Turning Home

by Janice Kay Johnson - His Best Friend's Baby

  When would all of this change? Abruptly, between one night and the next, or gradually over the course of weeks?

  She was driving herself crazy.

  “I have to do something,” she said aloud.

  Quilt. What else? Unfortunately, her mind could still roam free while she quilted, since her hand knew so well what to do. Still, that would engage part of her attention. Plus . . . quilting was one thing that wouldn’t change, except that she’d no longer have the benefit of electric lighting.

  She’d recently pieced a wall hanging with buildings of different sizes and shapes, including a steepled church, different pitches of roofs, interspersed with trees, evergreen and deciduous. To do the hand quilting, she stretched the quilt in a large hoop instead of the frame in her spare room. Picking up where she left off, she began to quilt a picket fence in the frame below a row of houses.

  At a knock on the door, her hand jerked. Who on earth . . . ? Surely not Nick, come to renew his disapproval.

  She set down the hoop and went to the door, with its tiny peephole. Pulse racing, she looked through it . . . and saw Luke. His hair was wet and disheveled. Stubble showed on his angular jaw. As she watched, he knocked again, firmly.

  Why was he here?

  Julia made herself close her eyes and take a few deep breaths before she undid the dead bolt and opened the door. “Luke, is something wrong?”

  He walked in, crowding her back. Eyes intense, he said, “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Tell you what?” How could he have already learned . . .

  “Bishop Amos came by to say you’d asked to join us.”

  “Oh. I had no idea he’d do anything like that.” She was wringing her hands together. Her gaze lowered to his arms. “You’re injured!”

  With a glance down, he said, “Only scratched. I was cutting back blackberries.” He shook his head as if rattling his brain into place. “How long have you been thinking about this?”

  “I . . . would you like to sit down?”

  His jaw flexed. “No. I don’t think I can make myself sit right now.”

  Her knees felt so weak, she wasn’t sure how long she could keep standing.

  “Answer my question.”

  “You’re being a bully.”

  He let out a huff that might have been a laugh. “You had to know I was torturing myself.”

  “I . . . no.” Torturing himself? Sometimes she’d imagined, but . . . “I talked to Miriam a few weeks ago. Until then . . . well, it hadn’t occurred to me that I could convert. I mean, I hadn’t seen anyone who talked as if they’d had any other kind of life. Miriam told me that you don’t proselytize, but that occasionally outsiders do join you.”

  “I almost asked if you’d consider it, but it’s such a big change, I didn’t think there was any chance,” he said gruffly. “It will be like jumping back a hundred—no, two hundred years in time. No horseless carriages for us. It will mean giving up so much.” He gestured, as if to encompass her entire apartment, or maybe her world.

  “You’re trying to talk me out of it?”

  “No. Only . . . hoping you’re being realistic, that this isn’t a rainbow that will vanish when you reach for it. If you change your mind again, I don’t know how I’d—”

  The intensity wasn’t just in his eyes, but in his voice, too. How he’d what?

  “Julia.” He reached for her hands. Pried them apart, then wrapped them in his much larger ones. “I told you I was in a fight with myself.”

  Breathless with what might be hope, she said, “I didn’t know exactly what you meant.”

  “That I gave thought to walking away from the Leit, if that was the only way I could have you.”

  Shocked, she made herself meet those glittering blue eyes. “You wouldn’t do that.”

  “I wouldn’t have wanted to. But . . . seeing you, never able to say what I need to . . .” His throat moved. “I didn’t know if I could bear it.”

  That’s what he’d almost said a minute ago. That he might break if she gave him hope and then snatched it away.

  She returned the clasp of his hands. “I was going to quit my job.”

  “What?”

  “If I made the decision not to convert. I didn’t know if I could stand seeing you every day, either. It . . . hurt.”

  “I never wanted to hurt you,” he said in a low, raw voice.

  “If I’d wanted my life to stay the same, I shouldn’t have taken the job. Those first few days, you scared me and made me feel things I never have.”

  “You scared me, too,” he admitted. “That’s why I didn’t want Daad to hire you. From first sight, I knew what a temptation you’d be.”

  “It wasn’t just, oh, that I reminded you of what you’d given up when you came home? As if one part of you still longed for the kind of women you knew before?” She hadn’t even known she carried that worry until the words came out of her mouth.

  But Luke was almost smiling as he shook his head. “No. If so, I’d have been out of luck. You’re nothing like most women I met out there. But I do like knowing that you understand the man I was in the Englisch world will always be part of me. I can never go back and be who I might have been if I’d never left the faith. You see all of me, don’t you?”

  “Yes.” Why was she so close to tears, when she was also happier than she’d ever been in her life? “Just as you’ll understand why I can’t remake myself instantly. I’ll bumble around and offend people and . . .”

  “Why would anybody be offended? You’re a devout, compassionate woman who is doing something extraordinary. They’ll want to help you adjust.” He paused. “You’ll have me to help you.”

  * * *

  * * *

  THAT SOUNDED LIKE he was offering friendship, not more. They couldn’t marry until she’d been baptized anew—assuming she had been as a baby—but that didn’t mean they couldn’t make promises.

  Yet somehow Luke found himself seated after all, with Julia needing someone to answer her many questions.

  “It felt like a letdown, coming home. You know? I talked to Bishop Amos, but then I could have spent the evening watching television. I don’t want my commitment to be questioned, but I’ll need to find someplace to live, and . . . and someone to help me make dresses. And can I keep banking the same way? I’ll need to learn how to drive a buggy, and harness a horse, and—”

  Luke laughed and captured her hand again. He loved the feel of it, fine-boned, with smooth skin but for the calluses left by the quilting needle. The fit was perfect, making him think of a dovetail joint.

  “We’ll ask my parents if you can live with them,” he suggested. “You know them well already, and Mamm would love to guide you. Abby and I can eat dinner there every night so we can spend time together. Once Rose has her baby, Miriam will be there, too.”

  “Oh. Do you really think . . . ?” There was the fragile hope that always moved him.

  “I really think. Mamm will be so happy. She hasn’t understood why I haven’t married.” Ach, there, he’d said the word. But he decided to finish answering her torrent of questions first. “She loves to sew. You will not need to harness a horse or drive yourself for a long time, although we’ll teach you. If you want to keep working for Daad and me, you’ll ride to work with us each day.”

  The hope on her beautiful face was now blinding, as if the sun had crested the horizon and spread glorious color across the sky. Basking in it, he said, “You will marry me, won’t you, Julia?”

  “If you’re asking me—you’re sure?”

  “I’m more certain than I’ve been about almost anything else in my life.” Peace washed through him, smoothing away the jagged emotions that had kept him on edge for months. “Do you know how happy Abby will be to find out you’re to be her mammi?”

  Suddenly her eyes were awash with tears.
“I can’t wait. I fell in love with her right away.”

  “I could tell.” He smiled crookedly. “And with me, too?”

  Tears still hanging on her dark eyelashes, she squeezed his hand hard. “With you first. You must have known.”

  More soberly, he said, “At first I hoped for both our sakes that wasn’t true. But I haven’t been able to deny how much I love you. It was as if”—he looked down at the seamless clasp of their hands—“you were perfect for me.”

  “With only one big problem.”

  He hesitated, knowing this was something they had to talk about. “Not one. Two. You were not Amish, and I frightened you when I stood too close to you.”

  She bowed her head. “Now you know why.”

  “Yes.” With his free hand, he lifted her chin. “I will be as patient as I need to be. Amish don’t make vows often, but this one is important.”

  “A few times I dated,” she said, sounding choked, “but I always ended up panicking. Especially if the man tried to kiss me. But when you did, there wasn’t even a hint of the old fear. I’ve always known I could trust you.” Cheeks pink, she finished, “I don’t think you’ll need very much patience at all.”

  “God was with us when you walked into the store that day,” he muttered—and then he kissed her again, as he’d done a hundred more times in his imagination. Her lips were soft, accepting. Eager.

  No, he didn’t think he’d need much patience, either . . . except that they had to wait until they could be married.

  When he told her Amish weddings were commonly held after the harvest, November being a popular month, she nodded and said she’d read that. He continued, “You must be baptized first, but Amos thought that wouldn’t take so long with you already speaking our language and so familiar with the Bible. I think November would be a fine month for our wedding.”

  She did cry a little when she told him about her talks with her parents, who had been upset, and her brother, who surrendered with less fight than she’d expected.

  Swiping away the tears with her free hand, she said, “My parents will come around when they see I’m happy. I’m sure they will. And they’ll love Abby. They both want grandchildren.”

  “My parents already have several, and they still want more,” he said, smiling broadly. Heart full, he looked down at her. “Will you come with me tonight, to Mamm and Daad’s? We can tell them and Abby, too.”

  Nerves showed in her eyes. “But it’ll be late . . .”

  “Why don’t you pack a bag,” he said gently. “You can sleep in Miriam’s bed, or my old bedroom. Tomorrow when it’s light, we can come for more of your things. We can eat dinner together every evening, drive to work together, go home to Abby together every day.”

  “A step toward my new life,” she said slowly.

  “A big step,” he agreed gravely. “Is it too big a one?”

  This smile lit her from within and made his heart swell until he wasn’t sure his rib cage could contain it.

  “No.” She pushed herself up and kissed his rough cheek. “It’s just right. Give me five minutes, and I’ll be ready to go.”

  When he carried her suitcase out four minutes later, leaving her only to bring an enormous tote bag filled with an unfinished quilt and a wooden hoop, she didn’t even look back.

  Epilogue

  “THIS IS THE kitchen, Mammi,” Abby said softly. She held tight to Julia’s hand. “Daadi says he’ll add more cupboards if you want them.”

  Julia smiled down at the daughter of her heart. “You can tell Daadi that I think there are plenty.”

  A smothered chuckle came from just behind her. Luke was sticking close. Probably looming, but now she enjoyed having him close, knowing he’d use any excuse to rest a hand on her shoulder or back, or run his knuckles softly over her cheek.

  This was Julia’s first visit to the house that would soon be her home. Deborah had decided they would have middaagesse here today, once the tour was over. Not just lunch, but something like a picnic, although Deborah insisted there must be tables and chairs.

  “It would be foolish to get grass stains on our dresses!” she’d declared, not seeing the amused glance exchanged by Miriam and Julia.

  The two of them were already outside setting food on one of the tables Luke and Eli had hauled from the house. Elam had been assigned the task of carrying chairs out. He was too busy admiring the walls in the dining room to pick up even the first chair.

  His voice carried to the kitchen. “I worked my fingers to the bone on these walls.”

  Also in the dining room, his father just snorted. Luke laughed.

  Beneath Julia’s feet, the sycamore wide-plank floors gleamed. That was really what Luke had wanted to show off, she knew. He, his daad, Elam, and friends had sanded and finished the wood both upstairs and down in preparation for Luke to bring her home as his wife. She’d have worried about the wear and tear that normal family life would put on them, except in the Amish way he’d made sure that original flaws in the wood and even some later damage, like burns, remained. Like all the work he’d done on the old farmhouse, he’d retained the character, instinctively avoiding perfection.

  That said so much about the man she loved, Julia’s heart ached anew and she thanked her heavenly Father for the countless blessings that now enriched her life.

  Eli and Deborah had welcomed her with open arms. Of course, Bishop Amos had told them that Luke had gone straight to her that evening, but she believed their joy was real. She knew Abby’s was.

  She bent to say, “Show me your bedroom, Abby.”

  The little girl turned. “Can I, Daadi?”

  He gently tugged one of the ties dangling from her organdy kapp, a miniature version of the one Julia now so happily wore, too. “Of course you can.”

  Then he laid a hand on Julia’s back in that way he did. His eyes had darkened. “You can see our bedroom, too.”

  Our. Once that word would have struck terror into her heart. No longer. After all the wunderbaar kisses they had shared these past weeks, how could she be afraid anymore?

  “I can,” she said, almost primly. “But we’d better hurry. I hear another buggy. It must be Rose and her family.” Two kinder already, and now the new boppli.

  So much family. Knowing her parents and Nick planned to attend the wedding had completed her happiness.

  Smiling, she started up the stairs.

  Home.

  About the Author

  The author of more than ninety books for children and adults, Janice Kay Johnson writes about love and family—about the way generations connect and the power our earliest experiences have on us throughout life. An eight-time finalist for the Romance Writers of America RITA Award, she won a RITA in 2008 for her Superromance novel Snowbound. A former librarian, Janice raised two daughters in a small town north of Seattle, Washington.

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