دانلود رمان انگلیسی “یک افسانه برای کریسمس” – رمان کوتاه عاشقانه و برنده جایزه برای جشن‌ها

Like a house from the pages of Little Red Riding Hood or Hansel and Gretel, the picturesque cabin—rough-hewn logs, lopsided shutters and a steeply pitched roof—appears at the edge of the forest. I scrape my boots against the wedge that serves as a doormat, push open the door and step over the threshold. Children’s picture books, dog-eared and battered but neatly stacked in an open-sided crate, occupy one corner of the room. A weathered oak table, the surface covered with the documents I left here last night, sits beneath the window. The solitary upright chair scrapes against the boards as I pull it towards me. A week ago, as I followed a disused fire track from my rented cottage to the top of the hill, I searched for reception. In addition to that … I found a fairytale. There’s only one room in the cabin, like there’s one stack of books and one window to frame the landscape. Powder puff clouds, glossy black cattle, patchwork green fields, a crease in the valley, a river. The farmhouse at the bottom of the hill—sandstone yellow chimney, soft brown walls, a glistening silvery roof—is in profile. Pushing my documents aside, I put my elbows on the table and my chin in cupped hands. Two white-faced herons, grey with long brown legs, fish for breakfast from the roots of a river red gum. Kookaburras laugh and welcome the morning. When a breeze pushes through the gap above the door, I reach for a bull clip and lift my hair high, twist it into a coil and secure it in a bun. Flipping pages in twos, I find the document I was working through last night, open my laptop and place fingers on the keys. I remind myself of why I’m here. ‘If I don’t finish this report by Christmas, I’ll lose the ballgown and slippers. I’ll also lose the carriage and—’ As if I’ve conjured them up, three horses appear on the grassy track that runs from the farmhouse to the cabin. A broad-shouldered man, Akubra tipped low against the early-morning sun, rides a tall black thoroughbred with a long white blaze. Two rounded ponies, one piebald, one grey, trot by the horse’s side. Is this the next-door neighbour Lorraine warned me about when I leased her cottage? You won’t see Beau D’Arcy if he sees you first. The ponies canter to keep up as the man takes a left at a fork in the track. It’s been seventeen years since I had a pony. Rocket was ten years old, the same age as me, and his mane and tail were flaxen like my pigtails. Tracing the line that runs along my jaw, I feel for the bumps where the stitches went in. My stomach clenches, my skin prickles. The only other times I feel like that is when I’m at a pool or when I’m— ‘No!’ I push back the memories, focus on the present. Cumulus clouds, storybook hedgerows, a dip in the valley, a ribbon of water. Up in my tower, as high as Rapunzel, I can live life from afar. ‘But not all day …’ I stretch out my fingers. ‘I have a Christmas deadline.’ I take another document, ASX Regulations: Corporate Restructures, from the stack of papers on the table and methodically turn the pages. Paragraphs. Sentences. Words. I know words. I understand words. Words don’t have the power to hurt me.