Myra
The Happy Pine’s Nursing Home was a place of beige walls and the relentless, rhythmic whoosh of oxygen machines and beeping monitors. It was the antithesis of the bakery. Where Dottie’s Place was warm, chaotic, and smelled of life, this place was sterilized and smelled of lemon-scented ammonia and fading dreams.
Tony’s biker boots sounded like thunder on the linoleum as we walked toward Room 11. He looked like he wanted to punch the walls.
Whatever grudges I held against Tony, he genuinely cared about his great-aunt, and it really bothered him to see her in a nursing home.
We found Dot in a high-backed armchair, staring out the window at a gray January sky. She looked smaller than she had when she was lying in bed. Her pale skin was like crumpled tissue paper, but when she turned
