Patti Benn was working behind the counter. “Number sixty-four,” she called out.
“That’s me,” Grandma said. “I want six sandwich rolls and a half pound of Italian cookies.”
“That’s my number,” Rose said, pushing to the front. “We dropped it, and that slut gold digger picked it up before we could get to it.”
“That’s exactly right,” Angie said. “I couldn’t hold on to the ticket because the slut broke all my fingers.”
“Liar, liar, pants on fire,” Grandma said. “I got this ticket from the machine. You two old hags gotta go to the end of the line.”
“Ladies,” Patti said. “Let’s all take a step back.”
“I’m not taking a step anywhere until I get my rolls and cookies,” Grandma said.
“Typical,” Rose said. “Hungarian.”
Grandma cut her eyes to Rose. “You got a problem with Hungarians?”
“They aren’t Italian.”
“You got that right,” Grandma said. “And proud of it.”
“Nobody likes Hungarians,” Rose said. “They’re all fornicators.”
“You bet,” Grandma said. “And I’m proud of that too. You’re just jealous because you’re such a dried-up ugly prune you can’t even get any fornicating.”
Patti threw some rolls and about two pounds of cookies into a bag and handed it over to Grandma. “On the house,” she said. “Next?”
Mrs. Ruiz stepped up. “I’m next,” she said. “I have number sixty-five. And I’m from Guatemala. Everybody likes us.”
I hustled Grandma out of the bakery, being careful to stay between her and Rose and Angie.
“Those women are so disagreeable,” Grandma said when we were on the sidewalk. “Jimmy could never get along with them. They hardly ever talked, and now you’d think they were joined at the hip.”
“It’s about money,” I said. “And who will inherit it.”
“Jimmy had a will. He said he had it drawn up a while ago and it gave everything over to his wife . . . whoever she was at the time.” Grandma shook her head. “It’s a shame people get so worked up over money. It’s not like Jimmy’s sisters don’t have any. They’re all living okay.”
There’s never a lot of traffic in the Burg. On weekdays, people leave for work in the morning and come home in the evening. Saturday morning is for shopping and car washing. Sunday is church. We were a block from my parents’ house when I heard a car come up behind us. I turned to look and saw that Rose was behind the wheel and Angie was next to her. They slowly drove past us and made a rude Italian gesture to Grandma and me.
“Va fangool!” Grandma yelled at them, and she gave them the finger.
Rose drove half a block, made a U-turn, and gunned it straight for us. She jumped the curb, and I yanked Grandma to safety wi
th about three inches to spare. Rose cut across Gary Luckett’s front lawn, spun around, and came back at us. Grandma dropped the bakery bag, pulled her gun out of her purse, and squeezed off three rounds. Rose swerved away from us and drove down the street.
“How’d I do?” Grandma asked.
“You took out a side mirror, but I think the other two shots went wide.”
“I was rushed.”
I picked the bakery bag up from the ground and looked inside.
“Well?” Grandma said.
“Everything’s okay.”
“Good thing, because your mother won’t be happy if I don’t bring rolls home.”