Small Town Tango

by Jennifer LeJeune

  “What condition? I am as good as gold. Sure, I had a little old heart attack, it was minor and I have recovered well. It is nothing for you to get all riled up about and have me move across the state. Good grief, boy.”

  “Mammy,” Bo tries to argue.

  “Bo,” says Katy, “I am over here just about every day as to where you haven’t been here in years. I know just how well Miss Viola gets around and takes care of herself, and you don’t. You’re wrong about what you think you know, sir.”

  “Sir?” says Bo.

  “Yes, sir,” replies Katy. “You are all high and mighty, aren’t you? Bo Brogan, attorney-at-law, most prominent lawyer in Dallas, owner of ‘The Squire’, whoopdi doo! That doesn’t mean anything to us down here. So you can take your condescending tone and go back to where you came from.”

  “Oh gosh, I’m sorry, Miss Viola, I apologize for my hostility. I just couldn’t stand the thought of you leaving the other day when that lady showed up and started talking about you moving. I thought you had made plans to leave without telling me and I was... heartbroken.”

  “Katy, I can see that you have grown close to Mammy, but she is MY grandmother.”

  “Halloo, I’m still in the room over here, young whippersnappers. Let’s not talk about me as if I’m not. If the both of you want to take care of something for me, why don’t you both go to the grocery store for me? I have a long list on the fridge and I have a stew going on the stove, I need a few more things for, oh Lordy, I must be senile, if I forgot the things I needed for my stew! Ha!” She slaps her knee, “Here’s the list and off you go!”

  “I’m sure Katy can manage this by herself, Mammy. Why don’t I stay here and we can catch up?”

  “Oh, I’m caught up,” says Viola. “Now get on to the store and get me the things on that list so we can have a proper meal for your first night in town.”

  Katy and Bo both let out a little sigh and grumble and give Viola a fake grin before heading out the door.

  “Well, her sense of humor is certainly still intact,” says Bo.

  “Everything is still intact,” replies Katy. “She’s the strongest woman I know.”

  They get to Jim’s Grocery and start searching out the things on the list.

  “Yellow onions,” says Bo, “there are different colors of onions?”

  “Yes,” says Katy, “red, yellow, white, purple…”

  As they round the corner, none other than Martha Jenkins stands there whispering to her husband, obviously having already seen the two of them.

  “Hi, Miss Martha,” say Katy and Bo simultaneously, with a little eye roll.

  “Well, look at you two in here, shopping from a list just like an old married couple,” she says in the sweetest most Southern belle accent.

  They laugh it off, and explain that Miss Viola has sent them on a mission together to get the rest of the things that she needs for supper.

  “Oh I see,” replies Martha. “She’s just trying to keep you in good company while you’re here, Bo. With yoo-hoos like Amber Chaney wandering around this town single, it’s safer this way for sure,” she says.

  “Oh Lord, please forgive me,” she says aloud, “that was judgmental, but some things are just the truth.”

  “How was the flea mall?” asks Katy.

  “Oh you know how it always is, those early birds get in there and grab until there is nothing left. I guess I will have to try next week,” replies Martha.

  “Nice seeing you, Martha, we are off to find ‘baby carrots’,” says Bo.

  “On the other side of the deli!” Martha shouts as she walks in the other direction, once again whispering to her husband.

  Katy and Bo can’t help but giggle about how obvious Miss Martha is, with her crude remark about Amber Chaney.

  “So what’s the deal with Amber?” Bo asks.

  “She has the same attitude she had in high school,” replies Katy.

  “Ah,” says Bo, “she still thinks she’s all that and a bag of chips, huh?”

  “You could say that,” Katy replies, “now that she and Dylan Jones broke things off, she’s on the prowl again, and as soon as she sees you, she will certainly try to catch your attention.”

  “Girls like that didn’t catch my attention in high school and won’t catch my attention now, you know. I like the sweet, girl-next-door type.”

  “Right,” Katy replies.

  Arriving back at Mammy’s house, Bo puts the groceries away as Katy helps her chop the veggies. With the stew smelling delicious in the pot, Bo thinks to himself, “maybe Mammy can still cook, but what if she was to leave the stove top on next to a towel?”

  Visions of the house going up in smoke run through his mind, his worry about his grandmother growing stronger as he is there in her home seeing all of the possible dangers.

  “The front steps are too steep,” he thinks, “and if she was to slip in the tub.” He thinks about stating all of these facts now but figures that he should probably keep the peace while it lasts. “Dinner will be a good time to voice my concerns,” he says to himself with a slight nod.

  “What was that?” says Viola, coming up from behind him.

  “Oh nothing, I was just saying how good the stew is going to be with that homemade cornbread. If there is one thing that I miss most about your cooking, it is that you always make a side of cornbread to go with everything.”

  As Katy sets the table, Bo watches from the other side of the kitchen how gracefully she walks, how gracefully she sets down the plates and folds the napkins. The sundress she has on matches her olive complexion and her long flowing hair makes her look like the picture of perfection - everything he has ever wanted in a woman, if it wasn’t for her stubbornness.

  “Alright, let’s sit down and thank the Lord for our food and dig in. I am just about famished,” says Viola. “Katy, would you lead us in prayer, dear?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Katy says. “Dear Lord, we thank you for the food that we are about to receive and we thank you for our health and that Bo has made it safely here to visit with his grandmother. Please bless this food for the nourishment of our bodies. Amen.”

  “Amen,” Viola and Bo say simultaneously.

  “Wow, Mammy, this stew is delicious, just like I remember it, and the cornbread, I have been missing out.

  “Mammy, I was just thinking while I was looking around here, those front steps you have are awfully steep. Don’t you ever worry that you might fall down them?”

  “Well, no. No, I don’t,” replies Viola. “Do you worry that you might fall down them, son?” she replies. Katy and Bo both have a snicker.

  “No, Mammy, it is just that I worry about you, that is all. What about your tub? I have noticed that you don’t have a grab bar on the side to hang on to. Have you ever thought of having one installed?”

  “No,” replies Viola. “But I reckon that I might if I was ever having a problem with balance,” she says, taking a bite out of her cornbread.

  Bo knows that he is going to get nowhere with this conversation. “So I presume that I would have to drag you out of here kicking and screaming to get you to come to Dallas with me?”

  “You’re right on the money,” replies Viola, with a huge smile. “Now you understand, I’m not leaving.”

  “Well then,” Bo replies, “Grandmother, I have no other choice than to hire a home nurse to stay with you during the day, and there is no way that you are going to talk me out of that. And I would really like for you to at least come and look at the apartment that I have set aside for you.”

  “I don’t need a nurse, dear,” she brushes him off, “and I am not going to travel to the city to look at an apartment that I will never set foot in again. If you came here to bark demands at me, I’m afraid you are going to get nowhere. Now if you came for a nice visit, you are welcome, and we will make a nice time of it, but I will not let you boss me around like I am a child. If you want to boss someone around, I suggest you go back to work or have a child of
your own. It’s about time for you to be settling down and making a family of your own now. Don’t worry about me, if I find myself needing help from you, I will ask. Until then, I don’t.

  “I think it’s time for me to go,” says Katy, as she grabs her dishes off of the table and goes over to the sink to rinse them and put them in the dishwasher. Katy grabs her bag and gives Viola a kiss on the cheek and swiftly walks out the door.

  “Now look what you have done, you have run off my Katy bug.”

  Bo, realizing his harshness that would make Katy want to leave, gets up and runs out the door to try to catch her and apologize. He finds her sitting on the bench on the side of the house beside the rose bushes.

  “I’m sorry, Katy, I didn’t mean to upset you or make you feel like you had to leave. It’s just that she’s so stubborn.”

  “She is not the one that is stubborn, Bo, it’s you. Do you even know why she wants to stay in this place so bad? It is because this is the town that she has lived in for her entire life, this is the house that your grandfather built for her with his bare hands. Just for her, he made every detail of this house exactly as she wanted it, God rest his soul. This is the bench that they were sitting on when she told him she was pregnant with your father. Haven’t you ever thought about what the real reasons behind her wanting to stay here are? This is her home, the people in this town have known her most, if not all, of their lives. They love her and she loves them.

  “This is her life, church on Sunday morning, grocery on Monday morning, Martha’s’ salon on Tuesdays for her weekly hair appointment. She likes to take a walk around the town square on Wednesdays to see what is new in all of the windows of the little shops.

  “Thursday is Bible study night. I bet you had no idea of what her life even consists of, yet you just swoop in here and try to start making decisions for her.”

  “Wow, no, you are right. I had no idea about my grandmother’s life at all. I can see that this upsets you, but I am worried about her. She is getting on up there in age and I just want to help her the best way that I know how. I am going to contact a home health agency and get someone to come out here and be with her during the day. I’m sorry but I feel like that is the least that I can do.”

  Katy stands up and says to Bo, “If that’s what you want, there is nothing I can do to stop you. I’m going home now. This has been a very long and eventful day for me, and I’m wiped out.” She walks down the side walk.

  “Good night, Katy,” says Bo, “it was good to see you.”

  She turns and waves. “You will be seeing a lot more of me,” she thinks to herself.

  The next day, Bo makes the call to Southeast Home Health and speaks with a secretary named Lilly to make arrangements for a nurse aide to come sit with Viola for eight hours a day, three days a week, to help her with things around the house.

  “Yes, sir, Mr. Brogan. I have that all set up for you. Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, from eight to five, a nurse aide will be scheduled for Mrs. Brogan. Tomorrow will be her first day,” says Lilly. “Thank you for choosing Southeast Home Health for your home health needs, goodbye.”

  “Well, that was quick and painless and takes a lot of worry off of me, Mammy.”

  “Mmhmm,” she replies. “When can I expect this nurse to be here and what do you expect that she is going to do?”

  “Anything you need her to do - help with the dishes, the moping, help giving you a bath...”

  “So, you hired me a babysitting maid?”

  “Ha-ha, I guess if that is what you would like to call it, Mammy. Think of it as more of a companion who can help you out every now and then in the areas that you need it. It will make me feel much better after I leave, knowing there is someone who comes in regularly to check on you and help you with things.”

  “I don’t know if it has occurred to you, boy, but I do have friends in this town, ones that I don’t have to pay to come spend time with me,” she snaps.

  The next morning at eight o’ clock sharp there is a knock at the door, and how very surprised Bo is to see Katy Bates standing there in pink scrubs and white tennis shoes with her hair pulled back in a ponytail, holding a clip board, blood pressure cuff and stethoscope.

  “Umm, Katy, what...?”

  “I’m the nurse aide that was assigned to Mrs. Brogan.”

  As baffled as he is, he steps back and lets her through the door.

  “Good morning, Miss Viola. I’ll be your new nurse aide from now on. Will you please roll up your sleeve so I can take your vitals?”

  “Sure thing,” Viola says with a huge “I got you” grin on her face.

  “Wait a minute, I thought you worked at the bakery? There is no way you run a bakery and work for a home health company,” says Bo. “The joke is over, Katy, what have you done? Did you cancel the arrangements that I made yesterday? You don’t have the authority to do that. This is now a legal issue between Southeast Home Health and the law offices of Bryant-Stratton and Brogan. I am calling Monica this instant to have her start the case. I cannot believe the people of this town would blatantly break the law just because a friend asks them to, this is absurd.“

  “This is no joke, Bo,” Katy says, snickering at the way he is panicking over the possibility of a broken law. He looks as if his head is about to explode and she can almost see the smoke coming out of his ears.

  “If you would have asked me anything about my life yesterday instead of just rambling on about your work and all of your accomplishments, you would have known that I do not run the bakery, Becky does. I only fill in on the weekends and when she or Sally call in sick. I work for Southeast Home Health on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, just as you called to schedule to have someone here with, Miss Viola,” she says very matter of factly. “Now, if you would excuse me, I need some time with my patient to ask her about her bowel movement frequency and urination.”

  “Do you see what you have done to me, Bo? You have turned me into a patient that has to have my poop monitored and my pulse checked to make sure I’m going to make it through the day. If this doesn’t make me feel old as dirt and helpless, then I don’t know what does!”

  “So you are telling me that you are the nurse aide that was assigned to my grandmother and you interfered in no way?” asks Bo.

  “Well, it was between me and Josh Shalenski to get this job, and I assume that you don’t want an 18-year-old boy seeing your grandmother’s hind parts in these showers that you requested that we regulate and stay with her during.”

  “You what?” screams Viola. “I have had just about enough of you, sonny. If you can’t butt out of the ways of my life, which are perfectly fine, mind you, then you need to go back to that big city where you came from because you are making me mad as a hornet and I’m sure that’s not good for my blood pressure.”

  “Actually, no,” says Katy, “it is not.” She looks at the dial on the blood pressure cuff and rips that sleeve off of her arm quickly.

  “Are you feeling dizzy, Miss Viola?”

  “A little,” Viola replies.

  “Ok, Miss Viola, what I need you to do is to take some deep breaths in through the nose and out through the mouth. Lean back in your chair. If you still feel dizzy after that, I will need you to lean forward and put your head in between your legs.”

  “What is going on?” exclaims Bo.

  “Her blood pressure is dangerously high, we need to head over to Southeast General Hospital right away and have them take a look at her. This is a condition that she might need medication for.”

  Bo, concerned for his grandmother’s health, races to the garage and pulls out his pink little beetle and backs it up to the front door where Katy is helping Miss Viola down the steps. “Steady and slow,” Katy tells her as they take each step.

  As they get into the car, Katy tells Bo to calm down and take some deep breaths so that his driving won’t be erratic, which would make Viola’s blood pressure spike again.

  “Drive slow and cautious, Bo,” Ka
ty says. “There is no need to rush, this is not a life or death situation, although it will be if we can’t manage to get to the hospital in one piece.

  When they pull up to the front doors of the Emergency Room, Bo leaps out of the driver’s seat and runs inside and grabs a wheelchair and brings it out for his grandmother to be wheeled in.

  “Easy does it,” Bo says to Viola as she goes to get in the wheel chair.”

  “Boregaurd Amus Brogan, you stop telling me what to do!”

  Bo looks at his grandmother without saying a word as Katy pushes the wheelchair through the emergency room doors and goes to fill out the paper work. As Bo is pulling the car around to a parking spot, he sits for a while, reflecting on all of the things that he has said to his grandmother since he arrived in Little Hill. Just as Katy had said, all he did was talk about himself and his job. He hadn’t once asked his grandmother about how her life was going or any activities that she is involved in. He figured that she is 89 and she must sit in a recliner all day and watch reruns of I Love Lucy and Wheel of Fortune. If it wasn’t for Katy, he would not even know how active and capable his grandmother really is to take care of herself.