“Hold tight,” he said to her.
“I’m down. Assistance!” Babushka yelled. “Assistance!”
He pulled open the industrial door and called into the room. “Can one of you call for some help over here? Babushka fell.”
“Again?” Agatha asked. “That’s the fourth time today.”
Well, when she had something that got attention, she milked it.
“Is she really hurt, or does she just want the fire brigade to come?” Betty Jane asked over her glasses, putting down a three of diamonds on the stack of whatever game they played.
“Get Sam!” Babushka wailed.
“Fire brigade,” everyone at the card table agreed in unison.
“She prefers the crew from Station 21,” Etta said, laying down the King of Spades.
When he first came to the Purple Peony after the crew got themselves evicted from a Dimefront concert at Brek’s Bar, he fell in love with the place. He’d never had a grandmother figure in his life, and suddenly he had five. He never expected what they’d come up with next, and whatever it was they’d all have a helluva good time.
Once they went on a clandestine mission to Walgreens for Pixie Sticks and Butterfinger bars and somehow landed on a plane headed to Muskego, Wisconsin. That was an adventure.
He missed these women when he went on tour, honest as all fuck he did. But right now, he wished he was on stage in a big city, dropping a beat for the band.
“Can one of you please call the front for some help?” he asked, stepping back into the hallway to check on Babushka.
Babushka, who did her best impression of a model for a chalk outline as she called, “Sam! Get Sam! Only Sam!”
Tanner shook his head. The woman channeled Meryl Streep with this performance and her dedication deserved an award.
Except…
Fuck, maybe he’d been wrong.
Maybe he saw things wrong, and she really hurt herself. A woman of her age couldn’t continually fling herself on the ground and not suffer some eventual damage.
He hurried to her just in case he’d been wrong about what he’d witnessed. Kneeling down, he checked her color—all good. Lips still pink. He held the back of his hand to her mouth to ensure; yeah, she breathed normally. Chest rising and falling just like it should’ve. He reached for her wrist to take her pulse rate.
“Vhat are you doing?” she asked, pushing his face back with her hand.
“I’m checking your pulse,” he said.
“No need.” She waved him off.
“Tell me you are faking?” he asked, demanded, so he could assess the situation appropriately. “So I can stop worrying.”
Babushka broke character for only a split second. “Believe vhat you vish.”
Yeah, that’s what he thought. “You’ve got to stop—”
She held her fingertip up to his lip and whispered, “This vill be fixed.”
“Your hip?”
She gripped her left hip. “Ay. So much pain.”
“Ten seconds ago it was your right hip,” he whispered. “Now stop trying to fix things that aren’t broken.”
She gave an efficient shake of her head. “Your Sam situation is inperil.”
