The Girl in a Coma Read Online Free

had seen them as agents of a foreign King. That was Jacob Shantz, and whether for adventure or his unruly beliefs, Jacob Shantz had gone off to join the Revolution.
    Rebecca turned her back to the three men and walked away. She calculated that the soldiers could never catch up to Jacob. Not even if they knew where he was going. It would take him two days to get to the winter camp of the Continental Army at Valley Forge. Even less, if he were riding old Bess.
    But something worried her.
    As she stepped back into the warmth of her own home, she wondered what would happen to Jacob if Washington’s Revolutionaries found out he was suspected of horse-theft and murder. Would they be obliged to arrest him? To turn him over to the British? To execute him themselves?

    Allison
    When I wake up this morning, I seem to be in the middle of a thought. It’s not a pleasant one. I’m thinking about Jaimie Retzinger. He’s a little strange. He’s only a little of anything. He just doesn’t measure up as a human being. He gets a job and forgets to go to work and gets fired. He forgets to go home. He forgets my name.
    But if that sounds like he’s stupid, he’s not. That’s what makes it so bad. I could live with stupid. He just doesn’t care about anything, even himself.
    Me, I care. I like people, I like working at Tim’s. I like the people who work there, and I like the people who come in. The regulars and the tourists. I’m planning on doing a cooking course at Sir Sanford Fleming College after university. I want to be an educated chef, maybe with my own restaurant someday. I want to travel.
    The only traveling I can do right now is inside my head.
    It’s a small world in here.
    That’s a joke.
    Maybe it isn’t. In some ways, a mind is bigger than the entire world, the universe, infinity, eternity, everything. Because we can imagine these things. We can reduce them to thoughts. One of my problems, according to Jaimie Retzinger. I think too much. I always explain my jokes and I think too much.
    It’s funny, I feel safe in my hospital room right now because I know it is daytime. During the day, nurses and doctors come and go. The cleaning staff comes in. The lights must be on and the curtains are pulled back. At night, the door is closed and the curtains are drawn. I can tell by the muffled sounds, by the stillness of the air. I’m pretty much on my own in the dark.
    Except for my visitor. He’s in the dark, too. So, is he just listening? That’s creepy. It really is. I wonder if he’ll be back again? They haven’t removed the bandages. I’d know if they had. I wonder if he’s waiting to kill me. If so, why wait?
    Unless he knows I’m aware, in here. Unless he’s taunting and torturing me on purpose.
    That’s pretty funny, if the only person who knows I’m alive is waiting to kill me.
    My world is a very limited place. But I have Rebecca Haun in my dreams, even if she’s terrified herself right now, because the soldiers want Jacob for murder.
    At least she has a life.

Four
    Rebecca
    After her sisters said their prayers and they all crawled into the big bed, Rebecca lay awake, staring at the ceiling. If she pulled the blue quilt down a little, she could tilt her head and see out the window. There was no moon and the sky was alive with a billion points of starlight.
    Where would Jacob be by now? If he had traveled all night and then all day, he might have reached Valley Forge.
    She tried to understand a world where soldiers were trained to kill people. People just like themselves. But if someone were suspected of being a killer, he could be hanged. She preferred the Mennonite ways, where death was a decision left up to God.
    She tried to fall asleep but she couldn’t stop worrying about Jacob. She decided something had to be done. He was wanted for murder.
    Rebecca dressed very quietly so as not to awaken her sisters. She walked