Greene sat bolt upright in bed, certain something was wrong. Glad for the strong night-light, she did a quick scan of the rectangular room, white dressers, a rocking chair, a canopied bed on which lay an evenly breathing child. She sighed. She did not possess ESP, always knowing when things weren’t right. She was not special. She was just Ms. Greene, Registered Nurse, watching over five-year-old Mary Nordine, who had recently undergone an appendectomy. Ms. Greene climbed quietly from her bed, which was remarkably comfortable for a rollaway. Mrs. Nordine had wanted her to sleep in the room next door, but Ms. Greene liked to be close to her patient, even when she’d had to sleep on a few folded blankets on the floor. Compared to that arrangement, the rollaway was a dream. Mary lay on her back, her blond hair spread beneath her head like a golden halo, her little pink mouth slightly open, her arms closed around a stuffed lion named Dandelion. “It’s his turn,” she’d explained seriously to her nurse at bedtime.
