LITMIR.BIZ

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and Nursing Center sang to her father, the guilt Maryanne Wellborn had carried for months began to lessen. Maybe Dad had been right to insist on the move into the multilevel care facility.

      “I want to be where the action is, Cookie,” he’d argued, roguish grin in full bloom. “All the—” he winked “—dudes and babes are there, the ones old enough to speak my language, that is.”

      Maryanne had wanted to care for her only surviving parent at home—his home. But Stan Wellborn’s obstinacy rivaled a mule’s, and he’d insisted on putting the family home up for sale. It had sold distressingly soon.

      She’d known how much attention he needed. An insulin-dependent diabetic and recent amputee, his blood-sugar levels needed constant monitoring, as did his blood pressure and diet. Not to mention, his penchant for merriment and trouble. He’d been lonely and bored at home while Maryanne worked. Boredom had led to nutty amusements, which then mushroomed into mischief. Mischief had invited risk along, and both had courted danger.

      She couldn’t discount the friendships he’d made since he moved in. He wasn’t bored anymore.

      “Hey, Stan!” called a bald-headed fellow of her father’s vintage. “Whatcha waiting for? Blow out them candles already. We want some of that cake.”

      Murmured agreement broke out.

      Her dad winked. “I’m making my wish, don’t you know?”

      “Ha! What do you need more wishes for?” This gent leaned on a cane. “The ladies here have made them all come true since you moved in.”

      The birthday boy grinned, closed his eyes and then blew out the eight candles—seven fat ones for the decades and a thin one for his additional year—on the large blue-blossomed cake. “You’re just jealous of my irresistible charm, Hughie.”

      The residents howled at the banter, no one louder than Maryanne’s dad. For a moment, she wished her mother were still alive to share his pleasure. Then she realized how silly her wish was. Mother would have frowned upon the whole scenario. Quiet and unassuming, Martha Wellborn would have been mortified by her impulsive, happy-go-lucky husband’s lack of restraint.

      Propriety had been Mother’s underpinning, and she’d drilled its need into her daughter’s psyche from the moment Maryanne could understand.

      What she never did understand was how two such disparate souls had made a match in the first place, but she’d never questioned her parents’ love for each other. Martha’s death two years ago had plunged Stan into a depression deeper than Maryanne had expected in such an upbeat man.

      The depression vanished once he moved into the home.

      She shook off her dark thoughts, stepped closer to her father and kissed his high forehead. “I brought you something.”

      His hazel eyes twinkled. “What are you waiting for?”

      With a nod to the nursing home’s activities coordinator, Maryanne smiled back. “Let me help Sherri bring it in.”

      The two women lugged in a stack of cartons and set up the stereo. Tears gleamed in his eyes.

      “Oh, Cookie. I oughta say you shouldn’t have, but I’m tickled you did.”

      Blinking her own mistiness away, Maryanne said, “I knew how much you missed your music, and your old record player was useless. Enjoy this one, okay?”

      “You know I will. C’mere.” He patted his blanketed thigh. “Let your old man give you a hug and kiss.”

      Maryanne perched on her dad’s lap and hugged him tight. She loved the old scamp, and she meant to keep him as healthy and happy as possible for as long as she could.

      “I love you, Dad.”

      “Love you always, baby.”

      “Harrumph!” offered the bald man. “You’re getting too mushy for a party. Let’s try out that stereo.”

      With a final pat to his daughter’s back, Stan gave a whoop. “Go for it, Charlie. We need music to make this a real party.”

      Under cover of the hubbub, Maryanne said, “You’re really happy here, aren’t you?”

      “Yes, Cookie, I really am.” He winked. “Now it’s your turn to find some action. Of the young, male, falling-in-love kind, that is. It’s not God’s plan for a beautiful young woman to spend her life buried in a library or visiting a bunch of geezers.”

      “You’re not a geezer, and I love books.”

      “You need a…a—Oh, yeah! A chunk to show you what’s what, girl.”

      Maryanne rose to hide her blush and stifle a nervous giggle. “I’m too busy, and I’d rather spend my free time with you.”

      Stan shook his finger and grinned. “Mark my words, girl. When that lovebug bites, you’re gonna fall hard.”

      “Hey, I use bug spray by the gallon. It’s my favorite fragrance. But I’d better go help Sherri—look at that mob of cake-starved partiers around her.”

      While she doled out cake, Maryanne watched her father from the vantage point of the activities hall stage. The stack of small gifts from his friends thrilled him. Then, after they’d finished eating, with his favorite Glenn Miller, Guy Lombardo and Jimmy Dorsey tunes on the new stereo, he drew each ambulatory lady near and twirled her around his wheelchair.

      “I told you not to worry,” Sherri Armstrong told Maryanne as she tied off another bag of trash. “He practically begged you to move him here.”

      “I know. But it was hard.”

      “He’s busy, and he’s happy. And he wants you to build a life for yourself. That’s your next assignment, you understand?”

      “Not you, too. First Dad, now you.”

      Sherri, happily married mother of two, nodded. “We know what we’re talking about.”

      “We’ll see.” Maryanne gathered the empty punch bowl and headed for the kitchen. “Right now, we have a mess to clean.”

      No sooner did she enter the vast, equipment-filled white room, than Dean Ross, Peaceful Meadows’ director, called her name. Her middle knotted. The busy man rarely found time to discuss the library cart she brought twice a week to the home. She doubted he’d come for the birthday party.

      “How are you, Dean?”

      He grimaced. “Same as always. You’re going to have to cancel Audrey White’s library privileges.”

      “Oh, no. I missed her at Dad’s party and meant to stop by her room to see how she liked the last historical novel I suggested.”

      “The ambulance just took her to the hospital. She slipped into a coma a little while ago, and she won’t be back.”

      “Are you sure?”

      “As sure as I can be. You saw how weak she was when you brought her books.”

      “You’re right. She couldn’t even sit up when I came…was it day before yesterday? The day before, maybe. Rosie, Audrey’s nurse, was getting the other bed in the room ready for a new patient. I helped her…I had to push the meds stand out of the way to get to Audrey’s side of the room. And Audrey mentioned she was headed to another floor.”

      “She was. Intensive care. And the new patient did no better.”

      Maryanne winced. “Audrey didn’t say a thing. Now…can’t they do anything more?”

      “Cancer at that stage is merciless. Morphine for the pain is the best we have. Nature helps and lets the patient enter a coma toward the end, but I’m afraid Audrey—”

      “I understand,” Maryanne said around the lump in her throat. “I’ll take care of her library card.”

      “She’s

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