. Have pharmacy, will travel. I’ll be fine.”
A dark-haired guy in maybe his mid-twenties, dressed in khakis and a cream polo shirt with the hospital’s logo embroidered on the pocket, walks in right then. “Knock, knock!”
Aunt Weeby preens. “Timmy. Aren’t you just in time? Here’s someone I want you to meet.” She points at me. “Andie, sweetheart, this is Timmy Holtz, my physical therapist— or rather, my torturer and taskmaster.”
I smile and shrug.
My irrepressible aunt continues. “And Timmy, this is my darling unmarried niece, Andrea Adams. She’s a New York gemologist. Poor thing.” Aunt Weeby tsk-tsks better than anyone. “Andie plays with fabulous diamonds all day, but, wouldn’t you know? She’s still looking for the man who’ll put one on her ring finger. I think she needs help”—she
winks—“therapy, in a sense.”
Swallow me, earth. “Looks like the pain meds KO’d her loose tongue’s internal editor. Forgive her.”
The therapist laughs. “It doesn’t run in the family, does it?”
“We are nothing alike.”
Aunt Weeby’s torturer laughs way too much for my comfort.
“That’s not what I hear,” he finally says, winks, and then goes to the broken-leg side of the bed. “Okay, Miss Olivia—”
“What’s that?” I shake my head, pat my ear, gape.
He looks at me as though I’ve grown another head. “I just said Miss Olivia. Isn’t that her name?”
I stare at the too-innocent senior in the bed. “Sure, but no one’s called her Olivia since I began to talk. I mean, I didn’t do it on purpose, but she hasn’t heard that name in—” Ooops! This guy doesn’t need to know about the upcoming three-oh, does he? And I’m no fool—I’m not about to tell him. “I didn’t think she even remembered her real name by now.”
Aunt Weeby blushes, thrashes around, and grabs her trapeze. “Now, don’t you pay her no never mind. She just has this pet name for me, and thinks everyone should use it—” “’Morning, Weeby!” A nurse in a black top with Pink Panthers and pink hearts all over crosses to the wide windows. “How’s the pain? What number are we if zero’s none and ten’s the worst torture you’ve ever endured?”
I grin. “Busted!”
Aunt Weeby groans. “Erin, honey, you sure do choose your moments, don’t you? First you wake me up to give me a sleeping pill this morning, and now you go and blow my cover.”
Erin narrows her clear green eyes. “What cover? What are you talking about, Weeby?”
I howl. “Serves you right!”
The therapist, a very confused-guy look on his face, ping-pongs his gaze from one to the other of us. Finally, he zooms in on me. “Did you really say . . . Weeby?”
“Oh, you know how it is.” I shoot Aunt Weeby a grin. “Toddlers are notorious at making up names. She’s been Weeby instead of Livvy ever since I turned two. Nobody calls her anything else.”
“Okay,” he says in an uncertain voice, then turns to the nurse. “So what’s up, Erin? Does Miss Olivia—er . . . Miss Weeby?”—he gives me a did-I-get-it-right? look—“have something else going right now? I came to start her PT exercises, but if you need her, I can come back later.”
Talk about strategic retreat!
“Well . . .” Erin fills Aunt Weeby’s water pitcher at the sink. “I had planned to give her a sponge bath—”
“Why, Erin honey, that’s just perfect.” Aunt Weeby’s eyes twinkle—uh-oh! Incoming trouble. “Andie? Why don’t you go along and keep Timmy company while Erin here gives me one a’ those nice sponge baths she’s so good at? I’m sure he’d love to hear all about you when you were small. You were such a sweet little peanut.”
“Aunt Weeby!”
She ignores my objection, reaches for and catches her therapist’s hand, then gives it a pat. “You shoulda seen our Andie here growing up. All that red hair and those beautiful gray eyes. Uh-huh. And smart? Whoo-ee! This girl’s always been sharp as a tack.”
Instead of the ubiquitous deer, we have a medical professional in the headlights. “Ah . . . well, you see—” He squares his shoulders. “I’ll go take care of Mr. Warren while you have your sponge bath, Miss Weeby. I’ll be back after we’re all done with what we’re doing . . .”
His voice trails off as he flees the nuthouse. Aunt Weeby can empty a room just by opening her mouth. Which she does with alarming regularity.
“So there you go.” I stand. “Tell you what. I’m going to do you a favor. I’ll pretend you didn’t do what you just did and go to the family waiting room while you two do the sponge thing. Last time I stuck my head in there, the coffee pot was still dripping. A fresh cup would hit the spot.”
“With an ulcer?” Horror doesn’t exactly work with Aunt Weeby’s lovely elderly lady looks. “Why, Andrea Adams. No wonder you’ve got yourself that corroded gut. Like Great-Grandma Willetta use’ta say, you’re just pouring oil on that fire. You oughta go get yourself a nice glass a’ milk instead.” “Actually, Weeby,” Erin says, a thick white towel, fresh linens, and another pillow in her arms, “the milk thing has been discounted. Milk protein does have an initial neutralizing effect on gastric acid, but because of its high calcium content, it’s also a potent accelerator, and stimulates excess acid production.”
My eyes glaze over. I’ve heard it all before. “You guys don’t need me here,” I say. “I’ll be in the family waiting room.”
Once there, I pour my cup of coffee, then plunk my butt down on one of the hard upholstered armchairs. True, coffee isn’t the best beverage for an ulcer patient, but if I only drink a cup or two a day, my torn-up gut doesn’t abuse me too badly. Four welcome sips later, my cell phone rings.
A gruff male says, “Miss Adams?”
“Speaking.”
“This is Al, here, ma’am. With Two Men and a Truck, you know? I . . . umm . . . thought I better call about your stuff.” Visions of an overturned truck kick my pulse up a notch.
“Oh no! What went wrong?”
“Nah, lady. Easy, okay? Nothing’s wrong, just that we can’t find the address you gave us. Can you, like, give us some directions?”
I talk them off the freeway, around Louisville proper, and out to Aunt Weeby’s three-story white colonial. I tell Al—again— that yes, they are to unload everything into the detached garage behind the house; that I left it open so they can do just that; that no, there is no room in that huge house—Aunt Weeby’s a devoted collector—and that I’ll be there shortly.
When I snap shut my clamshell cell phone, it sinks in. As does my stomach, so to speak. “What am I going to do with all that stuff?”
The rumpled woman who is crashed on the sofa across from me opens one eye and mumbles, “Whassup?”
“Nothing, nothing. Just muttering.”
Sure, sure. Why shouldn’t she look at me like I need help, of the straitjacket kind? I’ve been reduced to mumbling sweet nothings to myself.
Is this that big payoff my career was supposed to bring? What am I going to do with myself? I have no job, no income, and no raging desire to twiddle my thumbs.
My phone rings again. “Yes, Al. What else do you need?” “Al?” Roger asks. “Who’s Al?”
“My mover, Rog. You know, the guy who’s brought all my things from my closet-sized apartment here for me. I’m fine, thanks for asking. And how are you? How’s Tiffany?”
“Ah . . . well, yes. How did your trip go?”
“How nice of you to ask!” What can I say? I’m far from perfect, and I fail to stop my smart mouth from smarting off. Lucky for me, this time no one sticks me in a corner to ponder the error of my ways—like all those times back in my schoolgirl days. I shake my head, shoot a prayer for selfcontrol heavenward, then go on. “But I do know one thing. You didn’t call to see what kind of mileage I got on the drive, or to see how much wreckage Al and his pal wrought on my stuff. So what’s up?”
“What do you mean, what’s up? I called to see if you’d worked this tantrum out of your system yet.”
“I’m sorry, Roger. I am a smart-mouth, and that’s not so cool.” Okay. I’ve faced up to my part. But I hate it when he pulls his daddy-thing on me. “Tantrum? I’m not throwing a tantrum. I just couldn’t go on. I worked, worked, worked, and didn’t have a life. It all just got to me.”
“Oh, all right.” His long-suffering sigh rings alarm bells. Roger is known for his determination. “How about a 25 percent raise? Will that do it?”
Wow! Twenty-five percent . . .
Temptation lasts about two seconds. “I wish it were as simple as money. It’s the stress, the ulcers that don’t heal, the crazy rents that had me living in an apartment smaller than my aunt’s downstairs powder room.”
The woman on the couch glares. I shrink into my chair and lower my voice. “Where was I? Oh yeah.
New York, I’ve come to believe, is a great place to visit, but not one for me to inhabit. Sorry.”
“B–but . . . what about . . .” His words trail off. He sighs. He gulps. He stays quiet for a moment, two . . .
Roger is really upset. I’ve always known he respects my work but never thought he cared much about me as a person, an acquaintance, a friend. Or is it my gemological knowledge he loves so much? After all, a time or two, when he was gung ho on making a questionable purchase, I stepped in and managed to save his bacon. Big time.
“Andie, I really need you here.” The sincerity in his voice catches me by surprise. “I don’t know anyone else with your talent, expertise, and honesty. You can spot a flaw a mile away, never mind a fraud. Where am I going to find someone else who can do that? Besides, we’ve always worked very well together.”
I take a gulp of coffee . . . two. “Thanks for the compliment. It means a lot. Really. It does. But you know the GIA graduates top-notch gemologists all the time. That’s where I learned what I know. Call them. I’m sure they’ll hook you up with the right person.”
“They’ll know their stuff, but will they care?”
“Sure. Gemologists love rocks.”
“But will they care? About business. About negotiating.” “I can’t make any promises.”
“See? I need you back.”
“No, you don’t, Roger. And I can’t go back. You might never understand.” I pinch the bridge of my nose. “Even though you think I went temporarily insane when I jumped at the chance to come home again, I had been praying for a change. Aunt Weeby’s accident just gave me the push I needed.”
“But what about your career? All those years of studying?” Aargh! The guy does know my weak spots. As I think of an appropriate response, I glance at the woman on the couch. She shuts her eyes fast in a lousy effort to pretend sleep. I feel bad for disturbing her, but I can’t handle cell phone and coffee and walk all at one time. So I tell Roger, “Thanks for the free trip down the guilt aisle, Rog. It just won’t work. I quit.”
“I really need you, Andie. Take a couple of days to think it over. I can postpone the trip to New Delhi while you reconsider. I won’t hold it against you once you come to your senses.”