But it is gone, I thought drearily. It's really-for-true gone.My head was heavy from troubled sleep, and sorrow was a weariness in all mymovements. Waiting is sometimes a burden almost too heavy to carry. While mychildren hummed happily over their fun-stuff, I brooded silently out thewindow until I managed a laugh at myself. It was a shaky laugh that threatenedto dissolve into something else, so I brisked back to my desk.As good a time as any to throw out useless things, I thought, and to see ifI can find that colored chalk I put away so carefully. I plunged my hands intothe wilderness of the bottom right-hand drawer of my desk. It was deep with ahuge accumulation of anything—just anything— that might need a temporaryhiding place. I knelt to pull out leftover Jack Frost pictures, and a brokenbean-shooter, a chewed red ribbon, a roll of cap gun ammunition, one stripedsock, six Numbers papers, a rubber dagger, a copy of The Gospel According toSt. Luke, a miniature coal shovel, patterns for jack-o'-lanterns, and a pinkplastic pelican. I retrieved my Irish linen hankie I thought lost forever andSojie's report card that he had told me solemnly had blown out of his hand andlanded on a jet and broke the sound barrier so loud that it busted all toflitters. Under the welter of miscellany, I felt a squareness. Oh, happy! Ithought, this is where I put the colored chalk! I cascaded papers off bothsides of my lifting hands and shook the box free.We were together again. Outside, the world was an enchanting wilderness ofwhite, the wind shouting softly through the windows, tapping wet, whitefingers against the warm light. Inside, all the worry and waiting, theapartness and loneliness were over and forgotten, their hugeness dwindled bythe comfort of a shoulder, the warmth of clasping hands—and nowhere, nowherewas the fear of parting, nowhere the need to do without again. This was thehappy ending. This was—This was Sue-lynn's Anything Box!ABC Amber Palm Converter,http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlMy racing heart slowed as the dream faded—and rushed again at therealization. I had it here! In my junk drawer! It had been here all the time!I stood up shakily, concealing the invisible box in the flare of my skirts.I sat down and put the box carefully in the center of my desk, covering thetop of it with my palms lest I should drown again in delight. I looked atSue-lynn. She was finishing her fun paper, competently but unjoyously. Nowwould come her patient sitting with quiet hands until told to do somethingelse.Alpha would approve. And very possibly, I thought, Alpha would, for once inher limited life, be right. We may need 'hallucinations' to keep us going—allof us but the Alphas—but when we go so far as to try to force ourselves,physically, into the Never-Neverland of heart's desire—I remembered Sue-lynn's thin rigid body toppling doll-like off its chair.Out of her deep need she had found—or created? Who could tell?—something toodangerous for a child. I could so easily bring the brimming happiness back toher eyes—but at what a possible price!No, I had a duty to protect Sue-lynn. Only maturity— the maturity born ofthe sorrow and loneliness that Sue-lynn was only beginning to know—could betrusted to use an Anything Box safely and wisely.My heart thudded as I began to move my hands, letting the palms slip downfrom the top to shape the sides of—I had moved them back again before I really saw, and I have now learnedalmost to forget that glimpse of what heart's desire is like when won at thecost of another's heart.I sat there at the desk trembling and breathless, my palms moist, feelingas if I had been on a long journey away from the little schoolroom. Perhaps Ihad. Perhaps I had been shown all the kingdoms of the world in a moment oftime.'Sue-lynn,' I called. 'Will you come up here when you're through?'She nodded unsmilingly and snipped off the last paper from the edge ofMistress Mary's dress. Without another look at her handiwork, she carried thescissors safely to the scissors box, crumpled the scraps of paper in her handand came up to the wastebasket by the desk.'I have something for you, Sue-lynn,' I said, uncovering the box.Her eyes dropped to the desk top. She looked indifferently up at me. 'I didmy fun paper already.''Did you like it?''Yes.' It was a flat lie.'Good,' I lied right back. 'But look here.' I squared my hands around theAnything Box.She took a deep breath and the whole of her little body stiffened.'I found it,' I said hastily, fearing anger. 'I found it in the bottomdrawer.'She leaned her chest against my desk, her hands caught tightly between, hereyes intent on the box, her face white with the aching want you see onchildren's faces pressed to Christmas windows.'Can I have it?' she whispered.'It's yours,' I said, holding it out. Still she leaned against her hands,her eyes searching my face.'Can I have it?' she asked again.'Yes!' I was impatient with this anti-climax. 'But—'Her eyes flickered. She had sensed my reservation before I had. 'But youmust never try to get into it again.''Okay,' she said, the word coming out on a long relieved sigh. 'Okay,Teacher.'She took the box and tucked it lovingly into her small pocket. She turnedfrom the desk and started back to her table. My mouth quirked with a smallsmile. It seemed to me that everything about her had suddenly turnedupwards—even the ends of her straight taffy-colored hair. The subtle flameabout her that made her Sue-lynn was there again. She scarcely touched theABC Amber Palm Converter,http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.htmlfloor as she walked.I sighed heavily and traced on the desk top with my finger a probable sizefor an Anything Box. What would Sue-lynn choose to see first? How like a drinkafter a drought it would seem to her.I was startled as a small figure materialized at my elbow. It was Sue-lynn,her fingers carefully squared before her.