Chance of Plans
an excerpt

Anastacia complained that she was missing the last piece to her puzzle. Again. It seemed to Heather that a lot of pieces had come up missing lately.
Curious, Heather commented to Chloe about the disappearances. Chloe was, of course, up to the task of investigating. As always, she was enthusiastic and full of ideas for figuring out what was happening. She brought in an unopened hundred piece puzzle and left it on the table.
As expected, Anastacia and Evangeline started in on it. A few others wafted in and out, talking and helping, and when the picture was nearly complete they realized they were one piece short. Again.
A few days later Chloe brought in a five hundred piece puzzle. They took turns monitoring the table, but still the result was the same. The thousand piece jigsaw puzzle ended at nine hundred and ninety nine bits.
They searched under all the tables, checked the lining of the chairs, dug out a nearby heat vent, all to no avail. Nessie cleaned the drapes and wall-mounted lights, in a thinly disguised effort to turn up the lost pieces, but had no success there, either.

Eventually they gave up and went back to their regular schedules. Everybody who was lucid swore they weren’t playing a joke; those who weren’t lucid mostly ignored the question.
Except for Thile, who scolded, “Puzzle pieces! Don’t you know a baby could choke on puzzle pieces? I’d never –” she gave an exasperated, long-suffering sigh and turned away, not finishing the rant. She rolled off across the room in her wheelchair, carrying the doll Heather had bought for her.

A couple weeks later, Luther took Heather aside and whispered – loudly, since he couldn’t hear himself – “Doll, you need to keep an eye on Sherman. He really shouldn’t keep eating those pictures, he’ll get sick.” Confused, unsure of how seriously to take advice from an eighty seven year old man who thought he was twenty four, she promised to watch.
She passed the information on to the other CNAs as she came into contact with them, and left a note at the nurse’s station, just in case.

Chloe brought in yet another jigsaw puzzle, and they monitored Sherman more closely.
That proved to be difficult, because Heather wasn’t convinced that Luther wasn’t just trying to distract them so he could get his ‘unit’ out.
Nessie enjoyed all the intrigue, but did a good job of concealing the fact.
Luther, Morris, Bud, and Leroy didn’t do anything suspicious.
Sherman, on the other hand, walked over to the puzzle table, helped Evangeline and Anastacia for a few minutes, and took a piece with him when he left. Heather quietly followed him down the hall, expecting to find a stash in his room.
He popped the cardboard into his mouth and started chewing.
She had to retreat so he wouldn’t hear her laughing. She went to the mop closet and shut herself in before letting herself giggle.
A minute later, Chloe peered in. “What’s going on?” she asked, eyes sparkling. She loved to see Heather laugh like a little kid when something entertaining happened.
And Heather was always great for a story.
“Luther was right,” Heather forced out, between gasps for breath. “Sherman is eating puzzle pieces. Really eating them.” Tears were streaming from her eyes, and she was shaking with the effort to be moderately quiet.
Chloe laughed with her for a couple minutes, before asking, “Do we try and stop him?”
Heather had gotten herself settled down and was breathing normally again, but that question made her lose the rigid control. “We can’t. How else will he get enough cardboard in his diet?”