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Short Story: Brent's Illness

Decent Essays

Near the end of the story Brent is forced to run away and hides out in her grandmothers attic, which is a dark , tight space that is infested with rats, mice, and “little red insects.” She is able to see her children only through small holes in the wood, but she is not able to touch, hold, or speak to her children. She spends several years in these miserable conditions suffering from many illnesses which include fever and frostbite. “Often I was obliged to lie in bed all day to keep comfortable; but with all my precautions, my shoulders and feet were frostbitten. O, those long, gloomy days, with no object for my eye to rest upon, and no thoughts to occupy my mind, except the dreary past and the uncertain future!” (Jacobs 834) Brent is a mother

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