Snowstorm of Our Past novel · Chapter 27 of 32

Chapter 27: The Diner

I don't remember putting the plates down.

I remember the counter under my hand as I went over it, and broken glass under my knees.

"Gran. Gran, look at me."

Her eyes opened.

"Don't you dare," she said, through her teeth. "Don't you dare make a fuss in front of the customers."

"You're on the floor."

"I noticed."

Her hand was clenched on her apron over her chest. Her lips had gone blue at the edges.

"Somebody call dispatch!" I yelled. "Tell them chest pain, seventy-six, conscious. Tell them it's Gran."

Six people already had their phones out.

The old man who eats two eggs at seven fifteen was on his knees on the other side of her, holding her hand.

"Aspirin," I said. "Somebody's got aspirin."

A biker in leather dug a bottle out of his saddlebag vest and threw it over the counter.

I made her chew one.

"Tastes terrible," she said.

"Good."

The helicopter came in nine minutes later and landed in the ballfield two blocks down.

I heard it before I saw it.

Gabe came through the diner door at a run in his flight suit, with the flight nurse behind him and a stretcher between them.

He went down on one knee beside Gran.

"Hey, beautiful," he said. "You trying to get out of the lunch rush?"

"Gabe Haynes." Her voice was thin. "You get me off this floor before somebody sees my underwear."

"Yes, ma'am."

They had her on a monitor in under a minute.

I watched Gabe's face as he read it.

He didn't change his expression at all, and that was how I knew it was bad.

"We're taking her to Denver," he said quietly. "Now. You can ride up front."

"Tilly."

"I've got her," said the schoolteacher, who had appeared from nowhere and already had Tilly on her hip.

"The diner..."

"Go," the old man said, still on his knees. "Mallory, go."

I went.

The flight to Denver took thirty-five minutes.

I sat up front beside the pilot with a headset on and watched the mountains fall away underneath us.

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