Quill was on the floor in a bedroom-turned-playroom, enjoying time with his nieces and nephews. Lexi lay nearby, her head on her paws as she dozed. His Mamm’s home smelled and sounded like Christmas Eve—the best Christmas Eve they’d had as a family in nearly two decades. Dan, the eldest, had left home for the Englisch world almost eighteen years ago, and since he couldn’t return for visits, that was the beginning of Christmases starting to feel less full. But today felt like a miracle—Mamm’s five sons, four daughters-in-law, Frieda, and eight grandchildren were here. Boldly. Loudly. Here. Oh, and Mamm had another grandchild due mid-January, a boy, and this time she would be there to hold the newborn on the day of its birth.
Quill passed a truck to his oldest nephew. “You guys continue without me.”
“Noooo.” The moans were pitiful.
“Yeeeees.” He winked at ten-year-old Logan and put his hand on seven-year-old Kylie Peyton’s head. “You can do it.” He fisted his hands, showing enthusiasm as if cheering for them.
Lexi raised her head.
“You stay too.”
She stretched and moaned slightly before she rested her head on the floor again, looking content to stay put. Two-and-a-half-year-old Gavin ran to him. “Picky up. I go. I go.”
“Okay, buddy.” He picked him up and then made a circle with his hand toward the others. “You stay and play. Your parents are busy getting ready for the Christmas Eve feast.”
“Mammi Bertie says we each get to open one gift tonight after dinner.” Eight-year-old Jenna’s eyes radiated excitement, and her younger brother, Ethan, stared at Quill, clearly hoping for confirmation.
“That’s right. One gift each. That’s like a hundred gifts, right?”
The four oldest children laughed at his joke, and the younger ones laughed and squealed because the older ones did. Well, not Gavin. He was tenderhearted and whip smart, but he was the serious child of the group. He watched and listened when the others were rowdy.
Quill turned to him. “You ready?”
Gavin pointed at the playroom door. “We go.”
Quill walked down the long hall, thinking of the hundreds of times he’d slipped in through a window and padded down this ghostly quiet, dimly lit passageway. But tonight the hall was lit with kerosene pole lamps at each end. Voices rumbled through the place, a half-dozen conversations taking place at once. The Christmas Eve bustle in his Mamm’s house hadn’t ever been this busy, even when all five boys were living at home.
Quill stopped by the kitchen and spoke with his family.
Regina, Gavin’s mom, reached for him. “I bet you’re hungry, aren’t you?”
Gavin grabbed hold of Quill’s shirt, clinging tightly. “No! Stay Kill. Stay Kill.”
Regina laughed. “Fine. Stay with Quill.”
“Otay. I eat.” He reached for his mom.
Quill gently tousled the boy’s hair. The need to be able to say no began young. Testing the waters of having power over oneself was important. Quill saw that more clearly now than ever before. It was important from the start for little ones to feel a sense of control over their lives and for adults to pick their battles wisely, neither giving in too much nor demanding their way too often. Would he be a dad one day to put into practice the many things he’d learned as the uncle of eight? He hoped so, but it was best not to think about it.
He passed Gavin to his mom, knowing the little boy would return to his lap as soon as he was full. Quill went to the living room. He wasn’t sure where the rest of his brothers were, maybe still fixing the broken shelving in Mamm’s closet, but the room was empty. He drew a deep breath, ready for a few moments of solitude. He sat in an armchair in front of the hearth and watched the fire.
He checked his phone, but it told him what he already knew. He hadn’t received any new messages from Ari since early that morning.
Dan eased into the room. “Can I join you?”
“Sure.” Quill slowly slid his finger down the screen, rereading strings of texts between Ari and him. This is what he did when he wanted to interact with her and it wasn’t possible. Reading her texts was like hearing her voice inside his head.
“Will she stop by tonight?” Dan sat in a matching armchair across from Quill.
Quill looked up. “Maybe. I hope so. Tomorrow night for sure.”
Mamm walked into the room, carrying two mugs. “Hot chocolate. Ari’s recipe. I think she’s taught me how to get this right.”
“Thanks, Mamm.” Quill lifted a mug from her hands.
Dan took the other. “I was just broaching the subject of Ari. She’s quite the girl. We all love her. I mean, seriously, what’s not to love about her?”
Mamm nodded. “We do. I’m glad she’s relaxed her concerns about the trouble it could cause if she is with us while Quill is here. My favorite times are when everyone comes for a visit and she’s part of our family meals.”
Quill wasn’t fooled. There was a point to this topic. “You two gonna say it or keep dancing around it?”
Dan set his mug on the coffee table and leaned in. “Is there a chance for a future with her?”
Quill had expected this to come up. Actually his family had been very patient. Ariana and he had slowly become closer since Rudy left Summer Grove nine months ago, and now Quill’s family wanted answers.
Quill sipped the drink. “It’s very good, Mamm.”
“Denki. Would you answer your brother?”
He nodded. “We have a definite future together, just probably not one that includes marriage and children.”
They stared at him, and Mamm looked wounded and worried.
“Probably?” she asked.
“Anything is possible. This past year and a half has proven that, but there’s a great divide between us, Mamm. It seems to me that after everything is said and done, she could no more leave the Amish than I could deal with joining them.”
Dan rubbed his hands together, a sign he was thinking hard. “You need a woman you can build a solid relationship and life with.”
The brothers, all of Quill’s sisters-in-law, and Frieda eased into the room and dispersed themselves throughout but focused on this one conversation as if they needed to hear it more than anything else this Christmas Eve.
“Let me get this straight, Dan. You think I can ignore how I feel about Ariana and pursue finding someone I can marry? I’m in love with her. That’s the truth. And I believe she loves me, but I don’t think she’s in love with me. That aside, it’s a wonderful, rock-solid friendship.”
Dan stood and walked to the fireplace. “So you’ll be her best friend until the right man comes along and she falls in love again?”
“That’s about the gist of it. Look, I never expected the future with her to be easy. And I’ll say this one last time, so hear me: after everything is said and done, I don’t believe she could leave the Amish any more than I could cope with joining them.”
“Have you asked her? Have you told her how you feel?”
“No, and I won’t. Our volunteer work is valuable. Her contributions to the Amish are not any less important than me getting women and children out of violent situations. The strides she’s making to open minds and hearts to truths the people in Summer Grove have never known or considered are incredible. If she leaves for any reason, but maybe especially if she left to be with me, an iron door will close.”
Mamm knelt beside him, looking deep into his eyes. “Quill, you getting a chance to build a life with Ariana is why I’ve stayed. It would’ve been so much easier to move back to live with my relatives in Indiana or even to leave the Amish and join you boys in Kentucky. But when you left with Frieda, and I was silently nudging you to do so, I came to realize how deeply Ariana loved you. She was young, and I thought that at fifteen she was only capable of a crush and she’d be over it in a few months. But I was wrong. She grieved hard for two years. When she came of dating age, she couldn’t stomach the idea of going out with anyone for a while, and then she started dating a lot in order to put behind her what she felt for you. So when I saw how much you loved her, I decided to stay. Not interfering or nudging you two together in any way. Just being here so you could run into each other. But you’re not even going to ask her out or anything?”
“I knew you were the best Mamm in the world.” Quill plunked his mug on the table and looked at Dan. “Finally we know why Mamm wouldn’t leave. What you’ve given Ari and me is incredible. The healing of past hurts I caused her is complete. She respects why I left. You did that, Mamm. Your sacrifice gave me the incredible friendship I have with her. But, Mamm, we can’t let all these wonderful freedoms the new bishop is allowing cause us to forget that in her heart she’s Amish and in my heart I’m not.”
Mamm nodded. “I wanted to do more. I wanted to make up for wrong steps, wrong—”
“You know what, Mamm?” Quill clutched his hands around hers. “We love you so much for all you’ve done. Look around this room and absorb it. Please don’t dip regret out of yesteryear’s pool based on what we know today. If only we’d known this, we could’ve done that. I felt the same way after talking to the detective. But we didn’t know. We can’t rewind the clock. What we can do is stand in faith, trusting we have the strength for each new day. All of us are here, in your home together on Christmas Eve. That is an act of God, so let’s celebrate that miraculous gift.”
Mamm smiled, nodding. “Okay.”
Quill helped her stand. He offered her his chair, but she didn’t sit.
“I have food to fix and presents to wrap.” She walked toward the kitchen but stopped.
Quill sat again.
Dan scratched his head. “Then what can we do to help if this no-win love affair continues across the decades?”
“Dan, stop,” Regina scoffed while shifting Gavin on her hip. “All this endless talk of how things might go, and you, dear husband, are ignoring the fact that every concern you’ve expressed over Quill’s future could unravel with one strong tug by the gatherer of threads herself—Ariana.”
Quill’s heart thudded at the thought. He couldn’t ask her to leave the Amish for him, but at the same time, he knew his will to leave her Amish life intact would come undone if Ariana fell in love with him. “You understand that even under the new ministers, her leaving would cause a difficult division between her and her family. They love her, and that won’t change, but their contact with her would be considered a bad influence on the family and the community as a whole.”
“But they allow Skylar to come and go,” Regina said.
“That’s different. She was raised Englisch and came to them as a drug-addicted mess. They helped her. The Amish ways got her on the right path for her. That’s a positive story. Skylar was an outsider from the start, but Ariana was raised Amish. If she turns away, she won’t be invited to weddings or births or birthday parties or holidays or even to a meal or to sit by the fire in the backyard and visit. They would have no choice but to consider her lifestyle as a poison she could pass on to others, especially those who haven’t joined the faith. The adults would come to her place to visit, bring a dish, and stay for coffee, but she’d never again be welcome to join at will any family event. Come on, Regina, you know how this works. It’s a divorce, and Ariana would lose custody of everyone who’s Amish. We are all back in Mamm’s house after years of battling, in part because she has no young Amish relatives that we could have a bad influence on. But could we go into any other Amish home to visit?”
She shook her head. “No. But love doesn’t yield to facts. It doesn’t fade because of obstacles or because there’s pain that will have to be carried for a lifetime. Love bears all things and keeps thriving.”
Quill didn’t want that kind of loss for Ariana. But if she offered to leave the Amish for him, he would accept it. Still, it was too much for her to give up, even for a man who loved her more than life itself. His hope was that love would bear them remaining friends and nothing more. That’s what was best for everyone involved, especially her.
“Knock, knock, knock.” Ariana’s voice echoed through the house, and a moment later she was standing in the doorway of the living room, her arms filled with presents. “Merry Christmas!”
His family welcomed her, and Dan lifted the gifts from her arms. Her eyes met Quill’s, and she raised an eyebrow while grinning. “That’s your deep-in-thought position.”
He lifted his arms from the chair, looking at how he was sitting. “Is it?”
The sound of thunder rumbled through the house, and he knew the children were running. A moment later they hurried into the living room, laughing. Lexi was bouncing along with them as if she was part of the pack.
Ariana pulled a pair of ice skates off her shoulder and passed them to Quill. “You needed new skates. These are used, but they’ll fit and work. Midnight. At the pond. Ya?”
Before he could answer, she melted to the floor, talking to his nieces and nephews about what they hoped to get for Christmas.
She didn’t need for him to respond. There was no other answer but yes.
He knew they would skate and laugh and talk until he would barely be able to keep from pulling her into his arms.