Twenty-three years before
When I was twelve years old, one of our English neighbors passed away, and his farm was left abandoned. That summer, my brother, Jacob, my sister, Sarah, and Jonas, and I transformed old man Delaney’s pasture into a baseball field befitting a minor-league team. Jacob mowed a huge swatch of grass, leaving us with an acre or so of cleared land. Jonas set to work building a bench so people who came to watch us play would have a place to sit. Sarah and I sewed canvas bags that we filled with sand for the bases. We spread lime to demark the base lines. We piled a wheelbarrow of sand on the pitcher’s mound, and partially buried a flat stone for home plate. Jonas even came up with a gnarled length of chain-link fence and transformed it into a batter’s cage.
I spent my babysitting money on a leather glove. It was the first time I’d bought anything without my parents’ consent; even at that early age, I’d known they wouldn’t allow it. I was too competitive and too interested in partaking in activities better suited to my male counterparts. But I was crazy for baseball that summer. I loved hitting and I loved running. Most of all, I loved winning. Sometimes I was a sore loser. I remember vividly the mad rush to finish chores, so I could hit that diamond and make my mark.
On this particular day, I’d finished my chores early and was the first to arrive at the diamond only to find it had been commandeered by a group of English boys. There were six of them, a few years older than me, and they’d come in two ATVs wearing their strange baseball outfits with caps and cleats. I was wearing my traditional clothes—a mauve dress, an organdy kapp, and the fastest sneakers I owned—my glove and baseball in hand. I slowed as I approached, taking in the scene, keenly aware that all eyes were on me.
“Hey, look!” called out one of the boys. “We got us a new bat boy!”
A chubby red-haired kid with a catcher’s mask cocked on his crown approached me. I guessed him to be one of the younger players, about my age, heavier but an inch or two shorter. He gave my clothes a thorough appraisal. “Does this field here belong to your mom and dad?” He enunciated the words slowly, as if he were speaking to a two-year-old—or someone who wasn’t fluent in English.
“It belongs to Mr. Delaney,” I told him, my mind rushing through how best to get rid of them. “You’re not allowed to be here.”
“Says who?”
I looked up to see a second boy approach, eyes squinted against the sun. He was older, thirteen or fourteen, brown hair sticking out of a Cincinnati Reds ball cap he wore backward. His eyes fastened to the ball and glove in my hands.
“Mr. Delaney,” I blurted. “He gave us permission.”
“She’s lying!” The chubby boy laughed. “Old man Delaney croaked two months ago!”
My cheeks burned. I did my best to make up for my tactical error. “His family gave us permission,” I told him.
“She’s full of it,” Chubby said to his teammate.
The kid in the ball cap frowned. “Hate to break it to you, kid, but we were here first. Get lost.”
“Come on, dude! What’s the holdup?”
I looked past him, saw two more boys approach. They were older, too, wearing baseball helmets and cleats, and they looked seriously put out that their game was being delayed by an Amish girl.
One of the boys jabbed a thumb at me. “Who the hell is that?”
I felt my big plans for an afternoon baseball game slipping away. “This is our diamond,” I told them. “You can play until my friends arrive, but then you have to leave.”
The boys cracked up.
The red-haired kid guffawed. “The only one leaving is you. Go on, beat it.”
Another round of laughter ensued and the boys shuffled away, turning their attention back to the game.
“Let’s play ball!” one of them shouted.
Dismissed, I stood in the hot July sun and watched the boys prepare for their game. I thought about all the work that had gone into building the diamond—sewing the base bags, pilfering the lime from the barrel in the barn without my datt’s permission. All the money I spent on that glove. Mostly, I thought about the game I’d been pining for all morning. This was the day I was going to slam in that home run and show everyone how fast I could run. These English kids were going to ruin everything. In that moment, I was incapable of surrendering the diamond we’d worked so hard to build. How could I let them take it when they’d done nothing to earn it?
“This is my field and you can’t play here!” I called out to them.
All six of the boys turned to face me. The chubby boy looked perplexed. One of the kids wearing a helmet laughed outright. The others exchanged looks ranging from uncertain to annoyed.
The boy wearing the backward cap stalked over to me. “What did you say?”
He had a mean look about him. The kind of kid who might kick a dog. Or pick a fight with someone smaller because he knew he could beat them up. I didn’t like the way he was looking at me. His hands clenched into fists. I didn’t want to talk to him. Worse, I was scared and wishing I hadn’t opened my mouth. I looked over my shoulder, praying Jonas or Jacob or even Sarah would show, but there was no one there.
I was thinking about making a run for it when Backward Cap Kid snatched my glove from my hands and threw it as far as he could. “Beat it, you little shit!”
I watched my glove land in a muddy pond a few yards away. In the silence that followed, the chubby boy giggled, but it was a nervous, unpleasant sound. My heart was beating so hard the blood seemed to sizzle in my veins. I knew I should walk away, do the right thing, be a good girl, and let these boys have the field. Instead, I smacked the glove from the boy’s hand.
“Hey!” He reached for me.
I dodged left, scooped up the glove, and hurled it into the water.
One of the boys howled with laughter. “She’s got an arm on her!”
The punch came out of nowhere. One moment, I was standing there, breathing fire. The next my nose was crushed. My head snapped back. Pain zinged up my sinuses. I reeled backward, landed on my rear hard enough to jar my teeth.
“Whoa!”
“Dude!”
“She’s a frickin’ little kid!” This, from Chubby.
Somewhere in the periphery of my consciousness, I heard the jingle of a harness, but the significance of the sound didn’t register. I wiped my nose, saw blood on my sleeve. I was too furious to cry, but the tears came anyway. Part from pain, part from humiliation, but mostly because of the injustice of losing the diamond.
“You had enough, punk?” shouted Backward Cap Boy.
I didn’t look at him as I got to my feet, but I was vaguely aware of Chubby placing himself between us. “Aw, come on, Jeffie,” he said, darting a you-okay? look in my direction. “She’s Amish. Leave her alone.”
Shaking his head in disgust, the boy who’d hit me stuffed his fingers into his mouth and emitted an earsplitting whistle. “Let’s play ball!”
I’d just gotten to my feet when someone shouted, “Skunk! What the—Frickin’ skunks!”
“Shit!”
“Run!”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw two of the animals in question waddle onto the diamond. Jonas, I thought, and I swung around to see him standing next to his buggy, eating an apple, watching the boys scatter. Despite the pain in my nose, the blood dribbling down my chin, I laughed.
A few weeks ago, he’d rescued half a dozen skunk babies when their mama was hit by a car. He bottle-fed them. Tamed them. Carried them around everywhere. He’d been planning to bring them here and turn them loose in the woods. Today must have been the day.
The boy who slugged me stabbed a finger at me, but his attention was riveted to the skunks doddering in his direction. “You ain’t seen the last of us, you little shit!”
The boys clambered into their ATVs. Baseball bats and gloves tossed in the rear. The engines roared to life. A water bottle flew in my direction.
“This ain’t over!” one of them shouted.
Dirt and dust spewed into the air as the two ATVs sped away.
I needed a minute to hide the evidence that I’d been crying, so I walked to the bank of the muddy pond, toed off my sneakers and socks, hiked up my dress, and waded into the mossy water to retrieve my glove.
“Looks like someone got slugged.”
I turned to see Jonas walking toward me, his head cocked, his eyes taking in the blood on the front of my dress. He was sixteen now. Taller than me by a foot.
“I guess someone did,” I muttered as I pulled my socks and shoes on over my muddy feet.
“You’re still bleeding,” he said. “Tilt your head back. Pinch your nose. I got a kerchief in the buggy. Come on.”
Taking my hand, he led me to the buggy and sat me down on the step-up. I sat there, watching droplets of blood hit the dirt, praying I didn’t start crying again.
“Here you go.” Jonas handed me a crinkled kerchief.
I took it, trying not to wince when I pressed it against my nose and squeezed my nostrils together.
For a couple of minutes, we watched the skunks as they sniffed around, eventually moseying over to us. Jonas handed me a piece of his apple and I offered it to the runt of the litter, who took it and began to chew.
“Nose still hurt?” he asked.
I looked down at my muddy shoes and socks. “Mamm’s going to be mad.”
“I got some water in the buggy. We’ll get that dirt off you and no one will ever know.” He took the last bite of apple and offered the core to the other skunks.
I watched the animals eat, enjoying the way they held the apple core with their tiny clawed hands and wrinkled their noses when they bit into it.
After a moment, Jonas spoke. “You know that’s not going to be the last time someone gives you a bloody nose.”
“They were mean,” I said. “I didn’t do anything wrong.”
“You should have let them have the diamond,” he pointed out.
I sat up straighter, my hand falling away from my face, my sense of justice chafed. “We built it,” I said. “Why should we give it up to those boys who did nothing but try to steal it? It’s ours.”
Frowning, he guided my hand back to my nose. “You’re right. We built it. But this land belongs to the Delaney family, not us.” He shrugged. “Besides, we’re Amish, Katie. We don’t fight. Over ball diamonds or anything else.”
“Maybe that’s why I don’t fit in.”
“You fit in just fine. You just have to try a little harder.”
But while neither of us was quite able to put our doubts into words, we both knew my ability to conform wasn’t an attribute that could be counted on.
I was well versed in all the Amish tenets. I knew their importance. I felt their goodness, the comfort of them. I wasn’t mature enough to put my misgivings about the rules into words. But I was aware of the battle raging inside me and I wanted Jonas to know it wasn’t because I didn’t understand.
“You think I’m too rebellious,” I murmured.
“I think your nature is rebellious.”
I looked down at the kerchief, smeared with blood. I looked at the front of my dress and sighed, wondering how I was going to explain it to Mamm. Maybe if I told her I got hit in the face by the ball …
“If those boys were right to do what they did, why did you sic the skunks on them?” I asked.
“I didn’t say they were right. But neither were you.” I start to protest, but he raised his hand. “Besides, I didn’t want to see you get punched again.”
“Maybe I would have hit him back,” I snapped.
Jonas laughed despite the fact that I was serious and he knew it. “That’s the thing about you, Katie. You’re muleheaded enough to walk the hard road.”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“You stayed true to yourself even though you knew it might earn you a punch in the nose.” He shrugged. “In a way, that’s a blessing. In another way, because you’re Amish and a girl, it’s a curse.”
We got to play our baseball game that afternoon. We told Jacob and Sarah and my mamm I was hit in the nose by a fly ball. I never forgot what Jonas told me about staying true to myself. I recalled those words a hundred times growing up. Times when it would have been easier to compromise what I believed in and take the lesser road.
I felt closer to Jonas than my own brother. He listened to me. Treated me as an equal, as if what I had to say was important. He told me things he didn’t share with others. Nothing inappropriate—we were innocents that summer—just observations and opinions that didn’t necessarily jibe with all those Amish expectations. Later, when I began to get into trouble and the sum of my mistakes began to mount, Jonas was one of the few Amish who stood by me. He believed in me, even when I didn’t believe in myself.