Levi froze with his mug halfway to his lips, as if he’d just remembered why he’d come in the first place. He put his mug down, stuck his finger in the cocoa, and pushed the remaining marshmallows around. Yost almost scolded him, but the poor boy was just about to experience the wrath of Bitsy Kiem, and even though Yost didn’t know exactly what that would be, a woman who painted her fingernails and might or might not have a tattoo wasn’t likely to show much Christian charity. But it had to be done. Levi needed to learn that actions had consequences and that if a boy lost his integrity, he had nothing of value left.
Levi kept stirring and staring faithfully at the three remaining marshmallows in his mug. “I . . . I wanted to start my own beehive to earn money to buy a scooter.”
Bitsy scrunched her lips to one side of her face. “Believe me, Levi, a beehive won’t make anybody rich.”
“I borrowed three bee board things from your shed—”
“Stole three bee board things from my shed.”
Gute. Bitsy wasn’t going to let Levi get away with making it less than it was.
Levi frowned. “Okay. I stole three bee board things from your shed, and you didn’t notice.”
Bitsy leaned back in her chair. “I don’t know why you think I didn’t notice. They went missing August tenth or maybe the eleventh. And they’re called frames.”
Levi widened his eyes. “I guess you noticed. I put the board things—the frames—in a cardboard box and set the box right in the middle of the Chidesters’ sunflower patch, where no one could see it. I wanted to catch some bees for my hive.”
Bitsy didn’t smile, but she seemed to grow more and more amused with every word that came out of Levi’s mouth. “You wanted to catch some bees?”
Levi lifted his chin. “I’m not a dumkoff. The bees would come if I had more boxes. I just need to start earlier. In the spring.”
Bitsy smirked. “Just because you’re named after a pair of pants doesn’t give you permission to be too big for your britches, Levi Weaver. You don’t know the first thing about starting your own hive.”
Levi deflated like a balloon. “It doesn’t matter, because they’re ruined now.”
Bitsy narrowed her eyes. “Ruined?”
“I put the box in the barn for the winter, and our horse stepped in it. Dat found the smashed frames and got wonderful mad.”
“I don’t wonder that he did,” Bitsy said.
“But Dat don’t have time so Dawdi brought me over to say I’m sorry.”
“And to pay you back,” Yost added, to be sure Bitsy knew they meant to make it right.
Bitsy pinned Levi with a stern look that carried a hint of compassion with it. “You’re the oldest in your family, aren’t you, Levi?”
“Jah.”
“Your mamm is busy with eight little ones, including a new set of twins.”
Levi nodded.
“Do you help her with the babies?”
Levi stirred his cocoa with his finger again. “Sometimes. Mostly she says I’m underfoot and to go find something else to do. She barely notices me. I thought she would like it if I caught some bees.”
Bitsy rested her chin in her hand. “Do you help your dat on the farm?”
Levi shrugged. “I guess. He’s gone a lot working on houses. Amos and me milk the cow and muck out.”
Bitsy nodded. “Your dat works construction out of town sometimes. And cuts wood for the mill.”
Yost pressed his lips together. Reuben, his son, wasn’t home very often. Maybe Levi needed his dawdi more than they all realized.
“He once got a splinter two inches long,” Levi said, maybe hoping that Bitsy would feel sorry for him.
Bitsy looked up at the ceiling, and Yost thought she would launch into prayer at any moment. It did look like she was having a conversation with someone up there because she frowned and rolled her eyes and scrunched her lips together, but she didn’t speak out loud so Yost couldn’t be sure.
“Well, Levi,” she finally said, “I’ve needed some excitement in my life for months. I’ve thought about getting a real tattoo or cutting my hair short or even buying a television so I can watch The Bachelor, but what would really be fun is starting a candle business. What do you think?”
“I suppose.”
“What do you mean you suppose? I’ve already bought some candle molds. I’ve got bears and beehives and honeypots. I went crazy online at the library and bought a skull mold too. The excitement never stops around here.”
Yost didn’t know where she was taking this strange little story, but they’d been here way past three minutes, and he didn’t want to prolong the agony, especially now that she had started talking about skulls. “If you tell me how much the frames cost, I will pay you the money and then Levi can work off his debt on my farm.”
Bitsy’s mouth fell open, and she squinted as if trying to see him clearly. “That’s a terrible idea.”
Well, he wouldn’t have to guess what Bitsy thought. And he grudgingly admitted to himself that she was right. It was a terrible idea, born out of convenience and the wish to get out of there as soon as possible.
She turned to Levi and ignored Yost, probably hoping he wouldn’t think of any more bad ideas. “As I was saying, I want to start a candle business, but I need an assistant to help me melt and pour wax and clean up and do candle-making things. Would you like to help?”
Levi stopped stirring, but his finger still dangled into his cocoa. “I guess. I don’t know.”
“You’ve got to be more decisive than that, young man. Boys who can’t make a decision get led around by the nose by persuasive friends.” She leaned closer to Levi and rested her elbows on the table. “You help me pour wax three days a week, and I will let you sell all the candles at the community craft bazaar in two weeks. And you can keep the money.”
Levi jerked his finger out of the cocoa, and chocolate splattered across Bitsy’s already-unruly kapp. She didn’t even flinch. Levi pretended it hadn’t happened. “You mean you’ll let me keep the money we make?”
Bitsy reached up and pinched a drop of cocoa that was threatening to drip from a strand of hair. “But you’ll have to come three days a week after school, and when you leave, you’ll have to carry a cake or a casserole home to your mamm. What do you say?”
“I say yes!” Levi shoved a bite of cake into his mouth.
Yost loved seeing his grandson so happy, but he couldn’t let such a silly notion go unchecked. “But there’s no penance in making candles if he gets to keep the money. Levi still needs to pay for the broken frames.”
Levi pressed his lips together and glanced at Bitsy. He obviously thought she could solve the problem for him. Hadn’t she just offered to make him rich? Well, as rich as a twelve-year-old Amish boy could hope to be.
Bitsy took a swig of her cocoa that had gone untouched until now. “Ach, he’ll earn his keep. He’ll make candles and run errands and feed the chickens and the hog. Is that good enough?”
Yost couldn’t see anything wrong with Bitsy putting Levi to work, especially when he wasn’t much help at home and Bitsy would make sure he learned how to work. There was only one thing that worried Yost. Three minutes had turned into weeks. How bad of an influence would Bitsy be on his grandson if he were here three times a week?
“If you do a gute job, I’ll give you one of my extra hives and even send away for a queen in the mail. You can start your own hive when it gets warmer.”
Levi jumped from his chair, waved his hand in the air, and whooped like a peacock. “I get my own hive. I get my own hive.”
Bitsy grabbed his hand and pulled him to sit. “Don’t go counting your chickens before they hatch. I’m very strict, and if you don’t do a gute job, you won’t get a thing. Except I might decide to give you one of my cats.”
Levi stuffed another piece of cake into his mouth. “I’ll do a gute job. Mamm says I’m one of her best workers when I keep my head out of the clouds.”
Bitsy pointed her fi
nger at him. “I don’t want any heads in the clouds. That wax will burn your fingers if you don’t pay attention.”
“I will.” Levi’s smile faded, and he eyed Yost. “Can I do it, Dawdi? She’ll give me a beehive.”
Yost cleared his throat. How could he say no when Levi seemed happier than he’d been in months? With his mamm occupied with so many babies and his dat often away from home, Levi tended to get lost in the crowd. Maybe a candle business was just the thing he needed.
Yost searched Bitsy’s face, and warmth spread through his body until he felt as toasty and mushy as a bowl of tapioca pudding with raisins. Why would she do this for a boy she barely knew from a family that didn’t have much to do with her? It would certainly be more of a burden than a help to have an awkward boy in her kitchen, knocking things over, dropping dishes and candles, and complicating the process that she could surely do more efficiently herself. But Levi needed this, and Bitsy, for all her faults, was mindful enough to see it.
Yost’s throat got sort of thick, and he was a little ashamed of himself. He’d judged Bitsy harshly. Amidst the praying aloud and the purple hair, Yost had almost forgotten. Bitsy Kiem was not only an excellent cook, but also a woman of many good works. When Ruth went through her chemo, Bitsy had sent over something delicious from the Honeybee Farm at least once a week. She was known to be someone who was always first to a sickbed or a funeral, and now she was offering to take in a boy who needed some extra attention. Who would Jesus say was the true Christian?
Yost didn’t know why he had expected anything less. Bitsy had a rebellious streak, for sure and certain, but she had been kind to everyone in school, except for the boys who picked on the little kids.
“Can I help Bitsy with her candle business?” Levi said.
Yost nodded slowly. “If I come with you.”
Bitsy squinted and scrunched her lips together, but she didn’t argue. Yost would come with Levi every time he came to Bitsy’s. There were still rules to follow, and Yost was the only one who could make sure Bitsy followed them. For Levi’s sake.
Black fingernail polish and tattoos were not going to be allowed.
Chapter 2
How did Bitsy always seem to get herself into these messes?
It was because she couldn’t bear to say no to someone in trouble. It was definitely one of the burdens of being such a nice person.
She simply wouldn’t turn her back on a little boy who needed a little bit of attention and a wonderful lot of guidance. The beeswax candle idea had come to her out of the blue as she had been sitting at the table trying not to stare into Yost Weaver’s interesting eyes. It had been a gute idea, just not an incredibly convenient one. She had cleaned and rendered several pounds of beeswax earlier in the year, and it sat in her pantry in thick blocks, just waiting to be made into candles. She and Levi would have a wonderful gute time melting it down and forming it into candles. She was looking forward to that part. Levi was a sweet boy, even if he fancied himself more clever than he really was. Boys that age always thought they knew more than anyone else in the world.
But she was dreading the dawdi. Yost Weaver wouldn’t think of leaving his grandson alone in the same room with wicked Bitsy Kiem in case she talked Levi into a pierced ear or a Mohawk.
Hadn’t anybody in the district noticed that Bitsy had done quite an adequate job raising three girls to be very nice and devout Amish women? It was as if her neighbors thought she’d drag them to hell if they got too close. Some days, Bitsy was sorely tempted to wear a pair of horns to church with a pair of red high heels. If they thought she was so wicked, she might as well play the part.
She pulled three saucepans from the cupboard and frowned. She wasn’t being exactly fair to her neighbors. Most of them offered unreserved friendship, even if they had their private reservations about her. The people like Yost Weaver were the exception. The Amish were notoriously set in their ways. Bitsy couldn’t blame them for avoiding what they couldn’t understand.
Those people gave Christians a bad reputation. Although, many of her neighbors thought she was the one who gave Christians a bad reputation, so she couldn’t really point out the mote in their eye. They were wrong, and she was right, but there was no way to convince them of it. She simply couldn’t give up coloring her hair and wearing earrings. She loved how the dangly ones tinkled when she moved her head, and the hair colors gave the neighbors something to gossip about. Why should she spoil their fun?
She heard a noise at the door and opened it. Billy Idol, the ugliest cat in the world, stood on the mat, his paws caked with snow. Leonard Nimoy and Sigourney Weaver, two more of Bitsy’s cats, were covered head to toe with snow. They’d obviously been having some sort of battle, and Billy Idol looked as if he’d gotten the better of them.
“Billy Idol, you’ve got to stop picking on Leonard and Sigourney. You’ll soon have no friends left.” Who was she fooling? Billy Idol didn’t have any friends at all—except for maybe her nephew-in-law Luke. Billy Idol and Luke seemed to get along just fine. Probably because they were so much alike.
Bitsy spread a towel on the floor, and the cats rolled around on it to dry off.
It was too bad Yost felt the need to babysit his grandson. Or maybe it was her he thought he had to babysit. She shouldn’t have fed him. It was always a mistake to feed a man. They’d keep coming around like stray cats, and Bitsy had no patience for stray cats. She had no patience for any cats. Why in the world did she have four?
Yost was like an attack dog left to guard the cookie jar, watching every move she made, waiting for her to sin so he could report to the bishop or the deacon just what Bitsy Kiem was up to. He was a horrible nuisance. Good-looking, but still a nuisance. He hadn’t let himself go like so many Amish husbands did at his age. Bitsy hadn’t been able to detect an ounce of fat around his middle, and his arms had obviously seen some wonderful-heavy lifting. It wondered Bitsy why Yost hadn’t remarried. Ruth had been gone three or four years, and surely every widow and old maid in the community had set her cap for him. Well, every old maid but Bitsy. Ever since she had moved back to Bienenstock with her nieces, Yost and his family had made a point of steering clear of her.
She had told Yost that she’d gotten over it, but in truth, she still held a grudge. It was a small grudge, because time had certainly made it less important, but it was there in the back of her mind all the same. She couldn’t see how the grudge hurt anybody, and carrying the extra weight on her shoulders probably burned a lot of calories, so she’d never tried to get rid of it. Still, she felt a little down this morning knowing that Yost and Levi were coming, so she had put on her dangliest pair of earrings first thing—partly to make herself feel better and partly to get under Yost’s skin.
She never blamed Yost for choosing not to go to Green Bay with her. His parents loved him, he loved them, and he was happy at church. He had no reason to leave. But she did fault him for not having the courage to at least look her in the eye and tell her he wouldn’t go. She had waited for him on that abandoned road and had never before or since felt so utterly alone.
She should probably forgive him—not that he cared one way or the other. Bitsy had a wunderbarr life with three nieces who loved her, and she didn’t regret one decision she’d made. Well, almost. She looked up to heaven—or at least as far as the ceiling. “Dear Lord, I’m sorry about dyeing my hair that urine color. Denki for trying to warn me. It took months to fade. And I regret the Milli Vanilli concert.” She took a deep breath and expelled it slowly. “And, Lord, I would appreciate it if you could help me forgive Yost Weaver. I shouldn’t hold his past sins against him. You didn’t give him the chicken pox, but I’m assuming he had a heat rash or two. Denki for that.”
A knock on the door made her jump, and she quickly closed her prayer. Yost need never know about Milli Vanilli.
She opened the front door to find Levi grinning from ear to ear and Yost wearing a look of deep, deep concern. She shook her head slightly so her earrings tin
kled. Yost’s concern became an abyss.
“Hallo, Bitsy,” Levi said, strolling into the house without being invited in. Somebody needed to teach that boy some manners.
“Cum reu. If you step on one of the cats, you have to take it home.” Bitsy grabbed the corners of the towel where the cats were sitting and pulled it from in front of the door. Yost looked like he might break if he tried to sit down. Bitsy’s niece Rose always said that anyone could be softened up by a cat. Bitsy scooped up Leonard Nimoy and handed her to Yost. “Here,” she said. “Try this.”
If anything, Yost stiffened even more. “What do I do with this ?”
“You hold it and cuddle it and give it some love.”
He grimaced. “I don’t want to give it some love.”
Bitsy sighed. “Some people just aren’t cat people.” She took the cat from his arms and handed it to Levi. “You like cats?”
Levi shrugged. “I like dogs better, but cats don’t poop in the yard.”
“Would your mamm let you take this one home?”
“Nae,” Yost practically shouted.
He was so adamant that Bitsy had to laugh. “Don’t worry, Yost. I won’t make anyone take a cat home today.”
“Today?”
“I want to soften you up first.”
Yost frowned. “I’m never going to get that soft.”
Bitsy had to agree. Those rock-hard arms were testament to the fact that Yost was a hard worker, and that tended to be a lifelong habit. “I have a way of wearing people down,” she said. “Be on your guard.”
She could tell he didn’t know whether to smile or go back to looking deeply concerned. “I will.”
Bitsy shrugged off Yost Weaver. It was Levi who needed her attention. “Okay, Levi. That’s enough holding the cat. We’re going to make three candles today. I hope you can keep up.”
The Amish Christmas Candle Page 8