The Amish Seamstress Read Online Free PDF

me back to thinking about Zed. That’s what he did. He told stories. On film. And he had such a gift for it too.
    Then there was his cute smile. His kind heart. The way he brushed the blond bangs from his eyes when he was feeling self-conscious.
    No, if he ever kissed me, it wouldn’t feel like a buddy’s kiss at all.
    Somehow I made it through the rest of the lecture without Patricia calling on me again or challenging my attentiveness. I tried to stay focused, but it was so hard with Zed competing for my thoughts.
    As she wound things down up front, it struck me that it was a good thing I’d always been a voracious reader, because otherwise there was a chance I could have ended up being somewhat ignorant and uninformed. I’d never been able to concentrate in classrooms and hadn’t picked up much knowledge that way, even as a child. But perhaps, over the years, those gaps had been filled by my addiction to books of all kinds—history, fiction, biographies, and more. And Zed was so smart that I was often expanding my repertoire of reading just to keep up with him.
    After the class ended, I followed the other students out of the conference room, down the hall, and through the breezeway to the skilled nursing facility where we did our clinical training. We’d already learned the basics—feeding, dressing, and all the other stuff my fellow students seemed to balk at but I didn’t mind.
    In the first few weeks, we’d been working alongside certified assistants, but now, as the course neared the end, we were on our own as much as possible in caring for the patients.
    I went to Phyllis’s room first but didn’t find her there. She was probably down at the craft room. She had some shoulder problems but was still able to design, cut, and paste—which she loved to do. I’d seen some of the handmade cards she’d constructed, and they were clever. Phyllis had worked as an attorney, and I couldn’t imagine she had much time for card making back then, but she seemed to enjoy it now.
    She had lived in Manhattan much of her life, and she had stylish gray hair and dressed in classy sports suits. Her only child, a son, lived near Lancaster, and she’d told me that was how she’d come to the area ten years before.
    I stopped at the end of the bed of Phyllis’s roommate, Marguerite, who had just had her eighty-ninth birthday. She was also a dear, but she could no longer communicate, poor thing. According to Phyllis, Marguerite had grown up in France but had married a U.S. soldier at the end of World War II and moved here to the States with him. Though she’d spoken English almost exclusively after that, nowadays, whenever she said something,it was in French, and usually just a syllable or two. How I longed to hear her stories! I could only imagine what she would tell me if she could.
    Her children, grandchildren, and even great-grandchildren visited her regularly, all calling her Mimi. She smiled and seemed to remember them, although it was hard to tell for sure.
    Phyllis had taken Mimi under her wing and would ring for help anytime she thought the older woman needed anything, often in the middle of the night, I was told.
    After I greeted Mimi, who was immobile, I turned her to check for bedsores. Thankfully, there were none. Next I helped the patients of mine who ate lunch in the dining hall get there, wheeling some and walking alongside others. Phyllis hadn’t come out of the craft room yet, but I knew the staff person in charge of that area would wheel her to the dining room when she was ready.
    After I’d settled my mobile patients, I collected Mimi’s tray from the kitchen and returned to her room to feed her. Getting enough nutrition down her was a challenge. Today she had beef-and-barely soup, creamed spinach, and custard. I raised her bed to a sitting position and began. I knew it took me longer to feed Mimi than it took the other caregivers.