by Linda Byler
“This one doesn’t have a tail,” she said innocently.
Marvin and Elsie laughed and laughed. Marvin slapped his knee because he knew guinea pigs never have tails, so it was a joke.
Lizzie didn’t think it was one bit funny, and she even told Emma on the way home that she didn’t like Marvin nearly as much as she used to.
chapter 12
The Miller Relatives Visit
Mam could not hide the excitement in her eyes when she opened a letter from her brother’s wife who lived in Jefferson County.
“Melvin! Guess what? Elis are coming for a visit! Next Saturday, she writes, and they’re going to try and bring Junior’s along! Oh, I haven’t seen them for so long—this is just wonderful!” She smoothed back her hair, pulling her covering over her ears, and adjusted a pin in her dress. Mam always pulled her covering over her ears when she was excited or nervous, so Lizzie thought she must be very happy if she did all three things.
“Well, good!” Dat said.
“Oh my, what will I have for dinner? Mary wrote she’ll bring a pan of dressing, and if Juniors come along, she’ll bring a dessert. Let me see. I could have fried chicken. The butcher truck comes on Thursday, so I think my chicken would keep till Saturday. Mashed potatoes, or should I have scalloped potatoes, or just potatoes with a cheese sauce? What about a vegetable? String beans? Or peas? I think maybe corn, but I don’t want to use all my corn too soon. I could make Jell-O salad, or maybe macaroni salad would be easier.”
Mam was known to be a good cook, and she knew it, so when company came, it was her delight to impress the visitors with her delicious meals. She would plan and worry, fussing and stewing about what went well together, and if it was all too fattening, too sweet, or too heavy. Besides, she was on a budget and didn’t have a lot of money to spend on expensive things, so she would need to plan carefully.
“We’ll just set lawn chairs under the apple trees in the yard,” Dat said.
“Yes, you can, Melvin. Oh, I’m so anxious to see them!” Mam was really quite beside herself, and Emma was smiling happily. Lizzie was happy for Mam, too, of course, but she was worrying about how many cousins were coming along. She didn’t know them very well, and she felt uncomfortable and shy around them, especially Elis’ boys. They probably wouldn’t come along, Lizzie consoled herself, because they were older than she and Emma were.
Lizzie loved when company came to their house, and she especially liked to go away on Sunday to her friends’ houses. But when people came to visit who had children their age, it usually made Lizzie feel awkward, because she didn’t know what to say. Emma didn’t like to make up with strangers, either, although it seemed to Lizzie she was better at it.
So the whole week, while Mam cleaned the house and fussed about her two brothers and their wives coming for a visit, Lizzie worried. She had asked Mam how many children were coming along, and Mam said probably Elis’ Edna, because Edna was almost exactly their age. That depressed Lizzie since she could not remember much about Edna, and what were they going to say? It was too hot to play in the playhouse, and besides, Edna might not want to play doll. They could swing, but that never lasted very long, and the bumblebees flew under the eaves of the kettle house by the swing set.
By Friday, Lizzie had worried herself into a state of despair. She flopped on a kitchen chair and sighed. She cleared her throat and made tapping noises with her fingernails on the plastic tablecloth. She got a drink out of the refrigerator, leaving the door open too long so Mam would notice her. But Mam was bent over the counter, squinting at a recipe card through her glasses, stirring something on the stove and muttering to herself.
“Mam,” Lizzie ventured.
“Not now, Lizzie,” Mam said, squinting and stirring.
Lizzie sighed and sat on the kitchen chair. She drank some water and wondered if the Jefferson County cousins were talkative, or if they would all stand around and look at each other.
When Emma bustled into the kitchen with Jason and Mandy, Lizzie looked at Emma, wondering why she wasn’t worrying about the company. Emma went to the refrigerator and got a pitcher of juice, getting two plastic cups for Jason and Mandy.
Lizzie slid down in her chair and kicked the table leg. She told Mandy not to spill her juice. Mandy stood with her little hands on her hips and watched Lizzie kick the table leg. “How can I not spill it?” she asked.
“Why?”
“Because you’re just kicking the table leg,” Mandy replied, sliding over on the bench.
Lizzie stopped and watched Emma wiping up little drops of spilled juice. She wiped once with the wet soapy dishrag, then wiped it again to make sure it wasn’t sticky, because she couldn’t stand to rest her elbows on a sticky tabletop. Lizzie loved to put her mouth down to the spilled drops and make a slurping noise, because it cleaned up the juice and was a lot more fun.
“Emma.”
“Hmm?”
“Do you think Elis’ Edna will come along? And do they talk? Our cousins, I mean,” Lizzie said, looking down at the tablecloth and pleating it with her fingers.
“I don’t know, Lizzie. I guess they’ll talk if we do,” Emma said matter-of-factly.
“Oh.” That was all Lizzie said, because there wasn’t anything she could say. She sighed, noticing drops of juice on the kitchen linoleum and thinking that Emma would clean it up if she knew. Oh well, she would just have to wait and see about Saturday and the cousins.
· · · · ·
When Saturday came, it seemed as if the whole house was bursting with cousins, aunts, and uncles. They were all shapes, sorts, and sizes, and Lizzie thought they all looked very strange. Some of the older boys had very thick, curly hair, reminding Lizzie of a picture she had seen in a history book of a pirate. She wondered if Jason’s hair would look like that when he was older, pitying him with her whole heart.
The girls wore different coverings and did not comb their hair back in sleek rolls like Emma and Lizzie. They combed their hair straight back, loosely, and it was thick and wavy and shiny. Lizzie was ashamed of her tight rolls, wishing she could comb her hair like the Jefferson County cousins.
Dat and Mam were both very happy, chattering and laughing with Mam’s brothers and their wives. Lizzie liked Mary and Clara, who were both small with little round eyes and noses. She thought they looked a lot like Billy Beaver in her reading book. They both were very kind, talking to Emma and Lizzie and playing with Jason and exclaiming about his curls.
“Edna, Fronie, come play with Lizzie and Emma,” Mary said.
“You’ll have to get used to each other sometime,” said Mary with a smile. She pushed Edna forward, and she shrugged her shoulders to get rid of her hand. She smiled shyly at Emma, and Emma smiled back. Fronie stood behind Edna and looked at both of them with a bored expression. Lizzie’s heart sank, because she just knew this wasn’t going to work. How could you become friends with someone you didn’t know?
Emma stepped forward and bravely asked Edna if she wanted to swing, or look at Dolly, the pony. Edna smiled and shrugged her shoulders, so Emma started out the door with a nervous Lizzie and a bored Fronie in tow.
“We have only one pony now, because Dat sold Teeny and Tiny,” Emma offered.
Edna snorted. “Who were Teeny and Tiny?”
Fronie snickered behind Lizzie.
Emma ventured on bravely, “Oh, they were little ponies. So small that Dat could bend over them and touch the ground on the other side. That’s why we called them Teeny and Tiny.”
“Why don’t you have them anymore?” asked Edna.
“We sold them at an auction. Lizzie and I drove them in the ring with a little spring wagon Dat made,” Emma said.
“Hah-ah!” Fronie said, wide-eyed.
“Did you really?” Edna asked, amazed.
Before Lizzie even thought, she blurted out, “And when we drove around the ring, the people were clapping and standing up to see us better.”
“Did they get sold that day?”
Fronie asked.
“Mm-hmm. Oh yes, of course,” Lizzie assured her.
They had reached the barn, and as Emma flung open the door, Dolly nickered as she always did. Lizzie smoothed back her forelocks, stroked her neck, and murmured to her in pony language. Fronie and Edna watched as Emma opened the gate. They scurried back to the farthest wall as Dolly trotted to the water trough.
“She won’t hurt you,” Lizzie said.
“I’m not used to ponies, so they kind of scare me,” Edna admitted.
“I’m not a bit scared. Watch!” And with that, Lizzie jumped up on Dolly’s back, or at least tried to, but Dolly sidestepped, and Lizzie slid off, falling flat on her stomach in the loose straw and dirt on top of the concrete floor.
“Oof!” Lizzie’s breath was knocked out of her, causing her to grasp her stomach, making all kinds of strange noises as she struggled to regain her breathing. She sat on the concrete, gasping and holding her stomach, reeling from the unexpected blow.
Emma bent over her. “Lizzie!”
“What? You know I can’t answer you!” Lizzie was really upset, because how was she supposed to talk with no breath? She glanced at Fronie and Edna, whose faces were a mixture of concern and holding back their giggles. This really upset Lizzie, because how dare they laugh at her when she couldn’t get her breath? She looked down at her legs, covered with dirt and straw, and her dress had slid up too far, too. She felt so utterly humiliated, so ashamed of herself, that she jumped up and slapped the straw off her legs, still gasping for breath.
“It isn’t funny, either!” she yelled as loud as she could.
“Nobody’s laughing,” Edna assured her kindly.
“Yes, you are—you know you are!” Lizzie shouted, her face flaming with shame and embarrassment.
“Lizzie! I’m going to tell Mam,” Emma said, struggling to keep her distress from showing.
“Go ahead! See if I care!” shouted Lizzie, flouncing out of the barn, tears threatening to completely upset any trace of pride she may have kept. She ran across the yard, yanked open the door of the playhouse, and flopped on the old couch. A spring that stuck up through the upholstery scraped her leg, and she winced as a deep scratch appeared.
She sat up, smoothed her hair, and picked a piece of straw off her head. She looked at it, and decided very firmly that she did not like company at her house, and she didn’t like the Jefferson County cousins at all. She knew they were laughing at her, that was all there was to it. She wished they’d all go home so she would never have to see them again.
There was a slight sound on the creaky old boards of the playhouse porch. Lizzie lay as still as she possibly could, holding her breath, hoping no one would find her, because she didn’t feel like trying to be nice all over again. She had really made a mess out of everything, so what was the use starting over? They already knew Lizzie was a show-off and a loser.
The door creaked slowly open, and a hesitant voice whispered, “Lizzie.”
Lizzie kept her back turned, but was too polite not to answer. “Hmm?”
“Can I come in?”
Lizzie rolled over and sat up, pulling down her dress and smoothing her hair. She lifted humiliated eyes to find Edna standing shyly inside the door, her hands clasped properly in front of her. Her small brown eyes twinkled in her elfin brown face, as she calmly watched Lizzie desperately smoothing her dress.
“Lizzie, it’s okay. Dolly stepped way over, and I guarantee if she wouldn’t have done that, you would have been easily able to scramble up on her back.” She came forward and sat on the corner of the couch, reaching out hesitantly to touch Lizzie’s knee. “Don’t feel bad, Lizzie, it was the pony’s fault, not yours. I can see that you are used to being around ponies, and you aren’t near as scared of them as I am. I wouldn’t even lead Dolly out of her pen—not even near!”
Lizzie kept looking at the old rug at her feet, pushing her toes into the torn old rags. She turned her head slowly and met Edna’s brown eyes that actually seemed to be smiling all the time, even if her mouth wasn’t. They both started with just a slight, tentative turnup of the corners of their mouth, but it became steadily wider as their eyes picked up the feelings between them. Lizzie just kept smiling, all her teeth showing, and Edna smiled back.
“Do you really think it was Dolly’s fault?” Lizzie asked.
“Of course.”
Lizzie sat up straight, pulled in her stomach, and lined up her feet on the old rag rug. She sighed and told Edna she was so glad, because it really was the way ponies were. They were jumpy sometimes, and you could never tell what they would do next, even old Dolly. Edna nodded her head in agreement, because she believed every word.
“Edna, I really like you. I wish you wouldn’t live quite so far away, because then we could go to school together. We’d be best friends, wouldn’t we?”
“Of course!” Edna agreed, clasping Lizzie’s hand firmly in her own. Lizzie was so consumed with grateful feelings to Edna that she knew without a doubt that she was one of the nicest girls she had ever met. She felt so proud that Edna was her real cousin.
“Lizzie! Edna!”
They looked together, and Lizzie ran to the door.
“What?”
“Mam said it’s time for dinner. Hurry up! Nobody knew where you were!” Emma shouted.
Edna and Lizzie dashed out the playhouse door, pounding up the steps to the kitchen. They were laughing and talking as they threw open the screen door.
“Mam, can I sit beside Edna?” Lizzie beamed.
Mam and Mary smiled at each other as their little girls sat close together on the bench, heads bent together, giggling, as Edna told Lizzie a story.
Mam bustled around the kitchen, filling water glasses and making sure everyone could reach every dish.
Lizzie clasped her hands between her knees and swung her feet, leaning her chest against the table. Everything looked so good that her mouth watered. Mam was a good cook, and Lizzie could hardly wait to taste everything. There were glass dishes of applesauce and little sweet pickles on tiny glass plates. Mounds of steaming mashed potatoes had a puddle of brown butter in the middle, like a little brown pond. Fried chicken was heaped on big blue trays, and gravy was put in glass gravy bowls. Mam never made greasy gravy—it was always light brown in color, not too thick and not too thin.
Mam had made macaroni salad, peas with a white sauce, and fresh, hot rolls with strawberry jelly and butter. Mam had bought real butter for company, which was really different, because they always used margarine. Mam said it was much cheaper and almost as good.
The grownups’ chatter ceased, and Lizzie knew it was time to have a silent prayer, or “put patties down,” as the children said. Amish people never prayed out loud as English people did, so Lizzie always felt ill at ease if she heard someone praying out loud. Dat always told them to thank the Lord for their food, and to look down at their plates as they prayed. Lizzie often forgot to pray, because she was peeping at someone and thinking other thoughts. She didn’t know why, but it seemed she could never concentrate to pray a long prayer when everyone put patties down. She tried hard, though, because Emma lowered her head very far and her lips moved as she said her silent prayer. Lizzie often watched her sideways, fascinated by her goodness.
When everyone’s head was raised, Dat said, “Help yourselves, and if you can’t reach something, don’t be afraid to say so.” Everyone smiled, acknowledging Dat’s welcome, as bowls of food were passed. The clatter of silverware, and the grownups’ laughter and conversation were a bit overwhelming, so Edna and Lizzie just ate.
They smiled shyly at each other as they passed dish after dish and ate hungrily. Edna was a bit heavy, too, Lizzie could tell, because her plate was piled high with lots of food.
Mam had made pecan pie, apple pie, and pumpkin pie for dessert. She served it with vanilla ice cream and frozen strawberries, drawing ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs’ from the appreciative guests. Dat beamed as Mam’s brothers and their wives prais
ed her cooking.
“Annie!” boomed Uncle Eli. “You are about the best cook in all of Pennsylvania, maybe even Ohio!”
“Oh, now, stop it,” Mam said, bowing her head in humility. But her cheeks were flushed with pleasure, and her eyes were shining as she spooned up her vanilla ice cream and strawberries. Lizzie was so glad Mam was a good cook and felt very proud of her. Dat was telling Uncle Eli that was why he had to mow the yard in the evening, because he ate too well.
After dinner the men sat under the apple trees in the yard, and Lizzie, Edna, Emma, and Fronie played in the playhouse. Fronie was the mom, and Emma was the dad, so Edna and Lizzie were the children. They had so much fun that when it was time to start packing up to return to Jefferson County, Edna said she had a notion to stay in the playhouse, under the couch, so Uncle Eli couldn’t find her.
Lizzie put her hand over her mouth and giggled. She was so glad Edna liked her, because Lizzie just loved Edna. She liked Fronie, too, of course, but Edna was just special.
When they all piled into the van, Lizzie stood with Edna and took her hand. “Will you write to me when Aunt Mary writes to Mam?” she asked.
“Oh, of course I will, if you write me back,” Edna replied, squeezing Lizzie’s hand.
“’Bye, Edna,” Lizzie said soberly.
“’Bye, Lizzie,” said Edna, as she stepped up and sat beside Fronie. Lizzie stepped back and waved as Mam and Dat said their good byes, closing the door and stepping back as the van moved slowly off.
Lizzie waved and waved, until they turned onto the road going past their house. She turned to Emma and they looked at each other. “Boy, Emma,” Lizzie breathed, “making friends isn’t even one bit hard.”
They both agreed that they were their best cousins ever, and wished they could comb their hair like the Jefferson County cousins.
chapter 13
Potato Soup
After the Jefferson County cousins left, Lizzie was often feeling restless, which she didn’t understand. She would soon be nine years old and school would be starting, but she felt bored, even with Dolly and the playhouse. Some days she even wished she did not have to go to school, because it was just the same as the year before.