“Why don’t we see each other on Friday and Saturday nights, then? I miss you, too, but I know you need to get your work done,” Mark said with a gentle smile, his eyes searching Annie’s face.
“I like that. Ya, Friday and Saturday nights sounds good,” Annie said.
***
The next day, Annie spent much of the day, helping her mother with chores around the house. While they were doing this, her mother mysteriously disappeared for several minutes, coming back in with a gentle smile on her face.
“Mamm, where were you? I was looking for you. The rearranging of the fabric bolts is done. Now, you’ll be able to find what you need more quickly,” Annie said.
“Your daed and I had a private conversation, nothing more,” Mrs. Fisher said. Her eyes twinkled, causing Annie to look at her with suspicion.
“Something’s up,” she muttered.
Hearing this, Mrs. Fisher let out a laugh. “Nee, nee, nee, my Annie! All I needed was a few minutes with your daed. We discussed something and I came back inside. I like how you rearranged the fabrics. It will make it much easier to find what I need and what goes well with each other. Don’t you have a meeting with Amanda tomorrow?”
“Ya. I will take the buggy to town and meet her in a coffee shop where we can meet in private.”
“Good. No need for anyone finding out about the Kurtz’ business and taking it where it doesn’t need to go,” said Mrs. Fisher.
“Nee. No need,” said Annie. She didn’t know it, but her mother had disappeared to the barn, where Mark Stoltzfus had asked both of her parents for her hand in marriage. Upon getting their permission, he promised that he would be waiting to propose until after the upcoming wedding season.
The next day was Sunday. Annie drove to town and met Amanda as she had told her mother she would be doing.
“Here’s the information you’ll be needing. Mother and sister both hospitalized. The three younger children have all felt the aftereffects. One is extremely shy and the two youngest have been trying to express their anger by hurting the younger schoolchildren. I’ve had to keep a very close eye on them to keep them from succeeding. I have been asked to have you meet with them at the family farm and to keep it as short as possible. Once they have worked on their issues, they need to finish up the counseling,” said Annie.
“The shorter, the better. I will make sure they start to focus on their issues right away so they can resolve them appropriately. Do you have directions to their farm?” asked Amanda.
“Right here,” Annie said, giving Amanda a piece of paper with a hand-drawn map.
“Excellent, thanks! Now, I’m treating you to a luscious dessert and some coffee,” said Amanda.
After visiting for a few hours, Annie returned to Peace Landing and prepared for her evening visit with Mark. She changed to a clean dress, combed her hair and put on a clean, white kapp. Because it was getting cooler, they visited in the Fisher kitchen, talking and drinking coffee. Mark’s eyes twinkled and he smiled often. Something seemed to have happened between the previous night and this evening, Annie was thinking, to make him so happy.
A few miles away, Hannah sat in her family’s home, thinking about her recent trip to Hope Township and Annie’s success in the Peace Landing classroom.
Why didn’t I find out about the position here? It’s not fair that I have to face a drive to a community two miles away while Annie Fisher drives just down the road. That position should have been mine! Hannah managed to conveniently overlook that the position had been advertised in and around Peace Landing, meaning that news of the opening would have been common knowledge. No use crying over something that’s done now. Until I find out about that Hope Township position, all I can do is to stay around our school and find out what she’s doing.
***
The following Monday, Hannah walked to the Peace Landing school and stayed close by, listening to the classes in progress as Annie taught her students and kept them busy with school work. Hannah’s heart slowly slipped even further down as she realized how skilled Annie truly was at teaching.
“Sarah, can you please diagram this sentence for me? It’s okay. We all know each other here, so you’ll be fine. Come on. Take the chalk and diagram this sentence. Good girl!” Annie said, cajoling the shy Sarah to the front of the classroom where she quickly diagrammed the written sentence.
“Excellent! Very good! Everyone, do you see what Sarah did? She isolated the parts of speech and showed how they fit into this sentence. Sarah, you can sit down now.”
Next, Annie started the math lesson. She had found a way to involve all grades, teaching them with the same materials, but at different levels. Beginning students eagerly raised their hands to show their grasp of the concepts while the middle students worked on more-difficult addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. Annie’s oldest students worked on converting to decimals and percentages.
Outside, Hannah sank to the ground as she realized just how Annie had made the classroom her own. How did she come up with all this? Did her mamm give her the ideas?
That afternoon, Hannah quickly retreated to the back of the school house as students began streaming out to meet their parents and older siblings. She noticed that Annie had held Sarah Kurtz and her brothers back.
“Sarah, I have set up a counselor to work with you and your brothers at hour home. She will start this week . . . here, take this note home to your daed and have him talk to me if he has any questions. Go on, he’s outside waiting for you. Better yet, I’ll talk to him now.” Annie walked out with the three siblings and explained what had been set up.
Hannah’s jaw dropped. So, they need the services of an outside counselor! How can I use this? First, i’ll see if I can get Annie to tell me anything. Hannah waited on the school’s front porch for Annie to come out.
“Annie! I have a question for you . . . why have you set up a counselor for the Kurtz children . . .?”
“I’m sorry, Hannah, but . . . You have nothing to worry about . . . Mr. Kurtz makes sure that his childrens’ welfare is taken care of. In the classroom, I make sure they have what they need and that they are learning. If you will excuse me, . . .”
Annie quickly boarded her buggy and, instead of heading home, she headed for Mr. Kopp’s farm. How did she find out what I’ve set up? If she knows, who else knows? I took all precautions to make sure that services would be confidential. Mr. Kopp needs to know . . .
At the Kopp farm, Annie met with Mr. Kopp and explained what had just happened.
“I don’t know how she found out. I told her not to worry about any of it – that the children’s’ welfare is being taken care of.”
“Good. I’m glad you came to me . . . What is it, Micah? Miss Fisher, I must go. We have a bull in the corn. Thank you for telling me,” Mr. Kopp said, rushing off with his oldest son. As he ran to the field, he forgot about his conversation with Annie almost immediately.
***
Two days later, Amanda drove to Peace Landing and met with the Kurtz children at their home once they had gotten home from school. She met with them and with Mr. Kurtz, explaining how she would work with them after she took a basic history of what had happened the previous spring.
“Ms. Williams, I am grateful you don’t blame my wife or daughter for what they tried to do to your friend. That shows true Christian forgiveness,” said Mr. Kurtz.
“Thank you. It’s important for me to be able to see why something happened, Mr. Kurtz. Even though they tried to harm my friend, I know, inside here that it wasn’t them doing these things – it was their illnesses.” Amanda pointed to her heart as she responded. “I do have one question for you. It has to do with how . . . close your family’s blood is. Are your wife’s parents related by blood?”
“Ya, now that you mention it, they are. That’s not good . . . I know that. Just as with animals, the blood is too close in related individuals, and this leads to a worsening of any physical, genetic . . . or mental conditions th
at may exist in a family line,” said Mr. Kurtz.
“Exactly. I don’t know what testing has been ordered in the hospital for your wife or daughter, but you may want to ask for genetic testing. Don’t the Amish have a special fund or hospital for children who are affected by genetic conditions?”
“Ya. I will ask their doctors the next time I visit. Is this a problem for Sarah or my boys?”
“I hope not. Genetic testing for them should also be done, just to rule it out. Meantime, I want to help you and your children learn to deal with what has happened. I can teach them how to deal with their fears and emotions in a healthy way. Miss Fisher has told me that the school board wants counseling to be completed in a short time, which I hope we can do. I’ll be sending a report to her, and with your permission, to the school board.”
“Daed, does the school board really need to know about what’s going on with us?” Sarah asked in a painfully quiet voice.
“Sarah, they won’t misuse any of the information I give them,” said Amanda. “It’s just so they know you’re making good progress and about how much longer I think I’ll need to work with you. I’ve been given twelve sessions, which should take about three months. Close to the end of that time, I’ll look at how you are all doing then as compared to now. Miss Fisher’s goal, and my goal are for you to be able to speak out to others without your shyness getting in the way; for your brothers, it’s so their anger doesn’t lead them to do what’s wrong . . . like hurting other students,” said Amanda with a gentle smile.
The boys looked furtively at each other.
“Let’s start with you two. Have you tried to do anything to anyone that would hurt them?”
Ben looked at Joseph, seeming to communicate with him. Joseph, his younger brother, shrugged in response.
“Boys? It can’t feel good, holding onto all that anger. Wouldn’t you rather figure out why your angry and learn healthy and safe ways to express yourselves when you’re angry? By the way, anger isn’t a bad thing. It’s a healthy feeling we have in response to something that’s happened, something we see as bad. What’s bad is how we may choose to express how we feel – for instance, by putting a pin in another student’s seat . . . or taking a part of their lunch, for example,” said Amanda. Annie had filled her in on some of Ben’s and Joseph’s potentially harmful actions.
“Oh. Ya, that,” Ben said with a sickly smile. “Miss Fisher picks on the other students to answer her questions when we know the answers just as well. We feel like she doesn’t like us.”
“Okay. How many students are in the classroom. including you three?” Amanda asked.
“Uh, seventeen? Maybe?” Ben asked on a rising note.
“And all of you are in different grades. Answer this for me – does she try to go around to other students to get their answers so she gets them from as many of you as she can?”
“Well . . .” Ben cast a sideways look at his father.
“The truth, Ben,” said Mr. Kurtz firmly.
“ . . . Ya, she does. But we know all the answers! Other kids don’t!” he burst out in a high voice.
“Still, she needs to know who doesn’t know the answers so she can help them. Right?” asked Amanda. “What I want to teach you today is to recognize when your anger is out of proportion to the situation, when you want to hurt someone else, just because. Now, with this situation, Miss Fisher asks everyone to answer questions so she can identify who’s having trouble with something she’s teaching. And, even though you know all the answers, that’s not what she needs to know. She already knows you two are very smart young men. Now she needs to know how to simplify what she’s teaching for those who are having trouble with the material. When she doesn’t pick you, instead of trying to get back at them, what I want you to do is to remember that . . . and wait for your turns.
“Ben or Joseph, I want either one of you to answer my next question, because it’s something I think I know . . . but I’m not positive. And remember, this isn’t a ‘smart’ competition. Doesn’t the Amish faith frown on boastfulness or bragging? Calling attention to yourselves?”
Joseph answered first, hesitantly. “Yes, it does, miss.”
“Okay, thank you. What is it you’re trying to get in the classroom by answering all the questions your teacher has to ask?”
“Oh! I never thought of it . . . Miss, my sister . . . Barbara . . . she always told us that we have to make sure we’re all ‘better’ than anyone else in Peace Landing. Better behaved, smarter, cleaner, all of that,” said Joseph.
“Mr. Kurtz, is this true?”
“Ya. I always saw her comparing herself to others in town. When she fell short, she was very angry at herself. She took that out on others.”
“Ben, Joseph . . . and you, too, Sarah . . . do you see how this sets you up to fail more often than it does to help you to succeed?” Amanda asked. Once she had finished working with Ben and Joseph, they went to do their homework in the living room.
“Sarah, why are you so quiet? It’s very hard for you to ask questions and bring attention to yourself, isn’t it?”
“Ya,” Sarah whispered, looking down at the table. “I don’t want to be visible. I don’t want others to notice me. It’s easier when I don’t have to talk to anyone or answer questions.”
“Why?”
“I dunno . . .” Sarah said uncomfortably.
“Sarah . . .” said Mr. Kurtz. “ You won’t get better if you don’t answer honestly.”
Sarah sighed, looking as if she wanted to be anywhere but here. “I am always afraid I am failing. My neatness. My classwork. The only place I’m really comfortable is here.”
“Okay. So you feel as though you don’t measure up.”
“Nee.”
“According to whose ideals, Sarah?”
Sarah couldn’t answer. She opened and closed her mouth. Then, “Mine?”
“Exactly. We’ll be working with you on learning how to be comfortable with working to the expectations of others, especially when theirs aren’t as high as yours. Okay?”
Sarah looked silently at Amanda, then gave her the ghost of a smile.
“Denki. I like that. I must get started with supper, if you’ll excuse me,” she said.
Several minutes later, after tucking signed forms into her bag, Amanda left and returned to town. She was unaware that one additional person knew about her work with the Kurtz children.
At the Lapp farm, Hannah busily basted meat and chopped vegetables with her mother. She worked almost on autopilot as her mind threshed through the logistics of where Amanda was working with the Kurtz children. The school house was empty and locked when I passed by. Where could she be meeting them? How do I use this information and get Annie removed from her teaching position here in Peace Landing? What can I say that will make it impossible for her to stay in her role as a teacher?
After dinner in the Lapp household was over, Hannah and her mother washed dishes and cleaned the kitchen. As soon as she could, Hannah disappeared upstairs into her bedroom so she could puzzle over the information she had and how best she could use it against Annie.
That kind of information is supposed to be confidential. If I spread it and make it look as though Annie is saying something she’s not supposed to be saying, I can make sure it gets to the different school board members. Once they know she’s spread private information . . . Hannah’s mouth widened in an eerie, satisfied rictus. Nodding once sharply, she went back downstairs to spend time with her family.
***
The next day, after she finished her chores, she offered to shop for her mother.
“Ya, Hannah, I do have a lot to do here. If you’ll take this list and the money, buy what we need. Are you going to check on that opening in Hope Township? It’s been a few weeks, you know,” said her mother. “Your brother will be here to take you to the store in a few minutes.”
“Mamm, why can’t I go by myself like other girls my age?” asked Hannah in an aggrieved voice.
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br /> “Hannah, you have a wild streak. Your father and I have decided you need someone to watch over you to make sure you don’t try to do anything. When we see we can trust you, then we will allow you to go to town without an escort,” her mother said firmly.
Hannah, unwilling to admit that she was, indeed, up to something, clamped her lips shut tightly, looked at the ground and nodded.
“Ya, I know. I’m trying to show you I can be trusted.”
Ten minutes later, Jacob was sitting next to her, directing Mollie, their mare.
“I have this list of things from mamm, and I think it’ll take me about an hour to get them all. Do you need to get anything?”
“We need a part for the plow, so I want to see if it’s in,” said Jacob. “I won’t be more than ten minutes while I check. Will you be okay while I’m gone?”
“Ya,” Hannah said as she rolled her eyes mentally. She had lied to Jacob about how long it would take to complete the shopping – she knew she’d be done in less than thirty minutes. She rushed through her shopping then, when she was done, she loaded her family’s purchases in the back of the buggy and returned to the inside of the store, where she sought out an old schoolmate.
“Miriam, do you know what I heard about the Kurtz children? Do you remember what happened to Barbara and their mother?”
Miriam, always ready to gossip eagerly nodded. Ten minutes later, she scurried off, bursting with the “secret” that Hannah had just implored her to keep, upon pain of the loss of their friendship if she breathed even one word.
Hannah, looking at the other woman, smiled in self-satisfaction. Miriam is such a gossip. This will be spreading through Peace Landing by tomorrow morning. Now, to find just one more person to tell before Jacob finishes his errand . . .
Wandering around the small store, Hannah sniffed at the fruits and vegetables, looking around surreptitiously. Seeing Rachel Yoder, she waved happily to her and set the oranges down.
“Rachel how are you? it’s been so long!”
“Yes, it has! We hardly ever see you in town! What are you doing?”
Living Amish: Simple Pleasures (An Amish Love Story Series) Page 2