Message from Nam Read Online Free PDF Page A

good at everything, and had strong extracurricular interests. But still she was pretty sure she’d be accepted.
    Her mother had been smug and pleased when the early acceptance to Sweet Briar came, and as far as she was concerned, Paxton had heard from the only school that mattered. It pleased her to be able to say that Paxxie had been accepted at the other Ivy League schools, but like Paxton, she was unenthused about them. And as far as Beatrice Andrews was concerned, the schools in California might as well have been on another planet. She urged Paxton to make the most “sensible” move, and accept Sweet Briar before even waiting to hear from any of the others.
    “I can’t do that, Mother,” Paxton said quietly, her big green eyes searching the face that always seemed more like a stranger’s. “I made myself a promise a long time ago.” But it was more than just a promise to herself, it was something she felt she owed her Daddy.
    “You’d never be happy in Boston, Paxton. The weather is appalling. And it’s an enormous school. You’d be much better off closer to home, in familiar surroundings. You can always take some graduate classes at Harvard later.”
    “Why don’t we just wait and see if I get in, that makes more sense.” But what made sense to her made very little sense to her mother. It annoyed her no end that Paxton was holding out so stubbornly for a northern school when she could have gone to Sweet Briar and stayed so much closer to home. George turned up one Saturday afternoon to vent his views and Paxton smiled to herself while she listened to him. Talking to George was just like talking to her mother. They both believed that her life was destined to be close to them, and that it was foolish of her to try to spread her wings and expand her horizons.
    “What about Daddy, George? He seemed to have come out okay, in spite of venturing up north to go to school with the Yankees.” She was teasing him, which amused her if not him. Among his many other virtues, her brother George had not been blessed with their father’s sense of humor.
    “That’s not the same thing, Pax. And you know I’m not fixated about the South. I just think that for a woman, Sweet Briar is a better choice. Mother’s right. And there’s no reason for you to go all the way to Boston.”
    “With that kind of attitude, they might not even have discovered America, George. Imagine if Queen Isabella had told Columbus that there was no reason for him to go all the way to the New World.…” She was laughing at him and he was not amused by it.
    “Mother’s right. You’re still a child, and it’s ridiculous to do this just to prove a point. You’re not a man, and there’s no reason on earth for you to go to Harvard. You’re not pursuing any career like medicine or law, there’s just no reason for you to go anywhere. You should be close to home with us. What if Mama gets sick? She’s not as young as she used to be, and she needs us here.” He tried everything on her, including guilt, and it served only to enrage his sister. She couldn’t understand why they wanted to clip her wings. But they seemed to feel they owned her.
    “She is fifty-eight years old, not ninety-three, George! And I’m not going to sit here for the rest of my life, waiting to take care of her. And how the hell do you know what career goals I want to pursue? For all you know, I want to be a brain surgeon. Does that make it okay for me to go north to school, or do I have to stay here and bake cookies no matter what, just because I’m a woman?”
    “That’s not what we’re suggesting.” He looked pained by her bluntness.
    “I know that.” She tried to regain her cool. “And Sweet Briar is a wonderful school. But all my life I’ve dreamed of going to Radcliffe.”
    “And if you don’t get in?” He looked at her pointedly.
    “I will. I have to.” She had promised her father’s memory. She had promised him before that. She had sworn she would