One year later...
Leah parked next to a Do Not Litter sign and turned off the ignition. It was early morning, and the sky was just beginning to fade from dark to light. They were close enough to the shoreline that she could hear the ocean waves through the open windows of the vintage black truck. Around them, in the scrubby salt pines, birds were coming awake, and rabbits and mice were beginning to stir.
Thomas walked around the truck and opened the driver’s door. Leah turned toward him and he caught her by the waist to lift her down to the ground. “Wait,” she said. “Let me take off my shoes.”
“Let me, leibschdi.”
Sweetheart. Her throat clenched at the endearment.
Tenderly, Thomas untied her sneakers and removed them one at a time. After each shoe slid off into his hand, he set it back inside the truck and tenderly massaged each of her feet, taking care to concentrate on her sensitive arches and toes.
“That tickles,” she teased, but she liked it. She loved the feel of Thomas’s hands, so strong and yet so gentle. When he stepped back, she slid down off the seat. The surface of the parking lot was pleasantly cool on her feet. “Better take off your shoes, as well. Sand in them won’t be fun.”
“Ne, I suppose it wouldn’t.” He tugged off his boots and socks and tossed them into the back of the truck.
They had been up for hours, loading the truck and driving south from Seven Poplars. After some persuasion on Leah’s part, Bishop Atlee had decided to allow her to own a motor vehicle. The rules were that she could drive to deliver Thomas’s organic fruits and vegetables to the restaurants and to take community members to doctor and dentist visits. It was a trial period, which the elders could extend, so long as Leah and Thomas used the horse and buggy at home and didn’t use the vehicle for personal use.
She had traded the little black car for an old black truck with a reliable motor. Their first delivery today was in Ocean City, across the state line into Maryland, but it was early yet, and Thomas had wanted to take the time to stop and see the sunrise over the ocean.
“I hope we won’t be late,” she said. “New customers and—”
“We won’t be late,” he answered. And taking her hand, he led her away from the truck and down the wooded path to the beach. The boardwalk gave way to hard-packed sand, and the smell of the sea blended with the spicy scent of pine needles. Here, it was still night, and the trees loomed black against charcoal foliage. But the sound of the surf was louder now, and Leah’s heartbeat quickened in anticipation.
They traversed another bend in the trail and Thomas held a pine branch up so that she could duck under it. Suddenly, they were out of the dunes and onto the beach. It stretched out on either side of them, with the ocean directly ahead and filling the horizon.
Shorebirds were there ahead of them at the water’s edge. Long-legged shadows darted back and forth on the sand, bobbing rhythmically as they searched the wet sand for the ocean’s bounty. Noisy gulls flapped and dove overhead. From behind them, Leah heard the hoarse cry and the muffled flapping of a blue egret’s wings.
The ocean was a dark mass, lit now by rays of iridescent light. Clouds piled one upon another, pink and peach and lavender, and shining through, seemingly borne of the surface of the waves, came the glory of the sun. Leah stopped short, made speechless by the beauty of the sunrise. Thomas let go of her hand and slipped an arm around her shoulder. For minutes, they stood there, watching, mesmerized as dawn banished the darkness. Leah swallowed against the constriction in her throat and blinked back tears. “Wonderful,” she whispered.
“It is, isn’t it?” Thomas answered. “Whenever I see a sunrise, over the water here or the fields at home, it makes me think of God’s love for us.”
“Ya,” she agreed. “Me, too.”
“I think the beauty of a sunrise is here to tell us that love is like the light,” Thomas said. “You can’t measure it out in cups or bushels. It just is, and it is eternal.”
“Sometimes, I think you would make a good preacher.”
“Me?” Thomas snorted. “Hardly.”
“You have a deep core of wisdom,” she confided. “You understood what I didn’t.” She leaned against him, pressing her face against his chest. “Thank you for bringing me here to see it.”
“You’re part of it,” he said. “Part of the beauty.”
She chuckled. “Hush, you shouldn’t say that. You’ll make me guilty of hockmut.”
“Leah, you are a woman with more reason than most to feel pride in her appearance, and yet you show it least.” He smiled down at her. “I doubt very much that the bishop will be admonishing you for showing pride.”
She slipped her arms around his neck and stood on tiptoe. He bent and their lips met. His mouth was sweet and she thrilled to the sensation. “You will lead me into wicked thoughts,” she teased.
“I might. I never made any bones about the fact that I liked to have fun. And two people who love each other are sometimes tempted to play.”
“But temptation doesn’t always have to win out.” Laughing, she whirled away from him and ran through the sand to the water’s edge. Waves were breaking close to shore and salt water foamed and washed around her ankles.
“Watch out. You’ll get caught in one and end up wet to the neck,” Thomas warned.
In answer, she caught up her skirts and waded deeper into the water. It was cool and invigorating. She felt like a child again, playing tag with the waves. Venturing out, only to run for the beach when a larger wave threatened.
“Be careful,” Thomas said.
Another waved crashed around her, splashing salt water to her knees. “Come try it!” she dared.
Thomas looked up and down the beach. Leah did the same. The only living thing she could see was a sand flea digging out of the hard-packed sand, a line of fiddler crabs and the birds.
“Chicken!” she cried.
“Really? We’ll see who’s chicken.” Thomas pushed down his suspenders and stepped out of his trousers, leaving him clad only in his shirt and one-piece white cotton undergarment. It was sewn of heavy white cotton and consisted of a short-sleeved undershirt and drawers that came down halfway to his knees. English men wore much less when they went into the water. All the same, it was hardly an exhibition that the elders would approve of by a baptized member of the church, even on a swimming beach.
“You wouldn’t,” she said, suddenly not so certain what he would or wouldn’t do. She was so busy watching Thomas that she forgot to watch the ocean. A big wave rolled in, drenching her halfway to the waist and nearly knocking her off her feet.
Thomas doubled up with laughter.
“Not funny!” she shouted back, although it was funny.
But what was he up to now? Leah gaped in surprise as Thomas removed his shirt, folded it and laid it on the sand and put his hat carefully on top of it. “Thomas...”
Wearing only his undergarment, he dashed down the beach, splashed past her and dove into the water. He swam out to where the waves were breaking. A wave crashed over Thomas, and Leah lost sight of him. Fearful for his safety, she pulled up her skirt and waded deeper. Water wet her up to her thighs.
“Thomas!” She was about to go in after him when he bobbed up, laughing, a few yards away. Thomas had never told her that he could swim like a fish.
“Come in.” He gestured to her.
Leah backed toward the shore. “I don’t think so.”
“Maybe I’ll catch you and throw you in.” He got to his feet and moved toward her, but she fled to the beach. He followed and caught up with her on the sand.
He wrapped his dripping arms around her and kissed her. “I love you,” he said.
“And I love you,” she replied. He was wetter than she was, but she didn’t care. The warmth of the rising sun enveloped them both, and she clung to him as he kissed her again.
“Are you happy?” he asked her. “Have I made you happy?”
She looked up into his dark eyes. “And why wouldn’t I be happy?” she murmured. “You’ve given me everything that I could want—a home, work that I love, a future.”
He nuzzled the crown of her head. “I think I could have coaxed the skirt off you,” he teased. “You’d make a beautiful mermaid.”
“My skirt, maybe,” she replied. “But not my shift or my scarf.”
He chuckled, but then she felt his muscles tense and his tone grew serious. “You’re not sorry you married me, are you, Leah?”
“This would be a fine time to decide that,” she answered. “And me, a respectable Amish wife, alone with a half-dressed man on a deserted beach.”
“Your half-dressed husband,” he corrected.
She laughed and stepped away, smoothing down her wet skirt and shaking out some of the sand. He reached out and cupped her rounded tummy in his big hand. Shyly, she covered his hand with her own. “Soon, I’ll be so fat that you could roll me down to the beach,” she whispered.
“I don’t care how fat you get,” he said, leaning down to speak to the little one growing under her heart. “I love this little one more than fried chicken and dumplings. And you will, too.”
“We’ll have no chicken or dumplings if we don’t get those vegetables delivered,” Leah reminded him. Her hand rested protectively on her belly. “You said we were coming to look at the ocean sunrise.”
“And we did, didn’t we?” Thomas grinned at her as he went to retrieve his clothing. “Life isn’t all work. Sometimes you need to stop a moment and just enjoy it.”
“I do,” she said. “Every day, living with you, being your wife.” How could she explain the joy he’d brought her? It was a new beginning. Life with Thomas was different than life with Daniel, but it was no less fulfilling.
Together, they were building a new house, building the farm and planning for the child that would be born to them in the late fall. “Have you thought what you’ll name the baby, if it’s a girl?” she asked as he dressed. He’d let her pick a boy’s name, and she’d chosen Jonas, after her father.
He pushed back his damp hair and settled his straw hat on his head. “I’m thinking either Hannah or Martha,” he teased.
“Martha?” she cried. “You wouldn’t do that to our innocent baby, would you?”
“Well,” he explained as he led the way back to the truck, “that might get us back in your aunt Martha’s good favor.”
“Good try,” she answered. “But nothing would keep us there long. You have to remember that I’m one of Hannah’s girls.”
“Fair enough,” Thomas said with a grin. “Then Hannah it will have to be.”
Laughing, they climbed back into the truck and Leah backed out of the parking space and pulled carefully back onto Coastal Highway. “Hannah Stutzman,” she murmured. “It has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it?”
“It does,” Thomas agreed. “But not nearly as goot as Leah Stutzman.”
“Oh, Thomas, what a thing to say. What will our baby think if she hears you?”
“She’ll think that her dat is head over heels for her mam. And what’s wrong with that? Besides, it’s going to be a boy. Jonas. A good name for a farmer.”
“Or a blacksmith,” she teased.
“Or a blacksmith. Whatever he wants to do for a living will be fine with me, so long as he remembers that all blessings come from a merciful God.”
Leah could add nothing to that. And when Thomas began to hum and then to sing a joyful hymn as they rolled along, she joined in with him. Together they sang the old beloved verses of a song they had learned as children as they drove into the bright, sunny morning, full of hope for whatever lay ahead.
* * * * *