A Family for Gracie

by Amy Lillard

  “I’m not going to accept that.”

  What had happened to sweet, sweet Gracie who was always so accommodating? Who always wanted to help?

  Maybe he had mistaken compliance for weakness. He had been wrong. She was not backing down. There might have been a time when she would have, but no longer.

  His expression was a war of emotions she couldn’t name. Then there was a flash of shame, another of hurt, then pride, and finally resignation.

  She watched as he took a deep breath and raised a hand to his head as if making sure everything there was intact. She waited and waited, but his words when they came took her completely by surprise.

  “Beth didn’t just drown,” he said slowly. “She killed herself.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Once the words were out, he thought he’d feel better, but the sickened look on Gracie’s face was enough to bring all the shame back to him.

  “She what?” Gracie whispered. Then she shook her head. “You’re wrong. You have to be mistaken.”

  “I wish I was.” More now than ever before. “And it’s all my fault.”

  “That can’t be.”

  How he wished he had her ability to deny the truth. But he knew what he had seen with his own eyes.

  “It was an accident,” she said. “Everyone said so. She fell in the creek and drowned.”

  “She walked into the creek and drowned herself. She left the twins and Henry alone in the house. She left the baby bundled up on the bank.”

  Gracie’s expression was one of pained surprise. “No one ever said any of these things.”

  The Amish gossiped, that much was true. But not like the Englisch for the entertainment value alone. Gossiping to the Amish was about sharing the stories of community, spreading the word, and helping others. Talking about one another got benefits started, relief funds organized, and supper schedules lined out. It was as much a part of the community as buggies and wash lines.

  “I’ve never told anyone else.” His voice was so quiet, he barely heard it himself.

  “Not even the bishop?” Her own tone matched his.

  “Especially not the bishop.”

  “But you—” She stopped. “How could you not tell anyone? Somebody may have seen something differently.”

  “There was nothing different to see. She set the baby on the ground and walked into the water.” In the February cold.

  “I find that hard to believe. Impossible,” she said. “She had just had a baby. Why would she do something to jeopardize her life?”

  In that moment he understood why Gracie was having such a difficult time understanding. She wanted a baby more than she wanted anything in the world. Beth had had everything that Gracie dreamed of. How could she have been anything but over the moon with her life and the way things turned out?

  “She was depressed,” he said quietly. “A deep sort of sadness.” He paused, trying to gather all the words that he needed to tell this story. He hadn’t thought he’d ever tell it and didn’t have them collected already. “It started after the twins were born.” He shook his head. He was making a mess of this.

  “It was before that. All the pregnancies. Except for Stephen. She was happy after Stephen was born. But after Henry . . . she was so down that she had a hard time caring for him. I thought it was the stress of having to deal with two children, both of them babies really. But she said she was fine. She would give me a smile and promise me that everything was all right. But after the twins were born . . .” He wagged his head from side to side at the sad memories.

  “She was just so melancholy. That was the word she used. It didn’t sound quite so bad. And I knew that having them was hard on her. Stephen was barely four and Henry just two. Now she had two more to care for. But I was so blind. I talked to people—well, a couple of people: my mother and my oldest sister—and I asked them if there was anything I could do to help. They told me to just be there for her. Help when she needed it and be supportive when she didn’t.”

  He shot Gracie an apologetic smile. He had been so intent on telling his story that he had almost forgotten he had an audience. And she sat there so quiet, barely making any sound at all as he spoke.

  “By this time we had the opportunity presented to us to buy this farm. I thought it would be good for her, a change. She would be in a new place, able to meet new people, kind of start over. But when we got here, being away from her family and everything that was familiar was almost more than she could handle. I tried everything I could to make her comfortable, make her happy. But she hated it here. Not the place, but being away from her family.

  “So I did anything and everything I could think of to make her happy.”

  He paused then, thinking back to the decision. Had he sealed their fate as he had tried to give her something to bring back that happiness from before? “She wanted another baby.”

  A squeak came from Gracie and the noise, though quick and soft, startled him all the same. She reached out a hand and squeezed his fingers. He didn’t pull away from her touch, just kissed the baby on top of the head and continued with his tale.

  “She wanted a girl. That was all she talked about. What she would name a girl if she had one. How much fun it would be to have a girl to teach. She wanted to share recipes, teach her how to cook, how to fix her hair, how to sew, crochet, and knit. All those things that women do.

  “At first I didn’t want to, but as time went on I thought maybe it wasn’t such a bad idea. Maybe one more baby would make her happy.” But one more baby had taken her over the edge.

  “Baby Grace,” Gracie whispered.

  He nodded, swallowed hard. His voice had turned hoarse and there was a lump in his throat. But for the most part his story had come to an end.

  “See?” he finally said. “I killed her. If I had only told her no more babies, she wouldn’t have died.”

  * * *

  Gracie stared at Matthew, hardly able to believe what she was hearing. He thought he was responsible for Beth’s drowning? He thought that she had intentionally died in the water? It was beyond her comprehension. She had never heard of such a thing as a woman getting so sad after having a baby that she felt the need to take her own life. What despair! What tragedy!

  What a terrible idea that Matthew believed Beth would do such a thing. What a terrible notion that he believed he was somehow responsible for it.

  She didn’t doubt that he believed the story he told her. He felt every word was honest and true. He had somehow made the real facts fit his own need to take the blame. She may have only been married to him for just a few weeks, but she knew enough of him to know, he would want to take the blame from his wife. He would want to lay it on himself. He was the one left to care for the children. So it had to be his fault.

  “It was God’s will,” she said, squeezing his fingers once again.

  Baby Grace reached in and tangled her own fingers with theirs. It was a sweet moment, quickly shattered when Matthew pulled away from her touch. He thrust Baby Grace toward her as if he couldn’t bear to hold her any longer.

  Gracie took her and held her close for a moment, kissed her chubby baby cheek, then put her in her crib to play with the mobile of fat yellow stars with a rainbow, a sun, and a smiling moon. She couldn’t help but wonder where it had come from. Was it a thoughtful shower gift, or maybe handed down from baby to baby? But the image that really stuck in her mind was a pregnant Beth strolling the aisles at Walmart or some other store, looking at the mobiles and picking out the brightest, happiest one for the baby on the way. She couldn’t have known if it was a boy or a girl, and she wanted the best for it whatever the gender. But she had secretly prayed for a girl, then apologized for taking up God’s time with a silly prayer. She should be praying about the health of the baby and nothing else. Someone who would do all that wouldn’t do something as tragic as drown herself in a stream while her children waited in the house and her newborn was exposed to the cold February air. It simply wasn’t possi
ble.

  He sighed and stood. “I knew this would happen.”

  “What?” She turned from the crib in time to see him stalk to the door. “Matthew?”

  He stopped just before leaving, turning slowly to face her.

  “What would happen?” she asked again.

  “You think I’m a monster.”

  She shook her head. She had seen him with his children, he cared for them, loved them, wanted everything in the world for them. He even loved and held the squalling bundle he believed was somehow blaming him for her mother’s death. An utterly ridiculous idea. “I don’t believe you’re a monster. Not even for a second.”

  “Then—”

  “I even believe that you believe that what you say is the absolute truth.”

  He scratched his head, then gave a short nod, her words having finally made sense. “What I told you is really what happened.”

  “I know you believe that. But I believe in God’s will.”

  He seemed to grow two feet across and two more feet up as he stood there. Anger rose into his features, a livid, raw emotion she had never seen from him before. She held her ground, refusing to even step back an inch as he came toward her.

  “You believe in God’s will?” he asked softly, the tone in direct contrast with his red-faced anger. “So it was God’s will that she drowned herself? She left three little children alone and a two-week-old baby outside to freeze to death. You think that’s what God wanted?”

  “It was God’s will that Beth died. How she died . . .” She shook her head. “I don’t know. It must just be part of the tragedy of life. But it is not your fault that she drowned.”

  “Herself,” he corrected. “She drowned herself.”

  “Matthew.”

  “You don’t believe me,” he said quietly.

  “I believe you think it’s the truth.”

  His gaze bored into hers as if drilling holes straight through to the other side. “That’s not enough.”

  * * *

  He wanted to hit something, maybe hammer a nail, reshape a horseshoe. Strike something with his fists or a tool, it didn’t matter. He had felt this way only one other time, and he had never expected to feel such a need for violent release again.

  Instead he climbed up into the hayloft and threw down bales of hay until the sweat ran into his eyes and stained his shirt at the armpits and down the middle of his back. By then half the hay was on the main floor of the barn. He would have to move most of it back, but he still had enough energy from his anger to take care of it without a problem.

  She didn’t believe him. He told her things he had never told another living soul. Not his brother, his mother, the bishop, not even Beth’s grieving family. He’d told Gracie and she hadn’t believed him. Even worse, she wanted to spout about God’s will. How he hated those two words. He’d heard them his entire life, believed them even, until his wife walked into ice-cold water and ended her life. How could he believe God had a hand in anything? There were even days when he sometimes wondered if God had simply left them all alone to the devil’s follies.

  Those days bothered him. He hadn’t been raised to lose his faith, but how could he keep his beliefs intact when so much was trying to kill them? It was a battle he faced every day. His struggle was real, almost tangible. And he hated it.

  Hated even more that Gracie didn’t believe him.

  He wanted her to believe him. No, he needed it. He had bared his soul to her. She was his wife. Maybe not in every sense of the word, but in enough that he was starting to depend on her. Not just to take care of the children, but to help guide him and their household. He valued her opinion. She knew things that other Amish women didn’t know. And not because she had left and become Englisch, but because she had remained Amish and gone out into the world to help others. There was no more noble cause. And he admired her for that. The Amish were always talking about helping your neighbor and they did, but sometimes only in their community. They kept so closely to themselves that they couldn’t see others, on the outside, might need help as well. But not Gracie. She had seen it and answered the call. And he loved her for it.

  He stopped, hay bale raised halfway into throwing position. He loved Gracie.

  How had that happened?

  He couldn’t love her. She didn’t believe in him.

  But that wasn’t true. She did believe in him. She had told him as much. She just didn’t believe that he had told the truth about Beth’s drowning. She wouldn’t believe that he had any part of it. But he knew what happened. He could have stopped Beth. He should have stopped her. He should have seen the signs, or at least had her mother come down to be with Beth after the baby was born. If he had been paying attention, if he had been watching, he would have seen. And Beth would be with them still today.

  And Gracie would still be living with the Gingeriches.

  Somehow, that didn’t sound right. She was supposed to be here with him and the kids. Supposed to be a part of their family. They were calling her Mamm and depending on her for things kids depend on their mamm for. They loved her. Especially the baby.

  He tossed the hay bale and reached for another. And she was wrong about that too. He had said her name. The baby hated him, but he’d said her name. Why wouldn’t he? He was her father. But yet he couldn’t remember a time when her name had been on his lips. Since Beth had died she had been “the baby” even in his thoughts.

  How had that happened? He shook his head. He had no idea, but he wasn’t about to try and analyze it. He’d done enough soul searching for one afternoon.

  And no matter what thoughts he turned over in his head, he couldn’t help but remember: Gracie hadn’t believed him, and that’s what hurt the most.

  * * *

  By the time supper rolled around, Gracie still hadn’t seen Matthew, and she wondered if they would get a repeat of those earlier days of their marriage where he would come home late and eat whatever supper she had left for him in a pie plate on the stove. Or if he would come home at all.

  The hurt look in his eyes was heartbreaking. And she hated that she was the one who put it there. But couldn’t he see?

  Everything was God’s will. They didn’t have to understand it, they didn’t have to like it, but to question it would surely drive a person crazy.

  Had God willed the hurricane that had devastated the Gulf Coast? Had He wanted all those people to die? She didn’t know for certain, but she had to accept that He had a plan and it was up to them to follow.

  She did know that it was God’s will for her to go help. It was God’s will that she and Matthew got married, and it was God’s will that he didn’t want to have any more children even though that was her biggest dream in life.

  Maybe she couldn’t have children of her own and God was sparing her that pain and heartache. She didn’t know. Might not ever know. But she had to trust Him and that trust was something Matthew had lost. She ached for him, prayed that he would somehow get that trust back. For without trust in God’s will, what did they have? Nothing. Chaos. Heartbreak.

  She leaned out the front door. “Come to supper!” There were a few whoops and hollers and four dusty boys came scrambling toward the porch. She shook her head. “Wash up first.”

  “Is it chicken and ducklings?” Henry asked.

  Gracie didn’t bother to correct him. They had tried so many times, but he was convinced ducklings was the proper term and couldn’t be persuaded to call them anything else. “Not tonight,” she said.

  He stuck out his lower lip.

  “It’s fried chicken,” she said, hoping that would smooth it over. She had made it special for Matthew, hoping to extend it as an olive branch. I’m sorry I hurt you, but I still care about you. It was a weak offering, but the only one she had right then.

  “Where’s Dat?” Stephen asked as he ducked into the house.

  Somewhere. “He’ll be in in a bit.” She hoped anyway.

  “He loves fried chicken,” Henry said, grinning
at her as he followed his brother into the house.

  The twins were right behind but their hands, now wet, looked worse than before, like muddy little tentacles.

  “Let’s try that again, boys.” She turned them around and, careful not to let the screen door slam behind her, marched them back to the water spigot. She turned it on and showed them how to rub their hands together to help the water remove the dirt.

  She might not be getting a baby all her own, but she had five wonderful children who were calling her Mamm. She shouldn’t ask for any more than that.

  “Mamm, Baby Grace needs you,” Henry called from the doorway. He ducked back inside, letting the screen door slam. She could hear Baby’s wails from where she stood in the yard. Gracie was needed. Matthew might not need her, but the children did. She loved them, and they loved her. God’s will had surely been fulfilled. She smiled a little to herself.

  “Come on, boys. Let’s go see about your sister.”

  Baby’s tragedy turned out to be a dropped binky that had rolled under the table. She had been propped up in her highchair waiting patiently for her supper and gnawing on her pacifier, something she seemed to be doing a lot lately. Gracie knew it was early, but she had a feeling that Baby might already be cutting teeth. It was exciting and a little sad at the same time. Gracie had only been there a few weeks, but she could already see the change in the baby. She was growing up so fast. Too fast. But wasn’t that what all mothers thought?

  She retrieved the binky, got her bottle ready, and gathered the boys around the table.

  But Matthew was still not there. She thought she had seen him in the barn when she was helping the twins wash their hands.

  “Can we eat?” Henry asked. He had his hands in his lap as if he didn’t trust himself to grab the food and start devouring it. He was swinging his legs with enough enthusiasm to rock himself back and forth.

  “Not yet.” She gave them a quick smile to let them know that everything was okay—even if it really wasn’t—and started toward the door. “He must not have heard me call him.”

  She hurried outside and over to the barn.