When Levi brought the buggy and Dolly out of the barn, Rebekah smiled. The boy had made every effort to be on his best behavior since the episode with the exploding root beer bottles three nights ago. Even on Sunday during the church service, he hadn’t squirmed once or poked the boy beside him.
Now she thanked him for hooking up the horse. He gave her a shy smile before jogging toward the house where Debbie was washing the breakfast dishes and keeping an eye on Sammy.
The road was empty while Rebekah headed toward the village. The sunlight shimmered on the road in front of her, warning the day was going to be a hot one. Usually she looked forward to summer heat, but not while she was pregnant. Every degree higher on the thermometer added to her discomfort.
She went past the Stoltzfus Family Shops sign. The parking lot was filled as usual with cars and buggies. When the door of Joshua’s shop opened and he bounded out, waving his hands, she drew back on the reins in astonishment.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
He didn’t answer her question. He asked one of his own. “Where are you bound?”
“To my appointment with the midwife.”
He grimaced, then looked down at his grease-stained shirt and trousers. “I forgot your appointment was today. Let’s go.” He put his foot on the step, then halted because she didn’t slide across the seat.
“You don’t need to come with me, Joshua. I know you’re concerned about getting Mr. Carpenter’s carriage done on time.”
He shook his head, his most stubborn expression tightening his lips as he dropped back on to the ground. “I need to come with you. You are my wife. We will, God willing, be raising this kind together for many years to come.” He put his foot on the step again and held out his hands.
She gave him the reins and moved to the left side of the buggy. She was glad her bonnet hid her face, because she wasn’t sure what his reaction would be to the tears filling her eyes. She thought of the days since she’d visited the buggy shop and how solicitous he had been, making sure the kinder helped in the house and with Sammy so she could rest a short while each afternoon. Each kindness was a wunderbaar surprise she treasured, knowing how fleeting such benevolence could be. He’d welcomed her concerns about Timothy and accepted her silent chiding to be more gentle with his son after Levi had stashed the bottles of root beer in the cellar.
Am I being foolish to consider trusting again, God? The question came from the depths of her heart, bursting out of her unbidden. Only now did she recognize how desperately she longed for a real marriage.
As Joshua steered the buggy on to the road, a white van pulled up in front of Amos’s store. An elderly man and woman were waiting with their bags of groceries, each of them holding an ice cream cone. The driver parked, jumped out and opened the door to let them in while he put their purchases in the back.
It was a scene Rebekah had witnessed often at the grocery store in Bird-in-Hand, but her breath caught when she noticed how the elderly man helped his wife into the van as if she were as precious and essential to him as his next breath. Every motion spoke of the love they shared, a love that required no words because it was part of them. She felt a pinch of envy as she imagined having a love like that to share.
When Joshua spoke, it unsettled her to realize his thoughts closely mirrored hers. “The Riehls were married before I was born. Even though Amos has offered to deliver groceries to their house, they insist on coming to the store. He suspects the real reason is the soft ice cream machine he put in last year.”
“Ice cream is a gut reason.” She smiled, letting her uncomfortable thoughts drain away. “Do you ever make ice cream with the kinder?”
“Our ice cream maker broke a few years ago.”
“I brought one from the farm.”
He flashed her a grin. “I’m surprised Levi hasn’t been begging to make ice cream. The boy has a real sweet tooth.”
“He’s mentioned it several times, but...” She sighed. “There are only so many hours in each day.”
“I was wondering, Rebekah, if it is wise for you to be doing so much of the housework.”
She looked at him, baffled. Why wouldn’t she do the house chores? It was what a wife did. Dismay twisted in her middle. Had she failed to keep the house or make his meals or clean the laundry as well as Matilda had?
“Why?” It seemed the safest question to ask.
“I see how exhausted you are. You cook and clean for four kinder as well as you and me. In addition, you work in the garden every day and spend hours making and keeping our clothes in gut repair.”
“You work as hard at the buggy shop.”
“But I’m not going to have a boppli soon.” He shot her a grin. “What do you say to getting a girl in to help before the boppli is born? She could do the heavier chores so you can rest?” His smile broadened. “And have time to supervise making ice cream for Levi.”
“That would be wunderbaar.” Again she had to blink back tears. They seemed to be her constant companion recently. His concern touched her heart, piercing the barriers she’d raised to protect it from being hurt over and over.
“I asked around and Sadie Gingerich may be available.” He drew in the reins when they reached the main highway.
Route 30 was always busy. The buggy rocked when eighteen-wheelers roared past, but Dolly acted as if she encountered them every day. The horse stood still until given the command to go. The buggy sped across, and Rebekah grasped the seat with both hands to keep from being rocked off.
When they were driving along a quiet residential street, Joshua added, “Sadie helped my sister Ruth during her last pregnancy, and Ruth was very satisfied. You haven’t spent much time with my sister, but I can tell you she’s not easy to please.”
“Ruth knows what her family needs, and she isn’t afraid to voice her opinions.”
He smiled. “That’s a nice way of saying she’s bossy, but she’s the oldest, so she’s used to looking out for us. If you want, I can contact Sadie’s family. They live south of Paradise Springs, closer to Strasburg. If she can’t help, she might know someone she can recommend.” He glanced across the buggy. “Do you want me to check if she can come?”
“Ja.” She couldn’t say more. The tears that had filled her eyes were now clogging her throat until she felt as if she’d swallowed a lump of uncooked bread dough.
“Are you sure?”
She realized he’d taken her terse answer as dismay instead of overwhelming relief and gratitude that he cared enough about her to hire Sadie Gingerich to help. Blinking the tears hanging on her lashes, she said, “Ja, I’m sure. Danki, Joshua.”
“I’ll see if she can stop by soon. If you like her—and I think you will because she’s a nice girl—she can start right away.” He tapped her nose. When she stared at him as if he’d lost his mind, he laughed. “Then maybe my pretty wife won’t have dark circles under her eyes because she’s doing too much and not getting enough sleep.”
“Nice way to give your wife a compliment.”
“I don’t want you to grow prideful.” His gaze cut into her as he added, “And that can’t be easy for someone as beautiful as you.”
She knew she was blushing, but she didn’t care. Lloyd had never given her a compliment. Not even when they were courting. She should pay no attention to fancy words. Yet when Joshua said something nice to her, happiness filled her, making her feel as if the sun glowed inside her.
He didn’t add more as he slowed the buggy again and hit the toggle that activated the right turn signal. He pulled into an extrawide driveway and stopped by a hitching post. After jumping out, he lashed the reins to it, though Dolly would wait for them to return.
Rebekah was glad when he assisted her out of the buggy. It wasn’t easy to see her feet now, especially on the narrow step. Gravel crunched beneath her feet as she walked with him toward the single-story white building that looked as if it had been a home. Dark green shutters edged the windows. A bright wreath with purple and white blossoms hung on the yellow door, and a small plaque to one side announced: Paradise Springs Birthing Clinic.
Joshua reached past her to open the door. It wasn’t until she was inside that she realized she hadn’t cringed away from his arm when it had edged around her. She was torn between joy and praying that she wasn’t making another huge mistake. She wasn’t going to think about the dark times. They had shadowed her life for too long. She was going to focus on the here and now. And the boppli who would be born soon.
The clinic was as cheerful and bright inside as it was on the exterior. A half dozen plastic chairs in a variety of colors edged each side of the room. Three were occupied, and none of the women were dressed plainly. They looked up and smiled as she walked past. She returned their smiles and told herself to relax.
After going to the registration desk near a closed door at the far end of the narrow room, Rebekah gave her name to the receptionist who wore large, red-rimmed glasses. The receptionist welcomed her and handed her a clipboard with forms to fill out.
Rebekah sat and concentrated on answering each question. Joshua took the chair beside her.
“Measles?” he asked when she checked a box on the long list of common diseases. “Didn’t you have the shot when you were a kind?”
“I did, but I caught them anyhow.” She chuckled. “The doctor told Mamm it sometimes happens that way and that I would have been much sicker if I hadn’t had the shot. I couldn’t imagine how, because I was pretty sick with them.”
Turning the page over, she was glad the portion on health insurance had already been crossed out. That showed the clinic was accustomed to dealing with the Amish, who weren’t required to purchase health insurance because their community took care of any medical bills a family couldn’t pay on their own.
But how was she going to pay for the boppli’s birth? She couldn’t expect Joshua to pay the costs. The boppli wasn’t his. The answer came instantly: she’d have to sell the farm in Bird-in-Hand. Once the farm was gone, her haven would be, too, but what choice did she have?
Finishing the rest of the pages, she started to rise to take the completed forms to the desk.
Joshua stood and held out his hand. “Let me do that. You should sit while you can.”
As she thanked him, a woman sitting on her other side leaned toward her. “You have a very considerate husband,” she whispered. “I wish my husband understood like yours does how tough it is to get up and down.” She laughed. “My ankles are getting as big as a house.”
Taken aback, Rebekah wasn’t sure how to reply. She gave the woman a smile, which seemed the perfect answer because the other woman laughed and went back to reading her book.
Joshua sat beside her again. “The receptionist said it shouldn’t be long before you’re called in.”
“Gut.” The plastic chair was uncomfortable.
A few minutes later the inner door opened. A tall woman stepped out. Her dark brown hair was swept back beneath a kapp that identified her as a Mennonite. The back was pleated and square rather than heart-shaped like Rebekah’s. Her plain gown was worn beneath a doctor’s white coat, and a stethoscope hung around her neck. She called out Rebekah’s name. When Joshua stood, too, the woman asked him to wait, saying he’d be called back in a few minutes.
He nodded and took his seat. He gave Rebekah a bolstering smile as she went to the door and stepped through into a hallway that branched off past two open doors on either side.
“This way, Rebekah,” the woman in the white coat said.
In spite of knowing she shouldn’t, Rebekah stared at the woman who limped as she walked. A plastic brace ran from below her right knee into her black sneaker. It was held in place atop her black stockings by a wide strip of what looked like Velcro.
She recovered herself and followed the woman into a room. The midwife’s warm smile was so genuine that she was instantly at ease.
“I am Elizabeth Overholt, but everyone calls me Beth Ann,” said the woman before she asked Rebekah to get on the scale. She then checked Rebekah’s blood pressure. Rebekah was pleased with both, and so was Beth Ann.
“Excellent,” Beth Ann said and led her to a room across the hall. She motioned for Rebekah to come in. “Do you need help getting on the table?”
“I think I can manage still.”
“Don’t be brave. Ask for help when you need it.” She kept her hand near Rebekah’s elbow until Rebekah was sitting on the examination table. “Okay, I have your file from your midwife in Bird-in-Hand, so let’s see what it says.”
Looking around the pleasant room while Beth Ann read the file, Rebekah smiled. Childish drawings hung on the wall. She guessed one of them depicted a kitten or maybe a lamb. Something with curly, fuzzy hair. The other was of a kind holding a woman’s hand. A small house and a huge tree were behind them, and the sun was bright yellow while a rainbow arched over the whole scene.
Booklets she recognized from when she’d been pregnant with Sammy were stacked neatly by the window. Then she had read every word, hungry for information to make sure her boppli was born healthy. Not one had contained any advice on how to keep her husband from damaging their kind.
She pushed the dreary cloud of memory away. Lloyd was gone, and Joshua hadn’t raised his hand to her. Not yet.
Oh, Lord, help me to trust he’s not the man Lloyd was. I want to be able to believe he won’t hurt me or the kinder.
Beth Ann looked up, and her smile vanished. “Is everything okay, Rebekah?”
“Ja.” She forced a laugh that sounded brittle in her ears. “It’s impossible to get comfortable at this point.”
“Are you having contractions?”
She shook her head, sorry she was causing the midwife worry. But how could she be honest? She could not let Lloyd’s sins become a shadow over his son as people watched to see if he had inherited his daed’s violent outbursts.
As she began to answer Beth Ann’s questions, she told herself again, Think about now. Maybe if she reminded herself of that enough times, she’d make it a habit and would finally be able to leave the darkness behind her once and for all.
* * *
Joshua had been in places, but not many, where he felt less comfortable than in the waiting room with a group of Englisch women who looked ready to give birth at any moment. None of the magazines stacked on the tables interested him enough to page through one until he noticed a sports magazine tucked at the bottom of one pile. He drew it out and almost laughed out loud when he saw it was a year old. The cover story was on baseball, so he began to read. He glanced toward the inner door when it opened, but it was a different woman calling out the name of one of the pregnant women.
“Mr. Stoltzfus?”
At his name, he looked up and saw the midwife who wore the brace and who’d come to get Rebekah was holding the door open again.
“Will you come with me?” she asked with a smile that suggested she knew exactly how eager he was to escape the waiting room.
Joshua had a smile of his own when he entered the room where Rebekah sat on a paper-topped examination table, her feet swinging as if she were no older than Sammy. He went to stand beside her.
After the midwife introduced herself, Beth Ann pulled out a low stool and sat. She handed him a sheet of paper. Scanning it, he saw it was a to-do list for when Rebekah’s contractions started, including when to call Beth Ann.
“At that point, I will contact the doctor so he’ll be there if we need him,” the midwife said. “As Rebekah didn’t have any complications with her first pregnancy, I don’t see any reason to expect any this time. God willing, of course.”
He nodded. “We have been praying for God’s blessing on this birth.”
“Do you have any questions?” Beth Ann asked.
“Not after having been present at the birth of my three kinder.”
“All right, Daedi,” she said with a laugh. “You are clearly an expert.”
“I know enough to call for you to come.”
That Rebekah didn’t correct Beth Ann’s assumption he was the boppli’s daed pleased him for a reason he couldn’t decipher. He didn’t want to. He wanted to enjoy the gut news that Rebekah and the boppli were doing well.
He assisted Rebekah from the table, thanked the midwife and nodded when she instructed them to make another appointment for two weeks from today. He took the small bag Rebekah held. She told him it contained vitamins. While she made an appointment, he went to get his straw hat and her bonnet from the rack by the door.
Cautiously he put his hand on her elbow to guide her on the steps and across the driveway to the buggy. Again he was relieved when she didn’t tug away or flinch.
She was quiet as he started the drive toward home. He guessed she was exhausted. Crossing the highway took more than twice as long this time because the traffic was even heavier. When a tourist pointed a camera at the buggy, he leaned into the shadows so his face wouldn’t be visible in the photograph. Most visitors understood the Amish didn’t want to have their picture taken, but a few didn’t care.
Once they crossed Route 30 and drove out of the village, no more cars zipped past them. He waved to an Englischer who was driving a tractor. He recognized the man from the charity mud sale at his mamm’s house in the spring. From what he’d heard, the Englischer was planning to run an organic vegetable farm. Joshua appreciated the man’s determination to practice gut husbandry.
After stopping to collect the mail, Joshua drove up the driveway. He glanced at Rebekah when she stirred. Had she fallen asleep? He didn’t want to embarrass her by asking.
“Danki for taking me to my appointment today,” she said.
“You are my wife, and that boppli will be growing up in my house.” He felt her tense, but her shoulders became softer next to his as he added, “In our house. I’m sorry I didn’t say that first.”
“You don’t have to apologize. That house has been yours for years. You can’t expect to change old habits overnight.” She flashed him a smile. “I know I haven’t been able to change mine, though I’m trying to.”
Was she talking about how she flinched from him? If so, he hoped her words meant she was making an effort to accept him being close to her. Because, he realized, he wanted to be close to her. The sound of her laughter, the twinkle in her eyes when she looked as mischievous as Sammy, the gentleness she used with the kinder, the ruddy warmth of her hair...each of these and more drew him to her.
He assisted her out of the buggy, teasing her because she was getting almost too wide for the narrow door. He started to suggest that he grill some hamburgers for their supper tonight so she could rest, but halted when he saw Sammy running toward them with Debbie on his heels. The kinder were barefoot, and their clothes were spotted with water above the wet hems.
“Daedi, come see!” yelled Sammy. “Froggie!”
Joshua couldn’t move as Lloyd’s son called him Daedi again as he tugged on Joshua’s hand. This was a complication he hadn’t seen coming. What should he do?
He didn’t look in Rebekah’s direction, fearing he would see pain and grief on her face when her late husband’s son called another man Daedi. An apology burned on his tongue, but what could he say even if he let the words out? He wouldn’t apologize for loving the kind, especially when Sammy reminded him of his own boys at that age. Curious and excited over the most mundane things, filled with joy and eager to share his happiness with everyone around him. Even something as commonplace as a frog was a reason for celebrating.
“Daedi!” Sammy’s voice tore him away from his musing. “Quick! Froggie jumping.”
“We’re coming,” Joshua said. “Go ahead. We’ll be right behind you.” As the kinder raced toward the stream beyond the barn, he began, “Rebekah...” Again words failed him.
She gave him the same gentle smile he’d seen her offer the kinder when they were distressed. It eased the tightness in his gut.
“It’s all right, Joshua. He needs a daed, and if you’re willing to be his, that’s wunderbaar.”
“Are you sure?”
“Ja. I think you’ll be the very best daed he could have.”
“Now, you mean.” He didn’t want to be compared to his best friend when Lloyd had no chance to prove he would be a gut daed for Sammy.
She nodded, but her gaze edged away. She was hiding something, but what? He was certain if he could answer that question, so many other puzzles would be solved, too.