Reach for Tomorrow Read Online Free PDF Page A

her.
    “Same amount of time, different reason,” Sarah told him.
    Mrs. McGreggor took the little boy’s hand. “Sarah’s not going back to the hospital, remember, Richie? She’s had her transplant, and she’s better now.”
    Katie didn’t like eavesdropping, but she couldn’t help thinking that Sarah didn’t look better. Katie was automatically reminded of her own appearance after her heart transplant surgery: gaunt and colorless. She had also experienced a period of rejection, followed by a long recuperation process. But as her body had accepted the transplant, she had begun to gain weight back and had felt more energetic. Perhaps the weeks at camp would work the same wonders for Sarah, filling out her thin frame and brightening her dull complexion. Katie hoped so.
    The Bluejays marched in a line to the cabin, where their stuff had already been delivered by workers. Inside, the group scattered like ants, scrambling for bunks. “Why don’t you bunk near me?” Katie said to Sarah, and pointed to the far end of the room.
    “But that’s the bunk I want,” Dullas announced.
    “I want Sarah to have it,” Katie said politely but firmly.
    “That’s all right,” Sarah said. “She can have it.”
    “No. I’m the counselor. I get to choose. Sarah gets that bunk.”
    Dullas shot Sarah a murderous look but didn’t argue.
A miracle
, Katie thought.
    But when Katie pulled everybody into a get-acquainted game, Sarah begged off. “I’d just like to rest,” she said.
    Katie didn’t try to persuade her. She understood Sarah’s reluctance. After all, Sarah was sixteen; the others were just kids to her. She was in a child’s world when she didn’t want to be. Katie vowed to make Sarah’s time at the camp the best she could possibly give her. Whatever the petite teen had been through, it had changed her. Of that Katie was certain.
    “Everybody ready?”
    Morgan’s deep voice was answered by squeals and choruses of “Yes, yes!”
    Meg appreciated her girls’ enthusiasm; it was her cabin’s turn to go horseback riding. She hadn’t seen Morgan since camp started three days before, but just a look from him could turn her insides to jelly.
    “Are they safe?” Meg asked, giving the saddled and waiting horses a skeptical eye.
    “Perfectly tame and safe,” Morgan assured her. “They know the trail by heart. Even if you drop thereins, each horse will tag along after the other, go so far, then turn around and come back. You couldn’t get lost if you tried.”
    “You won’t be coming along?”
    “You’re their fearless leader,” he said.
    She looked up and saw a hint of teasing in his expression. She colored. “Then I’ll try not to embarrass myself.”
    “Ms. Meg.” Nine-year-old Cammie tugged on her arm. “I have to go to the bathroom.”
    Meg rolled her eyes.
    “Use the one in the tack room,” Morgan said. “I’ll get the others up on their mounts.”
    Meg ushered Cammie down the line of stalls and into the small room where saddles were kept. While the girl went to the rest room, Meg took a leisurely look around. The room smelled of leather and fresh hay. A cot stood along one wall, and sunlight streamed through a dusty window. She wondered whether Morgan slept there. A book lying on the bed caught her eye. Curious, she picked it up.
    Collected Poems of the World’s Great Poets
. The title surprised her. Wildflowers were being used as bookmarks. She opened to one and saw a poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay. She turned to another and read Emily Dickinson’s name. Quickly she scanned the other marked sections and saw that every poetshe had mentioned on the trail that night to Morgan had been flagged with a flower.
    The corner of a page in Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s section had been folded over, the last few lines of the poem underlined and circled. Meg read the final, familiar words of “How Do I Love Thee” under her breath.
    “…  —I love thee with the breath
,
    Smiles, tears, of all