by Ciara Knight
“I see.” Teddy put his hat back on his head and adjusted it. “Just the same, I think that it’s good for you to be out of the house and doing something.”
I eyed the smoke in the far distance and knew they were awake and Agatha was probably already cooking a hearty breakfast. “Can I ask you something, Teddy?”
“Of course.”
“Do you think I’m…well, too… Oh, never mind.” I faced the front door and made a run for it, but I wasn’t fast enough.
“I don’t think you’re too old. I believe you deserve happiness. And you are far too pretty to be rotting away alone,” Teddy said.
I turned to face the man who I’d begun to consider a friend. “Thank you.”
He tipped his hat while walking away backwards. “Just one thing. Tell Jeb before he finds out. He’s mighty protective of you, and the good Lord only knows what he’d do if he found a man he didn’t know near you.”
“Understood, but he isn’t here and won’t be here for a while.”
Teddy smiled. “Just the same, best tell him when he arrives home. Better yet, send him a note. Best he reads it all the way from the East Coast. That way he can’t kill the man.”
I chuckled at the absurdity of it but knew Jeb would thwart any hope of me maintaining a relationship with the Krauses when he returned. “We are just friends, so no reason to write him just now.”
Teddy shook his head. “You keep telling yourself that, and maybe you start believing it.”
I didn’t have time to argue my point because in the distance I spotted a horse galloping across the land toward our ranch. My breath caught at the sight of the only person it could be. I glanced down at my house dress and touched my hair falling in wisps around my face. “Excuse me, Teddy.”
“Of course. We wouldn’t want you to be out of sorts when your friend arrived.”
I didn’t miss the way Teddy enunciated the word friend, but based on the growing dot in the distance, time would be short, so I rushed inside. My pulse competed with the speed of my legs as I shot up the stairs to my room, fixed my hair, donned a more appropriate dress, and flew down to the front door. By the time I reached outside, Teddy and Fredrick were by the barn talking as if they were old friends.
With my heart still hammering against my chest, I forced a calm, icy breath and walked over to the men. “I thought I was supposed to meet Agatha at midday so she could teach me how to make strudel.”
“Yes, but I take you somewhere. Don’t worry. Not courting. Friend showing friend something. That is if Teddy here not mind.”
Teddy glanced around as if Jeb might jump out of the barn and attack him for letting me leave. “Go, enjoy, if that’s what Mrs. Clayton wants.”
My curiosity was peaked at Fredrick’s invitation. “As a friend, I accept.”
“Good. We go, then.” Fredrick lifted me with ease, and in moments we were riding toward his place.
“Where are we going?”
Fredrick kicked his heels and caused his horse to pick up speed. “You see soon.”
I couldn’t help but enjoy the aroma on him of wood and German food that I now thought of as his village scent. We rode across the land, enjoying the sun rising higher in the sky. The vast open land stretched out around us, but I’d never felt so cozy as I did in Fredrick’s arms.
We reached the stream and followed it along the property until we came upon a small shack. Fredrick guided his horse up to the strange little structure made of wood and stone near the embankment. “I share food from home. Now I share something else.”
My intrigue drew me to the door, where Fredrick lifted the board off the front and opened it. “Keep animals out.”
Inside, dozens of different kinds of plants were in bowls, jars, cups, hanging from the ceiling, tacked to walls. Greenery hung from rafters across the top.
“You not like?” he asked.
“I love.” Sparkles of light hatched from small openings in the roof and walls. “It’s as if I’ve stepped into a book. A story about a castle garden in the midst of a dead land.”
Fredrick smiled. “My wife wanted to bring from home with her, so I brought plants for her garden, but she never planted them. I keep them here for now. Hope to grow in spring.”
I walked around the room and found myself drawn to a little tree at the corner of the hut sitting on a shelf. It stood alone like a baby waiting to be planted. I ran my fingers under the branches, touching the fuzzy needles. “What kind is this?” There were so many smells, from dried purple flowers to yellow dots from green leaves, but the little tree smelled like lemon and pine.
“It is rosemary tree. It is your name.”
I laughed at his words. “Actually, it kind of is. My parents used to call me Rose Mary. My father said it was on account that I reminded him of a perfect rose.”
“You are special to be named after this plant. Legend says, baby Jesus mother, Mary, draped her cloak over a rosemary bush, and it took on the fragrance of her cloak. Our village used rosemary at Christmas as symbol of Christ.” Fredrick pulled a blanket out from a shelf and handed it to me. “When spring comes, you plant any you wish in your own garden.”
“I’d like that, but I’m afraid I garden even worse than I cook.”
Fredrick straightened to his full height. “Then I teach you.”
“I would like that.” If I admitted it to myself, I liked the idea of working on land to cultivate something to grow with this man by my side. It had been my childhood dream of what I thought marriage and family and land meant.
“Come. I have another surprise for you.” Fredrick retrieved a basket from under the table, grabbed my hand, and pulled me outside.
“I can’t imagine anything grander than that,” I said, but then we rounded the small shack and I saw a table. It was obvious it was one that Fredrick had hand carved. On top was a white tablecloth with a lantern in the center and two chairs.
He placed the basket on the table. “We have picnic. I know it cold, but I build fire and we have blanket.”
A pile of sticks in the center of stones was already set up. Fredrick had done all this, and it was barely morning. “Why would you do all this for me?”
Fredrick turned on his heels and tilted his head. “I tell you why, but I make you sad, so I say, because we are friends.”
I wanted to believe him, but no one went through this much trouble for a friend. He could call it anything he wanted, but he was courting me. And the worst part, the notion that scared me the most, was that I enjoyed it.
Chapter Six
The smell of sawdust greeted me at the barn door. Fredrick had been working all day, so I thought I’d visit and bring him a trial of the biscuits I’d made the night before. The minute I stepped into his workspace, he abandoned his chiseling and greeted me with a kiss to my cheek. A simple gesture that caused complicated feelings. But from what Agatha had told me, kissing on the cheek was like the American handshake.
“Um…I don’t know if this is a good visit for you or not. I’ve brought biscuits. Since Agatha is too nice, I thought I’d come for an honest opinion.”
“Dirty hands. Put in my mouth.” Fredrick opened his mouth.
I broke off a small helping, stepped closer, and slid it onto his tongue. My hands shook, and I wasn’t sure if I was more nervous to be so close to him or to find out if he liked the biscuit.
He chewed and swallowed while I waited to find out his thoughts. “Better.”
“Better but not good,” I asked.
Fredrick nodded. “It tastes fine. I have question, though.”
I set my basket down on a workbench. “What’s that?”
“You passionate about food? Do you want to cook?”
I thought about his question for a few moments and thought I came up with the right answer. “I want to cook better. Every woman should know how to cook.”
“Why?” He lifted an eyebrow, and his forehead crinkled.
I shrugged. “Because I need to cook for
Jeb.”
“You cook for him already.”
“Yes, but not well. And I guess, in a way, I wanted to impress you.”
Fredrick straightened to his grizzly bear height and lifted his chin. “Really? You want to impress me? Why?”
It was my turn to toe the ground, but I couldn’t answer. “Um…because you have allowed Agatha to teach me to cook. I should prove it is worth her time.”
“I not allow Agatha to do anything. She does what she wants. She the one to impress.”
I thought about his words. Could they be true? A man who didn’t try to control a woman? Even Jeb, who only wanted to protect me, still tried to control me. Was there a possibility that a man could marry a woman and not treat her like a dog that he could order around and possess?
Fredrick returned to his wood carving but didn’t work. Instead, he scanned the area and then stood once again and grabbed a small piece of wood and a chisel. “If you want to be good at something, you must have passion for it. Your desire makes something great, not your skill.”
I searched the barn, looking to the horse studying me as if I had a hidden treat in my coat pocket. Then I looked at the ornate furniture that Fredrick obviously had passion to create. “What if I’m not passionate about anything?”
“Then you not find right thing.” He pulled his stool away from the table he was working on and dragged it over to my side. “Sit. I show you.”
I lowered to the stool and looked up at him.
He stood behind me and held the piece of wood in front of me, his cedar-smelling sleeves at ear level. “What do you see?”
I tried to concentrate on his words instead of the way his closeness made me feel happy and excited for the first time since I was fourteen and living with my parents. “A piece of wood.”
“No, what do you see inside the wood?”
I glanced up at him, but I still didn’t understand what he meant. “Grain?”
He chuckled. “Do you want to know what I see?”
“What?”
“A hummingbird.” Fredrick withdrew the piece of wood and knelt in front of me. “It’s not so much that I see it. I feel it.”
I blinked at him, trying to follow his meaning, but I didn’t know if it was a language barrier or my lack of life experiences.
“You not see hummingbird?”
I shook my head. “No.”
He took his chisel and began scraping wood shavings onto the ground. In a matter of minutes, I saw a wing come to life as if the wood was its cocoon that it stretched its wing from. “Oh, my goodness. That is amazing.”
Fredrick paused and glanced up at me, his chisel inches from the wing tip. “You see it now?”
“The wing.”
His hand raised, lifting the block of wood to my eye level. “Look closer. Imagine bird is inside. Can you see it? Think of its soft feathers, tiny dark eyes, fluttering wings.”
For a second, I thought I could almost see the small creature inside the wood. “In a way, yes.”
“Then all you have to do is set it free.”
“I can’t do that.”
He lowered the block of wood and sighed. “No, but I can because I am passionate about what I can find inside wood.”
The barn door slammed against the wall several times from chilling wind gusts. He abandoned his caged bird and lifted me by the elbow to stand. “Come. We warm you by the fire.” He tucked me into his side and walked me toward the house.
I didn’t want to feel heat radiating down my arms from his touch, but I did. “You know, I understand what you are saying now, but I don’t know what I’m passionate about.”
He turned me in his arms and placed a hand on each of my shoulders. A delicate, light touch for such a strong man. “Then we figure it out.”
My mind lingered on the word we a little too long. When I left the Krause’s home in the evening, I settled in Jeb’s house and thought about what Fredrick had said. I lay awake thinking about what I felt passionate about. For years, it was caring for Jeb. Once he was grown, I continued to remain to keep things clean and organized and cooked for him. I’d already established I wasn’t a great cook, and as for cleaning, it was more of an obsession than a passion.
From the early morning hours before the sun rose, I roamed around the house searching and then out to the barn and finally on horseback, but nothing came to mind. Eventually, I found myself visiting with Agatha for my next cooking lesson. She said I had improved, but I didn’t feel like I couldn’t wait to cook again. Actually, if I admitted it to myself, I was here more for the friendship than the food. I’d even grown accustomed to Helga’s occasional grunt or rant in German.
When Agatha and I finished preparing the evening meal, I went to retrieve Fredrick from the barn. If I admitted it to myself, each time I heard something outside, I looked up to see if it was Fredrick. I’d hoped he’d check on us, but he hadn’t left the barn all day. I found him crouched over a chair working on fine detail. The man was a genius with wood. I stood at the door, wrapping my arms around myself to stay the cold. I loved the aroma of the wood and the sight of him concentrating on his work. If I wasn’t careful, I’d find myself passionate about this man from a far-off land who said sweet words and showed me a new way of looking at things.
“You stand staring at me all night? If so, I pose for you.” He set down his chisel, flexed his arms, and lifted his chin.
I giggled and edged inside. The man was an adorable puppy in a guard dog body. “I didn’t want to disturb your work.”
“Time for break. I wanted to visit you earlier, but order due in two days. Biggest order yet. If this continues, I will need bigger barn.”
“Based on what I see, you better get a larger space, because all of this is art. Anyone would want to have this in their home.” I shuffled around the horse stalls and eyed all the pieces of furniture stacked along the wall until I saw two strange wooden blocks that looked like shoes. “What are these?”
Fredrick sighed with a burst of air, blowing his hair from his eyes. “You spoil surprise. I figure you need shoes for tonight.”
“Shoes?” I quirked a brow at him.
“Yes. You put them outside so Pelznickel visits and fills them.”
I snickered. “I don’t think Pelznickel will be visiting me.”
“Why? You been naughty?” Fredrick asked in a parental tone with a dash of amusement.
“No, but I’m too old.”
He set his chisel and hammer down on the bench and crossed his arms over his chest. He leaned back against the wall and crossed one foot over the other. He looked relaxed instead of his normal nervous side around me. “You are young,” he said with such conviction I almost believed him myself.
“Still. It has been a few years since anyone has visited me for Christmas, and I’ve never celebrated Pelznickel Day before. I’m not German.”
“You are German if you make German food and visit with German people and hold hands with German man.” Fredrick reached out and took my hands in his. They were rough and warm and inviting. I thought I could stand there through the night if it meant I didn’t have to let him go. But that was wrong. They weren’t mine to hold.
I opened my mouth, but I couldn’t remember what I was going to say. Instead, I only stood silently and watched his thumb brush across my hand. “What do you hope Pelznickel will bring you?”
The barn door creaked open from the wind, and a shot of chilly air brushed over the back of my neck, causing me to shiver.
Fredrick wrapped his arms around me and rubbed small circles on my back. “You cold. We go inside.”
His strength promised protection. His eyes promised compassion. His words promised freedom. The hard shell around my heart cracked. The width of a single hair, but I felt it, and I was scared.
He took my hand and led me to the house but paused at the front door. “You not answer my question.”
“What question?” I asked, my mind still stuck on the thought of a man hol
ding my hand, walking by my side, and me actually enjoying it.
“What do you hope Pelznickel brings you?” Fredrick waited with a firm set to his jaw that made him look serious.
I thought about it for a moment, but I only sighed. “I don’t know. There isn’t anything I need.” That wasn’t true, though. I wanted to find my purpose, that one thing that I could be passionate about.
“Then it will be a surprise.” He opened the door, and we found ourselves at the table once again as if we were a family, but we weren’t a family. Soon I’d have to be home each night to cook for Jeb, not to mention washing his clothes and cleaning the house. Is that how I wanted to spend the rest of my life?
The evening slipped away, and for once I fell asleep the minute I went to bed. My dreams were full of flowers in strange shacks, trickling water of a creek, wooden furniture that people fought over to own, and a dark hole. A large nothingness that waited for me. I jolted awake to the morning sun.
After several deep breaths to calm my racing heart, I managed to get up and make some coffee. A few taps sounded at the door. “Come in, Teddy,” I shouted, but the door didn’t open.
I abandoned my morning elixir and opened the front door, but I didn’t see Teddy. All I saw were the wooden shoes, a small rosemary tree with holly wrapped around its trunk, the block of wood that had been reborn into a hummingbird, and a note. It simply said, Be ready tomorrow morning so you can go to town with me. Maybe you will find your passion in Sherman.
I took the wooden shoes inside and sat staring at the beautiful bird that appeared to be flying even though its wings were still. The perfect script with crooked lines held an exciting promise that made my insides feel like the hummingbird fluttered inside me.
I wasn’t sure if I was nervous or excited about an adventure, but I knew one thing for certain. I was glad I’d be sharing it with Fredrick. My heartbeat quickened at the realization. I wanted to spend time with a man. Not just any man—a man I was growing to care for and looked forward to seeing again.