A Slender Thread Read Online Free PDF

the perennial flowers reappearing every year. Always beautiful. Now, with this illness, it was as if Lacey’s life had become a garden infested with deadly insects, or an unstoppable blight. Margot shivered. Alex and Lacey kept the house cool at night.
    She reached for the railing and continued down the stairs. A light was on in the kitchen. A cupboard door clicked shut. She had lost her opportunity to fix her tea and slip unnoticed back to her room, but she went into the kitchen anyway.
    â€œI hope I didn’t wake you,” Alex said. “I wanted to get the turkey out of the fridge.” The large bird sat in the roasting pan on the counter, its flesh a ghostly white in the dimly lit kitchen.
    â€œNo,” Margot said, pulling her robe around her and tying the sash. “I was going to make a cup of tea.”
    â€œLet me do that for you.” He reached for the kettle next to the sink. He wore sweatpants and a shapeless blue sweater. His hair, once a reddish blond, was now flecked with gray. He was a tall man. His face was angular, and with age he had grown into his beaklike nose. He no longer had the freckles she remembered from their childhood summers on Bow Lake. His family had had a cottage just down the lake from Grandmother Winkler’s camp. To Margot, he had always been the fabulous older boy in baggy boxer swim trunks diving off the float into the icy blue lake.
    â€œIs Lacey still asleep?”
    â€œThe doctor put her on a prescription sleeping pill. She takes it every night now. As you can imagine, we haven’t been sleeping too well lately.”
    â€œAlex, I’m so sorry.” This was the first time they had been alone. Margot knew that the girls would sleep for hours.
    â€œShe’s going to get better.” He opened a cupboard and took out two mugs, then reached in a canister for a tea bag. He shook his head. “There’s quite an assortment. You choose.” He handed Margot the canister. She took the one on top, country peach, not wanting to search any further.
    Alex turned his back to her and began to make coffee in the machine on the far counter. He filled the carafe with water, shoveled out scoops of coffee from a different canister, and pressed a switch. His movements were quick and jerky, as if he were uneasy being alone with her. The teakettle started to whistle.
    Margot grabbed it before the noise could wake the rest of the family. She poured water into her mug and stared into the liquid, watching it steep. The amber liquid slowly darkened. “Lacey said the doctors told her the aphasia would grow worse.” Margot hesitated. She didn’t want to upset Alex, but she wanted to understand everything that was going on. “She said they had taken brain scans.”
    â€œYes, but nothing might happen for years. We saw another doctor yesterday. He said they couldn’t say for sure.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “Shit, Margot. Why can’t these guys give us a straight answer?”
    Margot looked away from him. Alex, always so calm, so thoughtful, looked shaken.
    He said, his voice pleading, “It doesn’t make sense. Lacey’s the picture of health. She runs. She does yoga. She’s smarter than any of us. So what if she has a little trouble remembering the right word? We all do.”
    â€œCan’t they give her anything to stop the progression? She seems convinced there’s no way out of this. I just wondered.”
    â€œThey say there’s nothing.” He rested his elbows on the counter and covered his eyes with his hands. “I’m sure it’s because she’s overtired. As usual, she’s doing too much. She’s going to take the sleeping pills, get her rest, and she’s not going to get worse. We’re going to take it one step at a time.”
    â€œOf course,” Margot said, trying to conceal her doubt. “Lacey’s always been strong.” Margot blinked back