FOR SECURITY PURPOSES, Charlie boarded up the two glass entry doors to Field to Table like we were bracing ourselves for a hurricane, which—in a way—I guess we were. But it evidently didn’t work, since the thief has been pilfering supplies from the inside out rather than the outside in. I use my flashlight to scan the aisles of empty shelving, searching for some sign of a burglary. But of course, there’s nothing. Not even a footprint marking the painted cement floor. Eventually, I give up my amateur sleuthing, close and lock the doors behind me with the key Jabil keeps beneath the welcome mat, like he’s just begging for somebody to find it.
I don’t know who would have the gall to steal canned goods and flour, desiring to survive while the rest of the community starves. Everyone I know seems to have too much pride to reduce themselves to that. Or if not pride, then too much morality. Although we’ve all pretty much concluded that electricity and the normal life it provided—even for the Mennonites, who lived mostly without it—are not returning anytime soon, there is still this unspoken hope that, at some point, the current will suddenly flow again and the lights in the town of Liberty will shine.
But the longer it goes since the EMP, the more I can see panic eating away at the community, swallowing all their determination and hope. I suppose I can’t judge someone for attempting to preserve their own hide when watching that mass of people coming down the highway from miles off made me want to do everything I could to preserve my own.
I leave Field to Table and walk over to the perimeter that appears as fortified as those boarded-up glass doors. Sean and Old Man Henri are the only ones on duty, and for a second I wonder if I should bother telling them what Leora and I saw. All of us are sick and tired of rumors, which are in overabundance as if to make up for our storehouse’s lack. But these aren’t just rumors.
So I recount my morning to Old Man Henri and Sean. No surprise that Henri narrows his eyes at me, grizzled mouth puckering as if sucking on a lemon drop. I can’t tell if he’s trying to absorb all the information I’m giving or trying to convey that he doesn’t believe a word I’ve said.
“But you couldn’t tell if they was friend or foe?” he asks, once I’m done. I shake my head. “How you know, then,” he continues, “they wasn’t another group of families trying to find someplace safer than where they left?”
I shrug. “Could be. That’s just not the feeling I got when I saw them.”
Sean leans back against the scaffolding and crosses his arms. “I’m with Henri on this one, Moses. We can’t make decisions based on what some drugged-up homeless person says.”
“So you want to just sit here and take the chance he’s wrong?”
Sean shakes his head. Old Man Henri sighs. We’re at a standstill, and nothing I say is going to budge them in my direction. Not sure who else to talk to, I walk up the lane to the Snyders’ house. The door’s locked—the first time it’s been locked since I came. At first, there’s no response. Then the youngest Snyder girl, Priscilla, opens it and peers up at me.
“Your bruder Jabil home?” I ask, using one of the only Pennsylvania Dutch nouns I’ve picked up, since Priscilla, age five, hasn’t completely grasped the English language. She nods, chaff-colored braids brushing her heart-shaped face.
“May I speak with him, please?” Priscilla must understand more than I think, and be feistier than she appears, because she tears off into the house, yelling for her eldest brother.
Jabil comes to the door so fast, I get the feeling he locked me out on purpose and has been waiting for my return. Hands fisted at his sides, he leans against the frame, glowering with the same expression my father used to give whenever I would come home after curfew my senior year of high school, reeking of anger and Brut cologne.
“Seth Ebersole came over around two this morning,” he says. “Seems Anna woke up and saw Leora was missing. The funny thing is, you were missing as well. I told Seth not to worry, that you two were probably out for some—” he throws one hand in the air, a bitter sneer on his face—“stroll.”
I say nothing, hoping he’ll move on to another subject. But it soon becomes clear he has no intention of moving on until he’s understood what I’ve been up to with the girl he thinks belongs to him, even if he’s got no right—that I can see—to claim her as his.
My silence must tick him off because he steps out on the porch while leaving the door ajar. He emphasizes our height difference by leering down at me. I know from personal experience that the only reason he’s posturing is because he feels threatened, so I don’t do or say anything—just stand here, slouched, and place knuckles against the side of my jaw to pop my neck. Really, I do everything but yawn.
My casual behavior drives him over the edge, which was my intention. “You need to get something straight,” he says, all but poking a finger in my chest. “You’re not good for Leora. You’ll never be good for Leora. She simply likes you because you are the antithesis of me.”
I almost ask him what antithesis means, to act like I’m some dumb Devil Dog, chock-full of hormones, with no conscience or heart. But though I want to keep toying with Jabil, we’ve got no time to lose. So I straighten up and look him in the eye. I tell him that Leora’s father is alive and, though not well, was the homeless man I spoke with. The one who warned me about the gang.
“Who this gang is,” I finish, “or what they’ve been up to, I can’t say, but what I can say is this: we’d better figure out what we’re going to do about it.”
“That’s easy. We’ll find protection in the shadow of his wings.”
“I’d rather find protection in the shadow of my semiautomatic.”
Jabil barks, “Don’t be sacrilegious!”
“And don’t be ignorant! God gave us minds for a good reason!”
“He also gave us hearts to trust.”
Riled, I look away from him, at the warped cookie tray of butternut squash seeds drying in the sun. At the rusted chains holding up the front-porch swing. At the gutter hanging slightly off the roofline, more than likely pulled down under the weight of last winter’s snow. All the while, I’m envisioning the community’s nightmarish screams as they run down the highway, clutching their children and leaving all material possessions behind. And Jabil wants me to do nothing to prepare for the gang? To not put my body in action, but to use my heart to trust?
“You really believe, don’t you?” I ask.
He nods. “Like I believe I can see you standing before me.”
“I respect you for that; I do. I wish I had more of whatever you got. But it’s not going to be good if this gang gets here, Jabil. We’re not talking about some washed-up gang leader like that one we met in town. We’re talking about ex-cons and drug addicts, made desperate without their fix. We’re talking the lowest of the low. These aren’t the kind that just steal; they’re the kind that murder and rape and pillage, leaving nothing but destruction in their wake.”
He says, “But you know none of that for fact.”
“True, but there was real fear in Luke’s eyes when he told me about what’s coming. I know his word probably doesn’t hold much weight with you, but I believe him. That group of people heading our way is up to no good, and we’d better stay and fight or go now and leave everything behind. As far as I can see, there are no other options.”
Jabil shakes his head, but the majority of his rancor is gone. “Are you going to take this to the elders again? Try to take over yet another meeting?”
“I think it’s better to be prepared if we have that option, don’t you?”
“Fine.” He steps to the left and jerks his chin toward the house.
As I walk through the front door, I can see the three deacons and bishop gathered around the two tables in the dim kitchen, where I suppose they’ve been conducting a meeting in secret. The platters, which I remember being heaped with breakfast a week ago, now hold meager portions of potatoes, toast, and eggs. Even the community’s leadership is cutting back, which once again reassures me that they’re not expecting their people to do anything they’re not willing to do themselves.
I enter the kitchen, and the men look up. “Hello, Moses,” Bishop Lowell says.
“Good morning.”
A whole bench is empty, but I don’t sit down. I lean against the wall with my fists in my pockets. My jeans haven’t fully dried from our early morning swim. Behind me, Jabil says, “Moses has something he’d like to say.” He may be trying to fight it, but I can hear the contempt in his voice. So I don’t really feel like opening my mouth. Let their ignorance get them killed for all I care. But then I remember Leora’s face as she stared through the scope at that indistinguishable mass of people, and for her alone I start telling them what I saw this morning and what her father told me last night. However, I leave Leora out of it because I don’t want her getting into trouble for taking me to the fire tower unchaperoned.
The bishop and the deacons look at me for a long time after I finish; then they look at each other—communicating through ESP, apparently. Enough time has passed during my speech that steam no longer rises from the platters of food. Then Bishop Lowell folds his square hands and places them beside his mug, like a gavel coming to rest.
“Obviously, I can’t ask the people of Mt. Hebron to fight,” he says, “but I also can’t ask them to leave everything without having seen some evidence for myself that danger is coming.”
A toxic mix of frustration and anger surges in my chest. I stride across the kitchen. Placing my palms flat on the table, I lean down and look directly at Bishop Lowell. “Would you even have left Egypt when Moses said it was time?”
“For crying out loud!” Jabil says. “You’re not that Moses!”
I continue staring at Bishop Lowell. “Am I not?”
The front door opens. Jabil turns toward it, as do I. Leora’s standing there, cutting a stark shadow in the sunlit cavity. She comes forward and walks past Jabil. Her hair is as it was before Glacier Falls, slicked back and shackled beneath its prayer covering, like the freedom she experienced in the water didn’t happen at all. She looks over at me—her face colorless—before addressing the deacons and the bishop.
“I was there, on the fire tower, with Moses.” Her voice remains clear and strong. “I saw it too: the people coming. Everything is just as he says.”
Not one of them responds, but their shock is palpable, even to me. Finally Bishop Lowell looks at Leora, paternal reprimand deepening the parallel lines between his brows. “You purposely flouted the rule about being out with a member of the opposite sex after dark?”
“It was actually two in the morning when we met,” I say, trying to defend her, but the look Jabil gives me confirms that I sound like a jerk. “I’m sorry, what I mean is that I’m the one who asked if she would take me to the fire tower. I’m the one. She would’ve never offered on her own. If you’re going to punish someone, punish me.”
“Yes, well—” Bishop Lowell unfolds his hands and puts on a pair of half-glasses that are hooked on the front of his shirt. “I think we have more important matters to discuss than curfews.” He addresses the deacons. “It would probably be wise to have everyone leave the community for a few days until we know more—”
“We’re not talking about a few days,” I interrupt. “This might be the end of Mt. Hebron Community as we know it.”
Bishop Lowell sighs, his patience wearing thin. “Yes, you know that and I know that, but there’d be a lot less panic on our hands if we let them think this is only a precautionary measure.”
“But don’t the people deserve to know the truth, rather than having you all hiding behind doors, discussing their lives?”
Behind me, Jabil growls, “Address my uncle with respect, Moses, or leave.”
I flip up my hands. “Okay. I’m not trying to be smart. I’m just trying to understand how a community that—until three weeks ago—worked somewhat like a democracy, has suddenly become this oligarchy, where the decisions for the majority are made by the elite few.”
Bishop Lowell takes off his glasses, angling his compact body to face me. “What’s happened here, Moses, is that we don’t believe everyone who’s now part of the community is working for the good of the community. We cannot give out critical information to those we can no longer trust.”
“This is true, Bishop Lowell,” Leora says. “When Moses and I were in the woods on our way back, we found a cellar concealing rations that were taken from our supplies. They have probably been stealing since day one.”
Bishop Lowell shakes his head. “So it is as we feared.”
“You knew about this?” I ask him.
“No. Least not entirely,” he says. “Jabil’s the one who called this meeting. He was the first to notice that supplies were dwindling at a faster rate than we’d anticipated, given we were so closely monitoring our rations. He needs our help understanding how we can uncover who is doing it without making the entire community feel like they’re being placed under suspicion.”
I say, “I don’t think we should even let the community know we’re aware someone’s stealing rations. It’d be best if we continue like normal and let the thief set himself up for a fall.”
“And once he’s discovered?” Jabil asks. “What then? Put him in stocks?”
“He’ll have to be cast out,” Bishop Lowell answers. “We can’t build a community on a foundation of lies and distrust.”
Leora asks, “So what do we do? How do we help everyone prepare?”
Bishop Lowell rises from the chair and stands before it, revealing afresh his diminutive height. “What can we do?” he says, as if speaking to himself. He looks up at the three of us—Leora, Jabil, and me—the lines on his forehead dissecting those etched between his brows. “We must stay calm. We must carry on with life the same as before. To leave our homes and the protection of the compound is not an easy decision to make, and on one hand, it seems like the foolish thing to do.” He pauses, allowing the room to fall quiet before meeting my eyes. “But if this mob is as you say it is, Moses, then I would rather my community face the uncertainty of the forest than the near certainty of death. I only wish to stave off as much violence and bloodshed as possible. If that means leaving, then we shall leave. The Lord knows all things, and it is to him we must look for our refuge in times like these. No amount of hoarding or fighting will be able to save us. We must trust our God, and if we perish—” the bishop looks up and his blue eyes are brilliant with resignation—“then we perish.”
I don’t say anything as Moses and I walk in tandem down the path leading to the lane. He has no reason that I can see for leaving the Snyders’ house. The idea that he might’ve left simply because he enjoys my presence is frightening and exhilarating at the same time. So I try concentrating on the mountains in an attempt to divert my thoughts.
Yet, looking at them in the distance—each spike and dip defined with snow—I find my mind refusing to be diverted from the memory of Moses holding me on the fire tower as we looked down on the highway. The memory of my behavior makes me uncomfortable, but not ashamed. He held me until my fortifications crumbled . . . until I felt my heart opening up and my body turning toward his. I don’t believe he comprehends the magnitude of that scene, as we looked down on our post-EMP world. Or if he does comprehend it, he is at a loss for how to interpret his thoughts and emotions, the same as I.
Only once the silence becomes strained do I realize that Moses—he of the glib tongue—must feel uncomfortable as well.
He bumps into my shoulder with his. “Nice the bishop’s so preoccupied with the invasion, we get off the hook for breaking curfew.”
His nonchalance gives me a healthy dose of reality. “That’s probably the truth . . . for you,” I tell him. “For me, on the other hand? Bishop Lowell and the deacons will never look at me the same way again. They’ll always just think I’m some rebellious girl who doesn’t mind flouting the rules.”
“Is that really so bad,” he says, “when the rules are so outdated to begin with?”
“Yes, it actually is bad. I need them to trust that I have a good head on my shoulders, or else they’ll never listen to a word I say.”
“Trust me.” He grins. “When you speak, they have no choice but to listen.”
My face grows warm. “I have to be serious here, Moses. So many things are hanging in the balance.”
“Like what?”
“Like if that was really my vadder you spoke with at the center, how can he come back here, to the community, when they don’t want to let anyone in they cannot trust?”
“But your father’s not just some random guy off the street.”
“No. But he’s also a drug addict.”
Moses drags a hand over his beard. “So you know about the drugs.”
“I know they’re what drove him from our family. Or, I guess, they didn’t drive him as much as he drove himself away from us.”
We pass the pavilion. Moses looks at the lane as he says, “Melinda came in contact with him, Leora. At the center. She tried paying her way out of Liberty with prescription drugs.”
“And he took them?”
Moses nods.
My mouth tastes bitter. I swallow in disgust. “He must be more addicted than I thought.”
“I think he’s pretty bad.”
“Where is Melinda now?”
We are standing in front of my house. The sun beats down hard on my kapp, but beyond that, it’s almost impossible to feel its warmth.
“Luke doesn’t know,” Moses says. “I guess she showed up at the center and told him she was willing to do anything to get home. Apparently, after she gave him the pills, he turned her over to someone who could ‘help’ her, but I’m afraid what that ‘friend’ might want from her in return.”
I wipe tears, angry and sick.
Moses sighs. “I wasn’t sure I was going to tell you. Jabil even told me not to. But I thought you should know, since we’re going to be leaving soon.”
I nod, though I am not sure he has made the right choice, since I cannot handle another stressor in addition to the ones I already have. I watch Anna come out of the greenhouse with a calico kitten draped in surrender over her arms, a stand-in for her favorite orange tom that recently disappeared. My stomach somersaults with anxiety. My sister’s been outside, by herself, the entire time I’ve been over at the Snyders’. I don’t know how to keep her safe without telling Grossmammi and Seth about the attack so they will guard her as they should. I don’t know how to ensure Anna’s future while trying to navigate the direction of my own. Therefore I must do what I have always done. Or at least what I have done in the past two years since our vadder left. I must put duty before desire and put Anna’s needs before my own.
Turning from Moses, I look out over the community: Field to Table, the schoolhouse, the pavilion, the homes that used to be immaculately kept because potential buyers of the log cabin kits, which Jabil and his crew built by hand, liked to drive down the lane and pick out which style they wanted. The gardens in everyone’s yards are picked clean of bounty, and I can see—even from here—how the bleak cornstalks shiver and rasp together against the dark backdrop of the forest, how the round bales are lined up against the Lehmans’ barn, sustenance necessary for the livestock that will have to be either slaughtered or left behind.
This is not the place where I was born, but it is the place where I imagined, one day, I would die. The place where I’ve lived through equal parts sorrow and joy. And currently I am forced—we are all forced—to give it up and try to seek safety elsewhere because of marauders who may or may not be coming for us. But I agree that we cannot stay here and take the risk that the marauders are real.
“How are we supposed to survive in the mountains?” I ask. “Especially through the winter? How are we supposed to leave everything behind?”
“God will provide. He has to.”
I look over at Moses, trying to gauge if he’s mimicking one of our community’s rote phrases, but his expression is sincere, which irks me. I don’t need another Jabil; I need someone who can help me take revenge. “Yeah, well. I’ll believe it when I see it.”
He frowns. “How is that for a woman of faith?”
“I have a hard time placing faith in a God who’d let my sister suffer.”
“Is she the one whose pain you blame yourself for?”
I stare at the Lehmans’ red tin roof, which—from this angle—appears white in the sun. “I told you her accident was my fault.”
Moses doesn’t look at me. I wonder if he’s remembering, as I am, that he said almost the same words to me about his brother’s death only a few hours ago.
“It’s been ten years this summer. I was playing in the hay with a new litter of kittens. It wasn’t until I heard Anna scream that I shook the kittens from my lap and ran to the edge of the hayloft. I looked down and saw her tiny body sprawled there, next to our vadder’s hoe. She must have hit her head on it. I remember noticing how the blood matched my old dress that she was wearing.”
Now Moses looks at me. I am unable to meet his eyes. Having begun this dreadful story—like a broken arm in the midst of being set—I have no choice but to finish the job.
“I was paralyzed by terror. I forced myself to breathe, even though my sister was not breathing. I forced myself to think, even though my sister was incapable of thought. Finally I ran and threw back the door to my vadder’s wood shop, choking on my tears. I was so incoherent, my vadder didn’t wait for me to try to explain but set down his nail gun and ran outside. I started running again and he followed me, and then outran me when he saw Anna. He was able to get her breathing again with CPR, and while he did that I somehow had the presence of mind to run back to the wood shop and use the phone to call 911.” At Moses’s puzzled look, I explain, “The wood shop was the only place on our farm that had electricity and a telephone.”
He nods.
“When I got back, I overheard my vadder crying and my grossmammi trying to comfort him. She told him it wasn’t his fault; that I was supposed to be watching her. She didn’t realize I was listening.”
Time and distance from the event have let me see that Grossmammi was only trying to shift the blame so her son wouldn’t feel its full weight if Anna died. She was not attempting to place that weight on me. But after my sister’s emergency craniotomy, followed by months of rehab, I felt that my vadder withdrew from me. That he started blaming me for Anna’s accident, which I understood because I started blaming myself minutes after it happened; half of my life has been crucified by guilt.
How different would our lives be if I had been watching Anna that day and therefore prevented her fall? Would my vadder still be here? Would my mamm still be alive? Would my parents still be in love?
I close my eyes again until the peril of tears has passed and open them afresh to the sun.
“So you see, I feel responsible for Anna in a special way. I let her down once, and I promised myself I would never let her down again.”
“Okay,” Moses says, clearly having a hard time following my reasoning.
“It seems she was attacked the night we went searching for Melinda.”
Moses is quiet; then he reaches out and takes my hand. “You mean . . . raped?”
The barn roof blurs. I turn from him. He holds my hand tighter, rooting me. “I don’t know. There was blood on her legs. Scratches on her face. I found her outside. Alone.”
“Were there any . . . obvious wounds?”
“Then could the blood have come from something else?”
“I can’t think of what.”
“It just seems odd there could be blood like that.” I can tell he thinks I’m overreacting.
“It wasn’t odd. It was terrifying.”
Hearing my frustration, he says, “Sorry for the third degree. I just don’t understand how it could’ve happened when Charlie and I were at the gate.”
“Unless Charlie’s the one who did it.”
“No, Leora. He wouldn’t do something like that.”
“Maybe not before the EMP. But we’re all doing things we wouldn’t otherwise.”
Moses waits a moment, and then lets go of my hand. “Are you trying to push me away?” he asks.
“I’m not trying to do anything but keep my head above water.”
“And you think I might be pulling you down.”
“I never said that. I’m just tired of being needed.”
“That’s because you don’t let anybody help you.”
“I can’t let anybody help me. They wouldn’t do things the way I would.”
“I like you a lot, Leora. But you got some serious control issues.” Seeing me flinch, his face softens. He steps closer, tips my chin up until I have no choice but to lift my gaze. “I only say that ’cause over the years I’ve watched my mom get so eaten up with worry, there’s not much of her left.” He swallows and looks at me. My soul weakens at the depth of feeling in his eyes. “And, Leora, I sure don’t want to see that happen to you. Not if I can help it.”
The tables near the schoolhouse are spread with embroidered cloths, redolent of the cedar chips and mothballs in which they were stored. Bishop Lowell’s announcement yesterday—to eat any food that could not be transported—made everyone realize there was no point in saving their special table linens for another occasion. Our impromptu feast will be the last celebration we have here for a long time. Maybe the last one ever. Tiny curls of steam rise from the heirloom platters and bowls: corn, green beans, succotash, mashed potatoes puddled with browned butter, sweet potatoes, rolls, even a suckling pig beaded with cloves that Elizabeth Lapp decided to butcher and cook here because that was easier than carting a pig into the mountains.
As I move around the tables, preparing for what could be our last meal on Mt. Hebron soil—folding linen napkins and weighing them down with the cutlery provided—I understand why the pilgrims had their first Thanksgiving before they were certain their spearheading community would survive. Sometimes it is necessary to celebrate life, despite being faced with defeat and death. We have no idea what our future holds, or where we will all be next week, next month, or next year. But today, we are together; therefore we should fellowship in peace.
Ten-year-old Ezekiel Lapp asks if we are ready. At his mother’s affirming nod, he hustles inside the schoolhouse to ring the bell. Members of the community, halted in their packing by this sound, soon stream out of their cabins and barns. They converge into a throng of downcast expressions, generated by the quandary: How can we leave almost everything to climb into the national forest surrounding the community? And yet, how can we fight back if we stay?
For the first time in my life, I not only yearn to stare straight into my assailant’s face, instead of turning my other cheek to his abuse, but also to defend what I perceive is rightfully mine . . . rightfully my family’s. Part of this is because I crave a steam vent for my anger, which is boiling within me, making my insides feel like they are ready to burst. Part of this is because I am also angry at the community for turning themselves over to an unseen enemy rather than attempting to stay and, if necessary, put up a fight. If we each took up a weapon, would Mt. Hebron stand a chance against this supposed violent gang? The truth is, no one in our community would defend himself, and so we will flee without knowing if we could’ve remained.
Taking this into account, folding napkins and placing knives, spoons, and forks in the correct order seems trivial compared to what challenges lie ahead, and yet the predictable movements keep me from analyzing to the point of insanity. Anna, sensing that I am not acting myself, remains by my side as the rest of the Mennonites and the few Englischers gather around the tables. Two of the women, Esther Glick and Marta Good, grip the chairs with one hand while jiggling their newborns with the other. As I watch them fighting back emotion, I am reminded of the biblical warning that the last days will be hardest for those with babes pressed to their breasts. But I believe it is also hard for those who find themselves falling in love for the first time, when one’s heart cannot be given the priority it deserves. I always imagined that, when confronted with the end of life, other desires would fade beyond those needed for survival. This is not the case. In fact, I’ve found the opposite is true. I yearn to be with Moses, as if he is my North Star in this black hole of madness, but my duty to my family forces me to remain lost.
Bishop Lowell must sense the community’s growing discomfort, for he assumes his place at the head of the far-right table. A summer wind blows across the acreage, offering relief as I swelter in my dark cape dress. Behind me, I can hear the swings’ ropes creaking in this same wind, and I recall that first day Moses and I sat swing by swing and talked as though I had thoughts worthy of sharing. I set the basket on the table. It has grown too heavy, though its weight has not changed. Anna and Seth stand behind the seats next to me. Jabil and Moses stand behind the seats across from me. I meet Moses’s eyes and then force myself to look down the table.
One of the women has placed tea light candles down the center of the tables, reminding me of the runway lights I once saw at the airport in Kalispell. Though it is late afternoon, and therefore a waste to burn candles, it soothes my soul to view such beauty. The minuscule flames waver in the wind, about to be snuffed out. Bishop Lowell motions for us to be seated. I drop my hands from around a tea light to pull out my chair and watch the wind extinguish the flame.
“I called for this celebration today,” he begins, “because regardless of what the future holds, I want us to remember that we are a community of people who trust Gott to provide, just as he provided for the Israelites in the desert. We are not guaranteed to have it easy, nor that we will even survive. But we are guaranteed that, regardless of how bad it gets, he can take it and use it for good. We must trust him with our provisions and our lives. Therefore, we will not hoard our manna for ourselves but will continue to share with those in need and expect Gott to bring manna tomorrow and in the days ahead.” The bishop runs his maimed fingers over the tablecloth’s pattern. “It has been my honor to serve you these years, and if the Lord wills it, I hope that when we reestablish ourselves as a community—whether it is here or up in the mountains—I will have the honor of serving you again.”
Esther’s baby begins to brutz. Bishop Lowell raises his head and looks at the child. He smiles, the worry momentarily leaving his face. “I would like to sing a prayer over our meal,” he says, “to show Gott our appreciation for the bounty he has given, even in this season of want.”
The bishop extends his hands and hums a note that is surprisingly steady for someone of his age. The Mt. Hebron Community—composed of the neighbors I have known for years—then begins to sing hymn 131: “‘We thank thee, Lord, for this our food, but more because of Jesus’ blood; let manna to our souls be given, the Bread of Life sent down from heaven.’”
As we continue through the simple verses, I can hear our disparate voices uniting into one resonant chorus that rises on the same wind that extinguished the flame. Tears fill my eyes as I listen to Jabil’s bass voice harmonizing with my alto. I look over, and our gazes communicate every bittersweet emotion without a word being said. He is my friend, and I care for him, but unless the Lord intervenes and changes my heart, I can never care for him in that way.
The singing stops, and we begin passing bowls to each other. I savor a mouthful of creamed corn and lima beans, a slice of ham with gravy made from canned pineapple, and a sourdough roll slathered with butter, wondering how long it’s going to be until I can taste these flavors again. I scoop cranberry sauce onto my china plate and pass the bowl to my sister, whose table manners are superb for someone who cannot communicate well.
I haven’t finished my meal when black smoke starts to rise at the beginning of the lane, first as the leavings of a smokestack and then as a cloud. Moses alone is impervious to the inertia that is affecting the rest of us. He leaps up so abruptly, his chair tips back. He runs down the lane with such adrenaline fueling his steps that, for the first time, I see no trace of a limp. Within seconds, our stunned silence dissipates, and everyone bolts into action. Water spills as cups fall over. Napkins twirl to the ground like severed wings. Children begin crying as they sense their parents’ panic, and I know this vortex of terror could be the exact thing we were hoping to escape.
I watch, helpless, as Anna rocks in her chair and claps hands over her ears, keening at the riot of sound. I sit beside her and pull her onto my lap, wrapping my arms around her as I would a child. Jabil’s wagon wheels fling gravel as he careers past us over the schoolhouse lane. Jerking back on the reins, he jumps out and ties the mare to the hitching post. He touches my shoulder as he walks past. “You and Anna should go,” he says. “We have no idea who’s—”
“I’ll send her with you,” I interrupt. “But I’m staying here until everyone’s safe.”
He nods and turns from me toward Grossmammi Eunice. In her black cape dress and outdated pince-nez glasses, she appears unruffled by this sudden unrest, just as she’s appeared unruffled from the commencement of the EMP. For the past ten minutes, during which the community has been darting to and fro, trying to salvage what they were packing before the ringing of the schoolhouse bell, she has continued to sit and eat. Part of this is probably due to her visual impairment, which barred her from seeing the smoke at the gate and now bars her from seeing the pandemonium erupting around her table. But some of this languor could possibly be because of how long she’s lived her life—and how much she’s lost during its duration—so she doesn’t feel the need to preserve it with the same intensity the rest of us do.
It requires mental and physical effort to lift Anna into Jabil’s wagon. Trying to abate her shivering, I wrap a feed sack around her legs and realize it is one of the same feed sacks Old Man Henri used to cover up the shotgun that night we went to the museum. Decades seem to have passed between then and now, and I cannot even remember the person I was in comparison to the person I’ve become. I am less of a butterfly freed from her cocoon, and more of a predatory bird free-falling from the safety of her nest. Breathing deeply, I help Jabil load everyone left around the table into the wagon, and then we go back for Grossmammi Eunice.
She at first refuses to budge because she hasn’t finished her pie, but Jabil leans down and smiles, convincing her with a masculine charm that would be impossible for me. She strides across the schoolhouse yard with her thin shoulders back and a china plate balanced in her hands. Batting away Jabil’s assistance, she climbs into the rear of the wagon and sits ramrod straight beside the children, who have been separated from their parents in an attempt to let the parents use their wagons to load the last of their goods. My grossmammi sighs and blindly reaches for the most heartbroken toddler, Suzie Stoltzfus, who throws herself across her lap. Stroking Suzie’s sweaty hair, she takes the spoon and begrudgingly feeds her the last bites of pie.
Climbing up into the wagon, Jabil turns to make sure everyone’s safely seated, then glances over at me. I shake my head to let him know I haven’t changed my mind. He nods and begins directing the horse toward the old logging trail that wends up into the forest. Bracing my arms across my chest, I watch him go before I survey the abundance of food discarded on gold-rimmed plates, at the heirloom platter with the filigreed edge now broken in half, at the ornate tablecloth I admired earlier tainted with cranberry sauce the color of blood. None of the tea light candles have withstood the unpredictable gusts.
Behind me, but still far too close, I hear the sky being frayed by gunfire. My heart thuds so hard it hurts. I glance at the abandoned feast once more before I sprint across the lane toward the woods, praying that at the perimeter, Moses Hughes—the pilot with a death wish—is alive.