“Rose who?” Blackjack asked, turning toward the nurse.
“My daughter, Rose. We listen to her play the piano every day after lunch.”
“Right.” The man lifted his chin and looked at Grub. “Keep an eye out, soldier. I’m goin’ in.”
“I got you covered,” said Grub, repositioning himself behind the plant. He peeked out one last time. “Sir, would you tell me some of those stories sometime? The ones that aren’t in any books?”
Blackjack grinned. “You bet.”
I looked back to the girl named Rose playing piano, to find her watching me and laughing.
And wow, what a smile. I gave a stiff wave.
The place was really rocking now. A few of the female residents had coupled up to dance and were singing the repeating refrain: “She’s a lady . . . whoa, whoa, whoa, she’s a lady!”
Off in the corner, the national anthem met its climax as the tenor continued: “And the rockets’ red glare! The bombs bursting in air! Gave proof through the night, that our flag was still there.”
Then—and I couldn’t make this up if I tried—the girl named Rose perfectly segued from Tom Jones to Francis Scott Key with a couple of chord changes.
The tenor took his cue: “O say does that star-spangled banner yet waaaave . . . o’er the land of the freeee, and the home of the brave?”
“To victory!” Blackjack shouted, raising a fist and grinning over his shoulder at the potted plant.
Grub raised a small fist in response.
The room broke into applause just as a woman in a black pantsuit rushed into the common room, typing away on her cell phone.
“Enemy, twelve o’clock!” shouted Blackjack. “Prepare to fire!”
The woman shot a quick glare at Blackjack’s nurse.
Grub looked at Blackjack, then at me, as if he couldn’t believe a grown-up was playing army with him.
I shrugged. Hell, I didn’t know what was going on. My mind was still on the girl.
“Target locked,” confirmed Grub, followed by “BZSHOOO!” which, I imagine, was the sound of the bazooka firing.
“Watch your crossfire!” yelled Blackjack.
“Target missed! I repeat, target missed!” shouted Grub.
“Retreat!” yelled Blackjack, his voice fading as the nurse quickly ushered him out of the room.
The woman in black marched straight toward me, never looking away from her phone. She was striking, in a sort of a sharp-businesswoman way, her hair pulled back into a tight bun. She held out cash between her first and second fingers without ever looking up.
“Missy Stouffer?” I asked.
“Ms. Stouffer, yes.”
I checked the receipt. “Eight ninety-five.”
She looked at me for the first time, over the top of her red-framed glasses. “And worth every penny, I’m sure.”
“It’s really good,” I said. Truthfully, I’d never even tried it. But she didn’t need to know that.
“I hope so,” she replied, motioning with the cash for me to take it. She handed me two fives and told me to keep the change. I wanted to say, “Gee, thanks,” but kept my mouth shut. Then Ms. Stouffer marched back from wherever she came.
As soon as she was gone, the room returned to life. Cackling Woman, clearly the pack leader, yelled, “More Tom Jones!” The girl named Rose went right into it, and several residents joined in for the chorus: “What’s new, pussycat? Whoa, whoa, whoa-oh!”
Tom Jones must really like the word whoa.
I looked back to the girl named Rose, who was watching her hands as they traveled the keyboard. I turned to leave, but after a few steps I spun around for one more look, which caught her attention. I pointed at the floor and mouthed the words, “I’ll be back tomorrow.”
She gave me a quick thumbs-up before returning to the keys.
THREE
I MUST HAVE AN EFFECTIVE AUTOPILOT SETTING, BECAUSE I DON’T remember the bike ride back across town to the café. My mind was somewhere else the entire two-mile trip.
Somewhere involving a Tom Jones song-and-dance number.
Somewhere involving a World War II vet and the national anthem.
But mostly somewhere involving a girl named Rose. And if I timed it right, thanks to the 5-Day Deal, I’d get to see her for the next four days in a row.
My delivery job had taken a sudden turn for the better.
That is, until I got the news.
The World Peas Café was located on the corner of Main Street and the railroad tracks, in a run-down strip mall that also featured a cash-loan place, a psychic, some kind of small-town detective agency, and Crazy Joe’s Hot Slots. It was like one-stop shopping for people who would someday end up on The Jerry Springer Show.
Not that I ever watched that show . . . Crazy mom, remember? We grew up without a television. Mom believed in the power of imagination. Somehow I’d managed to grow up pretty normal—save for the occasional propensity to daydream—but my brother definitely took Mom’s lesson to another level, which explained a lot about his compulsive mapmaking and battle planning.
The parking lot was nearly empty, as usual, except for a few beat-up cars, including our own. I was locking the bike to the light pole in front of the café when my mom started talking from the doorway. “Another cancellation of the 5-Day Deal, that makes two today.”
“Cancellation?” I asked, stepping inside.
“I just got off the phone with the director of Hilltop Nursing Home. Apparently, the salad was ‘overpriced and not what she was expecting,’” Mom said, adding peevish air quotes to the last part.
My heart sank. “Did you try to talk her out of it? What did you tell her?”
She threw her hands in the air. “I can’t force people to eat my food, Zeus. If they want to live in a world of trans fats, hydrogenated oils, and factory-farm meat, that’s their choice, but I can’t change someone’s free will.”
I wanted to say: “But, but, but Hot Piano Girl!”
What came out instead: “That’s bullshit!”
Mom crossed her arms and looked at me. “Watch the language, you. Care to rephrase that?”
“Um . . . total bullshit?”
Mom tried not to laugh and failed. “Complete and utter bullshit,” she agreed. “But don’t you dare say ‘I told you so.’”
A rush of guilt hit me, and I looked down at my feet.