Her reporting rival had bumped up a notch to assistant editor awhile back and now latched onto every opportunity to remind Carley of her position.
“Yes, Katrina and I discussed it, Carley, but—”
“She doesn’t like me, Matt.”
Right away she realized the comment sounded childish.
“Not true.” Matt shook his head and pushed an envelope in Carley’s direction. “This is a month’s vacation pay. You’ve accumulated a lot more than that. Take a month off, Carley. Come back refreshed. You should have taken more time off after the accident.”
Carley peered at the envelope on the table as the waitress returned with their lunches and offers of ketchup and extra napkins. “I’m not taking a vacation, Matt. Why should I be forced to use my time right now?”
“Because you wouldn’t like the alternative.” He wrapped his mouth around his burger.
Carley wasn’t hungry for anything except Katrina Peighton’s hide. This was her doing, not Matt’s.
“So let me get this straight. Either I go on vacation or I’m fired?”
“Don’t look at it that way, Carley,” Matt said between bites. “Take advantage of this. I would.”
Her thoughts churned. What will I do? Sit around my big empty house?
No. Too much time to think.
She bargained. “I’ll take a week off.”
“A month, Carley. We will welcome you back with open arms in one month.”
By the end of the meal, she’d reluctantly accepted the envelope. Not that she had any choice in the matter. Matt made it quite clear her vacation started directly after lunch.
2
CARLEY TRIED TO KEEP HER EYES ON THE ROAD AS SHE studied the map laid out beside her on the car seat. She’d never been to Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, but a sign flashed by, indicating twenty-six miles to the town of Paradise. Good. She was on the right track.
She watched the farmland scrolling by and thought about seeing Lillian. Her friend had fled the craziness of Houston a year and a half ago, moved in with her Amish grandparents, married an Amish man, and now happily resided in the town of Paradise with her new family. Carley couldn’t help but wonder how much her friend might have changed. From her initial letters Carley knew Lillian’s grandparents’ farm in Paradise had provided Lillian with a safe haven where she could get her life together. But when Lillian wrote to say she had converted and was staying—that was a lot to swallow. Carley couldn’t get past the lack of electricity, much less the fact that Lillian had married Amish widower Samuel Stoltzfus, become a stepmother to his thirteen-year-old son, and now had a baby of her own.
Of course, Carley knew she had changed too. Everything had changed last Christmas Day . . .
According to Lillian’s letters, she had been baptized in the Amish faith—a required step toward marrying an Amish man. Her friend also adhered to all their Plain customs, including the wardrobe. It was an unbelievable transformation. No television, makeup, jewelry. No computer.
Hmm. Carley eyed her laptop on the floorboard of the rental car. How was she going to charge the battery?
One thing shone through in all Lillian’s letters: she was happy. As a writer, Carley excelled at reading between the lines. She had looked for clues that perhaps Lillian wasn’t as content as she let on. She couldn’t find one. Lillian’s destination seemed to have brought her the peace Carley knew Lillian longed for.
Carley felt like she was still wandering, her own destination unknown.
Which brought her to her current situation. In her last letter to Lillian, Carley had asked her friend if she might come for a visit and do an article about the Amish ways. Lillian quickly responded with an invitation—which Carley accepted the day her forced vacation began. She would put her leave to good use. Even better, she would incorporate work into her trip.
Work would keep her sane.
Lillian popped a loaf of bread into the gas oven. Carley would be hungry when she arrived. Hopefully her friend would like the meatloaf and baked corn casserole she had prepared, along with the chocolate shoofly pie for dessert. If she hurried, she could have the meal ready before Anna woke up for her feeding.
She scanned the wooden table in the middle of the kitchen. It was covered with a variety of jellies and applesauce and some pickled red beets. For a moment she pondered whether she should have tackled the sauerbraten recipe instead. But the meatloaf was a lot less work, and Anna had been fussy all afternoon. She’d fallen behind on the household chores.
Maybe she should have baked a peach pie instead of the rich shoofly with its filling of molasses and brown sugar.
Or maybe she should stop worrying so much about Carley’s arrival. But she couldn’t help it. Their last time together, Lillian had sported blue jeans, a name-brand blouse, stilettos, full makeup and silver jewelry, and a designer handbag.
She tucked a loose strand of hair beneath her white Kapp, glancing down at her blue linen dress covered by a black apron. Her plain black leather shoes were a far cry from the spiked heels of her past.
The screen door slammed shut behind her. Samuel.
“It smells gut in here,” he said, kissing her smile before tossing his hat onto the rack in the den.
“Danki. I hope it’s gut.” She breathed in the aroma of baking bread while she mixed the sauce that would go on top of the meatloaf. “I hope Carley likes it.”
“Your friend will be here soon, no?”
Lillian knew Samuel worried about her Englisch friend coming to visit. They had discussed it, and although Samuel assured her it was fine for Carley to stay with them for the month of May, Lillian also knew Carley’s visit was an exception to an unspoken rule: no outsiders allowed. But it wasn’t that long ago she’d been the outsider in the Old Order Amish district. How quickly a year and a half had gone by.
“She should be here any minute,” Lillian informed Samuel. Plain Pursuit “It’s almost four thirty, and I know you must be hungry. David should be home soon too. He’s at Mamm’s doing some yard work.” She stirred the sauce atop the gas range. “I think you’ll like Carley, Samuel. And she promised me the story she writes for her newspaper will include only things we’re comfortable with.”
She caught the uncertainty on Samuel’s face, which he quickly hid with a half smile. “Ya, I know,” he replied.
“You said there are a lot of misconceptions written about the way we live. Wouldn’t it be nice for someone to get it right in print?” She challenged his skepticism with a playful wink, hoping to alleviate some of his fear.
“Ya, it’s just that . . .” He hesitated, grimacing.
“What?” She turned the fire down under the sauce and slid in beside him at the kitchen table.
“I’m sure everything will be fine, Lillian. I just don’t trust those who print words about our lives, and I don’t know this Englisch woman.”
Lillian grasped his hand. “But I do. And I trust her, Samuel.”
“Then I will trust her too.” He gave her hand a squeeze. “Now where’s my little boppli?”
“Anna should be waking up hungry any minute. I was just trying to finish supper before Carley gets here.” She returned to the sauce, and Samuel stood. “Carley is a gut person, Samuel. Try not to worry.”
As his arms wrapped tightly around her waist, Samuel nuzzled the back of her neck. “You are a gut person, Lillian. Besides, worry is a sin.”
“Ya, it is,” she whispered as she tried to push aside her own worries over Carley’s arrival.
Writing has always been a part of best-selling novelist Beth Wiseman’s life—whether writing books, articles, or a weekly column. When Beth was introduced to the Amish, she gained an appreciation for their simpler way of life and began writing love stories featuring this fascinating and endearing group of people. She and her family live in Texas.
QUAKER SUMMER
For Erin Healy,
my partner in crime.
He has showed you, O man, what is good.
And what does the LORD require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.
—MICAH 6:8
Contents
Part One: The Fool on the Hill
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
NINE
TEN
ELEVEN
TWELVE
THIRTEEN
FOURTEEN
Part Two: The Long and Winding Road
FIFTEEN
SIXTEEN
SEVENTEEN
EIGHTEEN
NINETEEN
TWENTY
TWENTY-ONE
TWENTY-TWO
TWENTY-THREE
TWENTY-FOUR
TWENTY-FIVE
TWENTY-SIX
TWENTY-SEVEN
TWENTY-EIGHT
TWENTY-NINE
THIRTY
THIRTY-ONE
Part Three: I’ll Follow the Sun
THIRTY-TWO
THIRTY-THREE
THIRTY-FOUR
THIRTY-FIVE
THIRTY-SIX
THIRTY-SEVEN
THIRTY-EIGHT
THIRTY-NINE
FORTY
FORTY-ONE
FORTY-TWO
FORTY-THREE
FORTY-FOUR
FORTY-FIVE
FORTY-SIX
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
READING GROUP GUIDE
Part One
* * *
The Fool on the Hill
ONE
Five months ago I raised Gary and Mary Andrews from the dead. I took a wrong turn trying to find a Pampered Chef party to benefit Will’s eighth grade trip to New York City, and there it stood as close to the road as ever, their old house. Superimposed over the improvements of the recent owners, a small bungalow with cracked siding, smeared windowpanes, and a rusted oil tank figured into my vision. The mat of green grass dissolved into an unkempt lot of dirt and weeds supporting a display of junk: an old couch, a defunct Chevy, and rusted entities the purpose of which I never could say.
What happened inside that house remains there. All I know for sure is that Gary and Mary Andrews climbed onto our school bus every morning and never waved good-bye to anybody. We’d pull forward in a throaty puff of diesel, away from that little frame house, its once-white paint as gray as the dirt that always outlined Gary’s hands and shaded behind his ears. As a sixth grader, I didn’t realize children weren’t responsible for their own cleanliness, that Mary’s hair never glinted in the sunshine or smelled like baby shampoo because nobody helped her wash it; nobody thrust their fingers into her curls and scrubbed away the dust of a tumble in the yard with the dog; nobody applied a nice dollop of cream rinse to untangle knots from windy hours outside. I never stopped to think nobody in that house cared about them.
God help me.
So I sit now in the anonymity of my car, praying somebody steps out. Perhaps they’ll look around, notice me sitting here, walk forward and ask if there’s a problem.
No. No problem. I just knew the people who used to live here. Might you know where they live now?
No movement, no fluttering of the drapes, no shadows behind the blinds. Always quiet here. It always was.
I pull off the side of the road, the heavy tires eating the gravel. I turn for home. I’ll find myself back here again soon. It’s become the way of it.
I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.
* * *
I fell asleep last night to the eerie strains of “Blackbird,” my last conscious thoughts of broken wings and sunken eyes. Waiting for moments to arrive when broken wings fly and sunken eyes see, waiting for that moment of freedom, flying into the light.
If I had to listen to one musical artist or band or composer for the rest of my life, I’d choose the Beatles. Their music encompasses all the emotions, all the moods, and all the tempos I’ll ever need, taking me back to my childhood when my father would slip an album on the stereo, set the speed to thirty-three, and push the lever up to automatic. The fact that my father was younger and definitely cooler than the other dads around only helped the Fab Four become the thing to an elementary school girl who should have been listening to Bobby Sherman or the Osmond Brothers. I never really did go for the teen sensations.
Lying on my stomach, I would watch from eye level, chin resting on the back of my hands, and stare, gaze stuttering in and out of focus as the record fell to the turntable on the floor by the couch, the arm lifted, swung backward then forward, diamond-tipped needle poised with promise over the smooth outer rim of the vinyl disc. As it dropped with slow precision, I held my breath wondering if it would really make contact with the disc this time. Those old hi-fi systems didn’t miss the mark often, but they did enough to glue your eyes to the entire process and make your heart skip a few beats until the needle found its groove.
And then, after the static and scratch, Paul sang about his mother, Mary, comforting him, telling him to “Let It Be.”
I was a daddy’s girl, my mother having left him when I was two and then died not long after in a motorcycle accident with one of her precursor-hippie boyfriends. Nevertheless, I closed my eyes for the duration of the song, wishing she still existed and could lift her hand and rest it on my shoulder. She must have done that long ago.
Or maybe not.
During the strains of “Blackbird,” I dreamt of my father for the first time in many months, his dark, winged hair breezing back from his wide forehead. Snuggled in the comforter freshly snapped down off the line yesterday afternoon, I wallowed in the numbness of slumber as he returned anew. Nobody told me how precious dreams of the dead become, how our own subconscious somehow gifts us with the time and space to once again be with those who have left us behind.
* * *
And so I lay basking in my father’s presence, wishing so much for more time. But isn’t that always the way? There he was, living in that little house in Towson, and I only saw him once a week. How differently I’d do things if I’d known he was slated for an autumn death. An accident at work. He was a plumber, a fact that used to embarrass me, an expert at redoing historical houses during his last decade. Nobody knew that wall was ready to fall down. They were just doing the initial walk-through. He was only fifty-five.
The cool morning air spirals the window curtains, and I inhale the breeze off Loch Raven to the bottom of my lungs. At the crest of the hill beside our home, earth—turned over and ready for planting by the farmer who lives next door—casts its loamy smell over the yard. As yet, the sun rests below a horizon unadorned but for the crabbed Dutch elm standing long past its expiration date. I hate that bleached thing. Why my neighbor, a sweet widower nicknamed Jolly, doesn’t pull it down is as much a mystery as his very name. As far as I know, nobody knows Jolly’s real name, and Jace and I wonder if Jolly even remembers. Maybe it actually is Jolly. Jolly Lester. I always figured it was John or Jacob or maybe James.
Jolly tries to live up to the name. Lord knows the man tries. But some days, especially when the rain falls in a light slick from a platinum sky, his sepia eyes tell me he misses his Helen with the longing of someone who loved one person all of his life and was content, even honored, to do so. And Helen loved him back.
The distant buildings of Towson peek over the trees, and farther yet, Baltimore lies hidden to me here. But life is beginning again in those places that formed me into this woman I’ve become, for good or for bad.
I should pray. My father taught me to pray.
Jace stirs. “You awake, Hezz?”
I sit up and grab for my robe. “I need to get that turkey in the oven so it’s ready for sandwiches for the party this afternoon.”
“What party?”
“We’re having the end-of-the-year party for Will’s class here, remember? I’ve got a ton of stuff to do. At least I decorated the cake already.”
“Forgot. Would you like the shower first?”
“Nope. You go on.”
“What kind of cake?”
“Triple chocolate with white chocolate buttercream icing.”
“Mind if I take a piece to the office?” His mouth stretches into a smiley ribbon. He closes his eyes and I stare at my husband. Most women imagine that plainer women who’ve stolen a handsome man as their own must feel smug and superior having scored an undeserved hottie. Obviously, we’ve got brains or money or an extraordinary sense of humor to have nabbed such a prize.
Let me say, it isn’t as easy as it looks. I know what people think when we walk into a restaurant. Tall, lean, good-looking Jace with his wavy brown hair and smoky eyes, his easy assurance, his ruddy skin warming up the room. They must wonder how on this green earth a little old roly-poly like me ended up with a movie star like him.
For the first ten minutes I’m conscious of myself in ways Jace has never made me feel. But he’s just Jace, even in posh restaurants, placing his hand on the rounded waist that expanded with the growth of his child, smiling into eyes wrinkled from many afternoons squinting in the sun at swim meets, and laughing at my jokes that are only funny because of context, not content.
And they don’t know that cucumbers give him terrible gas, that he can be a real jerk when he’s sick, that he shuts down when he’s mad, and that he still draws stick figures. They don’t know that he doesn’t call his parents nearly enough . . . that he gets upset about my spending habits, which I must admit are sometimes a little over the top. But it’s too beautiful a morning to think about that.
I give his head a quick scratch. “I’ll get you a cup of coffee, sweets.”
Eyes still closed, he smiles. “I don’t deserve you.”
“Well, looks notwithstanding, that’s probably true. Because I’m a good Christian woman, I seek an almost-perfection from the rising of the sun to the going down of the same. I volunteer at school; I once hosted a foreign exchange student; I color my hair, exercise at least three times a week to keep my temple from collapsing; I wear lipstick. Sometimes I wear two colors at once to manipulate the perfect coordinating shade with whatever Eddie Bauer or Talbots dreamed up for the season.”
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