A Wells Landing Christmas

by Amy Lillard

  “Are you sure?”

  “Positive.” She smiled to reinforce her words.

  From outside, a car horn sounded. “That’s my ride.”

  Zeb studied her once more, and she squirmed under his scrutiny. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  “Jah. Of course.” But she felt different. Somehow, someway, something inside her had changed.

  “Sei brauf,” he said. Behave yourself.

  She smiled. “You do the same.” Though she wanted to ask him what he thought she would be doing. She was purposefully going when Logan Dallas wouldn’t be there. She had avoided him for the last two days. But as she got into the car with her Englisch driver, she realized that Zeb had no idea who Logan Dallas was, because she hadn’t told him. Now anything she had said on the matter would have only made her look incredibly guilty.

  * * *

  She had to have one of the cemetery grounds workers show her where Ethan’s grave was. It was too soon to put up a headstone. She had looked at the mound of dirt that covered a man who had once been her friend, but there was no closure. Once-beautiful flowers framed the grave, but the cold air had wilted them to sad petals that dropped every time the wind blew. She hadn’t thought about sending flowers. Why hadn’t she sent flowers?

  She wasn’t sure what she had expected when she came here, but it was more than what she left with. Maybe she simply wanted answers to questions that had none.

  Or maybe she wanted to know what Ethan had known about her. She could see it in his eyes each time she visited. He knew something about her that she didn’t even know herself. But what?

  Her tears fell, warm against her cool cheeks. She reached into the pocket of her coat for a tissue, only to find other papers in there as well. She pulled them out. It was an envelope. The envelope Angie had given her after Ethan had died. It was from Ethan. She had forgotten all about it. Or perhaps she had wanted to save it, this last piece of such a special man.

  What better time to read it than while standing at his final resting place? She slipped the paper from the envelope and began reading.

  My dear Ivy,

  I can honestly say that I was well and truly blessed when you came into my life. I know we only knew each other for a short time, but you made my last few weeks very happy ones. I thank you for that more than you will ever know.

  But even as you brought me joy, I could see the hurt and confusion in your eyes. I told you about Mary, Jesus, and the grace of God. Everything else is up to you. Well, it is now. If you have this letter, it’s because I’ve passed.

  Tears sprang into her eyes, but she blinked them away. The time for crying was no more.

  When I first met you, I could sense the searching inside you. I don’t even know if you recognized it yourself. But once you do, it may take some time, but don’t give up. You will find your place. I know that as certainly as I know my own name. God is good, and He takes care of those who follow Him. In all ways.

  Ever faithfully yours,

  Ethan Dallas

  She pulled the second paper from underneath and read the poem typed there.

  Now Is Not the Time for Tears

  Now is not the time for tears, for I have laughed . . .

  I have walked through the meadows and ran through the fields.

  Now is not the time for tears, for I have loved . . .

  And I have been loved. I never knew a stranger, only friends.

  For every man is the face of God.

  Now is not the time for tears, for I have seen . . .

  The ocean blue, the mountain snow.

  The beauty of this world will never fade.

  Now is not the time for tears, for I have been . . .

  I have joined with my fellow man,

  and I pray leave this world better than I found it.

  Now is not the time for tears, for I have lived . . .

  In happiness and in sorrow.

  When the wind brushes through your hair, I am there.

  In every heartbeat, every breath, every joy and remorse.

  Now is not the time for tears, for I am not gone.

  He had said some of those very words to her before he died. He had lived. He had left the world a better place. He had left her a better person, just from having known him.

  “You will be missed, Ethan Dallas.” She blew a kiss toward the mound of dirt and hoped that somewhere in heaven he caught it. She knew he was there. How? Because he knew that was where he was going. And that was enough for her.

  She folded the letter and poem, placed them back into the envelope, and gently slid it into her pocket. She wanted to save the letter, to keep it safe so she could read it again and again. She wanted to have it when the confusion cleared, when she found out that purpose which had eluded her for so long.

  The driver had the car running by the time she walked from the grave site to the cemetery road where he was waiting.

  “All done?”

  “Jah,” she said as she slid into the back seat.

  “Home then?” he asked.

  She shook her head. “Whispering Pines Senior Living Center, if you don’t mind.”

  “Not at all.” He put the car into gear, and down the road they went.

  She contemplated why she had told him to take her to the retirement home, but could come up with no rightful answer as the miles zipped by. Maybe just to see it again, tell Angie that she would come next week and help take down all the Christmas decorations. She would read to other residents, talk with them, visit with them, anything and everything she could do to make their lives a little brighter. Because it was one thing she knew she could do. That in itself was special.

  She wouldn’t be able to stay long, not with a driver waiting. So perhaps just making sure it was still there was more her goal. Whatever it was, she wanted to see it before she went home.

  “Can you wait for a moment?” Ivy asked. “I just need to tell a friend something, then I’ll be right back out.”

  “Sure.” He was a good driver, and she vowed to give him a healthy tip for his service.

  Ivy raced to the door of the home, her coattails flapping behind her despite the chilly weather.

  Angie was at her place at the desk, as usual. Just the person she wanted to see.

  “Will Monday afternoon be all right for taking down the ornaments?”

  Angie seemed a bit startled. Perhaps Ivy should have said hello first. But Angie recovered quickly and gave a small nod. “Sure. They can wait until then.”

  “Good.” She smiled and was on her way back out the door when she heard his voice.

  “Ivy.”

  She stopped mid-stride and turned to face him. “Hello, Logan.”

  What was it about the man that made her feel tingly? He was handsome, sure, but so was Zeb. He was godly. Again, Zeb was too. Maybe it was the way he looked at her when she spoke, as if every word was plated in gold and more valuable than the last.

  “I thought I heard you out here.”

  She nodded dumbly. “I thought you would be gone.”

  He gave a casual shrug. “These things take time, you know.”

  She didn’t really, but she nodded again as if she understood completely. Then she realized she looked like one of those wobbly-headed statues that some people put in their cars. She stopped.

  “Good luck to you,” she said. This would be the last time she would see him, she was certain. “And Godspeed.”

  “What’s your hurry?”

  She jerked a thumb over one shoulder. “I have a car waiting.”

  “I can drive you home,” he offered.

  “Isn’t that nice,” Angie drawled. Ivy wished she could kick her. Not real hard, but hard enough to get her to shut her mouth.

  “It is,” Ivy agreed. “Really nice, but I should be going.”

  “Too bad.” Logan rapped his knuckles against the receiving desk. “I was going to ask if you could come with me to get a piece of that famous Kauffman pie. Maybe we could talk
a little about my grandfather.”

  She wanted to say no. How she wanted to say no—but even stronger was the need to say yes.

  “Okay. Let me pay the driver.” She refused to look at Angie as she walked away. She heard the woman stifle a squeal and knew what she was thinking. But most people didn’t realize just how impossible a mixed relationship like Amish and Englisch could be. She might be going to get a piece of pie with Logan, but that was all it would be. Pie, nothing more.

  * * *

  They weren’t the only ones in Kauffmans’ eating pie, and she knew that word of this little get-together would be all over by sundown. She didn’t care. She sniffed, stiffened her spine, and pretended this was the best time a girl could have. Not that she had to pretend very much. Logan was as sweet as his grandfather, maybe even more. He was handsome, and she could tell that all eyes were on them. Most likely on him, as the women watched under the hood of their lashes, both Amish and Englisch alike.

  “What do you call that one?” Logan pointed to her pie with the prongs of his fork.

  “Bob Andy pie.” She sliced off another bite with the side of her fork and ate it with gusto.

  “Why’s it called that?”

  She smiled. “The story goes that a farmer’s wife made him the pie, and he said it was so good. It was as good as his two best horses, Bob and Andy. The name just stuck.”

  “For real?”

  “I have no idea,” she said truthfully.

  “And what’s it taste like?”

  She grinned around her bite. “Good.”

  “Seriously.”

  “Sort of like caramel pie but not as caramel-y. A little like pecan pie without the nuts. Maybe a little like chess pie, but not as—”

  “Chessy,” he supplied.

  She laughed. “I was going to say boring. This has cinnamon and nutmeg to spice it up a bit.”

  “You think chess pie is boring?”

  “It is when you compare it to this.”

  He looked down at his own pie, then longingly at hers. They hadn’t talked about one thing of importance since they sat down. They had talked about the town, the empty shops, the home shops like Fitch’s Furniture Store. The franchises. It seemed that Logan was very interested in their little town. Either that or he was trying to be polite.

  “Give me a bite,” he said.

  “No way.” She shook her head. “I told you to get something more Amish-y.”

  “What’s more Amish than apple crumble pie?”

  “Shoofly pie, buttermilk pie, peanut butter pie, vinegar pie—”

  “Wait. Hold up. Vinegar pie?”

  “Jah.”

  “Will the Amish make pie out of anything?”

  She smiled. “Pretty much.”

  “I think I’ll stick with this.” He took a bite of his apple pie. “Mmmm, so good and so normal.”

  “You don’t have a sense of adventure.”

  He sat back looking falsely affronted. “I do so. I just got back from a year in Central America.”

  Okay, he had her with that one. “When it comes to food.”

  “I’ll have you know, I eat all local food when I’m on a mission. It builds up trust and camaraderie.”

  “Fine. When it comes to pie. You have no sense of adventure when it comes to pie.”

  “I think they should be made out of something sweet,” he said.

  “Anything can be made into pie.”

  “Even vinegar?”

  “Even vinegar.”

  “How do you take something so sour and make it into this?” He gestured toward his plate.

  “I can’t give away all our secrets.”

  “Which means either you don’t know or the pie is terrible.”

  “Not terrible, but the best pie in town is down the street at Esther’s Bakery.”

  “I saw that when we drove in. If they have the best, why did we come here?”

  “Because you said this was where you wanted to eat.”

  “I could have been persuaded.”

  “I work there,” she said bluntly. She hadn’t taken him there because she worked there, and she hadn’t wanted anyone to know that they’d had dessert together. Like everyone here at Kauffmans’ doesn’t know.

  She pushed that voice aside. “You can be persuaded as to where to eat pie, but not what kind of pie to eat.”

  “That’s right.” His smile was so bright and warm that it almost made her forget about everything. Zeb. The baby. Forgiveness.

  She ducked her head and went back to her dessert.

  Almost.

  Chapter Nineteen

  “What’s it like?” she asked several quiet moments later. Somehow the conversation had turned from playful to intense. Or was that her imagination?

  “What’s what like?”

  “Living in another country.”

  He looked around at all the people, the tables in the restaurant, the cars whizzing past outside. “Different,” he finally said. “At least, different than this. We’re out in the middle of nothing, jungle all around, then suddenly there’s a little village, but not a village. Just a group of houses in shambles.”

  She tried to imagine what that was like, but no picture would come to her.

  “These people are so poor. They’re hungry. The water supply is low or barely drinkable.”

  “And you correct all that?”

  “We dig wells, help with crops, repair their houses, build new ones.”

  Ethan had told her that his grandson had built houses for the poor. He had failed to mention all the other things. They were turning villages from starving hovels into thriving communities.

  “That sounds wonderful.”

  “It is. And hard and fulfilling.”

  She could only imagine.

  “There are a couple of Amish boys on our team.”

  “Really?”

  “I say Amish. I think they’re more Mennonite. There’s a difference, right?”

  “Jah. There’s a difference.” She hid her indulgent smile.

  “These boys come down from Belize. There’s a settlement there, did you know that?”

  She shook her head. Mennonite boys from Belize building houses in Central America for those less fortunate. “There were a couple of people from here who went to Haiti to help them.”

  He nodded. “There’s something wonderful about helping others.”

  There was. She knew that from her own experience. How long had it been since she had helped her fellow man?

  “You helped my grandfather,” he said. “You’ll never know how much that means to me.”

  “I didn’t do anything.”

  “You did everything. You ate pudding with him. Played games with him, watched TV with him. You were his friend.”

  “And he was mine,” she said in return.

  “Thank you for that. Thank you for having a giving soul and giving part of it to him.”

  * * *

  Part of her soul. She figured it was as good an analogy as any. She had given part of herself to Ethan and in return received something from him. But she still had the feeling that something else was about to happen.

  “You can drop me off here,” she said, pointing to the phone shanty that was a couple of houses down from hers.

  “I can take you home,” he said. “I may not know much about the Amish, but I know that’s not a real house.”

  “My house is down a ways.”

  “Then I should take you there.” He made to put the car into gear, but she laid a hand on his arm to stop him.

  “Please,” she said.

  He sighed and got out of the car. “You know this goes against everything my mother ever taught me about being a gentleman,” he said as he opened the door for her.

  “It has nothing to do with that,” she countered. It had to do with questions and hurt feelings, confusion and indecision. She couldn’t avoid them altogether, but she could delay them a bit.

  “If you say so,” h
e grumbled.

  “I do.” She slipped the strap of her purse a little higher onto her shoulder and shifted in place. “Thanks for the pie.”

  “Thanks for going with me.”

  “Have a safe trip back to . . . to . . .”

  “Costa Rica,” he supplied.

  “Costa Rica,” she said, then repeated the name in her mind to lodge it there. Costa Rica.

  “Thank you again for looking out for my grandfather.”

  She nodded. “I wish you had gotten here before . . .”

  “Me too.” He took a step closer, his arms opening to give her a hug. That wasn’t something Amish girls did, hugging Englisch men on the side of the road, but she wanted that one last contact with him. It was as if he might have the answers she had been hoping to get from his grandfather.

  He stepped back, but still held her arms in his hands. “Take care of yourself, Ivy Weaver,” he said.

  “Sei brauf,” she returned.

  He frowned.

  “It means behave yourself.”

  “I like that.” He released her then, and she was free to walk away. Except she didn’t want to. Why? What sort of hold did Logan Dallas have over her? She might not ever know.

  She turned on one heel and started for her house. It took everything in her power not to turn around and watch him drive away.

  Her nose was numb by the time she made it to the porch. Zeb must have been watching. He bounded outside and pulled her in.

  “I was worried sick about you.”

  “Which of you by worrying can add one cubit to his stature?” she paraphrased.

  “Ivy.” His voice lowered until it was almost a growl.

  Her anger slipped away. “I’m sorry, Zeb. I didn’t mean to sound callous. I’m just not used to having someone worry about me.” But it was more than that. She felt almost guilty being out with Logan when Zeb was here at her house caring for her grandfather.

  “Yonnie worries about you.”

  She looked over to where he sat on the couch, head back as he snored, feet propped up before him. He sure looked worried to her. “Uh-huh.”

  “Well, he does.” He lifted her coat from her shoulders so she could easily slip her arms from the sleeves. In a minute he had her coat, scarf, and gloves hung by the door, ready for her next outing.