By 12:30, they’d cleared away all of the dishes and Kay thanked Lane, saying that she and her family could go home if they wanted. Gabe asked what the residents would do for the rest of the day. Kay replied that they were supposed to have carolers coming at 1:00, but that they’d called earlier and cancelled.
He looked at Jess, “What do you think? I can play the piano if you’re up for it.”
Kay looked from Gabe to Lane. “He’s kidding, right? A concert by Gabe Greer would cost more than $100.00 a ticket and that’s just the cheap seats.”
Lane smiled and shook her head. “No, I don’t think he’s kidding.”
Jess looked at Gabe and shrugged. “I’m in. You know, my brothers sing and so do Joey and Pauli.” She smiled. “We might not be Grammy award winners, but even without practice, we should be able to pull off a few Christmas carols.”
She pulled out her phone and started making phone calls as Gabe walked to the piano in the corner of the room.
Ben looked at Lane. “Red, if we’re having a house full of guests for dinner at two, I’d better get home. Are you coming or staying here?”
Lane looked at Jess. “Did you get everyone?”
“Yes, Joey and Pauli are both coming. I could use another female voice, but like Ben says, you have a house full of guests coming.”
Kay spoke up, “It’s more of a sing-a-long than a concert. I can sing with them, Lane. You should go home.”
Lane looked at Ben. “I’ll go home with you, but if half the guests are here singing, maybe we should delay our dinner until 2:30.”
Lane waived to Jake, Jamie and Gabe who were repositioning the piano and called, “Break a leg, guys. See you later.”
Joey ended the call and looked at Evie, “You’ll have to excuse us, Evie. We have to go out, but Ben will be home soon.” He looked at Pauli. “Come on, apparently we’ve been drafted to sing Christmas carols at the nursing home.”
Pauli got up and followed Joey toward the garage complaining every step of the way, but Joey turned and held up his hand as if to tell him to stop.
“Like you would have told Jess no.” He shook his head. Thank God, Pauli brought me a change of clothes or I’d be singing in my workout gear. He thought as he took the keys for Pauli’s BMW from the hook and opened the garage door.
Jake called Meg. “Apparently the people scheduled to do Christmas caroling at the nursing home cancelled, and we’ve been drafted to do it, so dinner’s being delayed by half an hour. Ben and Mom are on their way home, and Nana Evie is there, but the caroling goes from one to two, so Jess, Jamie, Gabe, Joey, Pauli and I will be a little late. You and your folks go on over to Mom’s as scheduled and I’ll see you as soon as I can.”
“Okay, I love you.” Meg replied.
Meg knew she should have gone with Jake to serve lunch at Sunset House. They saw each other every night and he had called her as he drove to Sunset House, and yet she couldn’t believe how much she missed him.
Jake walked away from the guys and responded, “I love you too.”
He had planned to wait until New Year’s Eve to propose, but the ring was beginning to burn a hole in his proverbial pocket. Ben had set a high bar on how to do a proposal though, and he’d planned a romantic New Year’s Eve proposal. He just hoped he could hold out that long.
Kay spoke with the nursing staff to let them know that caroling was back on at one o’clock in the activity room. Joey and Pauli arrived and Kay put them, Jake, Jamie, and Gabe to work breaking down the lunch tables and loading them on a cart in the hall while she and Jess set up folding chairs to make room for the other residents. She really hadn’t expected the families to stick around for the caroling, but now, word was out that the servers were in fact Gabe Greer and Jessica Lane, and that they were leading the caroling, no one was going anywhere.
There was an announcement over the PA system advising the residents and nursing staff about the caroling and the room was quickly filling up. Gabe had found a book of Christmas songs in the piano bench and had started warming up, checking to see how badly the old piano was out of tune. He handed the book to Jess.
“Pick out a dozen or so and decide what order you want to do them in. After you’ve decided, I’ll ask Kay if she can make copies so the singers have the lyrics.”
Kay went to the activity director’s office and came back carrying copies of the songs and seven Santa hats. She held them out to her volunteer singers and kept the last one for herself.
Promptly at one o’clock, she stood in front of the crowd, “The Leawood Lyrical Choir had to cancel, but the volunteers who helped serve lunch have offered to stay and do caroling. We have Gabriel Greer on the piano with Jessica Lane and friends singing.” The room erupted into applause as Gabe began playing I’ll be Home for Christmas.
The concert continued with residents singing along to most of the traditional Christmas carols. Gabe encouraged Jess to end the concert with Santa Baby and she reluctantly complied. “Greer, you owe me big time for this!” She whispered before turning to the audience with a smile as she began singing.
Midway through the song, Jess had seen one of the nursing staff standing in the back recording the impromptu concert with her smart phone and had nodded toward Gabe. They both knew the video would hit the internet before they made it home and they knew they were going to have to call their agents and PR people to give them the heads-up.
Gabe, who had closed more than one concert, stood and smiled. “You’ve been an amazing audience. Happy Thanksgiving, everyone, and we hope you all have a very Merry Christmas.”
He stood and motioned toward his fellow singers. Everyone held hands and bowed. They walked toward the doors, Gabe and Jess stopping to shake a few hands as they left.
As they walked into the parking lot, Jamie said he’d catch a ride with Jake leaving Jess and Gabe in the rental SUV sandwiched between Jake’s Silverado and the Bellini twins in Pauli’s BMW in the parade toward the Bellini’s house.
Jess had paired her phone to the blue tooth in Gabe’s rented SUV earlier and was surprised when it rang. She clicked to answer, and was assaulted by a barrage of Italian curse words, peppered with words she understood. She’d learned Italian using Rosetta Stone and it wasn’t big on curse words.
As soon as she realized Joey had butt dialed her, she muted her phone.
“Who the hell does that punk ass think he is anyway?” Gabe quickly translated.
“Gabe Greer, Jessica Lane and friends, my ass. Volunteering to sing at the home, what’s he going for anyway sainthood?” Gabe continued translating.
Jess slapped her right hand into her left. “Gabe. Basta!”
He was stunned as he looked at her. “And exactly when did you learn Italian?”
“Would you stop already? I’m trying to listen here.” She replied.
“And why the (something) did she bring him home for Thanksgiving? Who the (something) is he to her anyway?” Joey said.
“I learned 2 years ago using Rosetta Stone. It’s not big on the curse words, so there are some things I’m missing in translation.”