Driving him Crazy

I live in an area where public transport means two buses a day, if you are lucky - and if you catch it in my village it will take you ninety minutes to reach the market town five miles away because the bus goes round every other village before it gets there. The bus station in town is helpfully situated at the bottom of the hill that leads to the shops so, all in all, it's pretty much useless to anyone who is in any way frail. This means that people carry on driving long after they would probably have stopped in a city.
Cora is famous around here. She is eighty nine years old and she drives a huge old Ford which looks like someone has crawled all over it with a toffee hammer, no panel is it's original shape.She drives the narrow lanes at breakneck speed, flicking ash from her constant cigarettes into a crystal ash tray that she keeps on the floor. She doesn't reverse any more though - if she meets someone at a narrow point in the road she leans out of the window and shouts "I'm eighty nine dear!" until the other driver gets the message and reverses.
We visit their house twice a day to help Cora's brother Bob to get in and out of bed. Bob has chronic obstructive airways disease and uses oxygen. He is fifteen years younger than his sister, the baby of the family and the two of them squabble incessantly though they adore each other. The risk assessment says that Cora doesn't smoke in the house but we know she does, the wallpaper and all the furniture is stained orange and there are often ash trays around when we visit. Trying to tackle the issue just brings on a fit of filial unity and they both act innocent, agreeing that oxygen and cigarettes are a very dangerous combination and of course Cora wouldn't smoke around Bob "with his chest" Bob's chest is a worry though, some mornings he can barely breathe and even Cora hesitates in her constant stream of chatter and casts worried glances as we help him with his nebuliser. Cora talks incessantly, an outpouring of gossip and observations that has us all laughing and makes Bob smile in spite of himself even as he tells her to be quiet and let the girls get on with their job.
It was earlier this year when Cora first asked one of the girls to pick her up a little bit of shopping. The girls were tactful, they didn't ask why she was not going out for the groceries herself and they brought the items she had asked for. A few days later Cora asked if she could have regular shopping and we arranged to go to the supermarket once a week as a private call. To be honest, we were all relieved that she had lost her taste for the open road - she was a total liability, we never knew whether we were more afraid for her or more afraid of meeting her round the next bend. It was sad though, somehow not driving shrank Cora, she took to sitting in her armchair all day, entertaining herself with nagging poor Bob. We went many nights to find him sitting in the kitchen "for a bit of peace" while Cora hastily tried to waft the tell tale cigarette smoke away before the carers noticed. Their former camaraderie all but disappeared and the two of them were constantly gloomy,
Then one morning the carer rang me in stitches. She had arrived at the house to find a smart little hatchback sitting outside. She thought Bob's daughter must be visiting but when she got in the house there was just Bob, upstairs in bed, and Cora, busily putting on her hat. "Do you like my new car?" she said. The carer was astounded "But I thought you had given up driving?" she said. Cora met her eyes in the mirror and winked "Oh no dear" she said "The old car died, but I knew Bob would get fed up and give me the money for a new one eventually if I went on enough!"