“I need your help, sweetheart. Your mother is already at the market, and I don’t want to bother her, but Aggie’s had a bit of a fall.”
Fred’s heart dropped into her stomach. “Shit!” She stood up so quickly she went dizzy; the chair screeched loudly as she pushed it back along the floor. “Is she okay? Does she need an ambulance?” A hundred thoughts raced through her head all at once. Warren was looking up at her, a concerned expression on his face.
“No, no, no, now calm yourself, Fred,” said Aunt Cam. “She’s okay, it’s just that I think she’s sprained both her wrists and so she can’t push herself up, and I can’t get her up off the floor by myself. Would you mind cutting short your plans and giving me a hand? Getting old is such a bind at times.”
Fred let out the breath she’d been holding in a whoosh. “Of course, don’t worry, I’ll be home ASAP. Lucky I brought the car this morning. Hang tight, I’m on my way.” She ended the call.
“Problem?”
“Aggie’s had a fall, and Cam can’t lift her by herself. Ihave to go, sorry,” she said, pulling her coat on and slinging her bag over her shoulder.
“Can I help at all?” Warren stood too.
“No, it’s fine. But thank you. Let me know where our food critiquing tour begins.”
“Any preferences?”
“Surprise me,” she said, smiling as he pulled her in for a brief but passionate kiss, the tingle of which she could still feel on her lips when she reached the car and put the key in the ignition.
—
As her littlecar chugged up the last gradient, Ryan’s Land Rover came up behind her and followed her in through the already open gates. She wondered briefly why he should be following her but, whatever the reason, his presence was serendipitous. She parked quickly and jumped out, hurrying around to the driver’s side of his vehicle and rapping on the window for him to wind it down.
“Hello,” he said in his usual jovial tone, pulling two boxes from the passenger seat onto his lap. “Where’s the fire?”
Fred gave only the briefest mental acknowledgment to the fact that he was dressed as an elf again.
“No fire, Aunt Aggie’s had a fall; I’m on a rescue mission.”
Ryan’s expression morphed into concern as he killed the engine and followed her quickly into the house, dumpingthe boxes on the console table as they passed through the hall.
They found Aggie resting up on her elbows, hands splayed limply on the sea of tinsel and baubles she lay on, sucking up something green from a cocktail shaker through a curly straw, the layers of her organza kimono spread out in ripples around her. Cam was kneeling on a cushion beside her, holding the silver cocktail shaker and straw to her wife’s lips. Fred had so many questions, she didn’t know which to address first. “What in the Lindsay Lohan? How did this happen? Are you all right?”
“I’m fine, don’t fuss, just hurt my wrists when I went down is all,” said Aunt Aggie. “Greetings, Santa’s Elf, nice tights! Fred thought we might need reinforcements, did she?”
Ryan grinned and struck a muscleman pose. “I was actually on my way up to deliver some more Christmas coffee trials before my shift in the grotto, but since I’m here…” he said.
Fred was looking around the kitchen floor. “It looks like a grenade went off in Whoville.”
“We were bringing the Christmas decorations in from the storeroom; we wanted to surprise your mother by having the place all sparkly by the time she got home from the market,” said Aunt Cam, taking the straw from Aunt Aggie’s lips and using it to stir the green drink.
“I slipped on a puddle of water,” Aunt Aggie said, outraged but seemingly unfazed by her predicament. “I’ll survive, but I think that radiator in the bathroom has finallygiven up the ghost.” She raised one arm and winced. Aunt Cam stuffed the straw back into her mouth.
Fred looked up and noted a steady dripping from the ceiling, which was being soaked up by a life-sized plush fawn that usually stood beside the big Christmas tree in the hall but was currently lying beside her aunt with one of its hind legs twisted at an unnatural angle.
Her aunt saw her looking. “Better him than me,” Aggie remarked. “I went down like a drunk uncle at a wedding,” she continued, moving the straw to the side of her mouth so she could speak more easily and still drink. “Landed on poor old Father Christmas,” and she nodded toward a large metal painted Father Christmas with his face caved in, who was propped awkwardly against a dresser. Fred doubted he would ever be the same again.
“And the cocktail is medicinal, I suppose?” Fred wagered.
“Absolutely,” Cam nodded, with feeling. “It’s called a Grinch’s Heart. Good for shock. Very fruity, with enough peach schnapps and rum to numb an amputation. Not that I think we’ll be needing one.”
Fred looked at Ryan, who raised his eyebrows but stayed quiet. “Okay, let’s get you up,” she said, moving to one side of her aunt. Ryan was already moving into position on her other side.
“Let me at least finish my cocktail,” Aunt Aggie grumbled, but Aunt Cam took the straw away. In another moment, Ryan and Fred had her up and were gently lowering her into a tartan wing-back chair by the Aga.
“We should really get these looked at,” said Fred, gently handling her aunt’s wrists. “They could be broken…” The skin on her aunt’s arms was pale and soft and delicately stippled with age spots, and Fred was suddenly filled with a melancholy that made her chest ache.
“Bollocks to that! I amnotgoing to the hospital! I refuse to sit in a waiting room for ten hours, only for them to tell me I’ve sprained my wrists, which I already know, and stick compression bandages on each arm.”
