The Bake-Off (27 page)

“Hi.” She paused, feeling awkward and adolescent. “I heard you and my grandmother had quite the dialogue.”

He cleared his throat. “You're probably wondering why I called.”

“Oh, well, I guess. I mean, after last night, I sort of thought . . .” She'd sort of thought he'd called to shower her with compliments and ply her with poetry and beg to see her again, but it seemed rather immodest to come right out and say that.

“I sat in on a very interesting staff meeting this morning,” he said. “Evidently there was a spate of vandalism in the back alley the other night.”

Linnie sat down on the bed. “Vandalism, you say?”

“Something about typographical errors.” His voice deepened with amusement. “Very seedy and sordid. The police got involved.”

“Wow.” She reclined into the mound of pillows. “This city's really going to hell in a handbasket.”

“You're a very complicated woman.”

“I'm not complicated, just stubborn.” She sighed. “If you give me a bucket and a brush, I'll be happy to go out there and scrub down the wall this afternoon.”

“That won't be necessary.”

“No, really, it's the least I can do. The good news is, it should be pretty easy to get off, since it's mascara. Waterproof mascara, I grant you, but—”

“Hold on. You defaced my hotel wall with mascara?”

“They didn't mention that part?” She provided an abridged recounting of the night's events. “At least my defacement was spelled correctly. I take no responsibility for the spray paint.”

“I see.” For a moment, Cam was dumbstruck. “And you were arrested for vandalizing existing vandalism?”

She picked at her cuticles. “Well, at first the officer was going to let me off with a warning. But I sort of forced his hand.”

“I see. Do you have a long history of trouble with the law?”

“No, and I can't say I'm in a hurry to revisit the holding cell. Frankly, I found the amenities to be shockingly substandard.”

Cam chuckled. “Worse than a twenty-dollar youth hostel?”

“Well, maybe not
that
bad. By the way, thank you for getting the air conditioner fixed.”

“Thank your grammy. She provided technical support for our repair crew. Good old Hal. He used to work for NASA, you know.”

“Now you're on a first-name basis with Hal, too?”

“I think your grandmother has a little crush on him.”

“What else did you discuss with my grandmother?” Linnie's eyes narrowed as suspicions stirred. “Did she tell you why I came to New York?”

“I assumed you were here for vacation. Is that not the case?”

Before answering, Linnie composed a quick mental list of the pros and cons of divulging her participation in the Delicious Duet competition. Given that he now knew about her history of art fraud and vandalism, she could see no possible upside to adding baking fraud to the list of ethics violations. There would be plenty of time to disillusion him
after
at least one more night of steamy sex. Plus, what if she and Amy lost at the finals? The only thing more humiliating than losing was admitting your failure to someone else.

“We're kind of having a girls' weekend,” she hedged. “Me, my sister, and Grammy Syl. Now, please, I insist on taking responsibility for my mistake. How much will it cost to have the graffiti removed?”

“It'll cost you one chess rematch. Tonight, my room, at midnight.”

She wrapped the phone cord around her index finger. “Same terms as last night?”

“Higher stakes. Double or nothing.”

She wasn't entirely sure what that would entail, and she couldn't wait to find out. “You're on.”

Then she disconnected the call and used her cell phone to dial the pawnshop in Vegas, the number for which she had now memorized. “Hi, this is Linnie Bialek. Yes, again. I'm calling to make sure that platinum-and-diamond brooch is still there.”

 

W
hen she returned to the sitting room, Amy was tipping the room service waiter while Grammy arranged a trio of plates heaped with carbs, butter, and bacon on the coffee table.

“We're not eating at the dining room table?” she asked. Usually, Grammy was a stickler for napkin-on-your-lap, elbows-off-the-table propriety at mealtimes.

“I'd prefer to eat out here, if it's all the same to you. I want to watch my show.”

Linnie glanced at the television screen, where a Rhodesian ridgeback was systematically devouring a dining room set. “What is this, anyway?”

“
Dog Whisperer
,” Grammy said. “I watch it every day.”

“But you don't have a dog,” Linnie said.

“I know, dearest. This way I don't have to deal with shedding or barking or chewed-up chair legs.”

“She likes
Supernanny
, too,” Amy said, “but I can't watch more than ten minutes of it now that I have kids. All those toddler tantrums and parental breakdowns hit too close to home.”

“Oh, pish-tosh. Chloe and Ben are nothing like the brawling hellions on that show.”

“Ha. Come over some afternoon when they've missed their nap.” Amy folded a strip of bacon into her mouth. “So, how's your boyfriend?”

Linnie refused to take the bait this time. “He's quite well. And while we're on the topic of boyfriends, Grammy, what's the deal with you and Hal?”

“I haven't the foggiest idea what you're referring to.”

“You've got a thing for the NASA guy?” Amy clasped her hands together as though this were the cutest thing she'd ever heard. “You should go for it. Grandpa died, what? Twenty years ago? Twenty-five? It's time to move on.”

“I have moved on. There's more to life than finding a man, darling.” Grammy gasped and raised a hand to her cheek. “Oh goodness.”

“What's wrong?” Linnie and Amy both raced to her side.

“This side of my face has gone numb.” Grammy announced this with mild annoyance, as though she were remarking on a weather forecast for rain. “I suppose I'd better call my neurologist.”

Linnie clicked off the TV and demanded, “Since when do you have a neurologist?”

Grammy pursed her lips, then rolled her eyes and sighed the same way Linnie herself often did. “Well, girls, there's no easy way to say this, so I'll just come right out with it. I've got a brain aneurysm. Three aneurysms, actually.”

Amy and Linnie looked at each other, then looked at Grammy, then looked back at each other. Those three short sentences provided so much to process that Linnie couldn't string together a coherent thought, much less a sentence.

Grammy Syl took the stunned silence as a cue to keep on talking. “I've put off telling you because I didn't want you to worry. Or look at me like a fragile, frail old biddy, the way you are right now.”

Linnie's arm was still angled straight out from her body, her hand clutching the TV remote.

“Oh, Grammy.” Amy put her arm around the older woman. “How long have you known about this?”

“Only a few months.”

“A few
months
?” Linnie finally recovered her voice and, along with it, a spark of anger. “And we're just finding out now? If I had a bunch of brain aneurysms, wouldn't you demand to know about it?”

“Naturally. But I'm an adult and you're a child.”

“I'm twenty-eight and she's thirty-one,” Linnie pointed out.

Grammy Syl nodded. “Babies. You girls focus on your baking and let me take care of everything else.” She gave Amy a kiss on the cheek. “Don't you fret, darlings. I'll be just fine.”

“ ‘Don't fret'?” Linnie flung the remote onto the carpet. “You have
three brain aneurysms
.”

“What does that mean, anyway?” Amy asked.

“It means she needs to get into surgery, stat,” Linnie said. “Honestly, Grammy, I can't believe that instead of taking care of yourself, you came to New York to babysit us. Does Dad know about all this?”

“Not yet. And I'm not going to have surgery.” Grammy got to her feet with assistance from Amy, then pulled a small floral address book out of her purse. “They can't operate.”

“Who's ‘they'?” Amy demanded.

“My doctors. They say because of my age and my health and the location of the aneurysms, I probably wouldn't make it through the operation. How did they put it? The risks outweigh the potential benefits.”

“But brain aneurysms—can't you
die
from that?” Amy grew more agitated with every passing second.

Grammy gave up. Linnie could see it in the sloping of her shoulders and the sudden weariness in her eyes. She gave up trying to bolster them with cheer and false confidence and gave them a glimpse of her pain and uncertainty. “Well, let's face it: We're all going to die sooner or later.”

This just incensed Amy further. Linnie had never seen her mellow, upbeat sister yell at anyone like this. “So you're just going to sit around doing nothing?”

Grammy let her yell. “I'm having brunch with my granddaughters and watching
Dog Whisperer
. I'd hardly call that nothing.”

Linnie didn't know how to navigate these dark emotional eddies. All she could do was try to fix the problem. “We'll find a better doctor. We'll get a second opinion.”

“Oh, sweetheart.” Grammy sat down again. “I've gotten third, fourth, fifth opinions. It is what it is.”

“Then what are they doing for you?” Linnie persisted. “What's the prognosis?”

“I'll be fine until I'm not fine. That's all we really know for sure. Now if you'll excuse me for a moment, I really should make that phone call.”

“Screw your neurologist.” Since everyone else had abdicated their normal roles, Linnie took charge. “Half of your face is numb. We're going to the emergency room.” She turned to Amy. “Call down to the front desk and tell them to call an ambulance.”

“An ambulance won't be necessary. Dr. Hilman told me that dizziness and numbness are to be expected.”

“Fine, then we'll take a cab. But we're going.” She collected everyone's coats and made sure Grammy had her insurance card and a complete list of current medications. Amy and Grammy both followed her orders and seemed almost relieved to be bossed. “That elevator had better be working, is all I have to say.”

T
he elevator worked, and Grammy made it to the hospital without any further complications. She caused a bit of a stir among the emergency room team and the attending neurologists, but after a series of tests and CT scans, she was discharged with a tweaked prescription for her hypertension and a warning to avoid undue stress and exertion.

Seeing her grandmother swathed in the folds of a threadbare blue hospital gown jolted Amy out of her anger and into a deepening sense of dread. Age had settled in so gradually that it had been easy to overlook the increasingly pronounced topography of veins in Grammy's hands and the slackening in her cheeks and jawline. Suddenly, Grammy Syl looked
old
.

“I'll call Dad,” she offered, but Grammy stopped her with a single look.

“Don't you dare. I will call him this evening and explain this to him on my own terms. He should hear this from me, not from you.”

Linnie kept searching for a loophole in the diagnosis. She wanted to read all the medical charts, scrutinize all the scans, speak directly to Grammy's physicians.

“Don't worry,” she kept saying. “We'll figure something out.”

And Grammy kept repeating, “It is what it is.”

Amy ducked out into the waiting area and called Brandon. “ ‘It is what it is'? She's got three brain aneurysms and she's telling us ‘it is what it is'? What does that even mean?”

Brandon didn't say much, but she knew he was just as shaken as she was. “Do you want me to come into the city and drive her home?” he offered. “I can cancel my last two appointments and leave now.”

“Would you? Oh, honey, thank you. I keep telling her I'll take her home myself, but she's insisting that she wants us to stay here and win this stupid Delicious Duet thing.”

Brandon paused. “You're still going to compete?”

“That's what I said! It's insanity. But you know how she gets when she's made up her mind about something. The woman is impossible.” Amy seethed for one more second, then teared up. “I want to come home. I miss you guys. I want to rewind this whole week and start over.”

“I'm sorry, sweetie. And I know dealing with your sister isn't helping your stress level.”

“I can't believe I'm saying this, but Linnie's been great. She's still a bossy know-it-all, but that comes in handy during a crisis.” Amy nibbled her lower lip. “Ever since she got me arrested, I've really warmed up to her. We're a good team.”

After promising to call back frequently with updates, Amy got off the phone and tracked down Linnie, who had cornered a doctor in the hallway.

“There must be something you can do for her.” Linnie presented this as a challenge, a double-dog dare to the medical community. “Aren't there any clinical trials she could enroll in? Experimental procedures that show promise?”

The doctor remained empathetic but held his ground. “We have to consider her quality of life. She's in her eighties, with a history of high blood pressure and three large aneurysms clustered near the brain stem.”

“Girls.” Grammy Syl summoned them from her stretcher. Both sisters immediately reported for duty. “Enough. I've talked to my doctors at length about my outlook and my options, and this is my decision.”