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“No, I didn’t work it out until I saw her by the creek.”
Two more nurses joined the melee.
It was dreadful to see Mrs. Sweet so confused and distraught.
“I will not go to my room. I’m not a child. I don’t live here,” the woman argued, raising her voice.
“Poor thing,” Libby lamented.
Harper looked on as Mr. Sweet tried to reason with his wife, but his words were getting lost between the nurses attempting to assist the woman.
“I wish we could do something,” Penny said.
Do something.
She studied the space. The main entryway served as a gathering place. Clusters of intimate seating dotted the area, and a piano sat in the corner of the room.
A piano.
“I can help,” she said, eyeing the instrument. She handed Penny her stone cookie and tote, then skirted by the group attempting to calm the woman.
She lowered herself onto the bench and rested her fingers on the keys. “Here we go,” she whispered. She played a rolling arpeggio scale. Climbing then descending, the reverberation of the crisp notes ringing in a cascade of sound quieted the frenzied conversations.
She looked over her shoulder. “Mrs. Sweet, would you like to hear a new song I’ve been working on?”
The baker’s pinched expression smoothed into a serene smile.
It was as if a switch had flipped.
“I’d be delighted, Harper Barbara,” she replied and settled herself in a rocking chair next to the piano. “I’m ready, dear.”
What song should she play?
Oddly, the decision wasn’t hers.
As if Joyce and Bartholomew had reclaimed control of her hands, she played the intro to a tune that didn’t even have a title—or a full set of lyrics. But the notes didn’t come from her hands. They came from her heart.
“She’s a girl with chameleon eyes,
Her laughter’s full of surprises.
Sign me up for the romance scale of devotion.”
The lyrics from the second challenge flowed past her lips.
She waited for heartbreak to set in.
But it didn’t.
A steadiness took over.
“Tell me, baby, what you need.
I won’t stop till I succeed, working my way through the scale of devotion.
Breakfast in bed, flowers in a vase, chocolate bonbons are no disgrace. Baby’s got a scale of devotion.”
She glanced up and caught Mrs. Sweet tapping her foot to the beat. Mr. Sweet stood next to her, and Tanner was there, too. The High AF dude nodded as he held up his cell phone. The guy must be recording her. Why would he do that? Then she noticed a few of the nurses doing the same thing.
