Finally we made it to Ken’s convertible. The nurse had tried really, really hard not to charge Grandma for the sling but in the end she gave up and charged Grandma so she wouldn’t have to cook the books or lose her job and Grandma told her not to worry one iota about it, she underthtood. The nurse said Grandma would have to get a cast put on her arm. Grandma said hmmmmmm. She wasn’t worried. The nurse gave her a T3 for free. Don’t tell anyone, she said. She whispered it. Grandma said, What? I said, Don’t tell anyone the nurse gave you a free pill. A free pill! Grandma shouted. Well, zut alors! The nurse came to the other side of the check-out desk and hugged Grandma and me before I had a chance to escape. She told me to come back again! I just nodded and smiled. Please God, let that never happen. I’ll give up smoking and swearing. When we were shuffling back to the car Grandma said she had seen the writing on the wall. She said hoooooooo. I had her red purse on my shoulder. I felt the nitro spray in the outside pocket. I asked her what she meant. She laughed and said, Oh, just that maybe we should go home a little sooner than we had planned to. We’ll surprise Mom! she said. I thought about Grandma all bruised and broken with blood on her face and her tooth missing just suddenly standing there in the living room by the TV for Mom to discover when she came home from rehearsal. Won’t that be fun? said Grandma. I tried to change the subject instead of lashing out, the way the therapist had told me to do. I knew she would say I was angry with myself for not protecting Grandma. But sometimes I was angry at other people, too! I guess the therapist wasn’t getting paid enough to deal with the hidden costs of additional anger because Mom did the sliding scale option. Watch this, I said to Grandma. I jumped over the passenger door of the convertible and landed in a perfect sitting position. Ho HO! said Grandma. That’s an eleven out of ten. Okay, watch this! She pretended to be an Olympic sprinter in a starting block. No, Grandma, no! I yelled. I was lashing out. What the fuck is wrong with you, man! I said. Why can’t you just stop doing all these fucking things that are killing you all the time and just fucking be normal! Grandma was quiet then. She stood by the car and moved her good hand on the hood of the car back and forth like she was saying to the car it’s okay, it’s okay. She said hooooooooooo. I pulled her nitro spray out of her purse and got out of the car and gave it to her. I had to twist the lid off myself because of her arm. I opened the car door and she heaved herself in there and sat down. We waited five minutes. I didn’t sing or dance or talk. We sat in the sun, mad. She didn’t use her spray the third time. I’m okay, she said. I’m thorry, Thwiv. I’m sorry too, I said. Grandma looked at her teeth in the rear-view mirror and smiled and moved her face around to different angles like a beautiful model. Not bad! she said.
Then we found out Grandma couldn’t drive the car with a broken arm! I’m calling Ken, I said. Hold on, hold on, said Grandma. Just hoooooooold your horses, buckeroo. She made her face go small so she could think. After a minute she told me it was probably time that I learned how to drive stick because she had been six years old when she learned and after that had driven to America by herself to deliver a cake and all that. I was trying to be calm and agreeable, instead of lashing out, so I let her teach me. It took a long time to learn. The engine kept stalling. It was really hard. The car was jerking around so much that the radio came on all by itself. Grandma made a joke that we’d be stuck in the parking lot forever just like the old people in the building trying to escape. Somehow that made me learn instantly, and I drove out of the parking lot! I stalled again in the middle of the street. It took four hundred years to move ten feet. The car was jerking so much that suddenly the roof started to come up over us! We couldn’t find the right dial to switch off the radio. It was blasting the best of the 80s so loud that even Grandma could hear it and she sang along but not with the right lyrics. Everything was happening at once. The wipers went on. The roof kept going up and down and up and down. We jerked along, singing and yelling. Grandma told me I was doing a great job! We’re getting there! But she didn’t even really know how to get there or where we were going. She didn’t care. She just thought it was hilarious that somehow we were moving forward at all.
People in other cars were looking at us like we were escaped tigers or something. I stalled again at a red light. Two teenagers got out of a car beside us and came over to ask if we needed help. They asked Grandma if she’d been in a fight and Grandma said you’d better believe it! They laughed and stood around like nothing serious was happening. Grandma asked one of the boys if he knew how to drive stick and he spread his arms wide like are you kidding me? This is the meaning of my life, driving stick. I was born to drive Canadian children and ancient, bruised ladies around without knowing where to. Grandma said she’d give him twenty bucks to drive us back to Ken’s place. I climbed into the little back seat so the teenager could drive. He jumped over the door and landed in a perfect sitting position! Sup! he said. He turned around to fist-bump me. I’m T. I nodded. And you are? he said. S, I said. Awesome! Let’s roll. He fist-bumped Grandma on her good hand. He looked at her sling. He said he’d like to see what the other guy looked like and Grandma laughed and laughed like there was no tomorrow. T told his friends to follow us in their car. He turned the radio to a better station and made the roof stay down. I was jealous of Grandma getting to sit beside him. T and Grandma looked like they were in a commercial and had a useless baby in the back seat always getting in the way of their sexy California dates. Grandma didn’t know how to tell T how to get to Ken’s place. I just feel my way around when I’m in Fresno! she said. I love that! he said. You just feel your way around when you’re in Fresno. I love that. He opened the glove compartment and looked at Ken’s registration. He found Ken’s address. He was careful not to let the glove compartment door bonk Grandma on her knee. He didn’t say uncool shit like okay, ladies, don’t worry about a thing. I know where to go. Leave it to me. He didn’t say anything. He just half-smiled like Lou and made jokes like Grandma. I was dying from how cool he was and how mad I was that Grandma got to sit next to him side by side but life isn’t always fair or easy so dot, dot, dot.