She woke early and felt the same sense of urgency to get dressed and downstairs as before. But this time she found only Rachel in the kitchen, sipping tea and reading a Bible at the kitchen table. Her hair was in a loose braid down her back and she didn’t have her kapp on.
“Guder mariye,” Leah said, pleased to say it in Deitsch.
Rachel raised her head and smiled. “Guder mariye.”
“I thought the rest of the family would be up by now.”
“It’s the Sabbath, and we have no church service today. They’re sleeping in.”
Leah chuckled and shoved a pin back into her bun, readjusting her kapp. “And I thought I was being so good and virtuous, getting up early.”
“I’m an early bird anyway, and it’s a good time for me to read Scripture without everyone around me.”
“And I’ve interrupted.” Leah felt awkward. “I’m so sorry...”
“No, don’t apologize. I’m just finished.” As if to prove it, Rachel closed the large volume. “Make yourself some tea. The water’s hot.”
Leah scooped tea leaves into a strainer, poured hot water, added a touch of milk and honey, and sat at the table. “So it’s a day of relaxing?”
“Don’t you feel you need it?”
“Oh yeah,” she replied with such feeling that Rachel laughed.
“It’s why Gott provided it for us. It gives us a chance to...” Rachel’s eyes glinted with mischief. “Recharge our batteries.”
“No cooking today?”
“Not really. We prepared a lot of extra food yesterday, so we just eat leftovers. I expect we’ll have some visitors later on—Aaron for sure, and probably Isaac, if I don’t miss my guess.”
“Isaac.” Leah looked down at her tea. “So, should I discourage him from visiting? From seeing me?”
“I don’t know. How do you feel about him?”
“Does it matter? I’m not Amish.”
“I suppose you’re right.” Rachel rubbed her chin. “If things get more serious, I guess he’ll have to lay the matter before the bishop.”
“Whoa! What do you mean by serious?”
“Isn’t it obvious?”
“You mean marriage?” She stared at Rachel, feeling prickles of panic down her scalp. “Rachel, I’ve only met the man a couple days ago. We don’t share a faith, which is so important to him. He can’t be thinking of marriage so soon!”
The younger woman shrugged. “Sure he can. And he obviously is.”
“He doesn’t know me! And I don’t know him!”
“Well, that’s why he visits. So he—and you—can remedy that.”
“But why would he focus on me, of all people?”
“I suspect it’s because you’re Englisch and understand a lot of what he experienced when he was out in the world. But if he marries you, he’ll have to leave. So that’s a problem. Or you could become Amish.”
The clunk of footsteps interrupted their conversation as Ivan came into the kitchen, yawning. “Morning.” He rubbed his eyes. “I’d best go milk before the ladies explode.” He bustled about, grabbing clean buckets, and disappeared out the back door.
“I didn’t mean to distress you,” resumed Rachel. She reached out and touched Leah’s hand, wrapped around the mug. “Gott will lead you. Just follow Him. But don’t shut Isaac out—he’s been through a lot, and acceptance into the community is important to him.”
Others came into the kitchen at that moment, and in the bustle of greetings and hot drinks, more intimate conversation was impossible.
The tenor of the house was more relaxed as the morning went on. Except for vital chores, no one worked. The children played, the adults relaxed and read books out on the porch, and Aaron did indeed come by to visit with his betrothed.
And in the back of her mind, Leah wondered if—and when—Isaac would come by.
It was almost with a sense of relief that she saw him coming down the road. It gave her time to compose herself, to summon up some of the innate calmness she admired in Rachel.
“Guder nammidaag, Isaac,” called Sarah from the porch swing where she sat next to Aaron.
“Guder nammidaag.” He paused, one foot on the lower porch step, and asked Aaron about his corn crop.
Leah lingered in the kitchen, feeling self-conscious. But when he finally knocked on the screen door and she called “Come in!” he hardly gave her time to think about it.
“Would you care to walk to the pond?” he inquired.
“What pond?”
“There’s a pretty pond about half a mile that way.” He pointed. “Right off the road. It belongs to the Millers, but they’re generous about letting people walk around it.”
What else could she say? “Sure.”
Moments later she found herself striding next to him along the road. Her feet had toughened up a bit, so she wasn’t walking as slowly as before.
But her mind was in turmoil, and she knew the only way to calm herself was to face the problem head-on.
“Isaac, Rachel said something rather disturbing the other day.”
“Ja?”
“Yes. She said you’re acting like a courting man.”
Silence. Leah sneaked a peek sideways. He stared straight ahead, his curly hair springing from under the straw hat.
“Maybe I am,” he said at last.
The air whooshed out of Leah’s lungs. “Isaac, you know that’s impossible. I’m just a visitor, I’m not Amish and we’ve only known each other a few days.”
“I know. Believe me, I know.”
“Then why me?”
“I don’t know. There’s something about you.” He glanced at her, then resumed his straightforward gaze. “You’re the only one who can understand the context of my experiences in the wider world. You’re the only one who’s seen Jurassic Park. You’re the only one who understands something of what goes into making a magazine. You’re easy to talk to. And you’re pretty.”
She was so startled at his last words that she stopped dead in her tracks. “You’re kidding.”
He stopped and looked at her. A smile quirked the corners of his mouth. “Why does that surprise you?”
“Because I’m not.” The words were blunt, bitter.
“If you’re referring to the scar, I beg to differ. It doesn’t change the way you look, not after the first few seconds. Then no one sees it.”
She wanted to believe him. She wanted desperately to believe him, to believe she could recapture something of the appearance that made her the darling of the news camera.
“I used to be beautiful, you know,” she said low. Even as she uttered the words, she recognized how shallow they sounded.
“You still are,” he replied. “But I should hope you’d know it’s not a huge factor with us. Perhaps it comes across as a cliché, but we still see the inside of people, not the outside. I think that’s why we discourage photographs of people. They put too much emphasis on individuality. We prefer to see and think about people for other things besides their outward physical appearance.”
She sighed. Next to Rachel’s stoic acceptance of her own physical challenges, Leah’s obsession with her face seemed heartless and small. She started walking again.
“Penny for your thoughts?” Isaac paced alongside her.
“Just thinking what a shallow person I am, worrying about how I look.” She stared straight ahead. “Especially in light of Rachel’s fortitude with her condition.”
“Rachel’s pretty special,” he agreed. “She has more strength than almost anyone I’ve ever met.”
“Changing the subject... Can I ask you a personal question?”
“Of course.”
“Every Amish man I’ve met so far has a beard. No mustache, but a beard. Why don’t you?”
He stroked his chin. “Because by tradition only married men wear beards. I’m not married. Yet,” he added.
That made Leah’s face grow warm. His meaning was clear. “Oh. I see.”
“Here’s the pond,” he said.
It was a pretty little body of water, right at the edge of the road, ringed by trees. In the warm June sunshine, it offered a cool and shady respite.
Without asking, he led the way toward a willow and sat down beneath it, inches from the water. Leah followed.
“Did you figure out those issues with the computer program?” Leah was anxious to table the whole courtship thing.
“Yes. I messed up a couple of times but finally got it. If it wasn’t for the awful typing, I could have gotten a whole section transcribed. I hate typing.”
“Really? I love it. I clocked myself once and hit one hundred twenty-five words per minute.”
He stared at her. “You’re kidding.”
“Of course not. Why, what’s the matter? It’s nothing unusual.”
He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Unless you didn’t learn to type until you were an adult. Can I hire you to help me prepare the next issue?”
“Seriously?”
“Yes, of course.”
Her mind churned. It was clear he wanted her help, and it was obvious this was one thing she could do well, but she also knew she wouldn’t feel comfortable getting paid.
“We’ll talk about it when the time comes,” she prevaricated. She wrapped her arms around her updrawn knees and stared out across the still waters of the pond. A turtle blinked at her from a sunny perch on a half-submerged log. “It might help me feel more useful here,” she admitted at last. “I’m only just learning the domestic skills the Byler girls can do in their sleep. I’m still all thumbs.”
“I think,” he offered, “you might find you’ll enjoy the kinds of information I put in the magazine. It occurs to me news journalism usually means covering unpleasant things—death and mayhem, natural disasters and car crashes. This is negative, that is negative. But with the magazine, I cover positive things—the businesses people have created, the techniques they’ve mastered to do a difficult task, how they solve problems.”
“Yes!” Leah sat up straighter. “Do you know what Rachel did yesterday? She made cheese! And I watched her!”
“And you found that amazing?”
“Of course! She started with milk and ended with something completely different. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“My mother makes cheese too. Most women do. It’s the best way to use up extra milk.”
Leah shook her head. “I find myself very intimidated by Sarah and Rachel. Even Eliza. There’s so much they know how to do.”
He grinned. “This is good. You’re starting to come alive again. I detected a certain degree of apathy and deadness of spirit at first, but you’re a fighter and you’re starting to pull out.”
Leah fingered her scar before she realized what she was doing, then snatched her hand away. “Maybe,” she muttered.
“Look.” He laid a hand on hers for a moment, then withdrew it. “I know losing your career was a blow, but Gott didn’t abandon you. There’s a line in Exodus—‘The Lord will fight for you. You need only to be still.’ To use a modern cliché, you have to roll with the punches. Whatever injustice you feel on your part, it doesn’t mean Gott isn’t there waiting to pick you up and get you back on your feet.”
“I guess.” She tucked her knees under her chin again and wrapped her arms around them. “I was raised without faith, and it’s hard to accept the fact that God cares about each and every one of us.”
“Yet He does. That’s one of the toughest things for the wider world to accept or understand. Or believe. It’s why I came back to the Amish, to my roots. I found it easier to maintain my beliefs by living them, not fighting to keep them while living among people who don’t share those beliefs.”
“I wonder—would it be better for young people not to go on this rumspringa in the first place? Maybe it’s not such a good thing if they don’t come back, like you.”
“No. I think it’s necessary for young people to get it out of their system. The wider world is like the forbidden fruit, all the more attractive because it’s out of reach. By letting them taste it, they can decide for themselves whether they want to accept or reject it. Those who truly want to stay Amish get baptized, which makes for a more unified community.”
“But if they don’t have the street smarts, they could get hurt by all the evil that’s out in the world.” She shivered in the warm sun.
“Most of the time, rumspringas are pretty mild, comparatively speaking. Most teens don’t even leave home, much less go live in the city. Most kids already know whether they want to stay and be baptized, or whether they want to leave. Sure, some kids go wild—I seem to remember a scandal with a drug bust many years ago—but I think the Englisch make a bigger deal out of how wild rumspringa is than we do.”
“Both Sarah and Rachel were like that. They knew they wanted to stay and be baptized. Because of her disability, Rachel didn’t want to leave home at all.”
“And Ivan and Edith didn’t expect her to, if she didn’t feel comfortable. Amish parents don’t encourage their kids to go crazy and engage in sinful behaviors. They certainly don’t condone it. But there has to be some semblance of free choice in the decision to remain Amish. Unforced decisions. Otherwise unhappy adults would sow dissent within the community. In fact—” His eyes twinkled. “Often the goal of a rumspringa is to find a spouse.”
Leah chuckled. “So that’s another myth busted. Everyone always hears about how crazy the kids go. That also explains why you were the oddball, since you left entirely.”
“Ja. They say a fling with worldliness reminds young people they have a choice about church membership. Knowing they have that choice strengthens their willingness to obey church standards. I didn’t want to—that’s why I left. I changed my mind, which is why I came back.”
She turned serious. “Which is also why you should get it out of your head that I’m an eligible match. Pursuing me as a spouse may well get you banished.”
“I’ve thought of that.” He looked over the pond. “And as you say, I only met you a short time ago, hardly the foundation to base a relationship on. At least with Amish youth, they know they share a common denominator of faith and family. But you—you’re an unknown. Granted, that’s part of the attraction, but in the long run...” His voice trailed off.
“In the long run, I might be a poor choice,” she finished for him.
“Ja, perhaps.”
“Well, at least I know you’re not chasing me for my money,” she quipped.
His eyes crinkled with humor beneath his curly hair. “Money isn’t a big deal with the Amish. No one’s wealthy, but no one is desperate either. We all watch out for each other and help anyone in need. Wealth is a distraction from living as Gott wants us to live. If you had money, it wouldn’t matter how interesting you were. I’d stay away.”
She gave a short laugh. “I feel like I’m living in Alice in Wonderland. Everything is different.”
“I felt the same way when I left the Amish and went to college, then to work. Values I took for granted were suddenly scarce, and values I didn’t like were common. I know just how Alice felt.” He gave a short chuckle. “I have two favorite Bible verses that guide my work. One is from First Thessalonians and says, ‘Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life. You should mind your own business and work with your hands, just as we told you, so that your daily life may win the respect of outsiders and so that you will not be dependent on anybody.’”
Leah gave a little snort of laughter. “That sounds tailor-made for the Amish.”
“Ain’t so? But it’s also why I was willing to accede to the decision of the bishop and the elders when it came to publishing a magazine with a computer. If they felt it would disrupt our lifestyle and not win the respect of outsiders, then I was willing to drop it.”
Leah watched the turtle on the log. “You said you had two Bible verses that guide your work. What’s the other one?”
“It’s from Romans—‘We have different gifts, according to the grace given to each of us. If your gift is prophesying, then prophesy in accordance with your faith. If it is serving, then serve. If it is teaching, then teach. If it is to encourage, then give encouragement. If it is giving, then give generously. If it is to lead, do it diligently. If it is to show mercy, do it cheerfully.’”
Leah cocked her head. “So in other words, whatever talent you have should be used to honor the glory of God.”
“Right. No matter how modest or humble.”
“I wonder what my talent is, now that I’m no longer a journalist.”
“Of course you’re still a journalist. You’re just no longer a television journalist. Now you need to figure out what to do next.”
She toyed with the strings on her kapp. “Do many outsiders become Amish?”
“No.”
“Maybe I should phrase it differently. Do people ever express interest in becoming Amish?”
Isaac gave a small snort of amusement. “Oh, sure. But no one wants to do the work involved.”
“Well, it is harder physically...”
“No, I don’t mean farmwork or carpentry or housework. They don’t want to adopt the things important to the Amish. They don’t want to give up cell phones or the internet, even if the result is richer friendships. They don’t want to give up their secular ways and serve Gott, even if the result is peace and saving their soul. They don’t want to give up their competitive ways and learn to become cooperative, to bury self for the benefits of community. That’s a lot of work.”
“And to my English ears, it seems overwhelming.”
He nodded. “That’s why conversions seldom happen. Becoming Amish is not just about dressing up in a costume and keeping your head covered. The clothing has a purpose, a rich meaning, but it’s just the outward reflection of the all-encompassing spiritual life we try to lead. It’s a lot for most modern women to consider.”
“Not a lot of feminists among you, is that it?”
“Nope. This doesn’t mean Amish women don’t have strong opinions. They do. But just like the men, they must subsume their identities to the community. That’s tough for outsiders.”
“But I sometimes wonder if it’s worth it.” She stared over the pond. “But it seems you don’t have the same stresses here.”
“No. We have stresses, of course, sometimes big ones. The parent who’s ill, an accident with an overturned buggy, the birth of a disabled child, a fire that destroys a house or barn. But overall, I don’t believe Gott wants us to lead...to lead...” His eyes crinkled with amusement. “To lead lives of quiet desperation.”
“You’re quoting Thoreau?”
“Yes.”
“You’re an odd man, Isaac.”
“So I’ve been told by every eligible young woman in the area.”
She grew curious. “Are you lonely?”
“Yes and no. No one can really be lonely around here—we’re too involved in the community to exclude anyone. But I’m at that point in life where I want to find a wife and have a family. I’m considerably older than most men when they embark on that adventure—and I’m starting to feel left out.”
“Hence the reason you’re focusing on me.”
“That’s part of it,” he admitted. “But you’re right, there are some pretty big obstacles.” He rose to his feet and held out his hands to help her up. “Come on, I’m getting hungry. Perhaps you could offer me some dinner.”
Leah grasped his hands and stood up. He wasn’t much taller than she was, only a few inches. The moment lengthened as he kept her hands in his. His eyes looked dark under the brim of his hat, and for once they didn’t sparkle with merriment.
It had been a long time since Leah had been kissed. Romantic entanglements were something she generally avoided. But she wouldn’t mind if Isaac took advantage of the situation...
But he didn’t.
She wasn’t sure if she was relieved or disappointed when he dropped her hands and turned to walk back to the road.