Revealing, The (The Inn at Eagle Hill Book #3): A Novel

by Fisher, Suzanne Woods

  He reached out to hold her hand. Her throat swelled and tears rushed to her eyes. “I need to go home,” she said, backing away from him.

  It had begun to rain as Mr. Kurtz drove her home, passing by the fields of green, each surrounded by a hedge of darker green; and Naomi stared hard out of the window willing the tears back into her head. But they came, one after the other, cascading down her cheeks. Her emotions felt like tangled vines, difficult to pull apart, no idea of where they began or ended.

  What Naomi had felt as she sat on that porch swing yesterday with Bethany had not been a suspicion, it had been a foresight. She didn’t just fear what Paisley’s arrival might mean, she knew it.

  What matters is what is.

  10

  Mim set her diary down, filled with notes and ideas about how to answer letters to Mrs. Miracle. She was stumped by a recent letter:

  Dear Mrs. Miracle,

  My father insists that I follow him in the family business. He’s worked very hard at establishing a successful business and I admire what he’s done. But here’s my problem: he’s a butcher and I’m a vegetarian.

  What should I do?

  Signed,

  Animal Lover

  “Honor thy father.” The words slipped through her mind as she glanced over at her Bible on the corner of her desk. Could you honor your father and still choose a different career path?

  She closed her diary, hid it under her mattress, and went next door in search of Naomi, who knew the answer to these kinds of questions.

  “Looking for Galen or Naomi?” Jimmy Fisher said as Mim came into the barn over at the Kings’, blinking her eyes rapidly as they adjusted to the dim lighting. Three horses stuck their heads over their stall doors, regarding her with interest. Barn swallows swooped from their nests and flew past her toward the open door. Jimmy was brushing a horse held in crossties in the middle of the barn aisle.

  “I wanted to talk to Naomi.”

  “She’s away, and so is Galen. I’m helping him out today.”

  Mim glanced at him with surprise. “Who’s minding the chickens?”

  He frowned. “I got up extra early and I’ll stay up extra late tonight.”

  Jimmy walked the mare outside to the round training pen and Mim followed behind to watch the training session. He stood in the center, holding on to the long lead line, and made a clucking sound with his tongue to get the horse circling around the pen. He watched the mare’s gait with a practiced eye. Now and then, he flicked a whip at her rear hooves to keep her in a gentle canter.

  Mim leaned her elbows on the pen’s railing. That pinched look Jimmy got on his face when she had asked about his chickens was gone. Come to think of it, that pinched look was on his face rather a lot lately, like his stomach hurt or he’d gotten a popcorn kernel stuck between his teeth. She felt a stab of pity for Jimmy. Here, as he concentrated on the movement of the horse, chirping to her when she slowed from a lope to a jog, praising her when she kept a steady pace, he seemed more like the old Jimmy. Happy, lighthearted, quick to smile.

  Bethany was right. Jimmy was in danger of losing his sparkle. Or did she say spark? Either way, it had gone missing.

  After the horse had been warmed up, Jimmy unhooked the shank from the mare’s halter. He walked over to Mim to set down the whip and pick up a few training tools. “Jimmy, can a son honor his parents but not agree to work in the family business?”

  Jimmy’s face went blank. “What did Bethany tell you?”

  “Tell me about what?”

  He looked confused. “About how much I hate chickens.”

  “She didn’t say a word.” She didn’t have to. Everybody knew that. Everybody!

  “Then, why did you ask me such a question?”

  “I just . . . was wondering. So what do you think? Can you honor your mother and quit the chicken business?”

  Jimmy leaned against the pen railing. “I’ve been giving this a lot of thought lately.”

  “Honor thy father. It’s in the Bible.”

  “I know it is.” Jimmy looked out at an eagle, drifting high on an updraft, its wings as still as the grasses below, circling and searching for its dinner.

  Those words were there. She couldn’t deny that. But other bits of verses came to mind. “It also says to walk in truth. And the truth shall make you free.”

  Jimmy’s head snapped around to look at her. “What did you say?”

  “Those are someplace in the Bible but I don’t know where, exactly. My mom has them written out on index cards and taped to the refrigerator.”

  Jimmy rubbed his face with his hands.

  Mim wasn’t sure what she had said that made Jimmy seem bothered.

  He picked up a bucket of tools used to condition the horse to unexpected noise. “I’d better get back to work.” He walked toward the horse, then spun around. “Thank you, Mim. You’ve been a big help. You know . . . you give pretty miraculous advice.” He winked at her.

  What had she said?

  After a few casual meetings, Brooke decided to go each day at the same time to the Sweet Tooth Bakery. Jon Hoeffner was always there, in the same seat and table that faced the door—as if he might just be waiting for her. His smile was warm, but it made her nervous. It had been a long time since a man had given her this kind of attention.

  And this was the kind of man you could dream about night and day, someone who would occupy all your thoughts. There was a definite undercurrent of romance between them. Jon was strikingly handsome, charming, easy to talk to, and most importantly, he didn’t wear a wedding ring. He mentioned very little about his private life, but he spoke well of everyone and badly of no one.

  Was Jon toying with her? She couldn’t tell. Her intuition read kindness and genuine goodness in him, but she’d been wrong about people in the past.

  Brooke was hoping Jon might suggest going out on a date. She thought about asking him—after all, this was the twenty-first century, but some warning voice made her think that she could only keep his attention if she didn’t seem to care. It was so silly, all this game playing, yet it appeared to work. “Will you stay in Stoney Ridge long?” she said nonchalantly. It was an act.

  He shook his head. “As soon as I wrap a few things up, I’m on my way.”

  She felt a twinge of disappointment. “Don’t you like it here? I do.”

  “It’s a one-horse town and a pretty poor horse at that.”

  “I don’t know about that,” she said, stirring her coffee. “There’s certainly a lot of drama at the Inn at Eagle Hill.”

  “Oh?” he said. “What kind of drama could be going on at a quiet Amish farm?”

  She told him about the pregnant girl named Paisley who had arrived, out of the blue, claiming to be carrying the oldest son’s baby, and how the family was reeling from the news. Come to think of it, she had learned quite a bit about this family just by paying attention. If only more people would learn to listen, they could pick up all kinds of amazing information.

  Jon, for example, was a wonderful listener. He leaned close to her as she talked, nodding in all the right places, eyes lighting up as he heard the Schrock family gossip. How many men would find it interesting to hear about an Amish family?

  She smiled at Jon. Stoney Ridge was turning into a surprisingly delightful place for her life to find new direction.

  She took a sip of coffee and gave a sigh of pure pleasure.

  “It’s good, that coffee, isn’t it?” he said.

  As far as Brooke was concerned, it could as well have been turpentine.

  Naomi arrived home to find the house was still empty. Relieved, she made up a sandwich for her brother Galen, left it in the refrigerator, and got ready for bed. She could tell that a migraine had begun and was moving from the first phase, which she had felt at the prison—where every sense felt on high alert and almost unmanageable, to the next phase, where a flickering blind spot occurred in the center of her vision, like a spinning black penny. Soon, she knew, the pain
would start to throb on one side of her head or the other.

  The weather had taken a turn for the worse as the evening wore on. Lightning lit up the room; raindrops splattered the windows. She tried to sleep, then gave up and went down to the basement to the little cot. It was dark in the basement, no sound of crashing thunder, no bright streaks of lightning, no pounding rain.

  When Naomi was a child, she used to play the game of “if.”

  If she got up the stairs before the grandfather clock in the hall stopped striking, then the teacher wouldn’t be in a bad mood tomorrow. If the daffodils planted by the front of the house bloomed by April first, she’d get a circle letter from her sisters.

  Now she sat in the dark basement with her arms around her knees. If the rain stopped soon, everything would be all right. It wouldn’t have happened at all.

  But it did. There was no point in pretending it hadn’t. The anxiety of what she had learned from Tobe kept coming back—things changing, not being safe anymore.

  She dozed off and on, but in the middle of the night, she woke with a start. The panic over Paisley seemed unbearable. She tried to beat back the wild fears that kept shooting through her mind, like violent streaks of colors.

  All sorts of horrible possibilities presented themselves in her mind, troubling thoughts that she might be able to dismiss in the daytime but that took hold of her in the dark of night and seemed completely real. As she lay there, she became convinced that Tobe would want to be—and should be—with Paisley and her baby, and her breathing quickened and her heart began to beat so hard that it was all she could do not to cry out. She felt so sad, so alone, so lonely. She was ashamed of her own lack of faith, but she conjured just enough to whisper, “I am afraid.” She hardly slept the rest of the night.

  By noon of the next day, Sadie Smucker came down the basement stairs to check on Naomi. “Galen asked me to come and see if I could help you. He’s worried about you.” Sadie’s voice was sweet and reassuring and Naomi felt thankful she was there.

  Sadie placed a cool compress on Naomi’s forehead and encouraged her to drink an herbal tea remedy made of Ligusticum. Naomi’s body ached, her chest was tight, her head throbbed. She had never felt so sick. “I don’t know what’s wrong. I’ve never felt like this before. It must be the flu.”

  “Can you think of what triggered this migraine? Any food you ate?”

  Naomi shook her head. Sadie had helped her create a diet high in magnesium and omega-3 fats to prevent migraines and taught her to avoid other foods that might act as triggers. “Nothing.” She put her elbow over her eyes. “I’ve been so careful, and I haven’t had a migraine in months. I thought I was finally getting past them.”

  Kindly, Sadie said, “I don’t think it’s the flu. Those migraines have always been your Achilles’ heel. Did something happen to upset you?”

  Naomi lifted her arm to look at Sadie. She and Sadie had always had a special understanding. Sadie said she used to be very much like Naomi: shy and timid and scared of her own shadow. Naomi couldn’t imagine Sadie like that. She might be a quiet person, but she oozed a strong, reassuring presence.

  “Naomi, you are sick from despair. This is how the heart speaks to us, through our illnesses.” Sadie tipped the cup of tea for Naomi to take another sip. “But you’re not alone in this, whatever it is that’s troubling you. You’re never alone. God hasn’t left you. He’ll see you through.”

  Naomi knew that. She knew that God was holding out his hands to her through this situation, asking her to trust him completely. She was trying! She truly believed that God hadn’t given her a spirit of fear. This wasn’t how he intended her to be. She’d been doing so much better, feeling so much stronger and more sure of herself. Then this situation popped up with Tobe . . . with Paisley . . . and now she was a frightened rabbit again. Afraid of her own shadow.

  After finishing the tea, Sadie rested her hand on Naomi’s back and began to trace circles with her fingers—across her shoulders and down her spine, back and forth, up and down, again and again. As she did, Naomi’s heartbeat slowed and her chest relaxed, and she began to feel calmer.

  “Nothing controls and calms the mind like full, deep breathing,” Sadie said. “Do you remember what I told you about breathing?” She had taught Naomi how to breathe deeply when the pain was at its worst. When you breathed deeply into the lower lobes of the lungs, she explained, you activated the parasympathetic nervous system, which produced endorphins, which in turn made you feel relaxed and calm and helped you let go of distractions.

  Sadie told Naomi to match her breathing to hers, and as she did, in and out, in and out, her fears subsided and she fell asleep.

  When she woke again, Sadie was still there, with a small plate of apple slices and cheese. “It would be good if you could eat a little bit.”

  Naomi sat up slowly. The worst was over, the pain had ebbed. She ate a few bites of apple and was relieved when her stomach didn’t reject them. “Sadie, have you ever had second thoughts about Gid?”

  Sadie’s head lifted in surprise. “What? Where in the world did that come from?”

  “I just wondered . . . did you ever think you might have made a mistake?”

  “I made a promise, Naomi, up in front of the church. You were there. You heard me.”

  “Yes, you said some words . . .”

  “Not just words, Naomi, a promise. A solemn oath. For better or worse, sickness or health. I meant those words.” She smiled. “Now, I will admit that I probably expected married life to be all sweetness and light and it’s not. Not every day, anyway. Life wasn’t meant to be easy. But those are the days I remind myself of that promise I made.”

  “Yes, but does your marriage make you feel safe?”

  Sadie tipped her head to one side and peered at Naomi. “There are more important things in life than being safe.”

  Naomi stared at Sadie and felt as if she’d just pushed open a window and light flooded into the basement to surround her and lift her, helping her mind shrug off the darkness and take wing. Her heart felt free to beat again and her stubborn streak set in. She was tired of worry and what-ifs. Was she going to let herself be chased away from something precious? No, she certainly wasn’t, she decided with sudden conviction.

  Right then she made up her mind. She wasn’t going to be afraid of this woman named Paisley anymore.

  As great with child as she was, Paisley walked with a swish and a certainty. There was nothing demure about her. She was flashy—even Mammi Vera agreed on this. Bethany heard her grandmother tut-tutting about Paisley when she thought no one was listening. Her back hurt terribly, though, she said, and that’s why she couldn’t help with chores around the farm.

  Whenever Bethany would ask when her baby was due and where did she expect to deliver this baby, Paisley would turn the full force of her smile upon her. “There’s plenty of time for all that,” she would say with a wave of her hand. Bethany would smile back and think to herself, Paisley is delusional on top of being flashy. That girl looked full of child, like she was ready to give birth any minute.

  But soon, Bethany stopped smiling back. Anytime Paisley was in close proximity to Jimmy Fisher, she found a way to bump against him or touch him.

  By week’s end, Jimmy wasn’t coming around anymore.

  One sunny afternoon, Danny asked Mim to stay after school. He waited until the students had all left, then locked up the schoolhouse and walked beside Mim toward Eagle Hill. On the way, he explained that Nancy Blank, mother of Mose, an easygoing ten-year-old boy who was often teased by the others, had come to the schoolhouse earlier in the week. “She’s worried about Mose—he’s getting pushed around by the big boys on the way home from school each day. She said if she mentions her concern to his father that he tells her to stay out of it. Leroy Blank is the type who thinks being bullied will make a man out of his son.”

  From the disdainful look on Danny’s face, Mim could tell what he thought of that kind of parenting. In an odd
flash of maturity, she realized that Danny was probably much like Mose as a young boy—gentle, kind, and a target for bullies.

  “I’ve been watching how the older boys act toward Mose,” Danny said. “I haven’t actually seen anything to worry about during recesses, but I don’t doubt Nancy about the walk home. I wondered if you had any suggestions, other than going to speak to the boys’ parents—which might create more problems.” He glanced at her. “I thought you might have a solution.”

  Mim nearly smiled. It was typical of Danny to look for a diplomatic way to solve a problem. “I think he needs to make a friend of Jesse and Luke,” she said after some thought.

  “Jesse Stoltzfus?” He looked skeptical. Very, very skeptical. “And your brother Luke?”

  “He’s as smart as a whip, that Jesse. Luke could be too, if he ever set his mind to anything.”

  “Why not with Sammy? They’re closer in age.”

  “Mose is gentle. He doesn’t need another gentle friend like Sammy. He needs an ally.”

  “How do I encourage Jesse to be a friend to Mose? Or Luke?”

  “Maybe put them on a project together. Make them stay after class to help you, so they get to know each other without the other big boys interfering.”

  Danny pushed his glasses up on the bridge of his nose. “I’ll give it some thought. Thanks, Mim. I knew you’d have some good advice.”

  When Danny thanked her, it almost brought tears to her eyes. It was so easy to solve a little problem for someone else when they asked, and so hard to sort out your own. She gave him a smile, a real smile this time, which she hadn’t done in months, and she wondered what Danny would think if he knew she was Mrs. Miracle.

  All at once, Danny turned. His face was shadowed, but she could see his eyes—very, very blue eyes—watching her, waiting. “Mim,” he started hesitantly, “it won’t be long until—”

  Who knew what might have happened next? She would never know, because in the next second Jesse and Levi came soaring down the Stoltzfuses’ driveway on their scooters, screaming like banshees, and Mim and Danny had to scatter to get out of the way so they wouldn’t get plowed over.