Between a Wok and a Hard Place

by Tamar Myers

  I fully expected Freni to go ballistic upon hearing that Terry Slock had played the role of a vampire; Amish theology and vampires don’t mix. I glanced back at the table just long enough to see that Freni was calmly slicing the offensive coil.

  “Well, at least the movie star is a nice man,” she said. “That’s more than I can say about the doctor.”

  “Oh?” I said, leading her tongue into temptation.

  She grabbed a wad of butter and rubbed it vigorously along the insides of several baking pans. For a brief moment self-discipline and self-expression battled it out. In the end, experience won.

  “He is not a friendly man, Magdalena. Yesterday I asked him a simple question about my bunions, and he told me to make an appointment with a podiatrist. When I told him we didn’t have one in Hernia, he said I should see my primary care physician. He didn’t even offer to look at my feet.”

  “Your feet are beneath him, dear. Wilmar Brack is a world-famous osteopath.”

  “Famous shamus,” Freni mumbled as she plopped the rolls into the pans. “I saw that back brace he invented, and I wouldn’t put that on a plow mule.”

  “It won him a Nobel prize,” I said.

  “And made him millions,” Freni said, and gave me an accusing look.

  “Man does not live by bread alone. Or even cinnamon rolls.”

  Freni limped over to the oven, a pan of rolls in each hand. “As far as I’m concerned, you have only one good English in this batch.”

  I knew exactly what and who she meant, and she wasn’t referring to the rolls. To the Amish all outsiders are English. Without a doubt the good one in this case was Ms. Shirley Pearson, a high-level executive of Silver Spoon Foods. I’m sure you’ve heard of them— they make that new breakfast cereal Chocolate Troglodytes, of which Susannah is so fond. At any rate, I am all for women in high places, and if the truth be known, I jockeyed my applicant’s list around and bumped her ahead of a few very wealthy, but less wholesome folks.

  “Ms. Pearson is very pleasant,” I agreed.

  “She dresses sensibly.”

  “Maybe too sensibly.”

  The oven door slammed. “Ach, what is that supposed to mean?”

  “She dresses plain,” I said.

  I didn’t mean that as a slight, merely a statement of fact. Ms. Pearson with her mid-calf skirts, and her elbow-length sleeves, could have traded dresses with the “plain” women of a number of Pennsylvania Dutch sects. Her shoes were boxy brown oxfords, the kind Susannah referred to as clodhoppers. And it wasn’t only her clothes that set her apart from past and present female guests. Ms. Pearson was totally devoid of ornamentation, be it cosmetics or jewelry. She wore her dark blond hair in braids piled at the back of her head and held in place with bobby pins. It was not the look I expected to see from an important executive.

  “Yah, plain is good,” Freni said stubbornly.

  “Freni, the woman is—”

  I was interrupted by a high-pitched wail that could only mean one thing. My sister was home. I whirled.

  Susannah swirled in. I mean that literally. My sister wears neither slacks nor dresses, but outfits consisting of yards and yards of flowing fabric. Just one of her getups could clothe an entire, small, third world country. And so as to not speak critically of my sister twice, I will tell you here that she owns a very small and nasty dog, Shnookums, which she carries around in her purse and, upon occasion, in her bra.

  “You’re home!” Freni and I chorused. Susannah had only recently been hired by a paint company in Bedford, Pennsylvania, to name their color chips.

  “I was fired!” Susannah wailed, and flung herself into my arms.

  There followed a pitiful yelp, which led me to conclude that the despicable Shnookums was spending the day aloft.

  I steered the poor girl over to the nearest chair. “Tell me what happened.”

  “I told you, Mags. I was fired. I worked there for only a month, and then they fired me.”

  “Why?” Susannah, much to everyone’s surprise, had loved the job and thrown herself into it.

  “Oh, they did some stupid survey and it said that sales were down on account of my color names.”

  I patted her comfortingly. There was not much I could say. I had tried to warn her that Mucus Mellow was never going to replace Buttercup, and as for Gonad Green—I shuddered at the thought.

  “Ach, there’ll be other jobs,” Freni said. She peered into the oven, willing the rolls to rise further and turn a light golden brown.

  Susannah sat slumped in her chair, like a pile of unfolded laundry. “What jobs?” she asked weakly.

  “You could help out here.”

  It was a radical thought. Before our parents died a dozen years ago they wisely left the farm under my control. Even at age twenty-four my sister could out-laze the most shiftless of teenagers—not that all teenagers are shiftless, mind you, but you know what I mean. Susannah could sleep for thirty-six hours and not have to use the bathroom. When she was awake, her spine was incapable of supporting her in an upright position.

  I am ashamed to admit that my sister did not outgrow this adolescent characteristic, until the paint chip job came along. That first day, when she got up with the chickens, Freni and I both went into shock. Even Freni’s husband Mose, who is never shaken, examined Susannah’s pupils with a flashlight to see if she was sleepwalking.

  “Yah, I could use some help,” Freni said. “What with your sister taking off to play policeman.”

  Susannah sat up. “What?”

  I filled her in. It was already clear I had made a colossal mistake. Two, in fact.

  “How much will you pay me to help out?” Susannah asked.

  The nerve of that girl. She gets a hefty allowance, plus room, board, and the occasional use of my car just because we share more genes than two pairs of identical twins.

  “I’ll double your allowance,” I said generously, “but you have to earn it.”

  “I’m thirty-six years old, Mags, and I still get an allowance! I want a salary.”

  “Then call it a salary, dear. Already you get enough money to support two Democrats or one Republican.”

  The oven door slammed, although nothing had been taken out. “Why Magdalena Portulacca Yoder Miller! I slave over a hot stove for you day and night, and do I get my salary doubled?”

  “Freni, please! I pay you plenty.”

  Freni yanked the oven mitt off her right hand and wagged a finger at me. “I want my allowance doubled, too. On principle.”

  That would make Freni the highest-paid professional cook in Bedford County, but since I could afford it, and she was both family and a friend, why not?

  “Okay. But you have to stop serving headcheese to the English just to see their reactions.”

  Freni nodded. Among her kind, that was as binding as a vow.

  “No fair,” Susannah wailed. “I’m your sister, so I should get mine tripled then.”

  I sighed wearily. I was breaking. I would have admitted to being Anonymous if anyone had asked.

  “Fine. Just get to work.”

  “Magdalena?” Freni was staring at me through flour-dusted glasses.

  “Freni, you’ll still be making more than Susannah. She really was getting only an allowance. I mean—”

  The oven door slammed and a pan of half-baked rolls came crashing down on the heavy plank table. “I quit!”

  Chapter Three

  I woke up from my mid-morning nap with a splitting headache. The phone was ringing.

  “What?” I may have snapped.

  “Mags?”

  It was Aaron. My husband. My Pooky Bear.

  “So how is Minnesota?” I asked, after we had exchanged a few intimate words which I will not share with you.

  “Cold. I wish I was back home.”

  “Aaron, it’s August, so it couldn’t be that cold. And if it is, why don’t you come back home?”

  There was a long pause which, had it been pregnant, would have
doubled the world’s population. “So, you’ve started nagging again, have you?”

  “I’m not nagging, dear. It’s just that I don’t understand why you had to go there in the first place.”

  “I told you, Magdalena, I had some loose ends to tie up.”

  “What kind of loose ends?”

  Those were wasted words. Aaron’s lips were sealed tighter on the subject than a clam at low tide. All I knew was that Aaron had once spent several years in Minnesota, between the Vietnam War and his repatriation in Hernia as the Prodigal Son.

  Aaron was born and raised a Mennonite, and as a member of an officially recognized pacifist group, could have done alternative service to the military. Instead, my Pooky Bear had actually volunteered, thereby breaking his pop’s heart. I didn’t even know he still had Minnesota on the mind, until just three nights ago when the phone rang. Aaron took that call, so I had no idea who it was, or why. Had I been strong enough to use a crowbar on my hubby’s mouth, I might have given that a try. The silence was deafening.

  “Well, if you keep that up, I’m not going to be able to get a word in edgewise,” I said. I said it playfully. I was trying to lighten the mood a little.

  “I should have expected something like this,” he had the nerve to say. “Pops warned me.”

  “Pops?”

  That did it. The old coot he calls Pops was living under my roof, and sponging off my generosity. I had given Aaron Sr. a place to stay even before I married his son because I felt sorry for him—and because I loved Aaron. But it was mismanagement, pure and simple, that cost Aaron Sr. his farm. It wasn’t like he fell on hard times through no fault of his own. Yet here he was, accusing me of—

  “Just what did your father say?” I demanded.

  I could hear my Pooky Bear gulp. “That just sort of slipped out, Magdalena. I mean, Pops was only looking out for my welfare.”

  “Well, Pops is going to be looking out for his own welfare, if he doesn’t watch his tongue,” I said, not watching mine.

  There was another silence during which the population of the world tripled.

  “Magdalena?” he said at last.

  My pregnant pause wouldn’t have populated Rhode Island.

  “Yes?”

  “I don’t want us to fight anymore. This isn’t how I imagined it.”

  “Me either.”

  “I’ll be back soon, Magdalena, I promise. And I’m bringing back a surprise.”

  Well, that was more like it! “All wrapped up with pretty bows?”

  Aaron laughed. His laughter had the ability to make me think impure thoughts. But then again, now that I was married, they weren’t impure after all, were they?

  I laughed, too.

  It was a good thing my mood had improved when I answered a persistent knocking at my door an hour later. It was none other than Pops. The old coot himself.

  “Yes?” I asked calmly.

  Aaron Sr. was once a handsome man like his son. Now that the black hair has turned white, and the broad shoulders are slightly stooped, he is only a little less handsome. The widows at Beechy Grove Mennonite Church agree with me, and have made him their summer project. The fact that he is poorer than a church mouse’s debtor hasn’t dawned on them. Or perhaps it has, and they think the old geezer will outlive me, and somehow inherit my estate. Fat chance.

  “I need to talk to you, Magdalena.” My Aaron’s eyes were blue as well, only brighter.

  “I’ll say.” I ushered him into my room and offered him the only chair. I sat on the edge of my bed. The door was wide open, in case you’re wondering.

  “Now, what’s this I hear about you warning Aaron not to marry me?”

  He looked genuinely surprised. Startled even.

  “Well, never mind that. What did you want to talk about?”

  “Do you believe in flying saucers, Magdalena?”

  “You’re serious?”

  “Yah. Do you?”

  What a question. We Mennonites tend to believe that while God created a vast and wondrous universe, he created only one world, if you know what I mean. On the other hand, so many of my guests have reported close encounters of their own, that I have decided to reserve the right to be skeptical. Believe me, this is stretching the envelope for someone of my background.

  “I don’t believe they exist,” I said honestly. “But I’m not sure they don’t. Is that answer good enough for you?”

  “Yah, that’s a good answer. I would have said the same thing yesterday.”

  “And today?” I asked. It is possible there was a trace of impatience in my voice.

  He smoothed an imaginary wrinkle in his gray polyester pants. “Last night—early this morning, really, I saw a flying saucer.”

  I stared at him. As much as I hate to admit it, there was a difference hearing those words come from my father-in-law’s lips, and, let’s say, a Harvard-educated man who makes over a million dollars a year. Or even a high school-educated movie star who makes ten million dollars a year.

  “Pop–”

  “Oh, I know, Magdalena, now you’re going to think I’m crazy, on top of being meddlesome, but I saw what I saw.”

  “Little green men with big bald heads?”

  “I didn’t see the occupants. I only saw the saucer.”

  I decided to humor him. After all, he was my Pooky Bear’s father. Besides, if I was eighty-one and the Easter bunny came to visit, I would want someone to listen to me.

  “Do tell,” I said politely.

  “Well, I only saw it for a few seconds. It landed in my pasture across the road.”

  Poor man. That cow pasture wasn’t even his, but belonged to a corporation called The Beef Trust, composed of Pops and his sisters. The farm, under Pops’s care, had lost money over the years. When the farm sold, most of the money would go to repay debts. Pops’s undoubtedly small share wouldn’t even see him inside the front door of Hernia’s Home for the Mennonite Aged, much less keep him there the rest of his unnaturally long life.

  Enter a developer who showed a keen interest in Pops’s property. Unfortunately the man was threatening to build Hernia’s first real shopping center smack dab in the middle of it. I say threatening, because several Amish families had banded together and were preparing to make Pops an offer he couldn’t refuse. The odds were though that the Amish offer would fall far below that of the developer and would not be accepted. Of course that would be a shame—although it would be nice to have a Wal-Mart and a Payless within walking distance. One must consider progress, after all.

  Or would it be so nice? What would the rich and famous prefer to view as they rocked on my front porch; a giant parking lot, or a green pasture dotted with grazing cows? It didn’t take a genius to figure that one out. No doubt even Melvin Stoltzfus would come up with the right answer if given three tries. Although Aaron Jr. might not be happy with my decision, I was going to figure out some way to get the Amish families to raise a donation large enough to impress the developer.

  “Magdalena? Did you hear what I said?”

  I smiled. “Of course, dear. You saw a flying saucer land across the road. How nice for you.”

  Aaron Sr. muttered something that sounded vaguely insulting and left the room.

  I had two missions now, one foisted on me by Melvin, the other placed on my shoulders like a mantle—well, it was sort of a revelation. At any rate, I certainly didn’t have time to shmooze with Wilmar Brack, the back specialist. He had no business lurking in the hallway just outside my room.

  Allow me to describe the PennDutch briefly to you. At one time it was a large, two-story farmhouse built by my great-great-grandfather, Jacob “The Strong” Yoder. At that time it had four bedrooms to house himself, his wife (my great-great-grandmother, of course!) and their sixteen children.

  It had undergone extensive remodeling since then. Guests are required to enter through the front door the first time, and when they do they find themselves in a vestibule that contains a counter topped with a cash
register and a rack of colorful and informative brochures describing area attractions.

  A door on the right opens into a large sitting room, complete with a stone fireplace. This is the least changed room in the place. Great-great Granny Yoder used to cook stews in a large cast-iron kettle suspended from the hearth. Legend has it she hid the baby under the pot when they were attacked by Delaware Indians. The pot, now spilling over with a plethora of petunias, graces the front porch of the Inn.

  Adjacent to the sitting room is the recreation room, the newest addition to the Inn. While I would prefer that my guests amuse themselves with Scrabble and quilting, they have a preference for treadmills and television. But it is my establishment after all, and the waiting list is long. The treadmill they got, the television they did not. Call me old-fashioned, but the road to hell is paved with remote controls.

  To the left of the foyer is the dining room, with its massive table, around which my guests are expected to take their meals together. Behind the dining room is the kitchen which, for as long as I can remember, has been Freni’s domain. Even when Mama was alive, Freni cooked for us. Back then it was her job to feed the farmhands.

  Directly in back of the vestibule is the only downstairs bedroom—until recently mine. Of course now I share it with Aaron. If the truth be told—and this must never get back to Aaron—I was actually looking forward to having it back all to myself for a few days. I hadn’t realized just how luxurious, and perhaps decadent, it is to be able to sprawl completely across a bed and not brush up against anyone. I believe firmly in a biblical hell, and the best metaphor I can come up with for it is a shared bathroom. Mine should be the only hair to clog the shower drain.

  Upstairs are all the guest rooms, along with Susannah’s room, and the suite I had built for Pops. Before you criticize me soundly for having stashed an octogenarian upstairs, at least allow me to state that we now have an elevator connecting the two floors. The impossibly steep staircase of yesteryear is still there, however, because it adds a certain quaintness.