Chapter 13

13

Mary Elizabeth heard the knock on the door and went to answer it. She said a silent prayer hoping it was Sam.

The last thing she needed was Ben stopping by unannounced.

Schur enough it was Sam carrying a bunch of daisies. “I brought these for your mudder.”

“Why, Sam, that was so sweet!” Linda said behind Mary Elizabeth.

“Just a thank-you for all the meals you’ve cooked and invited me to share over the years,” he told her as he stepped inside.

“Actually, Mary Elizabeth cooked tonight, but I’ll share,” her mudder said.

Jacob stood and dropped his copy of The Budget, the Amish newspaper, into his recliner, shook Sam’s hand, and followed them into the kitchen.

Grossdaadi was already seated at the table, and his grin was wide when he saw Sam. “There you are!”

“Good to see you,” Sam told him as he rounded the table to shake his hand. “I hear you want a game of checkers.”

“Ya. You think you can beat me?”

“I schur do.”

“We’ll see about that. I trounced Jacob here in both games today.”

“He cheats,” Jacob mouthed behind the old man’s head.

Linda beamed at Sam as she arranged the daisies in a white ceramic pitcher and set it in the middle of the table.

Sam took a seat after the women did. Jacob asked Abe to bless the meal, and Sam thought about how he had faltered for a time, thinking God had turned His back on him when he had to leave his home.

Rose Anna peppered him with questions about his life outside the community until her dat frowned at her.

“I missed this!” Sam exclaimed when he realized what they were having for supper. Haystacks were an Amish favorite at all sorts of gatherings, especially fundraisers. A bowl of crushed soda crackers made its way around the table. Each person dumped a handful or two on his or her plate, then a mound of browned hamburger mixed with taco seasoning, chopped lettuce and tomato, and green pepper and onion fresh from the garden. A couple spoonsful of rice, grated cheddar cheese, and Sam’s favorite—homemade salsa—and it was a haystack of edible delight.

He sighed happily as he dug into it. What could have been better on a hot summer night than this dish he remembered eating at so many special occasions in his youth?

His dat had growled at his mudder once when she served it. “Man doesn’t want a salad after working all day in the fields,” he’d complained. But the dish was hearty enough with all the ground beef and such. And his mudder had helped them harvesting in the fields and had hardly had time to come inside and slave over a hot stove afterward.

“Is it allrecht?” Mary Elizabeth asked him, and he realized he’d been frowning.

“Perfect,” he said, looking up and smiling at her. “I remember having this at so many youth gatherings. Remember when Naomi Rose’s mudder added too much taco seasoning in the hamburger?”

She laughed and nodded. “We drained two pitchers of lemonade that day.”

Their gazes locked, held as they both remembered that day. The clink of silverware, the family talking as they ate, faded away.

Mary Elizabeth didn’t know how long they might have sat there staring at each other. Her mudder tapped her on her arm. “This was such a gut idea. Look how your grossdaadi is cleaning his plate.”

They looked at him and he grinned and wiped his mouth with a paper napkin. “Miriam and I had this in Pinecraft last year when we went there for the winter. Hundreds of people showed up. Don’t remember what they were raising money for, but everyone schur did like having a taste of home.” He paused and looked thoughtful. “She schur did like being in Florida and visiting the beach when it was cold and snowing back here.”

He set his fork on his empty plate and craned his neck to see what was on top of the stove. “Is that blackberries I smell?”

Mary Elizabeth smiled at him. “Ya. Blackberry cobbler.”

“Do we have ice cream?”

Linda laughed. “Of course.”

“I’ll get it,” Rose Anna said.

Mary Elizabeth rose, pulled on oven mitts, and carried the still warm baking dish to the table.

Sam cleaned his plate and watched as she scooped up generous servings of the cobbler and passed the bowls to Linda so she could top them with vanilla ice cream.

The taste of the warm berries on his tongue brought back another memory. He and Mary Elizabeth had gone blackberry picking after a picnic once. They’d seen the wild berries growing alongside the road, and he’d stopped his buggy so they could climb out and pick them. The two of them had eaten more of the sun-warmed berries than they’d put in a bucket he got from the buggy.

That day he’d dared to kiss her. They’d both been so young, and the kiss had been innocent. The taste of her lips had been sweeter than the ripe berries.

Once again, their gazes locked, and he watched a blush creep up her cheeks.

She remembered.

Suddenly the room felt too warm, too close. Sam wanted to pull his collar away from his neck. He concentrated on the cooling ice cream and told himself he couldn’t do this again. This family, this home, had been his family and his home away from the troubled one where his dat berated everyone and his mudder pretended nothing was wrong.

And Mary Elizabeth belonged to someone else now. He’d practically thrust her into Ben’s path. He’d been crazy for sure.

Finally the meal was over, and the family went their separate ways: Rose Anna to do more work on a quilt pattern she said was challenging her, Linda and Jacob to sit on the porch and talk, Mary Elizabeth to wash the dishes and clean up the kitchen. Abe grinned at him.

“You ready for that game?” he asked.

“Sure.”

Mary Elizabeth pressed a hand on her grossdaadi’s shoulder. “I’ll get the board.”

In the end, Sam played four games with Abe and overlooked his cheating. He was just not able to hold it against him when he was such a friendly old man who remembered him and asked if he’d come play a game with him.

He lingered, accepting another glass of iced tea from Mary Elizabeth, until Abe nodded over a game. “I win,” he said, and Abe woke and blinked at him. “What?”

Then he glanced down at the checkerboard and chuckled as he stroked his snowy beard. “Guess it’s time to go to bed,” he said and got to his feet a bit creakily. “Danki for coming to play checkers with me, Sam.”

He turned to Mary Elizabeth. “So glad you’re seeing him again.”

Mary Elizabeth’s cheeks flamed as she watched him walk to the dawdi haus. She turned to Sam. “I’m so sorry, he misunderstood. He’s half asleep—”

Sam plucked a daisy from the vase on the table and handed it to her. “I’m not sorry he said it. I’m sorry I walked away from you. I wish there was a way to turn back the clock and change everything. Good night, Mary Elizabeth. Thank you for inviting me to supper.”

He saw the expression of utter shock that flashed over her face before he walked out of the room.

On the way home, he passed the Fisher place, the farm that Peter had shown him after they met the new homeowners at their house. Dusk was falling. The Fisher farmhouse was small and the fields around it lay fallow. But it was a good, sturdy house, and the soil was rich.

There had been Fishers there for generations but no more. Sarah Fisher had packed up and moved to Ohio to be closer to her dochder and grossdochders who lived there. The Amish stayed planted where they were most times, but the dochder had fallen in love with a distant cousin in Ohio, and after her dat died, her mudder had decided to move there to be closer to her, Peter had told him.

The thought of buying the place was a temptation Sam was afraid to even think about. Land was a precious commodity here in Lancaster County. But he’d promised Peter he’d talk to the widow by phone the next day. He’d learned not to underestimate God. Hadn’t his mudder often told him that God’s plan for him was better than anything he could envision?

He’d never thought he’d be invited into Mary Elizabeth’s home again and then she’d come to him and asked him to supper. As he drove home he thought about what it had felt like to be near her and be a part of a family again tonight. And as he took the familiar road he prayed for guidance for the one true path for his life.

* * *

Mary Elizabeth sank into a chair at the table and stared at Sam’s back as he left the kitchen.

Had she lost her mind? Had he really just said he wished there was a way to turn back the clock and change everything? Maybe she was asleep, as Grossdaadi had been over the checkerboard. Maybe she was dreaming. She pinched herself and winced. Nee, she was awake.

“What are you doing?” Rose Anna asked, frowning with concern at her.

She glanced up, surprised that she hadn’t heard her walk into the kitchen. “I have to break up with Ben.”

“Gut!” she said as she got a pitcher of tea from the refrigerator.

“I thought you liked Ben.”

“Not really. And it’s obvious from the way the two of you were looking at each other tonight that you and Sam still love each other.”

“He didn’t say he loved me.” She stared down at the daisy he’d handed her, telling herself that she would not pull off petals. He loves me, he loves me not.

Rose Anna got glasses from a kitchen cabinet and poured them both a glass of iced tea. “What did he say?”

She related the conversation and shook her head. “I didn’t know what to say. But he didn’t wait around for an answer.”

“So what are you going to do about Sam?”

“I have no idea.” She looked at her schweschder. “He said he was sorry, but he didn’t say he wanted to get back together.” She took a deep breath. “But whether I think we’ll get back together or not, I don’t want to see Ben anymore. I . . . well, I’m sorry to say that the more I know him, the less I like him.”

“Then you shouldn’t see him anymore,” Rose Anna said with the wisdom of someone much older. “Are there any more chocolate chip cookies?”

Mary Elizabeth stared at her, unable to absorb the lightning switch in topics. “What?”

“Never mind, I’ll see,” she said, jumping up to check the cookie jar. She pulled out a cookie and crunched into it. “Want one?”

“Nee, danki.”

Their mudder came into the kitchen and shook her head at Rose Anna. “Into the cookie jar again?”

“First time today.” She took another bite. “Well, second. It’s my last.”

Cookies were Rose Anna’s downfall. Fortunately, she never gained an ounce from them.

Mary Elizabeth looked at her mudder. “Mamm, if Ben comes around again, don’t invite him to supper, allrecht?”

Linda nodded slowly. “And what about Sam?”

She smiled. “Definitely invite Sam.”

“Gut. I’ll tell your dat so he doesn’t invite Ben again.” She poured herself a glass of cold tea and left the room.

“I’m going to bed.”

“We’re going to the open house at the new shop, right?” Rose Anna grabbed another cookie from the jar and followed her up the stairs.

“Ya, of course.”

“Peter told me he and Sam’ll be there.”

Mary Elizabeth thought about that as she climbed the stairs to her bedroom and got ready for bed. Well, so she’d be seeing him sooner than she’d thought she might. That was fine.

She didn’t know if this was leading anywhere, but that was fine. Maybe she’d decided Sam wasn’t the one God had set aside for her and looked in another direction—Ben—and shouldn’t have. Time would tell.

Sleep was a long time coming. The moon shone full tonight, lighting the room, but she didn’t want to get up and draw the shades. Instead, she lay there looking at the daisy sitting in a little dollar-store vase on her bedside table. And when she finally slept, she dreamed of Sam and picking blackberries on a bright sum-mer day.

The next day she found herself distracted as she sat in the sewing room and tried to work.

Usually sewing relaxed her, even when she had a lot of it to do on a deadline for Leah. Which was most of the time. Christmas orders were continuing to come in, stronger than usual, perhaps because the Englisch stores in town had recently run Christmas in July promotions. But her mind kept wandering, and she felt restless. All she could think about was the shop open house. And seeing Sam there.

“It’s about time to leave, isn’t it?” her mudder asked. “Rose Anna went to her room to primp half an hour ago.”

Mary Elizabeth smiled as she set aside her quilt. “Are you saying I should have done that?”

She chuckled. “Nee, Rose Anna loves to primp. No one spends as much time doing it as she does. Lavina and you never have done as much.”

But today, maybe she should, she thought, pulling her favorite church dress, a blue one, from the closet and changing. She smoothed her hair and pinned on her best kapp and slipped on her best Sunday shoes. And then, she looked at the daisy and plucked a petal. He loves me.

Her dat had hitched their horse to the buggy and had it waiting in the driveway. “What will I do without you this afternoon?” he asked, looking at his fraa.

“Work, like you’d do if I was here,” she responded tartly, but she was smiling as he helped her into the buggy. “Oh, I almost forgot. I left cold chicken salad for sandwiches in the refrigerator, and there’s leftover blackberry cobbler for you and Abe.”

“We’ll manage,” he said with a grin.

“I’ll bring you a treat from town.”

“No need,” he said as she picked up the reins. “Just bring yourself back home. Drive safe.”

“What about us?” Rose Anna wanted to know.

He winked at her. “You two also. Have fun and drive safe.”

“It’s not us who don’t,” Rose Anna said. “We watch out for cars more than they do for us.”

“Ya. So drive safe,” he said again.

Mary Elizabeth watched him set his straw hat on his head and start off toward his beloved fields. Her mudder drove the buggy in the direction of David and Lavina’s farm.

The seasons were so visible here. Farmers were gathering the last of their crops, and women were harvesting their kitchen gardens. Soon there would be bare fields and haystacks—the real ones—and pumpkins and other fall vegetables and fruits sold in the roadside farm stands.

Right now, they made so many things with the always bumper crop of zucchini: zucchini bread and muffins and casserole with cheese and bread cubes and even zucchini cake. Her dat had peered suspiciously at a piece of chocolate cake just the other night and inquired as to whether it had zucchini in it. Her mudder had retorted that he didn’t taste it in half the things she made them so hush. But as usual she’d had a smile on her lips and a twinkle in her eyes.

Soon everything would be made of pumpkin and butternut squash. The Englisch coffee shop in town did a brisk business in pumpkin coffee in the fall. Mary Elizabeth had been doubtful it was gut until she tried it herself.

They picked up Lavina, and Rose Anna gave up her passenger seat in front without complaint.

“How are you feeling?” Linda asked her as Lavina smoothed her dress over her abdomen.

“Wunderbaar since the morning sickness passed. But now I’m hungry all the time.” She pulled a plastic bag of apple slices from her purse and offered them to everyone. “I’m trying to stick with fruit between meals.”

Rose Anna sighed as they rode. “It’s so nice to take a day away from kitchen duty. I think we’ve canned twice what we did last year.”

“You always say that,” Lavina said, turning to look at her.

Rose Anna pouted. “Well, it feels like it.”

“We’ll be grateful for our bounty when winter gets here and there are no fresh vegetables and fruit.”

“You always say that,” they chorused and laughter filled the buggy.

There’d been little laughter in Sam’s house, Mary Elizabeth couldn’t help thinking. He’d told her about the fights he and his bruders had at home. That’s why he had enjoyed being invited to supper at their house so often, just as his bruders David and John had. She’d seen the way Sam behaved last night, seen him staring at each of them, felt that he lingered over the checkerboard for so many games with her grossdaadi before he left. He couldn’t hide the emotions from a face she knew so well. There had been contentment, peace, a sense of belonging . . . and yearning on it, carefully masked and yet visible to her when he caught her watching.

His red truck wasn’t in the parking lot behind the shop when they arrived. She told herself she shouldn’t have expected it when he was undoubtedly working.

The shop was filled with friends and shoppers who were a mixture of Amish and Englisch. Carrie manned the cash register with some help from Rachel Ann, who worked in Stitches in Time as well as the bakery and had volunteered that afternoon. Mary Elizabeth had seen such a change in Carrie during the time she’d been at the shelter. Carrie had worn bruises on her face and thought the whole idea of a quilting class wasn’t worth her time. Kate had been patient with her, and gradually Carrie had come around.

And something Carrie had said had in a way led to the shop. What good would it be to know how to sew quilts, she’d demanded. People wouldn’t want to buy a quilt made by an Englischer. Tourists would only buy quilts made by the Amish here. That had led Kate to thinking of other things they could sew and to a conversation with Leah . . . and so had begun the seed that became Sewn in Hope.

Now the old-fashioned cash register rang merrily with sales, and Carrie beamed as she worked the first job she’d had in months since she arrived at the shelter bruised and without hope.

Mary Elizabeth tried not to watch the door for Sam as she mingled, but she caught Rose Anna’s teasing smirk and realized she wasn’t doing a good job of hiding her attention to it.

She wandered over to the table of coffee and tea that had been set out. Choosing between a snickerdoodle and a miniature cinnamon bun became a big decision. She’d just picked up a little bun when the bell over the shop rang and she turned to see who’d walked in.

And saw Sam.

* * *

Sam figured there was no way Mary Elizabeth would be in the new shop when he walked in with Peter after four-thirty.

But there she was, standing near the refreshment table and looking cool and pretty on one of the last days of a hot summer. It wouldn’t do for him to walk right over to her—there were too many members of the Amish community here, and nothing was faster than the Amish grapevine. After all, he knew she’d been seeing Ben and even though dating was kept very private, some people might have paired them.

For all he knew, she didn’t care that he was sorry he’d walked away from what they’d had as he said the night he’d had supper at her house. It was possible the next time they talked she’d say too bad, you had your chance.

But he didn’t think he was wrong about the way she looked at him now . . . as if she was happy to see him.

Could it be he’d get a second chance?

So he strolled around, greeting Leah and Kate and Carrie, the Englisch woman who’d been hired to work at the store.

Then casually, ever so casually, he found Linda and Rose Anna and greeted them and stood making small talk about the work he and Peter had done on the shop before making his way to Mary Elizabeth.

Judging by the wink Rose Anna gave him as he left them, he realized he probably hadn’t fooled mother or daughter.

“I didn’t think I’d see you today,” he said, trying to look casual as he helped himself to a cup of some pinkish punch and a cookie. “I thought you’d come earlier.”

“We were about to leave,” she said. “Mamm wants to fix supper and make sure Grossdaadi ate today while we were gone. Sometimes Daed gets busy in the field, and if she’s not there to call Grossdaadi, he ends up forgetting to since Grossmudder passed on.”

She frowned. “I know she’s worried about him. Grossdaadi, not Daed. The doctor warned her that sometimes when one half of a couple that’s been married a long time dies the other—” she stopped, unable to finish.

He wanted to touch her hand, to reassure her, but an unmarried man wasn’t supposed to do that with an unmarried woman.

“He seems to be handling it well, doesn’t he? I know I haven’t been around him but those few hours the other night, but he didn’t seem overly sad or depressed.”

“Nee, you’re right. Still, we worry.” She eyed him. “So how’s the punch?”

“Have you tried it?”

She shook her head.

“Don’t. I think it’s got some grapefruit juice in it.” He glanced around to see if anyone was watching and dumped the cup in a trash can.

“How’s the cookie?” she asked when he took a bite, chewed, then got a funny look on his face.

“Did you make it?”

“Rose Anna did.”

“Anybody looking?”

She glanced around. “Nee.”

He took a paper napkin and swiftly disposed of the bite in his mouth. “Reminds me of some of Jenny Bontrager’s early efforts cooking and baking.”

“Hi, Jenny!” Mary Elizabeth said, looking over his shoulder.

He froze, then glanced behind him. Jenny was nowhere in sight.

“Very funny.”

She grinned. “You should have seen your face.”

Peter joined them, so Rose Anna wasn’t far behind. “Is this guy hogging all the cookies?” he asked her.

“There’s still some left for you.”

“I made the snickerdoodles,” Rose Anna said, proudly holding out the plate. “Snickerdoodles are my specialty.”

He reached for one immediately. “Mmm,” he said appreciatively after he’d taken a bite. “Sam, we need to get going if we’re to meet—”

“I’m ready when you are,” Sam said, frowning at him.

“Then let’s go. Nice to see you, Mary Elizabeth. See you Sunday, Rose Anna.” He picked up a cookie to go, then a second, giving Rose Anna a grin.

* * *

Mary Elizabeth watched Sam leave the shop with Peter.

That was odd. It seemed like Sam hadn’t wanted Peter to say who they were going to meet. She shrugged. Men weren’t the easiest creatures to understand sometimes. Except about food. They always wanted food and lots of it and often weren’t that particular about it.

Take for example Rose Anna’s snickerdoodles. Mary Elizabeth hadn’t needed to try her schweschder’s latest attempt after seeing Sam’s reaction.

For Peter to eat one and take another was a sure sign he was as infatuated with her as she was with him.

Kate wandered over and checked out the cookies. “Did you make them?”

“Rose Anna.”

Kate shrugged philosophically and picked up one. “Can’t be any worse than mine.”

“No?”

She bit into one. “Uh, I was wrong.”

Mary Elizabeth handed her a paper napkin. “Sam spit his out. No one’s looking.”

Kate disposed of the cookie. “What about the punch?”

“Sam said it tastes like it has grapefruit juice in it.”

“Oh, I happen to like grapefruit juice.” She helped herself to a cup and stood sipping it. “Nice turnout.” She studied Carrie. “Never saw her so happy. And she’s so good with the customers.” She sighed. “In my line of work you can get cynical about people, but I had a feeling she’d pull herself out of the abuse cycle. It’s early days still, but I think she’ll be okay.”

Neither of them had to say it helped that the man Carrie had been involved with was in jail, so there was no way she could go back to him even if she wanted to.

“Well, I guess I should be heading home.” Kate cast a longing glance at the Stitches in Time shop visible through the entranceway between the shops. “Malcolm bet me I couldn’t come home without new fabric and I’m not letting him win this one.”

Mary Elizabeth took a second look. “Maybe I’ll browse in there for both of us. We can always use new fabric for the quilting classes.”

Kate grinned. “I like the way you think. See you later.”

She and her mudder and schweschders left not long after Kate did.

A few blocks from the turn-off to their road, Rose Anna leaned to look out her window. “Say, isn’t that Sam’s truck?”

It was red and it looked like it, but Mary Elizabeth couldn’t be sure. She craned her neck to get a better look, but it didn’t help.

“It might be. Maybe he and Peter are looking at a home they’re renovating for someone.”

All the way home, she wondered when she would see him again.