Read Online There Was an Old Woman by Hallie Ephron - Free Book Online

mother’s car, she’d have the luxury of loading up at the PathMark a mile away.
    She unlocked the little one-car garage and raised the overhead door. There was her mother’s Subaru. A taillight was broken. She walked along the driver side. The left front fender was scraped, too. Evie sniffed. Did she smell gasoline over Jean Naté?
    Boxes were clustered near some old car batteries on the floor by the car door. One box contained cigarette cartons. Another was nearly full of liquor bottles. Evie pulled one out from between the cardboard inserts. More Grey Goose. Apparently vodka and cigarettes were being delivered by the caseload.
    Evie pushed the boxes away from the car door and got in. The interior smelled sweet, like fermented apples. She looked around and found the source: a rotting apple had sunk into the drink holder. She gouged it out with a tissue and tossed it into one of the nearby boxes. Then she buckled the seat belt, slipped the key into the ignition, and turned it halfway.
    The lights on the dash came on. She rolled down the window to let out the cloying smell. Adjusted the mirror. And then turned the key farther to start the engine.
    It caught, gave a sputter and a wheeze, then died.
    Evie sighed. She turned the key again. Wha-wha-wha. The engine cranked. And cranked. But no matter how much she pumped the gas, it wouldn’t catch. When she tried turning the key again, the engine barely roused itself and the engine light dimmed.
    That’s when she realized that the needle on the gas gauge was pointing to empty.
    She slammed her hand against the steering wheel. The horn gave a feeble bleat. She wanted to scream. It probably wasn’t the first time that her mother had parked the car and left it running until it ran out of gas.
    Evie sat for a moment, pulling herself together, then popped open the glove box. She looked in vain for an AAA card. She was pulling out the owner’s manual when her cell phone rang. She almost didn’t bother to look, thinking it would be Seth, his feelings hurt by her brusque response.
    But it was Ginger.
    â€œAre you at the hospital yet?” Ginger asked.
    â€œI was about to leave.”
    â€œHow bad is it?”
    â€œDisgusting. Stinky. Garbage everywhere. Cockroaches. Pantry moths. Squirrels. I’d give it a twelve on a scale of one to ten.”
    Ginger groaned.
    â€œI started cleaning out the kitchen. Tossed out a mattress. Covered a broken window.” She gave the car key one more futile turn. “And now the damned car won’t start. So I’m going to have to take the bus to the hospital.”
    Evie leaned forward and picked up a white paper bag from the floor of the passenger seat. It was printed with the black-and-red logo for Ruth’s Chris Steak House. Inside was a leftovers container that she didn’t dare open. Beneath it was an empty champagne bottle. Veuve Clicquot.
    â€œIt wasn’t bad when I was there last,” Ginger said.
    â€œWhen were you here last?”
    â€œMom’s birthday.”
    Two months ago. Evie had sent a card, but for the first time she hadn’t called. Now that felt mean. How big a deal would it have been to pick up the phone?
    â€œI brought her a cake,” Ginger said, rubbing it in.
    That explained the cake in the refrigerator. “Did you take her out for a steak dinner, too?”
    â€œYou’re kidding, right? I don’t even take myself out for steak dinners. I brought her a lasagna.”
    And there was the baking dish with blue moldy stuff in the fridge. Maybe Frank had been the source of the steak dinner. How many bottles of champagne had they gone through before this now empty one for the road?
    â€œThe house was just the usual messy,” Ginger said. “And Mom was pretty upbeat. She was excited about how she’d be getting money each month, I guess because her Social Security kicked in.”
    â€œSo you haven’t seen her since her