“I might be able to help you out,” Grandma said.
My mother gave my grandmother the steely-eye. “Yesterday you told me you got rid of the gun and all the bullets. You promised.”
“I was gonna suggest that she goes to Walmart,” Grandma said. “They got everything.”
I caught my mother glancing at the cupboard over the sink. She kept her hooch there, and she was probably weighing my opinion of her as an alcoholic against how bad she needed a drink. I love Grandma Mazur, but in all honesty, if I had to live with her I’d be taking a nip in the afternoon too.
“What kind of bad guys are you hunting down these days?” Grandma asked.
“No one special,” I said. “The usual suspects.”
“I heard you nabbed Billy Bacon but he got away,” Grandma said.
I nodded. “We had him in custody but there was an incident.”
My mother snapped to attention. “What incident? I didn’t hear about an incident.”
“It involved Lula,” I said. “I was getting lunch for all of us and Lula and Billy Bacon got carjacked.”
“Oh my God,” my mother said, and immediately made the sign of the cross. “Where did this happen? It was in a bad neighborhood, wasn’t it? You’re always in a bad neighborhood. I don’t know why you can’t find a nice normal job.”
“I sort of like my job,” I said. “I have a lot of personal freedom, and I don’t have to get dressed up.”
“You make no money, and you’re always dealing with criminals,” my mother said. “It’s a terrible job. You should quit and marry Joseph.”
I blew out a sigh.
“What?” my mother said.
“I’m not ready to marry Morelli.”
“Why not? He has a good job. He has a house. He has a nice car.”
“He’s hot,” Grandma said. “Don’t forget about him being hot.”
I wondered if there was dessert. There was a white Tasty Pastry bakery box sitting on the counter.
Grandma saw me look over at it. “Italian cookies,” she said. “Pinwheels and almond horns and pistachio shortbread.” She got up and brought the box to the table.
“You’re not getting any younger,” my mother said to me. “What are you waiting for? You should bring him to dinner on Friday. I’ll make pot roast.”
I took a pinwheel. “We broke up.”
My mother’s eyes got wide. “Broke up? Why?”
I shrugged. “He dumped me.”
“What did you do?” my mother asked. “You must have done something.”
I made a show of looking at my watch. “Oh gosh, look at the time. I have to go. I was wondering if I could borrow Uncle Sandor’s car.”
“What happened to your car?” my mother asked.
“It’s having some problems.”
“Like what? Do you need new tires? A battery?”
“It got filled with geese,” I said. “It wasn’t my fault.”
No point trying to hide it. It was probably going to be on the evening news. At the very least I was sure it would make YouTube. Everyone in the parking lot had had their cellphones out, recording the fiasco.
My mother looked dazed. As if someone had just smacked her in the face with a frying pan. “Geese,” she murmured.
“It’s okay,” I said. “Lula let them out, and the geese were fine.”
“Dang it. I miss all the good stuff,” Grandma said.
I grabbed a couple more cookies, stood, and lifted my messenger bag onto my shoulder. “Gotta get back to work.”
Grandma got the Buick’s key out of the junk drawer and handed it to me. “I got bullets and an extra gun if you need it,” she whispered. “Don’t tell your mother.”
•••
I always felt like a failure when I drove Big Blue, because I only drove it when I had no other option. Big Blue represented rock bottom in the automotive department. Jay Leno would have thought it was ultra cool, but I just thought it was ultra hard to drive. And a ’53 Buick wasn’t in keeping with my self-image. Truth is, the Mercedes SUV wasn’t compatible with my self-image, either. I was more a bright yellow Jeep Wrangler, or maybe a zippy red Hyundai.
I eased the blue behemoth out of the garage and onto the road. I put it in gear, fed it gas, and the car oozed forward. It picked up speed and rolled along like a tank. I turned out of the Burg onto Hamilton Avenue and noticed a red light flashing in my rearview mirror. It was Morelli in his green SUV with a Kojak light stuck onto his roof. I pulled into the small Tasty Pastry parking lot, and he pulled in after me. I got out of the Buick and held my hands up.