Always Friday Read Online Free PDF Page B

an
off-Broadway farce. Both older women, one tall, one nearly a head shorter, were
dressed in sweat suits and Reeboks. Martha wore a lavender outfit with her
pearls, while Olivia was clad in bold black and white stripes. When she’d
visited him briefly at the hospital, Olivia’s hair had been tucked under some
kind of a turban. He stared at it now. Held back with a black sweatband, it was
flaming red and hung halfway down her back. Her eyelashes were at least an inch
long and obviously fake. Both octogenarians beamed at him.
    Dan’s grandmother, her snow-white crop of curls tickling his
chin, hugged him as if she hadn’t seen him in years when, in fact, she’d spent
several hours at his bedside only the day before.
    “Oh, Danny, it’s wonderful to have you home from that
dreadful, sterile place.” Martha Craven dabbed at her eyes with a lace-edged
handkerchief she pulled from a pocket. “And all you’ve had to endure!” She
hugged him again with a new rush of tears.
    “Martha, don’t carry on so or you’ll get the hiccups again.”
Olivia Gates, who had turned eighty-one in January and was almost as slim and
fully as tall as Tess, patted Dan’s back. “Now, Daniel, you’re welcome here for
as long as we can persuade you to stay. You must think of this as your home.
Our digs are your digs, so to speak. And you must call me Aunt Olivia, just as
my Tess does.” She patted his back again. “We’re going to have you mellowed out
and coasting in nothing flat.”
    His grandmother on one side and Olivia on the other ushered
him toward the front porch, where Hook and Ivan stood waiting. Dan glanced back
at Tess as if to say, “Save me from all this,” but Tess only grinned and
shrugged.
    “I believe you already know Ivan,” Olivia said to Daniel, “but
you conked out the other night before you met Julius.” She introduced him to
the menacing black giant with the scar and the bald head. “Julius runs the
household. Anything you need, let him know.”
    “Hook,” the big man said in a bass voice, taking the hand
that Daniel offered. “Call me Hook. Nobody but Miss Olivia calls me Julius.”
    His grin was so broad that it showed not only his gold front
tooth but the star cutout decorating its surface. Daniel forced a smile and
thanked him for the blood donation, but he wasn’t convinced that anyone with
Hook’s history could be trusted with the family silver. Or with his
grandmother.
    Ivan Petkov bowed, his expression contrite. “Please accept
my profuse apologies for the shrimp puffs. My heart is overwhelmed with grief
for the pain they caused your stomach.”
    “Ivan—” Dan began.
    “No, no.” Ivan held up both beefy hands. “Tess explains, but
still I feel remorse for my idiocy. You must let me make amends. I work my
fingers to the bone to devise tempting dishes for your diet. Not one iota will
I deviate from the hospital’s list. Come into my kitchen and taste the healthy
drink I have created for you. Ah, fantastic! I think I shall write a new
cookbook. I shall dedicate it to you.”
    Ivan would not be satisfied until the entire assemblage
followed him back to the large kitchen and tasted his Tropical Smoothie Friday.
Daniel even took a tentative sip to humor the Bulgarian, but despite the
welcome—and Tess—he was trying to figure out a way to extract his grandmother
from this loony bin.
    “The touch of almond extract is the secret.” Ivan slapped
Daniel’s back. “Delicious, is it not?” When Daniel agreed, the blustery chef
said, “I leave a pitcher in the refrigerator here in the kitchen and another in
the small one in your cottage. You must drink a small glass every two hours for
the good of your stomach. And we have dinner early. Not that hospital food.
Bah! I fix—”
    “Ivan, cool it.” Olivia shot him a quelling glance. “Daniel
needs rest, a little peace and quiet, not a recitation of your concoctions.”
When Ivan hung his head, she patted him on the shoulder. “You know