It’s time we had the talk.”
Lavinia stopped stamping the store logo on a pile of shopping bags. “Because I’m engaged? Mamm, I know what married couples do.”
Rachel stared at her and then burst out laughing. “The talk we haven’t had about hiring part-time help for the season.”
“Oh.” Now it was her turn to laugh and shake her head.
“We need the help at the shop, and I’d like to take a day now and then to do some canning. It’s too much for your schweschder to do our kitchen-garden upkeep and canning as well as her own, what with her pregnancy. I remember being pregnant during the summer and having to do the canning.”
She glanced over as several women stopped to look in their display window.
“I thought about asking Emma, but she’s busy helping out part-time at both Hannah’s quilt shop and Gideon’s toy shop.”
Lavinia nodded. “She might have as many hours as she feels she can manage, with John being a toddler now.” She resumed stamping the bags while they had a few minutes without customers. “Still, I think you should ask her. She’s gut with customers, and she’s already coming into town several days a week.”
“I think I will. She’s at Hannah’s this morning. Do you need anything from Hannah’s while I go over and talk to Emma?”
Lavinia shook her head. She’d indulged in the fine fabric she’d bought for her wedding dress and would be watching her pennies for a while.
“Say hi to Hannah and Emma for me. And John, if he’s spending the morning at the shop with Emma.”
“I will.”
When the lull continued without customers, Lavinia decided to use the landline to call Abe.
When he answered the phone, his voice sounded huskier than usual.
“Are you allrecht?” she asked quickly.
“Ya,” he said. But she heard a sniff.
“You’re not. Bessie’s not doing better?” He’d told her about the cow being sick the night before when they talked on the phone.
“Nee,” he admitted.
“I’m sorry.” She knew the cow was more than just livestock for him.
They talked for a few minutes, but she had to go when customers walked in. The first chance she got to be alone again, she prayed for Abe and Bessie and decided she’d ask Liz to drop her at his house on her way home.
Rachel returned with gut news. Emma would be able to give them a few hours three days a week.
A little while later, Emma popped in for a quick visit with John in his stroller. They were on their way to Gideon’s for the afternoon. John had been in the shop before, but his big blue eyes were alive with curiosity as he looked around.
“Out?” he asked his mudder, and he held up his arms.
She shook her head. “We’re going to Onkel Gideon’s. Remember?”
“Toys!” he cried, and bounced in his seat.
She laughed. “Ya. Just give me a minute to talk to Rachel and Lavinia.” She glanced around the shop. “I haven’t been in here in a while. Looks like you have some new vendors with some interesting crafts. Oh, and Lavinia, I love the rug you’re working on,” she said as she walked over to the worktable near the front window. “So colorful.”
Lavinia picked up a strand of fabric and dangled it in front of John. He giggled and grabbed at it, and they played tug-of-war.
“My mudder’s been wanting to have him visit, so I think I might let her do that the first day I work for you.”
“Oh, but it’s such fun to have a kind in the shop,” Rachel protested. “My kinner grew up spending time here. Lavinia liked it more than her schweschder and ended up working with me after she graduated from schul.”
“He’ll come with me sometimes if you don’t mind. Hannah has a folding playpen we can bring with us.” She turned to John. “Well, shall we go visit Onkel Gideon?”
“Toys!”
She laughed. “John loves going there best.”
“What kind wouldn’t?” Lavinia said. The scrap of fabric they’d played with would soon be forgotten when he got to the toy shop.
The shop seemed less bright when Emma wheeled John out. Lavinia agreed with her mudder that it was going to be fun to have him coming with Emma, and she found herself daydreaming for a moment about bringing her own kinner to the shop when she had them.
Together, she and her mudder spent the rest of the day so busy they had little time to talk.
Liz’s passengers who worked in shops had been just as busy, so it was quiet in the van as they relaxed and got off their feet for the first time that day. Some dozed.
Lavinia decided to get out at her house with her mudder and then walk the short distance to Abe’s house. She liked her privacy and didn’t want others speculating on why she was stopping at Abe’s house.
She went directly to the barn and saw Abe sitting on a bale of hay in the stall with Bessie. The cow lay on her side sleeping, her breathing sounding labored. Her heart sank. Bessie wasn’t doing well at all.
Abe looked up in surprise when he heard footsteps.
“Hi,” Lavinia said, quietly so she wouldn’t wake Bessie. But the cow opened her eyes and stared at her for a long moment before closing them again.
“I didn’t think you were stopping by today,” Abe said.
“Allrecht if I come in?” she asked, and slipped inside when he nodded. “You sounded upset when we talked earlier.”
He shrugged. “I should be used to this, growing up on a dairy farm. But there’s always been something about Bessie.” He stroked her black-and-white-spotted flank. “The gut news is it’s pneumonia and not something worse. And none of the rest of the herd has come down with it. The bad news was that we had to dump milk until we found out.”
“But Bessie’s going to get better?”
Abe gazed up at her, and he looked sad. “Daed reminded me that she’s pulled through bad times before. But I don’t think that’s going to happen this time.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Danki.” He sighed. “When’s all the bad news going to end? Sometimes I think it would be easier to have a crop farm than a dairy farm. I get attached to the cows.”
Lavinia knelt and touched his face. “I know. It’s life, lieb. We weren’t promised an easy one. But we were promised He’d be with us during it. We aren’t alone.”
They heard the clanging of a bell. “That’s Mamm calling me in for supper. Will you join us?”
“Schur.”
“I’ll be back soon,” he told Bessie. “You get some rest, old girl.”
They left the stall and walked to the farmhouse.
“Did you have a gut day?” he asked her.
“I did. A busy one. Emma and John came by. Mamm decided we needed some part-time help, and Emma’s going to give us some hours. She’s already helping Hannah and Gideon.”
Waneta and Faron greeted her as they entered the kitchen.
“Any change?” Faron asked quietly, and Abe shook his head.
“I hope you’re joining us for supper?” Waneta asked as she set a big bowl of buttered corn on the cob on the table. “We’ve got plenty.”
“Danki, I will. Anything I can do?”
“Everything’s ready. Grab yourself a plate and fork.”
With the ease of someone who’d been in the kitchen often, Lavinia went to the cupboard for a plate, then got a fork from the silverware drawer. Abe watched her as he washed his hands, picturing her in the room in the future. It cheered him up a little. When he sat, the scent of the fried pork chops on a platter in the center of the table made him realize he was hungerich. His mudder had brought a sandwich out to the barn at lunchtime while he watched over Bessie, but he hadn’t felt like eating.
“How are you feeling today?” Lavinia asked his mudder.
“Just fine. You’re a sweet maedel to ask.”
His dat said the blessing and then began passing the platter of pork chops and the bowls of corn on the cob and sweet-and-sour green beans around the table. Abe added more butter to an ear of corn and decided maybe the day was looking up as he took a bite. He loved corn on the cob and could eat it every day of the week.
His mudder refused Lavinia’s offer to wash the supper dishes when they finished their meal. “You’ve been working all day.”
“So have you,” Lavinia said, gesturing at the mason jars of vegetables from her kitchen garden Waneta had obviously canned that day. She knew from experience how exhausting it was to can in summer heat.
“Go, have a visit with Abe. Faron will help me. Cleaning up won’t take long.”
Abe looked at Lavinia. “Might as well give up.”
Shaking her head, Lavinia thanked her for supper and walked out to the front porch with Abe.
Once outside, they sat in the rocking chairs.
“Feels so peaceful after a day in town,” Lavinia murmured. “Abe, your mudder’s overdoing again. I saw how much she canned today. It’s hard, hot work.”
“I know. Daed and I helped some. He washed vegetables and I chopped for a little while when Wayne gave me a break.”
“Mamm’s talking about taking a day off now and then when Emma can help us. My schweschder’s been doing some of the canning for us, but it’s a lot for her when she’s got her own work and she’s expecting.”
“What will you do when your mudder decides she doesn’t want to run the shop anymore?”
She stopped rocking and stared at him in surprise. “I can’t see that day happening.”
“Our eldres are getting older,” he told her. “I’ve come to realize that recently.”
“True. But it’s more likely that I’d stop working there for a while.”
“You?” Now he stopped rocking and stared at her.
“For a little while. After we have a boppli.” She grinned. “You do want kinner after we’re married, right?”
“Oh. Ya. Of course.”
“I’ll take our kinner to the shop,” she said. “I spent a lot of time there before I started schul and then during holiday and summer breaks. I loved it.”
They chatted a little longer, and then she reluctantly stood. “I need to get home, and you need to check on Bessie again.”
“I’m walking you home. I’m doing so well the physical therapist wants me to take some short walks and get more exercise.” He stood and grabbed his cane.
The walk took a little more out of him than he thought it would, but he got a chance to kiss her as darkness fell before he left her, so he figured it was worth the effort.
His legs were shaking by the time he got to sit on the bale of hay beside Bessie. And he was still there half-dozing as dawn light filtered in through the barn doors and she drew her last breath and left him.