Nine
Noell shivered. The walk to Hillcrest Nursing Home wasn’t far—just a couple blocks—and it was still summer, technically, even though school buses had been dropping off kids at the corner for a few weeks now. The kids always looked so tired as they walked home. Book bags. Homework. One kid always carried his trumpet case too.
She knew trumpet cases. She had begged to play, knowing Grampa would never deny her anything that was legal. But her band teacher only had a seat available for a flute. He had a whole row of trumpet students and only one flute player. Even saxophone would have been good but there were five—in a middle school band of thirty. Flute would have been just okay, except for the fact that the one and only flutist was Mary Jane Brixton, their papergirl, who one day when
