All for a Song by Allison Pittman Read Free Book Online

wait around for a while, why don’t you help out here? See if she needs any help with her breakfast.”
    “Okay,” Charlotte says, slowly extricating herself from Nurse Betten’s touch.
    “That okay with you, Miss Lynnie?” Nurse Betten pauses for exactly three seconds before clapping her soft hands together three times. “Then I am off. You have yourself a great day today. Don’t get yourself into any trouble.”
    Fat chance of that.
    Lynnie looks at the TV.
    “Want me to turn that on for you?” Charlotte finds the remote control and, after just a brief study, the power button. “Tell me when,” she says, flicking through the channels.
    Lynnie reaches out, surprised to see how clawlike her hand looks next to the girl’s, and snatches the remote away.
    “Sorry.” The word is dragged through four syllables.
    Soon enough she finds channel 5, NBC, the Today show. More than thirty minutes gone, meaning she’s missed the big stories. And Matt Lauer isn’t even there. She drops the remote control beside her on the bed and reaches for her breakfast tray.
    Charlotte rolls it closer. “Want me to cut up that muffin for you?” Seconds later, her fingers—including that same thumb that had spent so much time in the girl’s mouth—are tearing the bran muffin asunder, breaking it into bite-size pieces. “Can I try it?” She pinches a bite and brings it up to sniff, holding it just below the thin gold ring that goes through her nose, before popping it in her mouth. “It’s dry.”
    Worst muffins in the world here.
    Charlotte continues to eat, nibbling bits from her snaggled fingers. In between bites, she removes the silver dome from Lynnie’s tray and peelsback the plastic wrap, releasing steam from the bowl of hot cereal. “You take sugar in it?”
    Lynnie tries to shake her head.
    “I could never eat it that way. Just plain. My grandma makes it with brown sugar and milk.” With moist crumbs still clinging to her fingers, Charlotte has unraveled the spoon from its napkin and, with something close to daintiness, dredges it through the Cream of Wheat. She holds it, suspended, just below Lynnie’s chin. “Open up.”
    I’m not a baby, you snot.
    Indeed, left to her own devices, Lynnie would be quite capable of performing all the tasks Charlotte has taken upon herself, though she’s been forced to forgo sugar since those little packets became so difficult to open. Still, she opens her mouth for the familiar, bland bite.
    Just as she swallows, a familiar face comes on the TV. Willard Scott, the garrulous weatherman who manages at once to be both ancient and ageless, stands with the White House lawn as a backdrop. “Happy Birthday to You” plays in the background, and then the picture of a spinning jam jar fills the screen. She knocks Charlotte’s hand out of the way and leans forward. Somehow, the girl has enough wits to turn up the volume.
    Every year since the first stroke, Lynnie has entered her name for the honor of being recognized for living an entire century. Or more. They used to be a rare breed, these people who lived past one hundred. But lately, Willard Scott and the Smucker’s jam jar have been saluting so many men and women that it makes turning one hundred seem as common as taking a bath. Last year she even allowed Nurse Betten to e-mail the information. But never has that jar spun around to show her name, her face.
    “Norm Cheswick,” Mr. Scott announces, “lives in Brooklyn, New York. One hundred years old, and still a Dodgers fan.”
    Who cares, old fool!
    And then some old woman who owes her longevity to her Saturday night beer.
    But after that . . .
    She might not recognize herself if not for her name written soprominently within the checkered label of the jar. They must have sent in a picture from her birthday three years ago, because she is sitting in front of an enormous slice of cake. Her mouth is open just the slightest bit, and the skin around it is slack and spotted, like