The sun was dipping well into the western sky by the time Rebekah returned home with the clean, wet laundry. She loved how it smelled, like lye, cold water, and sunshine. Which makes sense because that is precisely what is in there.
As she was hanging the sheets on the line, she realized her cheeks ached.
That is odd.
She reached up and felt them, and realized she was smiling.
“You look happy, dochder.” Samuel appeared at the end of the clothesline. “It does my old heart good to see my eldest bopplin happy.”
“And it does your dochder’s heart good to see her fater happy and healthy. The leeches from Fogarty must really help, even though they make me kind of ill to look at.”
He nodded. “I believe they do.” He sank down into a chair that he had obviously brought out for just that purpose. “And if I really let myself think about them, they make my stomach churn a little, too.”
Rebekah chuckled. “I can only imagine. I suppose you cannot let yourself think of them at all.”
“Well, I have to think of them the right way. Those little things, I believe, have helped make me well enough to come see you and the bopplin. And that is good enough for me.” He nodded a curt nod at Rebekah as if to punctuate his feelings about the leeches. “That Englischer barber is really something else. I am quite glad to know him.”
She slid a clothespin over the sheet and stepped down the line. “It seems you two have become fast friends.”
Samuel smiled. “Friendship is more worthwhile than gold.”
“Jah,” Rebekah said. “You have taught me that from when I was small as Dawson there. Hey, speaking of Dawson, where is he?”
“He fell asleep while I was making a snack.”
“Danke, Fater.” She prayed a prayer of gratefulness for her father in her heart as she slid the other clothespins into place. “Is Fogarty minding him?”
“No, he had to go. Other patients, or other haircuts. I could not figure out which.” Samuel smiled. “I figured out what Dawson was fussing about earlier, though.”
“Oh? What was it?”
“He made me promise not to tell. He said he would show his mater when he wakes up.”
Rebekah giggled. “I am sure he did.”
Samuel’s face shone as the sun peeked out from behind a cloud and lit his face with a bright glow. A chilled breeze swirled around them, bringing with it the fresh smell of a nearby tulip tree. “God’s blessings, Dochder,” Samuel whispered. “Look for them each and every day.”
Rebekah picked up the empty basket and walked over to her father. “Thank you for coming to keep me company. Would you like to go inside and have a bite to eat?”
Samuel let her help him to his feet. Rebekah remembered him as a larger-than-life man, so handsome and strong and always laughing and happy when she was a little girl. Still the same man, he had seemed so much feebler since his possible heart seizure. Today was no exception, but the look of peace and gratefulness on his weathered face brushed away her temporary worries.
“The Lord impoverishes, and He enriches. He humbles, and He lifts up,” Samuel said.
I know exactly what that means now.
“1st Samuel chapter 2, verse 7.” Rebekah let her father escort her into the house. “The book of the Bible that you were named for.”
***
Inside, the kitchen smelled delicious. “Fater, you outdid yourself! It smells…” Rebekah searched her vocabulary. “Mouth-watering.”
Samuel took his seat. “Sourdough biscuits with sliced radishes, bacon, and, of course, cinnamon cake.”
This was Samuel’s go-to meal when she was a girl. It was rare that he was the chef of the kitchen, but when Elnora was down with a new baby or off helping bring another baby into the village, the task was left to him, and he never disappointed. Sometimes, he would even cut the biscuits in half, carve them into little hearts, and smother them in butter, which made it her favorite meal of all time.
“Coffee or tea, Fater?”
Samuel thought for a moment. “Coffee is for mornings. How about tea?”
Rebekah set the kettle on the wood-burning oven as her father served their food. “You mentioned having a good visit with Fogarty. Would you like to talk about it?”
“He is a good person, Englischer or not.” Samuel served Rebekah’s place first, then his own. “Did you know that he has lived all over this country? Said that as a boy he has run barefoot through cottonfields and jungles alike. He has seen the rain—” Samuel stopped short. “We should probably set a plate aside for Thomas since he spends all night up with his pack of bopplins.”
Rebekah already had the plate in hand.
“Wonderful idea, Fater.” She held the plate as Samuel scooped some of the delicious food onto it. “Fogarty sounds like a wonderful man. And a good friend to you, too.” She sat down. “It must be nice to exchange stories.”
She sat down and her father blessed the meal at once. “God, thank you for this day. Each sunrise, each cup of coffee, each moment is a gift. Danke for blessing us with this time together. Amen.”
Amen.
Samuel picked up where he left off. “He especially loved the stories of you as a baby, since he is a fater.”
“You told him stories about me?” Rebekah was truly shocked. “Like what?”
Samuel’s eyes gleamed. “Like how you came to be my dochder. How terrible circumstances sometimes lead to the greatest blessings.”
Rebekah sat in stunned silence.
“It was truly terrible what happened to your family on The Pike so many years ago, but God saw fit to put us not far behind. Then, in His infinite wisdom, he made you my dochder.” He waited a moment. “Your mater was worried that we would never have bopplins as we had been married several years and had yet to be blessed with a family. Then, there you were. Our only dochder. Then came—”
“All the sohns,” Rebekah joshed.
“See what a blessing you are?” Samuel paused long enough to take a bite. Once he swallowed it down, he continued. “Dochder, may I ask you something?”
Rebekah took a small bite and washed it down with a sip of tea. “Jah.”
“I know it is only natural to wonder about and miss the Englischer parents you never knew, especially since Peter showed up and told you of your lineage…” Samuel thought for a moment before continuing. “But, have your mater and I, well, have we given you a life where you feel complete? And nothing is amiss?”
She glanced across at the old man on the other side of the table. The only father who woke her in the middle of the night to witness the miracle of the birth of her calf-turned-milk cow, Buttermilk. The only father who carved a cradle for her as she was expecting her first bopplin and did not blame her or chastise her when she smashed it during a jealous fit of rage. The father who gave his all to save her from a lightning strike barn fire. The father who had literally gotten up off his death bed to come help her when she needed help the most. The father who had been there for her since day one, in so many unnamable ways.
Rebekah smiled at the only father she’d ever known. “You and mater have been more than enough, many times over. I am grateful that they brought me into this world, that they brought me onto The Pike, and I am sad that they met the end that they did. However, like you said, sometimes the greatest blessings come from the greatest tragedies. My becoming your dochder is not a tragedy. It is a blessing.”
“Danke, dochder.” Samuel picked up his cup of tea and swirled it around. “You are indeed the blessing.” His look grew mischievous. “Would you like to hear another story about bopplin, Rebekah?”
“Jah!”
“I came in from making a delivery during the summer when you were tiny. So small, about the same age as your bopplin. I was hot, sweaty, and hungry and when I came in the door, Elnora, pregnant with Jeremiah, was bouncing you on her hip. You were giving your mater fits.” He chuckled at the memory. “I had never seen her look as spent as she did that day.”
“I never knew I was a mischief maker,” Rebekah said as she finished her radish and bacon biscuit.
“‘I am so glad you are home,’ your mater said, ‘you take her, nothing I am doing seems to soothe her, and I must get to the outhouse!’”
I know that feeling.
Samuel continued. “So, she sat you down in the living room and hurried out the back door. You stopped your fussing and watched her as she dashed away, then you turned back to look at me. Before I could get over to you to scoop you up—”
As if on cue, Dawson’s screech interrupted his grossdaddi’s reminiscent story.
“I will fetch him,” Samuel said.
Rebekah sat at the table and waited. What a gift today is, to receive from my fater the stories of my youth that I have never heard before. The thought was so loud in her mind, she almost spoke it.
Samuel returned holding a squirming bopplin. He bent at the waist and plopped Dawson onto the floor.
Dawson responded with a yell.
Rebekah’s eyes widened. “Fater, I can take him.” She stood to go to her bopplin.
Samuel held up a finger. “Hold on, let your bopplin show you what he can do.”
Dawson studied first Samuel, then Rebekah, through his wide, blue eyes. Then, he began to rock back and forth, back and forth, until he situated himself on his hands and knees. He squealed again, to the tune of Rebekah’s laughter. “Fater! What did you teach him?”
Smiling with his arms crossed across his chest, Samuel pointed to Dawson. “Watch what he does next.”
Dawson pushed himself to his feet, steadying himself with the chair Samuel had just been occupying. All slobbery smiles, he squealed again.
“Look at you,” Rebekah cooed. She started to step toward him.
“Rebekah, hold on,” Samuel whispered. “You are so much like your mater; it is unreal sometimes.”
She stopped, tears in her eyes and a grin on her lips so wide her cheeks ached afresh.
With a look of concentration so severe it was almost tangible, Dawson let go of the chair. Ever careful, he took two tiny steps. With another shriek, he sat down and smacked his hands victoriously on the floor.
Rebekah covered her mouth with both hands. “The bopplin is walking!”
“Just like you did when your mater finally put you down that day. You stood right up and took two steps to your fater like Dawson did just now.”
Rebekah dipped to the ground and tickled Dawson under his chin. “Fater, you got to see the first steps of mine, however many of my brothers, and this bopplin here.”
“Just you and the bopplin here,” he said. “Your mater was privy to the first steps of each of your brudders.”
Rebekah’s eyes glistened with moisture. “Blessings from God, they really do come in the strangest ways,” she echoed.
“From the greatest tragedies,” Samuel said again as he plucked up a happy bopplin, “come the greatest blessings. Your fater is living proof of that.”
“Could you stay for just one cup of coffee, Fater?” For some reason, Rebekah did not want to see her father go. She wanted him to stay.
“I suppose one cup would not hurt.” He bounced Dawson in his arms. “Come on. You can walk your grossdaddi back into the kitchen. Pretty soon, you will be carrying me!”
***
Samuel set his coffee cup in the sink and handed Dawson back to Rebekah. “Well, dochder, I had better be going. You slept away most of the day, and that is gut, but now it’s time for me to go home and see your Mater.”
A wave of nostalgia swept over her, but she could not be quite sure as to why. “I apologize for sleeping most of the day and napping for the rest of it. I feel like I missed out on an entire day with you.”
Samuel shook his head. “No, do not be sorry. You needed it so. And the bopplin and I had a grand time.”
Rebekah forced a smile.
Why must I force it?
“I am saddened to see you go, Fater.”
Samuel donned his black felt hat. “Do not be saddened. After all, we part only to meet again, do we not?”
“I suppose so.” She tightened her grip on the bopplin as emotion clinched her throat. “I cannot wait to see you again tomorrow, Fater. Your being here has been the biggest blessing.”
Like manna from heaven.
“I agree, Dochder.” He strode across the room and pulled her into a tight hug. Dawson squealed, then punctuated it with a laugh. “These days have been the biggest gift. And they have showed me something I needed a reminder of. That I am by far the richest man in Gasthof Village.”
Tears sprang to Rebekah’s eyes. She squeezed her father tighter. I do not want to ever let him go. He is my past, all my fun memories, all my happiness. He is my fater.
“Do not fret, Dochder.” He pulled away slowly. “I will see you in the morning, bright and early…”
Rebekah joined him for the last bit.
“For hot coffee and good company,” they said in tandem.
She watched as he walked out her front door and down the stairs into the falling darkness. Without warning, her heart panged in her chest. For once, even Dawson was quiet. “Do not worry bopplin,” she whispered, though she was not sure if she was whispering for his sake or her own. “He will be back tomorrow.”