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    Beautiful Dreamer
    Beautiful Dreamer
    Beautiful Dreamer
    Ebook109 pages1 hour

    Beautiful Dreamer

    By Paula Freda

    ()

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    About this ebook

    (A Clean Inspirational Christmas Romance for hearts of all ages)

    Julie, shy, plain, suffered the worst taunts and nicknames, during her HS years. Evan, with his quiet, calm expression, was one of the few who didn't ridicule her.She often wondered if he hadn't moved away, whether he'd have asked her out. Will her dearest dream come true when as a young woman living on her own, she spots Evan in the crowd on her way to work?

    Years ago, Julie had unscrewed the casing to her old music box and donated its insides to a church charity, but kept the genuine hardwood exterior. Now, twenty-five, living comfortably, if frugally, in her midtown apartment, she valued the box for its sentimental value and its rare, expensive mahogany wood. What better place to keep her memories.
    Along with family photos was a 5 x7 she particularly valued, taken during high school. An old girl friend was as in the photo, shouldering her. In the background was the schoolyard where, shy, plain, and totally behind the times, she had suffered the worst taunts and nicknames.
    In one corner of the photo, on a weathered bench, sat a boy, handsome even at his gangly age. He watched her, a quiet, calm expression on his face. Evan was one of the few boys who didn't whistle sarcastically or wink duplicitously on those few occasions that she forgot to keep her head bent to avoid unwelcome stares. She often wondered that if he hadn't moved away with his family from their small Massachusetts's town, to New York, whether he might eventually have asked her out on a date. The smile he sometimes favored her with, was sincere. It had never proved otherwise.
    Still on the shy and plain side, Julie regarded herself in the mirror above her dresser. A dab of powder and eyebrow pencil added a bit of sophistication to complement her denim blue jeans and loose soft blue cotton top, and she was ready to join her friend, Abby, for a Labor Day outing -- Evan would have approved. Julie grimaced. She must not allow such thoughts, and forget that she ever believed she'd glimpsed him among the Broadway crowd as she rode the bus to work. All a trick of her imagination. It might be a good idea when she returned this evening to tear up that high school photo so it would never again bring back silly school girl memories.
    A knock at the door. It was Abby."Are you ready?"
    One last look in the mirror. Casual and comfortable. Good enough, she shrugged.It wasn't as though she were leaving to meet the love of her life....

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPaula Freda
    Release dateDec 13, 2015
    ISBN9781310836190
    Beautiful Dreamer
    Author

    Paula Freda

    About the AuthorDorothy Paula Freda, is also known under her pen names Paula Freda and Marianne Dora Rose. Herbooks range from Fiction and Non-fiction Adventure, Romance, Fantasy, Sci-Fi, Poetry, Articles, Essays and How-to-Write Instructional complete with Lessons and optional assignments.Homemaker, mother of two grown sons, and former off-the-desk publisher of a family-oriented print small press, (1984 thru 1999), The Pink Chameleon, that she now publishes on line, Paula was raised by her grandmother and mother, and has been writing for as long as she can remember. Even before she could set pencil to paper, she would spin her stories in the recording booths in the Brooklyn Coney Island Arcades for a quarter per 3-minute record. She states, "I love the English language, love words and seeing them on display, typed and alive. A romantic at heart, I write simply and emotionally. One of my former editors kindly described my work, '...her pieces are always deep, gentle and refreshing....'" Paula further states, "My stories are sensitive, deeply emotional, sensual when appropriate, yet non-graphic, family fare, pageturners. My hope is that my writing will bring entertainment and uplift the human spirit, bring a smile to your face and your soul, and leave you filled with a generous amount of hope."

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      Book preview

      Beautiful Dreamer - Paula Freda

      Beautiful Dreamer

      by Paula Freda

      © August 2015 by Dorothy P. Freda

      (Pseudonym - Paula Freda)

      Smashwords Edition

      Exterior and Interior Bookcover photos Licensed

      by Dorothy Paula Freda from iStockphoto

      Museum Photo inserts: Wikipedia Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license (Ingfbruno)

      Beautiful Dreamer Original Music Sheet StephenFoster. Licensed under Public Domain via Commons

      All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof. This is a work of fiction; names, characters, places and incidents are a product of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

      ~ A Clean Inspirational Christmas Romance for hearts of all ages ~

      Years ago, Julie had unscrewed the casing to her old music box and donated its insides to a church charity, but kept the genuine hardwood exterior. Now, in her twenty-fifth year, living comfortably, if frugally, in her Manhattan midtown apartment, she admired the box for its sentimental value and its rare and expensive mahogany wood. What better place to keep her memories.

      Along with family photos was a 5 x7 she particularly valued, taken during high school. An old girl friend was in the photo, shouldering her. In the background was the schoolyard where, shy, plain, and totally behind the times, she had suffered the worst taunts and nicknames.

      In one corner of the photo, on a weathered bench, a boy sat, handsome even at his gangly age. He watched her, a quiet, calm expression on his face. Evan was one of the few boys who didn't whistle sarcastically or wink duplicitously on those few occasions that she forgot to keep her head bent to avoid unwelcome stares.

      She often wondered that if he hadn't moved away with his family, whether he might eventually have asked her out on a date. The smile he sometimes favored her with, was sincere. It had never proved otherwise.

      Twenty-five, still on the shy and plain side, Julie regarded herself in the mirror above her dresser. A dab of powder and eyebrow pencil added a bit of sophistication to her denim blue jeans and loose light blue cotton top, and she was ready to join her friend, Abby, for a Labor Day outing. Evan would have approved. Julie grimaced. She must not allow such thoughts, and forget that she ever believed she'd glimpsed him among the Broadway crowd as she rode the bus to work. All a trick of her imagination. It might be a good idea when she returned this evening to tear up that high school photo so it would never again bring back silly school girl memories.

      A knock at the door. It was Abby. Are you ready?

      One last look in the mirror. Casual and comfortable. Good enough, she shrugged. It wasn't as though she were leaving to meet the love of her life....

      Dedication

      With thanks to my Dear Lord Jesus and his Blessed Mother Mary whose strength, guidance, and her Holy Rosary, are my anchor in this troubled world, I dedicate this book to my husband, Domenick, whose love and loyalty over the past 46 years have kept my dreams and view of the romantic alive and vibrant.

      Beautiful Dreamer

      by Paula Freda

      Story set to the melody of Beautiful Dreamer

      CHAPTER ONE

      Julie lifted the music box from the top drawer of her mirrored dresser. She recalled how sweetly it had played the gentle pings to the tune of her favorite lullaby. Her mom had played the music box for her at bedtime until the night of her ninth birthday, when she had proudly announced to her disillusioned mother, that, honestly, she was almost grown up, and too old for bedtime lullabies.

      On the evening of her twelfth birthday, it was her turn to be disillusioned, when she truly studied her reflection in the mirror and realized with horror, that she was plain. Not ugly. No one screamed when they saw her. Though she might have preferred that to the indifferent stare. She wasn't invisible. People did notice her, though it was mostly to hide their chuckle out of proper decorum and human kindness.

      Of course, her mother begged to differ. But that was a mother's prerogative. Julie's straight dark brown hair, parted at the crown, pulled into pigtails, and tied neatly with pink or blue bows, eventually replaced by braids trussed tightly with black elastic bands, above plume-like ends, was — Evelyn liked to boast — her daughter's crowning glory. Not so, to Julie. Or to the boys who tried to pull her braids, and laughed themselves silly as they ridiculed her, calling her Miss Twisty Piggy Tails.

      Even after she'd dispensed with the braids, and opted for a short-layered haircut, the nickname persisted. Blessedly, her mother and she moved from their New York apartment to a new one in Massachusetts, to be near her Aunt Lynn, her mother's sister, who late in life had married a sweet, conservative gentleman in his early sixties.

      Julie's self-esteem might have suffered less if her father had stayed in her life after he divorced her mother. But he had preferred to break all ties with Evelyn and her side of the family. And that included his three-year-old daughter.

      She didn't miss him. Had never truly known him. She did recall him thinner than his image in the only photo of him that her mother kept, for her daughter's sake. A 5x7 black and white that showed him in army fatigues. Something about his easy pose and his smile — at least in the photo — made her think that he would have told her to lose the pigtails and the braids long before her twelfth birthday.

      She gave a small sigh and replaced the mahogany shell of her old music box into the drawer. Sometime between high school and college, she had unscrewed the casing and donated its insides to a church charity, but kept the genuine hardwood exterior. Now, in her twenty-fifth year, living comfortably, if frugally, in her New York midtown apartment, she admired the box for its sentimental value and its rare and expensive mahogany wood. What better place to keep her memories.

      Along with her father's photo, were pictures of her mother, her aunt, old friends and neighbors, and the few schoolmates who had treated her kindly. One photo in particular she valued. Her best high school girl friend was in the photo, shouldering her. In the background was the schoolyard where she had suffered the worst taunts and nicknames. But in one corner, sat a boy, handsome even at his gangly age. He watched her, a quiet, calm expression on his face. He was one of the few boys who didn't whistle sarcastically or wink duplicitously, on those few occasions that she forgot to keep her head bent to avoid unwelcome stares.

      She often wondered what happened to him after he and his family

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