Huckleberry Spring

by Jennifer Beckstrand

  Nudging his head upward with her good arm, she scooted her knees over and he rested his head in her lap. He opened his eyes as she cradled his head and caressed his face.

  “You have a goose egg on your eyebrow,” he said weakly.

  “You’ve got a wonderful-gute gash on your forehead,” she replied, just as softly.

  “Your cheek is bruised.”

  “You can’t move your legs,” she said. One of her tears splashed onto his cheek.

  He frowned and closed his eyes. “Now you know.”

  “I don’t know anything.”

  Wincing at the pain, he braced himself on his elbow and sat up. Raising his arm as if it weighed a hundred pounds, he tucked a lock of her tangled hair behind her ear. “I don’t have much time left to live.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I have a terrible disease, Emma. It’s called ALS and the doctor said I’ve only got three or four more years at the most.”

  She trembled with shock and fatigue. “Are you sure?”

  He gently laid his hand over hers and squeezed her fingers. “I’m sure. I’m dying, Emma, and I didn’t want you to have to see it.”

  Every bit of strength Emma had left seeped from her limbs as dizziness overtook her. “That can’t be true, Ben. I don’t believe it.”

  He brought her fingers to his lips. “It’s true. My muscles will deteriorate until I can’t walk, then I’ll have more trouble swallowing until I can’t eat. Then I’ll eventually stop breathing and die.”

  She yanked her hand from his grasp and tried to think. There must be some mistake. There must be some way to save him.

  He bowed his head. “I’m sorry, Emma. I’m so sorry.” She’d never heard such a forlorn sound.

  She wasn’t ready to accept an apology. There must be some way to stop this. “What did the doctor say? When did you talk to him?”

  “Last summer.”

  A year ago?

  “He said my muscles would slowly deteriorate until I couldn’t walk or talk or feed myself.”

  A year ago?

  The bile rose in her throat. She was going to be sick. “You . . . you left me.”

  “Jah,” he whispered. “I left you.”

  “Why?” The question burst from her lips even though she already knew the answer. She didn’t even try to suppress the sob that followed. All these months of heartache because he didn’t trust her with his pain? “You must think very little of me to believe that I would reject you because of an illness.”

  “Nae, Emma, I love you.”

  She choked on her grief. “You wanted to leave me before I had a chance to leave you.”

  Even though it must have been agony, he raised his hands and grasped her shoulders. She didn’t even wince at the pain. “I left because I knew you wouldn’t leave.”

  In one swift movement, he pulled her to him and brought his lips down on hers, creating a jolt of raw energy that made her heart ache.

  Her Ben was dying.

  The kiss left Emma struggling for breath, struggling for composure. She pulled a few inches from him. “Do you love me?” she whispered.

  “Jah. More than anything.”

  Emma closed her eyes and savored the words she’d been aching to hear for months. She bowed her head and wept for pure joy.

  “That’s why I have to let you go,” Ben said.

  “Why?” she cried out. “I love you. I want to be with you.”

  “There’s so little time. I don’t want you to see what I’m going to become, to have to do personal, unpleasant things for me. No wife should have to do that for her husband.”

  She pressed her hand against his cheek. “Are you afraid I’ll stop loving you?”

  “It will get very bad, Emma. You don’t understand. A husband should be strong for his wife. I’m the one who should take care of you.”

  Emma caressed the stubble on his jaw and resisted the growing urge to kiss him again. “Why does it always have to be you?”

  “I want to be a gute husband.”

  “I may be able to find trouble without a compass, but I’m strong enough to pull you out of a well.”

  He fell silent and studied her face.

  She put her arm around his neck and pulled herself temptingly close. “It doesn’t matter if you resist, because I am never, ever letting you go again. And as we’ve already seen, you can’t run fast enough to get away from me.”

  Uncertainty and fear stumbled across his features as he gazed into her eyes, trying to plumb the depths of her sincerity. “Dawdi said that God put people in my path to help me.”

  “I wasn’t put in your path to help you,” Emma said. “I am here to love you. And you are here to love me. For as long as we live.”

  His expression grew like a glorious, breathtaking sunrise. “You still want to be with me?”

  “I don’t have enough words to tell you how much.”

  He leaned in and kissed her until she thought she might not be able to see straight. Her pulse danced wildly, and she found herself wishing it would never end, that Ben wouldn’t die, and that she could seal her heart to his forever. The tears coursed down her cheeks.

  He rested his blood-encrusted forehead against hers. “Are you afraid?”

  “Terrified.” She traced the contour of his jawline with her finger. “But mostly I’m happy that you love me.”

  He cracked a smile. “Then will you marry me, even though it will be unimaginably hard?”

  Jubilation raced through her veins. She could have taken to the sky like a songbird. “I already said yes a year ago. I haven’t changed my mind.”

  He kissed her again and made her wonder how wide her happiness could spread. She felt saturated in it. After months of despair, Ben was finally hers.

  “I am so mad at you right now,” she said, her mouth a mere breath from his.

  He pulled back in surprise. “What are you talking about?”

  “We wasted an entire year because you thought you were being unselfish.”

  He winced as if his finger had met with a sharp knife. “I know. I wish it hadn’t taken me so long to learn what God wanted to teach me.”

  “I’m not marrying you for your smarts,” she teased.

  Ben chuckled and brought on a coughing spasm that left him breathless. Pressing his hand to his gut, he grimaced and doubled over in pain. His undershirt was spotted with blood. “I think I scraped most of the skin off my chest on that ladder.”

  Being careful not to hurt him, Emma laid a gentle hand on his arm. “You need to lie down, and I need to go get help.”

  “Now you want to go get help. You should have gone when I asked in the first place.”

  “And left you to die? I will never do that.”

  The sun sank below the horizon, but there had been plenty of light to see by as Emma gingerly made her way through the thicket. Every muscle in her body begged for rest and shooting pains traveled from her shoulder to her arm with every step she took. Her palms stung where the skin had rubbed off from clinging to that pole in the well. Somewhere along the way, she had lost a shoe, and she shook uncontrollably with cold. Only deep concern for Ben kept her going, and it was by the grace of God that she found her way back to Jethro’s fire.

  Mahlon lounged in a camp chair on the opposite side of the fire. With his gaze in any direction but Lizzie’s, he saw Emma first.

  “Oh, no,” he yelled, jumping from his chair. Taking the shortest path between Emma and himself, he took a flying leap over the fire.

  Everyone turned to look. Emma heard a collective gasp, and Lizzie called her name in distress and disbelief. Soon the entire group of young folks surrounded her.

  Even though they were used to Emma getting into accidents, shock registered on every face. Matted with twigs and leaves, her unkempt, kapp-less hair hung to her waist, and her sleeve had ripped at the seam, exposing a good portion of her shoulder. Every patch of exposed skin was smeared with mud or dried blood, and that goose eg
g on her head felt to be about the size of a baseball.

  “Somebody call a doctor.”

  She hissed when Mahlon reached out to take her arm. “My shoulder,” she said. “Don’t touch my shoulder.”

  “What happened?” Mahlon said. “Can you sit down?”

  She grabbed his elbow with her good hand. “Ben,” she said.

  A fierce emotion jumped into Mahlon’s eyes. “It doesn’t matter about Ben. We need to get you to the hospital. Freeman, grab a chair for her. Davy, do you have your cell phone?”

  Somebody nudged a floppy camp chair behind her. Her knees buckled, and she suddenly found that she no longer had strength to stand. Keeping hold of Mahlon’s arm, she sank into the chair. “Mahlon, Ben is hurt. He can’t walk. You need to go get him.”

  Lizzie clutched the armrest of Emma’s chair. “What happened? Where is he?”

  “In the woods.”

  Lizzie turned her eyes to Mahlon, who gazed at her with growing concern on his face. She seemed to disintegrate into a puddle of tears as she threw her arms around Mahlon’s neck. “Mahlon, you’ve got to help Ben.”

  After a brief moment of uncertainty when Mahlon must have wondered if Lizzie would smack him upside the head, he melted and enfolded Lizzie in an embrace. “Hush,” he said. “It’s going to be all right. I won’t let anything happen to Ben.”

  “He’s in the clearing. Adam knows where it is,” Emma said, scanning faces for her ex-boyfriend.

  “He left with Martha half an hour ago,” Jethro said.

  Adam hadn’t wasted any time finding another girlfriend. Emma admired his audacity but wanted to growl in frustration all the same. She didn’t know if she’d be able to find the spot again, and she wouldn’t be able to walk there anyway. “Ben and I fell into an old well.” She pointed in the direction she had come. “It’s in a clearing.”

  “He’s still in the well?” Lizzie squeaked in panic.

  “Nae. We got out, but he’s too weak to walk back.”

  “How far?” Mahlon said while Lizzie clung tightly to him.

  “Less than a mile. Take a lantern. You won’t see him.”

  Lizzie released Mahlon’s neck. “I’m coming with you.”

  “No, you’re not.”

  Lizzie narrowed her eyes. “It’s my brother. You can’t stop me.”

  Davy handed Mahlon a lantern. “You’ll only slow us down, Tizzy.”

  Lizzie bit her bottom lip, and Emma saw the hurt in her eyes. “You don’t want me to come? I’ll come if I want, Mahlon Nelson, and there’s nothing you can do to stop me.”

  Mahlon gave her an indignant huff. “We’re going without you. It’s better for Ben if you don’t slow us down. If you can’t stand not being able to order people around, stay here and boss Emma. She won’t fight back.”

  Lizzie folded her arms and frowned ferociously. “I am not bossy.”

  A frown pulled at the corners of Mahlon’s mouth. “We can argue about it later.”

  “We can argue about it never, Mahlon Nelson, because I’m never speaking to you again.”

  The set of Mahlon’s jaw told Emma he wasn’t going to say any more about it. He held up the lantern, let Jethro light it, and didn’t give Lizzie a second glance. Leaning close to Emma’s ear, he said, “You know I’m not real fond of Ben right now, but we’ll bring him back safe and sound.”

  With Mahlon in the lead, the group of boys dived into the thicket, and the sound of rustling leaves faded behind them.

  “I’m never, ever speaking to him again,” Lizzie said as she wiped away the remnants of her tears. She reached out her hand and took Emma’s. “Your hands are ice cold.” Half a dozen girls stood around Emma. “Does anybody have a blanket?”

  “I’ve got one,” Lori said.

  Lizzie knelt beside Emma’s chair. “How bad is Ben?”

  “I think he’ll be okay, but he had a cut on his head.”

  “And you have a very big lump.”

  Dinah brought Emma a thermos of hot chocolate. “Can you scootch closer to the fire?”

  Emma gave a slight shake of her head. She hurt too much to move a muscle. She shouldn’t have sat down. She feared she’d never get up again.

  “I need help here,” Dinah said.

  With three girls on each side and Lizzie giving orders, they carefully lifted Emma’s chair and carried it near the fire. Emma held her breath as every movement to her shoulder made her dizzy with pain. But once she got closer to the fire, the crackling heat felt heavenly. She shivered down to her toes.

  Lori laid a blanket over her lap, being careful not to jar her shoulder. “I have a towel and some water. Do you want me to clean off the dirt?”

  “Nae,” Emma said, thinking about her shoulder. “I don’t think I’d be able to stand it.”

  Lizzie squeezed her fingers. “You fell into a well?”

  “It all happened so fast. Ben jumped in to save me and then he couldn’t move his legs.”

  Lizzie frowned. “Why not?”

  “I stood on his shoulders and climbed out. It was a miracle, but I found a ladder and dragged him out. He hit his head and scraped himself up something wonderful.”

  “You pulled Ben out of the well by yourself?”

  Emma’s chest tightened at the memory. He’d been so calm, but she knew she had almost lost him. The thought made her ill. What if her strength had given out? She closed her eyes to block out that horrifying memory. Nae. Even if she’d broken every bone in her body, she wouldn’t have let go.

  Lizzie caught her breath. “You saved him. You’ve never rescued Ben before.”

  “I’ve never needed to.” Ben had always been the one who rescued her.

  Lizzie’s eyes widened, and she stared at Emma as if waiting for her to understand something. “You didn’t run away. You’ve always depended on Ben to snatch you out of the jaws of death and burning chicken coops.” Lizzie put a hand on Emma’s good shoulder. The slight movement translated to the other shoulder and made her wince. “I’ve never been able to convince you, Emma, but you’re strong. Without Ben, without Mahlon, you’re enough by yourself.”

  She remembered that feeling of utter helplessness when she fell into that well. “No, not strong at all.”

  “Who grows acres of pumpkins without a crew of farmhands to help her? Who puts her bad-tempered brother in his place without batting an eye? Who has endured months of heartache with grace and faith? Emma, you are amazing.”

  “You’re making small things sound big,” Emma said.

  “Big things born of small choices.” She tucked the blanket around Emma’s ankles. “Emma, what kind of girl can pull my six-foot-five brother out of a well?”

  “A girl who has a lot of help from God.”

  “What I want to know is, why couldn’t Ben move his legs? Did he hurt them?”

  Emma studied Lizzie’s face. Was she ready for this? “He has a disease that makes his legs go weak.”

  Lizzie gasped. “I don’t understand. He has a disease?”

  “He’s been hiding it for a year. He went to Florida rather than ask for help.”

  Lizzie’s eyes widened with disbelief. “I told you he was an idiot. When I get my hands on him—”

  “I just want him to be okay.”

  Lizzie stopped mid-sentence and frowned. “Me too.” She glanced in the direction Mahlon had gone. “Mahlon purposely insulted me so I wouldn’t go with them. He’s so bullheaded.”

  “Thank goodness you’re not.”

  They smiled at each other. Lizzie was plenty aware of her own faults.

  “Even though you wanted to go, I’m glad you’re here with me,” Emma said. She couldn’t tell Lizzie the seriousness of Ben’s condition. Not when they didn’t even know if Ben was safe. Ben would tell his family in his own time.

  The sirens sounded as if the entire police force and three county fire departments were coming to their aid. Instead of the fleet Emma expected, two police cars, a fire engine, and an ambulance c
ame rolling down the road.

  Two men in uniform rushed toward her, but she wasn’t alarmed or even particularly interested. She already had experience with paramedics and policemen. And firefighters. She’d even ridden in an ambulance once, although she didn’t remember it well after the concussion.

  One officer checked her pulse while simultaneously communicating with someone on the radio strapped to his shoulder. She nodded and tried to answer their questions even as her head pounded. “Please,” she said, as one of the paramedics asked her to rate her pain on a scale of one to ten. Her anxiety over Ben was an eleven. “Ben is the one who’s hurt. I can wait while you help him.”

  “Miss,” said the first paramedic, still awaiting her pain score, “we’ve got three officers at the scene to help your friend.”

  Not only my friend. My fiancé. Warmth spread over her. She was going to marry Ben Helmuth, and she would cherish every minute of his love and give him every reason to be happy to be alive.

  The paramedic brushed against her shoulder as he lifted his hand to inspect the blood on her cheek. She gasped in pain.

  “Does that hurt?” he asked.

  “Jah.”

  “How much?”

  The paramedic waited for her to say something. What is it he wanted? Some sort of number? Whatever it was, Emma knew it had to be a big number, like a thousand million billion. She felt that happy.

  But also profoundly sad. The knowledge of what was to come tempered her complete happiness, but only momentarily. God loved her. God wanted her to be happy. He would help her find the way.

  And Ben still loved her. God had already helped to her find the way back to Ben. She would be greedy to want more.

  Chapter 17

  Mahlon brought the buggy to a stop slowly so as not to jar Emma’s shoulder. Emma, on the other hand, paid no heed to her shoulder as she jumped out of the buggy as quickly as she could with her arm in a sling. She’d gone a whole twelve hours without seeing Ben. If she’d had her way, she would have come home with him and kept vigil at his bedside last night. She hated letting him out of her sight just when they’d found each other again.

  She was halfway across the lawn before she realized that Mahlon still sat in the buggy. “Hurry up, Mahlon.”