“Dat!” Millie cried again, running toward him.
The way she took off surprised Elden. Typically, Amish women her age didn’t run. For many, it was considered inappropriate. His mother certainly would have said so if she’d seen her. But Millie was not a typical young Amish woman, was she?
Elden had forgotten how fast she could run. In their school days he remembered that despite her size, she had always been picked for softball teams first, certainly before him. Everyone wanted her on their team because she could run fast and hit the ball over the fence into the Swartzentrubers’ field where their schoolhouse was located. Millie had been so athletic that he’d been intimidated by her.
“Dat! Don’t get up,” Millie hollered, waving her arms at him.
Elden bolted toward Felty. Samson was barking as if to alert them that the older man had fallen. By the time Elden reached Millie and her father, the bulldog was standing over Felty, licking the older man’s cheek. Her father’s glasses were lying in a pile of dead leaves beside him.
“Samson, back up,” Elden ordered.
Millie fell to her knees in the wet grass and picked up his glasses, which appeared unbroken. There had been a rain shower outside while they were having dinner and everything was wet. “Dat?” She reached out as if wanting to touch him, but not knowing where for fear he’d been seriously injured. He was lying facedown. “Dat, can you move?”
Elden went to his knees on the other side of Felty. “Catch your breath,” he said calmly.
“Dat, can you hear me? I asked if you can—”
“Ya, dochter, I can move,” Felty sputtered. He tried to push the bulldog off as he rolled onto his back.
“Samson, off!” Elden ordered sharply.
“Where are my glasses? Lost my glasses.” Felty tried to sit up, bracing himself with his hands.
“Here they are.” She slid them onto his face. “Dat, I think you should lie still,” Millie fussed. “You might have broken your leg or arm. Maybe I should call an ambulance. I imagine someone here has a cell phone.” While cell phones, like many other modern conveniences, were frowned upon in their Old Order community, the truth of the times they lived in was that families needed a cell phone, if not for work then to be able to place a call in an emergency.
Felty blew a raspberry at his daughter and sat up without assistance.
“Dat!” Millie cried, her tone reprimanding.
It was all Elden could do not to laugh. The older man couldn’t have been hurt too badly to have that sort of sense of humor.
Millie brushed some dead grass off his face. “Can you move your legs?”
Felty kicked one leg out and then the other, demonstrating he could move just fine. “Stop your fussing, dochter. I tripped. I didn’t fall off the top of a windmill!”
“How about your arms?” Millie ran her hand over her father’s denim coat sleeves, one and then the other, brushing off bits of wet leaves and brown grass.
Felty flexed one arm and then the other. “Fine. See?” He reached out and stroked Samson’s muzzle as the dog poked his nose at him. “Just a tumble, right, boy?”
“Dat, what were you doing? Did you fall walking?” She looked at Elden, the worry plain on her pretty face. “He’s never been unstable on his feet before.” She returned her attention to her father. “Did you get dizzy?”
Felty frowned and looked to Elden, extending his arm in silent request. Elden rose and took the older man’s hand, helping him to his feet.
“Can you imagine what my life is like, Elden? It’s this times seven.” Felty pointed to Millie. “Yack, yack, yack.” He was wearing fingerless cotton gloves, and he opened and closed his hand so that it looked like a bird’s mouth.
“What happened, Dat?” Millie, still on her knees on the ground, asked again.
Elden picked up Felty’s black, wide-brimmed Sunday hat, banged it on his knee to get the grass and leaves off and handed it to him.
“I didn’t fall over like a boppli.” Felty’s tone was indignant. He pulled his hat down over his head. “I was showing Samson how to do it.”
“Do what?” Millie asked.
Millie made to get to her feet, and before Elden thought better of it, he grabbed her hand to help her. As her hand touched his, he was surprised by a warm feeling that surged through him. Her touch, warm and soft, somehow made him feel...like everything was going to be all right for him. It felt so good that he hated to let go when she pulled her hand away.
Felty exhaled, getting more perturbed by the moment. “I was showing Samson how to jump over the little fence I made.” He pointed at a small bundle of sticks in the grass that Elden hadn’t noticed before. “I made a fence jump and he wouldn’t go over it so I was showing him how.”
Millie crossed her arms. “You thought you and that stumpy-legged dog were going to jump fences? What? Stick fences today, stockade fences tomorrow?”
“Maybe,” Felty answered indignantly.
Elden had to press his lips together not to laugh.
But Millie didn’t. She threw back her head and laughed hard, a big belly laugh that made her eyes water.
And Elden’s heart melted. He wanted to ask her to the harvest frolic. He had nearly gotten up his nerve, but then Felty fell. He took a deep breath. What if she said no? Could he take the rejection now, when he was only just climbing out of the depths of disappointment and self-doubt?
“Oll recht, Dat.” Millie finally stopped laughing. “I think it’s time we went home.” She looped her arm through his and they started toward the yard.
The bulldog and Eden followed.
“What if I’m not ready to go home?” Felty asked, walking beside his daughter.
She tilted her head and gave a great, overblown sigh. “Then I’ll have to tell Eleanor that you want to stay, even though you fell for no obvious reason.”
Elden caught up to them and walked on Felty’s other side. He wanted to ask Millie here and now about the frolic, but with her father there, that didn’t seem wise. If she said no, he’d rather not have anyone else witness his embarrassment.
“I told you!” Felty blustered. “I was showing Samson how to take the jump.”
Millie shook her head. “I don’t know if Eleanor is going to accept that. She may not believe you. She may think you made it up to keep from getting into trouble with her.”
“What would make her think that?”
“I don’t know, Dat. Maybe because the other day when you were trying to make bird feeders with pine cones and peanut butter and seeds and you got peanut butter all over the counter and on the floor, you told her you were making a peanut butter sandwich. Even though there was bird feed on the counter and the floor.”
“I like feeding the birds,” he grumbled. “Birds have to eat, too, and I like watching them from my chair in the living room.”
“I know you do.” She stopped. “But I don’t know how Eleanor’s going to respond.” She looked at him cheerfully. “So do you want me to go tell Eleanor we’re ready to leave or should I tell her how you—”
“I think it’s time we go home,” Felty interrupted. He offered his hand to Elden and shook it warmly. “Thank you for having us. Hope we can return the favor, neighbor.”
“I’ll go round up the girls. It’s time we got home to check on Jane, anyway.” Millie’s gaze met Elden’s for a split second, and she smiled warmly. Then she walked away.
Elden watched her go and decided he was going to invite her to the frolic. If she said no, then she said no.
But he wouldn’t ask her today. Maybe tomorrow. The following day at the latest.
But he would definitely ask her.
Wednesday morning after the breakfast dishes were cleared, Eleanor walked into the kitchen where Millie and her sisters were still tidying up, and clapped her hands together. “Applesauce day,” she declared. “We’ve put it off long enough. It’s a perfect day for it.” She glanced out one of the big windows.
It was overcast and threatening to rain. When Millie had gone out to milk before breakfast, she’d been chilled by the time she brought the milk back into the house.
“Ya, I agree. A perfect day to make applesauce,” Millie piped up when no one said anything. Since Sunday she’d been in a contemplative mood. She needed something to distract her from thoughts of Elden that swirled in her head.
She was so confused. Did he like her or not? She’d been upset when he barely spoke to her when they arrived at his house the other day. But then later, he’d sent her dat inside to ask her to go for a walk with them. With him. So maybe he did like her. Or maybe he only wanted to speak to her alone so he could ask about his prospects with Beth and had never gotten the chance before their father had taken his tumble.
Or perhaps he really was interested in Millie. Would that really be such a crazy idea? She was smart and resourceful, a good cook, decent at sewing and she was a woman of deep faith. So what if she was fat? She wasn’t so fat that she couldn’t do her chores or that she couldn’t run when her dat had hurt himself. And Gott had made her this way, hadn’t He? Which meant, she lectured herself, that she was good enough for any man, even Elden.
That was what she kept telling herself. On Monday she had hoped Elden might stop by to say hello. When he didn’t, she thought he might come Tuesday. Today she’d woken up wondering if she had imagined the connection she’d felt to him on Sunday when they had taken a walk. With an inward sigh, she pushed those negative thoughts aside. There was no sense dwelling on them. Gott was good and He had a plan for her. Even if it wasn’t the plan she was hoping for. And she had to make herself content with that.
“Love to help make applesauce,” Henry said, stuffing the last piece of toast in her mouth as she headed out of the kitchen. “But I told Anna Mary I’d have a look at her stove. She says it’s not working and with her being widowed and her boys living so far away, she doesn’t know who to ask. She’s been cooking on her old woodstove.” Her last words were mumbled as she made a quick retreat.
“I’d help, but I promised Liz I would help her with her wedding chest,” Willa announced, following Henry out of the kitchen. “Henry is going to drop me off. The wedding is only a month away,” she threw over her shoulder. “I’ll be home by supper.”
“Wait!” Jane called, closing the refrigerator door. “Can I go with Willa? While she helps Liz, I can visit with Susie. Please, Ellie?” she begged, already starting to take off her dirty apron.
Eleanor, who had been busy wiping down the counter, turned around. “Who’s going to help me make this applesauce?”
“Sigh so gude, schweschter? Plee-ase?” Jane, who they sometimes forgot was still a teenager, begged.
“Let her go. I’m here to help,” Millie said. “I don’t have anywhere to be. And Cora and Beth can help, too. That’s four of us. Plenty of cooks in the kitchen.” She placed her hands on her hips and glanced at the huge copper-bottomed pots that Henry had brought into the kitchen from the cellar. “It will be fun, just the four of us.”
Eleanor hesitated and then with a sigh, said, “Fine, Jane. Go. See your friend.”
“Danki!” Jane threw her arms around her eldest sister, gave her a hug, and raced out of the room.
“Do you two want to start carrying in the apples?” Cora, who had been reading a book at the kitchen table, asked. “We’ve got a lot of peeling and cutting to do before they’re ready for the kettles.”
“Sure,” Eleanor agreed, seeming already frazzled although the day had barely begun.
“I’ll help carry them in,” Millie offered.
Bushels of Black Twig, Granny Smith, Winesap and Jonathan apples they had picked at the Masts’ orchard the week before waited on the porch. Making applesauce with her family was something that Millie looked forward to all year. She loved picking apples. And she loved the heady smells of cooking apples and cinnamon and seeing the results—rows and rows of quart jars of applesauce lining the pantry and cellar shelves. There was something so satisfying about knowing that a few days’ work provided good food that would last them until the next fall and the next crop of ripe fruit.
So the four remaining Koffman sisters began their task. The baskets were heavy, but Millie had done manual labor since she was young, and she didn’t mind the lifting. Peeling was easy. Her fingers remembered what to do while she sat and chatted with her sisters. As the minutes, then hours, ticked away in the cozy kitchen, they laughed and jumped from one subject to the next. It was all great fun until Cora reminded Millie what she was struggling with.
“Sooo...” Cora drew out the word. “I saw you and Elden through the window on Sunday, Millie.” She carried another big bowl of clean apples to the kitchen table. “How was it?”
Millie concentrated on the Black Twig apple she was peeling, keeping her gaze down. “Fine.”
Cora glanced at Beth and the sisters exchanged looks. “What we were wondering is, does he like you?” she asked with a giggle.
Suddenly Millie felt anxious. Cora wasn’t one for giggling. She was probably the most serious of all of them. Had she and Beth been talking about her and Elden? “I... I don’t know if he likes me.”
“Elden is a good-looking man,” Beth declared, turning from the stove where she was stirring a pot of apples, water and sugar. “And single.”
“Very single,” Eleanor agreed, not looking up from her peeling. “He’d make a fine husband,” she added.
“I have an idea. I think we should go to the harvest frolic,” Beth said. “And then Elden can ask Millie to ride home with him.” She looked to Eleanor. “Do you think we could go? Everyone is talking about it. There’s going to be singing and games and a bonfire and they’re going to roast marshmallows.”
“Are they making s’mores?” Cora looked to Eleanor. “I’ll go if there are going to be s’mores.”
“I don’t want to go to the harvest frolic,” Millie said, continuing to peel an apple. “And Elden is not going to ask me to ride home with him.”
“I think he is. Because he likes you.” Beth sang her last words as she took a long-handled wooden spoon and scooped up a spoonful of cooked apples to taste.
“Well, I think he likes you, Beth,” Millie blurted, startling them all, including herself. “He came right over to talk to you Sunday when we arrived.” Flustered, she stood up and, in the process, dropped apples from her apron onto the floor.
Beth made a face. “He does not like me. You’re the one he asked to go for a walk with him. I think he sent Dat in to ask you so his mother wouldn’t know.”
“Makes sense. Since she ruined his last betrothal,” Cora pointed out.
“We don’t know that to be true,” Eleanor chimed in as she cut a peeled apple into chunks and dropped them into a bowl in her lap.
Millie pressed her lips together as she stooped to pick up the fruit she’d dropped. “Can we talk about something else?” One apple had rolled under the table and she had to get down on her hands and knees to retrieve it.
“No one would blame you if you set your kapp for him,” Eleanor said. “Elden Yoder is a good catch. I think you two are well suited to each other.”
“Is that what all of you are talking about behind my back?” Having captured the apple, Millie rose to her feet and set it on the table. “That I’ve set my kapp for Elden? Because that isn’t true.”
Beth and Cora exchanged meaningful looks.
“You never know,” their oldest sister remarked, not looking up. “Sometimes even a smart woman is the last to see what’s plain as day to everyone around her.”
“Plain as day,” Millie muttered to herself a short time later as she came up the cellar steps, carrying two cases of quart-sized canning jars.
She knew Eleanor hadn’t meant the comment unkindly, but it was upsetting. Maybe because Millie desperately wanted to think that Elden was interested in her. She wanted to believe that there was a chance that he could fall in love with her, because if she was honest with herself, she was already half in love with him. She knew it was ridiculous, but she’d felt that way since they were kids. Not all the boys had been kind to her at school. There had been the jokes about what she packed for lunch, comments about the shape of her body and the laughter directed at her, but Elden had always been kind.
At the top of the cellar steps, Millie set down the boxes and turned to lower the metal Bilco doors. It was cold and gray, and drops of icy rain were beginning to hit her as she eased the door down.
She remembered being in the third grade, sitting outside for lunch on a sunny day in May. Elden had been in the fourth grade. There had been picnic tables that one of the neighbors had built so the students could eat outside under the trees. She’d been sitting with Annie, whom she’d been friends with for as long as she could remember, along with some other girls. There had been a bunch of boys, including Elden, at the next table over. Millie had left her lunch on the table to fetch a cup of water for her and Annie from the well. When she came back, she’d unwrapped the peanut butter and honey sandwich her mother had made for her. She’d nearly taken a bite before she realized there was something sticking out of it that didn’t belong. When she opened the sandwich, she found that someone had stuffed a bunch of grass and leaves inside it. Then one of the older boys, an eighth grader named Alvin, began to oink.
Millie had been so mad that she got up from the bench.
“I’m sorry,” Annie had whimpered. “I didn’t know how to stop him.”
But Millie hadn’t been angry at Annie; she was furious at Alvin. She’d marched over to the rude boy. “You think that’s funny, ruining someone’s lunch?” she’d asked him, hands on her hips.
Alvin had sniggered. Other boys at the table had joined him.
“That’s just mean,” Millie had told him.
Alvin had stood up and he was a lot bigger than she was, a lot taller. He’d leaned down and oinked right in her face.
That was when Millie had drawn back her fist with the intention of hitting him right in the nose. She didn’t care if she was going to be in trouble with their teacher, or her parents, or the bishop, or even Gott. But just as she was about to throw the punch, Elden had appeared at her side and placed his hand on hers, lowering it gently.
“Not worth it,” he’d whispered in her ear. “Here.” He’d pushed a sandwich, still in a plastic baggie into her hand. “It’s ham and cheese with mustard,” he’d told her. “The spicy kind. A goot sandwich.”
And then he had walked away, and Millie had gone back to sit with the girls. And she had never forgotten how good Elden’s sandwich had tasted.
Millie dropped the second cellar door with a bang and picked up the cases of jars. She had almost reached the back porch when she heard a dog bark. A bark she was familiar with, now. She groaned. It was Samson, and if Samson was there, that meant Elden was there, too.
He’d probably stopped by to ask Beth if he could take her home from the harvest frolic.
“Millie,” Elden called out.
She ignored him. She didn’t know why. She’d almost reached the back door when she heard his footsteps on the porch steps.
“Millie!”
She spun around. “Ya, Elden.” She held the jars against her. “What is it? I’m busy.”
“H-hi.” He slid his hands into his pockets but kept his gaze on her. “I... I see you’re doing some canning.”
“Ya.” She looked down at the jars. “Applesauce.”
“Mmm. I love applesauce.”
She watched his dog trot up the steps so she didn’t have to look at him.
“Uh...anyway. I... I was wondering if you—” He looked at his boots, then up at her. “If...if your family is going to the harvest frolic this weekend.”
“I don’t know,” she said, wondering if she just ought to ask him straight out if he wanted her to send Beth out to talk to him.
“It... It sounds like it’s going to be nice. I... I’m going and I was wondering if you...if I could take you home after,” he said all in a rush.
Millie’s heart skipped a beat. He wanted to take her home. Which made it practically a date because that was how it worked in Honeycomb. Single men and women of marrying age met and got to know each other at singings and frolics and social gatherings, and if a boy was interested in a girl, it was tradition that he asked to take her home.
But did he really want to take her home or was this some sort of ploy to...what? She didn’t know. Make Beth jealous? Or maybe he liked Willa and just was afraid to say so because she was so pretty.
“I don’t think so, Elden.” She turned away. “My sisters are waiting for the jars.”
“Millie—I—” He took a breath. “Why not?”
She turned to look at him. “If you want to go out with Beth, you should just ask her. Or I can, if you want me to.”
He frowned. Samson had moved between them and was now looking up at his master almost quizzically. “What are you talking about?” Elden made a face. “I... I don’t want to take Beth home. I mean, she’s nice and all but—”
“If you’re not interested in her, then why did you talk to her instead of me when we arrived on Sunday?” she demanded.
“What?” He was still acting as if he had no idea what she was talking about.
Millie shifted the cases of jars in her arms. It was beginning to rain in earnest now. She could hear the pitter-patter on the tin roof of their porch. “Sunday. You walked right over and said hello to Beth and...and talked to her. And then you talked to Cora and you barely looked at me. You barely said hello to me and then off you went.”
He shook his head slowly. “Millie, Beth was in front of me. It would have been rude not to speak to her. I didn’t get a chance to talk to you because I knew your dat wanted to stay outside with the men and if I didn’t get him—” He lowered his voice, she guessed in case any of her sisters could hear them from inside.
He took a step closer to her. “If I didn’t walk your dat over to where the other men were, he’d have been stuck in my mother’s kitchen with all the women. And I know that isn’t what he wanted.”
“Really?” she asked. “That’s why you didn’t talk to me?” She wanted to believe him.
“Ya. Why would I make something up like that? When you arrived, I wanted to ask you about the harvest frolic, but there was no chance to talk to you alone when we ate, not with my mother listening to every word I said. And then when you came outside, when we were walking, that’s when I was going to ask you, but then Felty fell and...” He gestured with one hand and went silent.
The bulldog looked up at Millie.
Millie exhaled. “I have to go inside.”
“Does that mean yes?” One side of his mouth rose in a half smile. “You’ll ride home with me?”
“It means no such thing. I’ll have to see if we’re even going.” She shrugged. “Who knows.” She met his gaze. “Maybe someone else will ask me to ride home with them.”
The look on his face told her he couldn’t tell if she was joking or not. In truth, she didn’t know, either.
“I suppose you better ask me again at the frolic.” She turned to the door.
He reached around her and opened it. “Really? You’re not going to just say yes now?”
“Nope,” she said. “Have a good afternoon, Elden.”
Then Millie walked into the house and closed the door behind her with her foot. She entered the kitchen carrying the jars and said with a big grin, “I’m going to the harvest frolic. Anyone else want to go?”