The Dream-Maker's Magic Read Online Free PDF

the few times I saw him I thought him one of the most likable men I’d ever met, genial and honest. In fact, what I really thought was that he deserved to have such a good-hearted wife, such agreeable offspring, such a happy life.
    I had to wonder what kind of person I would have been now if I had been born into this house and raised among these people. Would I have been full of laughter myself? Would I have been friendlier with the world, less suspicious, filled with an unconscious optimism? Would I be generous, more willing to hazard myself, secure in the knowledge that love awaited me no matter how dark my day?
    Or would I still have been just me?

    Gryffin and I had been working at the Parmer house for about a month when I became convinced I was going to die. I had woken up with a small amount of blood on my sheets, which puzzled me because I couldn’t remember a wound or find a cut, but I cleaned myself up and went to school. Twice that day I found more blood in my underwear, and as the day progressed, I felt a thick, dull pain build up in the region of my stomach. What could this be? I was panicked and afraid, seized by the notion that I had contracted some disease of the internal organs that would be impossible to cure. Sitting in the classroom, unable to concentrate on Mr. Shelby’s lecture, I was overtaken by a great feeling of sadness as I pictured my mother’s lonely life—husband missing, only child dead so young. My stomach knotted with pain, and I thought some of it might be coming from the tears I was trying to hold back.
    â€œYou’re quiet today,” Gryffin commented later as we rode in the cart to the Parmer house.
    â€œJust—tired, I suppose,” I said in a subdued voice. What a loss to Gryffin, too, if his best friend should die so unexpectedly! I couldn’t bear to tell him.
    â€œWell, maybe we’ll go home early,” he replied.
    As usual, once we were at the house, we separated, Gryffin following Sarah to the parlor while I went to the kitchen to see what Betsy needed. Fortunately it was a day of tasks that were not too strenuous—sewing, mostly—and I sat quietly with my hands busy and my thoughts dark.
    When I got up once to use the chamber pot, it seemed I filled it instantly with blood.
    I pulled my trousers up and stood there, shivering, my arms folded tightly across my chest. How quickly would the disease progress? How many days did I have left? How—how— how —could I tell my mother what had happened to me? Or had the same disease infected her already? Maybe it was a plague that would take the whole town. Maybe we were all just a week or two away from a painful and lingering death.
    â€œKellen! What’s wrong?” Betsy had come to look for me and now stood in the doorway of the back room, her face a study in concern. “You look so pale. Do you have a fever?”
    â€œBetsy,” I whispered. “I think I’m dying.”
    She made an inarticulate noise and hurried over to check my forehead with a cool hand. “You don’t feel hot. Does your stomach hurt? What’s wrong?”
    I could hardly get the words out. “I’m bleeding. From the inside.”
    I gestured toward the chamber pot and then put a hand on my stomach. Her eyes followed the motion of my hand and then fixed on my face. I will never forget the range of expressions she showed then—surprise, comprehension, compassion, and anger. “Kellen,” she said very quietly, “has your mother never told you about the monthly bleeding that women experience?”
    My mother had never told me about anything that women experienced. I shook my head, feeling a slight tendril of hope. Betsy didn’t appear as alarmed as I thought she would have if she believed my situation was grave.
    â€œOh, you poor child,” Betsy said, drawing me into a quick hug. “Let me give you some blood rags and some clean clothes—and