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“You’re so lucky, Mima,” Ruth Yoder sighed. “I wish I had your problems.”
The next afternoon, Jemima and her best friend were sitting in the woods just beyond the family garden, and were talking boys.
Jemima’s friend rested her chin on her hands and raised impish blue eyes to the sky. “Oh, Mark, stop it,” she simpered. “Samuel, you’ll make me cry!”
Jemima rolled her eyes. “If you say that again with a big scowl on your face, you’ll sound almost like Debby,” she sighed. “Does everybody hate me, then?”
Ruth giggled and relented. “Of course not, Mima. Everybody loves you. All the boys do, anyway, and the girls just wish they were you!”
Jemima eyed her friend ruefully. “I wish they didn’t,” she confessed.
“Why not?” Ruth replied, stretching luxuriantly. She looked up at the sky through the tree branches. “If you’ve got it, flaunt it, I say. I just wish I had it, so I could flaunt it, too!”
Jemima giggled, and then hushed her. “Quiet, Ruth! Be careful what you say! Debby is hanging around somewhere, and if she hears you, you’ll find yourself having to explain to your parents! I love my sister, but she’s the biggest tattletale –”
A rustling in the bushes, about a stone’s throw away, make Jemima break off. Sure enough, Deborah’s scowling face materialized out of the leaves.
“So that’s where you’re hiding! Mamm says come and help her with lunch, Jemima. And you, too, Ruth—since you’re here!” Debby added rudely, and stalked off.
Jemima went red with embarrassment. She turned to her friend apologetically. “I’m sorry, Ruth,” she stammered, “she’s just so... mean these days. I don’t know what’s come over her!”
Ruth stood up, brushing grass from her skirt. “I do!” she replied tartly. She looked at Jemima’s distressed face and bit back the rest of what she’d been planning to say. “But I’ll be glad to help you with lunch.”
Jemima clasped her friend’s arm warmly. “Of course you’ll stay and eat with us,” she pressed, and Ruth’s expression relaxed. She nodded.
They hugged one another, and walked back to the house arm in arm.
But while they were in the kitchen, dutifully making sandwiches, there was a jaunty knock at the front door.
Samuel Kauffman stuck his head into the living room and smiled. “Knock knock! Is anybody home?”
“Why, Samuel,” Rachel King exclaimed in a pleased tone, “come in! I hope everything is well with your folks?”
“They’re fine,” Samuel smiled.
The girls craned their necks to sneak a look at Samuel as he began to chat with Jemima’s mother. Samuel towered over her, and he had taken his hat off in deference. His blond hair shone like summer wheat.
Ruth squeezed Jemima’s arm in excitement, and they both smothered giggles.
“He’s here to see you – lucky thing!” Ruth hissed.
Jemima blushed and smoothed her hair back, but to her consternation, her mother was saying:
“Well, Samuel, in that case, you’ll have to go out to the shop and talk to Jacob. He won’t let you court with Jemima unless you talk to him first.”
Ruth hissed, “Did you hear that?”
Jemima put her hands over her mouth, and her heart began to beat oddly. She stopped even pretending to make sandwiches and inclined her ear to catch every word spoken.
“Thank you, Rachel,” Samuel said in a respectful tone, and took his leave.
After the door closed behind him, Jemima’s mother returned to the kitchen. She was trying hard to project a calm demeanor, but Jemima could see at once that her mother was on fire with excitement.
Jemima’s eyes went to her mother’s face. She searched it silently.
Rachel King broke down. “He wants to court with you, Jemima,” she said thrillingly. “The second boy in as many days! Your father will be –”
But another quick knock at the door interrupted her words. They all turned to look through the kitchen door.
Another young man stood hat in hand on the doorstep.
Jemima looked at her mother worriedly. Her admirers were dropping by so often now that it was becoming almost awkward.
Rachel King took a deep breath, smoothed her apron, and went back out to greet their newest guest.
That evening at dinner, Jacob King put a forkful of potatoes into his mouth, and gave his lovely daughter a rueful glance.
“Four now,” he told her, and Jemima turned a guilty red.
He turned to his wife. “What am I going to do with her?” he asked, with a twinkle in his eye. “If this keeps up, we’re going to have to make them take numbers. I thought Samuel Kauffman and that what’s-his-name Beiler boy were going to fight each other on the porch today.”
Rachel smiled at Jemima. “Jemima is a very blessed young lady,” she murmured happily. “Jemima, you should be praying every day for wisdom. You have an... unusual choice ahead of you. It isn’t many girls who have so many suitors to choose from.”
Deborah had been listening to the conversation in unhappy silence, but apparently she had endured her limit. She twisted her freckled face into a scowl and cried: “Jemima, Jemima, Jemima! If I hear one more word about Jemima and her boyfriends, I’m going to throw up!” She jumped up, flounced out of the room, and slammed the door behind her.
Jacob watched her, and frowned, but didn’t seem disposed to interrupt his meal. He took another bite of ham. “Do you want me to get involved?” he asked quietly, and looked at his wife.
Rachel closed her eyes, but shook her head. “No. I’ll take care of it. I know what it is. She’s going through an awkward phase, and the boys at school tease her. It’s hard for her, and then to be compared to Jemima—But I can’t wait until she’s fourteen, and over this – this –” She gave a soft huff, rose, and followed her daughter.
That left Jemima alone with her father. She raised her eyes tentatively to his face.
His expression softened as he looked down at her. “Well, Mima, you’ve got all the boys in this county rushing to my door! Got any that you want me to throw back?”
He winked and laughed, and Jemima blushed and sputtered, “Oh, Daed.”
After dinner, Jemima went up to her bedroom and sat at the window. She brushed her glowing hair and looked out through the green curtain of trees. The window was open and a cool breath of air, smelling of mown grass, wafted in.
She really should be putting the finishing touches on her work. She had sewn three big boxes full of dolls to sell at the store in town. There was a big summer festival planned for the next morning, and she was going to have to get up early to get them to town before the shop opened.
Jemima sighed and looked down at the neatly stitched cloth dolls. There was a blank space where their faces would have been, as was Amish tradition.
She looked out through the trees again. She felt like a doll sometimes herself, only uncomfortably different – like the one painted doll in a box full of normal ones.
She put the brush down and sighed.
She couldn’t concentrate on even the simplest task these days.
If she stared out the window long enough, she began to see faces – Mark Christner’s strong face, and Samuel Kauffman’s laughing one, and even Joseph Beiler’s shy eyes.
Mark was strong and sure and steady and handsome and she knew him so well and was so comfortable with him.
Samuel was fun and easy to talk to and he made her laugh and he was always interesting.
Joseph was quiet and shy, but so handsome, and, she thought—very smitten.
How could she choose between them? She couldn’t bear the thought of hurting Mark—or Samuel. And Joseph was so sweet and quiet.
She looked up at the soft twilit sky. Lord, what should I do? she prayed. I wouldn’t hurt any of them for the world, but I’ll have to, if I choose one over the others. Please show me what You want me to do.
She glanced back over her shoulder. She could hear the muffled sound of Deborah making noise in her own bedroom, across the hall. It sounded like she was muttering angrily and kicking something.
And please give me patience with Debby, Lord. Sometimes I have un-Christian thoughts about her.
There was a crash, and what sounded like a curse word, from across the hall. Then Deborah shrieked out, removing any doubt. There was a thunderous stomping sound, and Jemima’s door burst open to reveal her angry sister.
“Why didn’t you tell me that this clock you gave me was a piece of junk?” she demanded, throwing it down on Jemima’s bed. “It just fell apart! I’m tired of getting all your old hand-me –”
Their mother appeared suddenly in the hall, her anxious eyes on Deborah’s scowling face. “Deborah, that’s no way to talk to your sister. I won’t have you behaving like this. Go back to your room.”
Deborah pinched her lips together and stomped out again.
Jemima met her mother’s eyes ruefully, and they exchanged an unspoken comment before Rachel King sighed and closed Jemima’s door after her.
Jemima turned to her work and closed up the big cardboard boxes. Then she turned down the lamp and undressed for bed.
Tomorrow morning was going to start early.
