I buzzed about the front room of Swissmen Sweets, the candy shop in Harvest, Ohio, that I ran with my Amish grandmother, Clara King. As I scurried about, I hit every flat surface that I could reach with a feather duster. I dusted the maple shelves that held the glass jars of jelly beans, lemon drops, licorice, and hard candy, all of which were made in this very shop. I stopped just short of dusting the shop cat, Nutmeg, a little orange striped feline who watched my feather duster with studied interest.
“Bailey,” my grandmother said from behind the half-domed glass counter where we displayed our most enticing treats: molded chocolate creations, truffles, and fudge all had a place of honor behind the glass. At the moment, my grandmother was sliding a tray of butterscotch peanut bars into the case. “You must calm down, kind. You are making us all dizzy.” After the tray was in place, she patted the prayer cap on the back of her head. “Your parents will be here any moment. The shop is as clean as it’s ever been. There is nothing more you can do.”
“Cousin Clara is right,” said Charlotte Weaver, our young Amish shop assistant and my cousin. She put away the bottle of vinegar water she’d been using to clean the counter. “You are making me nervous.”
“I know I’m wound a little tight. I just can’t believe that Mom and Dad are actually coming to Harvest today. I thought they never would again.” I stepped behind the counter and stowed the feather duster in the cabinet below the cash register with the other cleaning supplies. As I moved, my dangly silver earrings knocked against my cheeks. Being the only non-Amish person in Swissmen Sweets, I was also the only one wearing any type of jewelry. I have always been partial to dangly earrings.
I never thought my parents would return to Swissmen Sweets because my father ran away from Harvest when he was a young man. He left the Amish community and Ohio so that he could marry my mother. When I was a child, they came back once a year so my grandparents could see me, but once I was an adult my parents stopped those visits. I didn’t think they had been in Ohio in over ten years, except for a very brief trip to attend my grandfather’s funeral. My nerves were heightened by the fact that my parents did not approve of my decision to leave my job as a prestigious New York City chocolatier to move to Amish Country. I suspected in their eyes I’d gone backward, since I’d settled in the place they’d fled when they were young.
I straightened up and ran my damp palms over my jeans. Maami was right. I needed to get a grip. I calmed down just as the front door opened and my mother and father walked in. Dad looked like any other suburban New England father. He wore chinos, loafers, and a light blue Polo shirt—Polo with a big P—and his gray hair was combed back from his face. A pair of sunglasses sat in the breast pocket of his shirt. He was clean shaven. Looking at him, you would never know that he spent the first twenty years of his life in the Plain community.
My mother, on the other hand, had not grown up Amish. She was originally from Holmes County too, but from an English family in the county seat of Millersburg. She wore a long, flowered sundress and short-sleeved cardigan, and I thought the best evidence that she’d never been Amish was the flower tattoo on the inside of her right arm. It was something she got as a teenager when she wanted to assert herself, or so she’d told me when I wanted one as a child. Tattoos were forbidden in the Amish world, and I always suspected, having grown up in Holmes County, the tattoo was my mother’s way of stating her Englishness.
My mother’s parents passed away before I was born. They were farmers, and she didn’t want that for herself or her husband. When she and my father fell in love, he left his Amish district and they ran away to New England. He went to college on a scholarship and got a corporate job, and my mother delved into her first love: painting. She sold her New England landscapes in gift shops around the region.
When I was old enough, my parents would leave me in Holmes County for the entire summer. This gave them time to travel and see the world without a child tagging along behind them. During those weeks and months when I was alone with my Amish grandparents, I fell in love with chocolate. I know people say all the time that they love chocolate, but I really did, and do to this day. At five I asked my grandfather to teach me the art of candy making, and I never looked back. However, I can’t say my parents were pleased with my dream.
I refused to go to college and instead enrolled in culinary school with an emphasis on chocolate and desserts. It was my goal to be a world-renowned New York chocolatier, and I almost made it. I was days away from being promoted to head chocolatier at JP Chocolates, where I had been the protégé of owner Jean Pierre Ruge for six years—until I walked away from it all to move to Harvest and help my grandmother at Swissmen Sweets after my grandfather’s death.
I knew it was the very last place on Earth my parents wanted me to land. Mom and Dad thought I had thrown away my career by leaving New York, but I felt differently. In New York, I was a workaholic. Everything about my life was related to my work, but in Harvest I could be a new person. I could have a life outside of candy that included friends, a boyfriend, and a bit of sleuthing too.
However, I wondered if my parents’ opinion would change soon. In two months, my cable television show, Bailey’s Amish Sweets, would air on Gourmet Television. I had been going back and forth between Harvest and New York City for months to shoot the show and publicize its debut. Maybe when my parents saw that I could succeed in both worlds, Harvest and New York City, they would believe that I’d made the right choice. Then again, there were no guarantees when it came to television.
“This place has not changed a bit,” my mother, Susan King, said the moment she stepped into the shop. “I swear I just traveled back in time. Though I always feel like that when we come back.” She shook her head. “I don’t know why I expect Holmes County to change.”
My father, Silas, was far less vocal than my mother. “It is nice to see the old shop.”
Swissmen Sweets was more than just a shop to my father: it was his childhood home. He and my grandparents had lived in the apartment above the shop when he was a child. Charlotte and my grandmother lived there now.
I stepped out from behind the counter just in time for my mother to envelop me in a hug. “Bailey!” She smelled like roses and sunscreen, and it reminded me of childhood weekends along the shore. “I’m so glad we are finally here. I thought we would never make it. It’s so easy to forget how out of the way Harvest is. It was cow after cow on the drive here. Isn’t that true, Silas?”
My father smiled at my mother. “It’s true. But we haven’t really been away from Harvest long enough for you to forget about the cows, my dear. We were here last year.”
There was a quiet moment when everyone realized this was when they’d come for Daadi’s funeral.
“I suppose not,” she said, passing over the unsaid words. “It’s so nice to see you too, Clara.”
My grandmother smiled and gave each of my parents a hug. “We are glad you came. It will be a very special weekend for us all.” She turned to gesture to Charlotte. “And I don’t think you have met our cousin, Charlotte.”
Dad shook his head. “That’s the thing about being Amish. There are cousins I never knew all over the county.”
Charlotte blushed so red her face was almost the color of her hair.
Mom smoothed her dark hair, the same color as mine, over her shoulder. “I’m just so happy to spend Mother’s Day weekend with my girl.” She turned to me. “What do you have planned, Bailey?”
I frowned. I should have realized that my mother would want an agenda. Mom was what I would call a “super planner.” Grocery lists were organized by the layout of the supermarket, and family vacations were run like military ops. She wasn’t the free spirit her tattoo would suggest. “Well,” I began. “Tomorrow there’s a tea—”
Before I could finish my thought, the door opened again, and this time Juliet Brody and her polka-dotted potbellied pig Jethro tootled into the candy shop. Once Jethro was inside, he made a beeline for Nutmeg, and the cat and pig bumped noses.
Dad stared at the animals. “Do they know each other?”
“Oh yes,” Maami said. “They know each other quite well.”
“Jethro,” Juliet said. “Don’t be so rude. Come back here! We’re here to meet Bailey’s parents. You can visit with Nutmeg another time.” She pulled lightly on the pink polka-dotted nylon leash tethered to Jethro’s collar. The leash matched her skirt, which was also pink polka dot, and she’d paired it with a white sweater. To say that Juliet loved polka dots was a grave understatement. This was becoming more and more apparent to me as her wedding to Reverend Brook drew near. I was to be her maid of honor, and every swatch of cloth and piece of stationery I saw had polka dots on it.
The pig didn’t budge at Juliet’s tug. I wasn’t the least bit surprised. Jethro was the most stubborn animal I had ever met, and I had a pet rabbit named Puff who ate my slippers. Jethro caused more trouble, and sixty percent of the time it was on purpose.
My mother put a hand on her chest. “You brought a pig into Swissmen Sweets?”
Juliet bent over and scooped Jethro up off the ground. “Of course I did. This is my comfort animal, Jethro. He goes everywhere I go. I can’t imagine life without him; I need him with me. He keeps me calm, especially now that I’m trying to plan my wedding.”
Mom wrinkled her nose. “But you’re inside a candy shop.” She paused. “With a pig. Is it sanitary to have a pig inside the candy shop? What if the health inspector decided to drop in?”
Juliet frowned. “The health inspector would understand. I have to have Jethro with me at all times. I have a note from my therapist, if you would like to see it.”
“That’s not necessary,” Mom said, and peered down at Jethro as if he were a bug under a microscope.
The little pig looked up at her and cocked his head.
Mom gasped. “It’s almost like he understands we’re talking about him.”
“He does,” Juliet said. “You know pigs are very intelligent, on the same level as dolphins, some say.”
I glanced down at Jethro. As much as I loved him, he was no dolphin.
The door opened again. This was the third time in ten minutes, and not a paying customer among them. Sheriff Deputy Aiden Brody stepped into Swissmen Sweets and scanned the room with his chocolate brown eyes like he always did when entering a building. Years of being a deputy had taught him to take everything in before letting his guard down even a little.
My heart gave a flutter when he made eye contact with me and smiled.
“Did someone call the police about the pig already?” my mother asked.
I thought it was best to ignore her question. “Mom, Dad, this is Aiden.” I stopped short of saying “my boyfriend,” although Aiden and I had been dating for several months. Instead, I said, “He’s Juliet’s son.”
“So this is Aiden. Can I give you a hug?” My mother wrapped her arms around him before he could answer. Mom pulled back. “Bailey has told us a little bit about you, so we know that you’re important to her. She’s very closed-mouthed about her personal life. The last time she had a boyfriend, we didn’t learn about him until we read it in the papers.”
I felt my face redden. I didn’t want to be reminded—or have Aiden be reminded—of my failed relationship with a celebrity pastry chef back in New York.
“He seems so much more stable than your last boyfriend. Not that I met the last one, but based on the articles,” my mother said in a stage whisper, and I wondered what it would take for the floor to open up and swallow me. I was open to the possibility. It seemed a whole lot better than standing there, watching my mother assess Aiden’s worth as my boyfriend.
Juliet clapped her hands. “Aiden, I just knew you would come over to meet Bailey’s parents. Now that we are all together, we can start making plans.” Juliet took my mother’s hand. “I am so excited to finally discuss the wedding.”
“Your wedding?” my mother asked, looking down at Juliet’s firm grasp on her fingers.
“Oh no. I do love talking about my wedding—I would talk to you about it all day and night if you let me.” She beamed. “But in this case, I’m speaking of the union of our two families.”
“What’s that?” my father asked.
I shot Aiden a panicked look.
“Mother,” Aiden interrupted. “I think it would be much better for us to spend this weekend celebrating you mothers and all that you do for us. That’s what Mother’s Day is about.”
Juliet patted his cheek. “You are the finest and kindest son.” She dropped her hand and beamed at my parents. “He has always put my happiness first. That’s why I need to think about his.”
Dad folded his arms. “What is going on? What is this about a wedding?”
“Juliet is getting married on the weekend of July Fourth. It is going to be a great event. Aiden is best man, and I’m maid of honor. Jethro will be the ring bearer,” I said, hoping that if I overwhelmed them with information about Juliet’s wedding, they would forget any mention of another wedding—namely a wedding involving Aiden and me as groom and bride. We weren’t even engaged.
“A pig as a ring bearer?” my mother asked in a tone that implied she had now heard everything.
“Yes, it will be such a special moment.” Juliet wrapped her hands around Jethro’s leash. “Reverend Brook was hesitant at first, but when I told him that Bailey would walk Jethro down the aisle, he was on board.”
My mother stared at Juliet as if she had a unicorn horn in the middle of her forehead.
Juliet laughed. “But we should really stop talking about my wedding and speak about the wedding between—”
The candy shop door opened for a fourth time, and I was never so happy to have a conversation interrupted. Over the next three days I would have to do my very best to keep Juliet away from my mother, so that she didn’t plant the idea of my nonexistent wedding in my parents’ heads.
“You should start selling tickets to get in here,” Charlotte whispered.
“No kidding,” I muttered back.
The next person to walk through the door to Swissmen Sweets was none other than community leader and super organizer Margot Rawlings. Margot was a woman in her late sixties, with short curls on the top of her head and a walk that would instill fear into anyone trying to run away from her. There was just something about the way Margot marched that told you there was no real escape. You might slip away from her once, maybe twice, but if she had you in her sights, she would eventually track you down. I had never met anyone with more determination, and I’d lived most of my adult life in New York City.
“Bailey. Just the woman I wanted to talk to.” Her tractor-beam gaze was locked and ready to pull me in. I had no idea what I was in for now.