A Time for Peace

by Barbara Cameron

  She smiled at him. "Thank you."

  They sat down and Jenny enjoyed a cup of tea while her husband ate his dinner. It was quiet, so quiet.

  "There's some pie."

  He grinned at her, his eyes lighting up. "I never turn down pie. You know that."

  "I know." She went to get it but when she reached into the refrigerator, her hand shook as she touched the pie plate.

  "No," she said, bringing it to the table.

  "There's enough for both of us," he said with satisfaction.

  Jenny's bottom lip trembled. "Phoebe baked the pie."

  "Yes," Matthew said slowly, watching her steadily.

  She looked at him with eyes brimming with tears. "What if it's the last one she makes?"

  Jenny came awake with a snap.

  She lay there, wondering what had awakened her. Matthew slept beside her, his arm wrapped around her. She listened, wondering if a child had cried out with a bad dream, but the house was quiet. No one needed Mamm to reassure them that the bad dream wasn't real. Or even that Phoebe would be back tomorrow.

  Closing her eyes, she tried to will herself back to sleep. It had been a long and stressful day. Tomorrow would be here soon. Well, tomorrow was today now, she noted after a glance at the clock on the bedside table. She wanted to be up bright and early to go get Phoebe.

  She pulled the quilt covering the bed up over her. Hannah and her friends had made it for her and Matthew and it was so special to her.

  But as she touched the quilt, she thought of another one and wondered what would have happened, what her life might have been like, if her grandmother hadn't sent that quilt to the hospital where Jenny lay wounded. On the verge of sleep, she hoped that Phoebe was resting comfortably, that she wasn't lying there feeling scared or lonely or in pain like she'd been that day.

  "You have a package," the nurse had said, placing it on the table beside Jenny's bed.

  "Help—help me open it?"

  "Sure, honey."

  The nurse had lifted out a quilt and stroked it. "Oh, look what we have here," she murmured. "Isn't it lovely? I can't imagine how much work went into this."

  Jenny watched the woman unfold it and spread it over her hospital blanket.

  "There must be a card in here," the nurse said, searching through the tissue in the box. "Here, I found it."

  She handed the card to Jenny. But no matter how much Jenny tried to read the writing, the lines blurred. "Can't read."

  Frowning, the nurse took the card. "I forgot about your double vision. It's taking some time to go away but it will, honey, it will." She patted Jenny's hand. "Here, I'll read it for you."

  The words inside had been simple and direct: "Come. Heal." It had been signed "Your grossmudder, Phoebe."

  So she came back here as soon as she could, the moment she was released from the hospital. She'd come here and the first morning she was back this man beside her had come over to see Phoebe, his next-door neighbor, and through the maze that her poor hurt brain had become, the memory of being in love with him had emerged.

  She'd never thought she'd walk again or talk normally and never, ever, in her wildest dreams, had she thought that Matthew could see past her battered body and failure to believe in herself or God or anything and want to marry her.

  But here she was, married to this big, blond, gentle giant of a man. As if he felt her thinking about him, he stirred in his sleep and gathered her closer, cupping her head and pressing it against his chest, so that she finally fell asleep listening the slow, steady beat of his heart.

  Someone was patting her arm. She opened her eyes and saw that Annie was standing beside the bed.

  "Time to get up," she said brightly.

  "Wha—what time is it?" Jenny asked. She glanced at the clock beside the bed and groaned. "Oh, Annie, go back to bed.

  It's too early to get up."

  Annie gave her a winsome smile, one that showed two missing teeth. "Let's go get Phoebe before I go to schul."

  Jenny pulled the quilt up over her head. It was too early to be up, even for the Amish. She nudged Matthew with her elbow. "Matthew? Tell our daughter to go back to bed."

  "Annie, go back to bed," he mumbled and rolled over.

  There was a tug on the quilt. Jenny lowered it. Annie still stood beside the bed but this time, Jenny saw the tears in her eyes.

  She moved a little closer to Matthew then lifted the covers so that Annie could climb into bed.

  "Ssh," she whispered when Annie started to speak. "Go back to sleep and we'll talk later."

  To her surprise, Annie did so and after a few minutes, Jenny fell asleep again. She woke when Matthew climbed out of bed and dressed for the day.

  Leaving Annie to sleep a little while longer, Jenny slipped out of bed and dressed, then headed downstairs to fix breakfast.

  Matthew was standing at the stove, watching the percolator sitting atop it, his cup in his hand. She smiled. He could wait for breakfast until after chores, but he had to have that first cup of coffee before he went to work.

  She walked up behind him, wrapped her arms around his waist, and laid her cheek against his back. "Love you."

  "Love you, too."

  "But you're looking at the coffee, not at me."

  He turned and grinned at her as he slipped his arms around her waist. "Sorry. That doesn't mean I love it more."

  "Sure," she said. "Sure."

  Bending, he kissed her. "I didn't have my arms around coffee last night."

  She returned his grin. "You're right."

  "And I'm making you tea," he said as the teapot began whistling.

  Reaching around him, she moved it and the whistling wound down to a sputter. "Thanks. Now, if we're quiet, we might get to have a few minutes before the children come down."

  They sat at the table and enjoyed their jolt of caffeine, a morning routine for them.

  Halfway through her tea, Jenny pressed her hand to her abdomen and winced. Getting up from the table, she rummaged in a kitchen cupboard for some Midol and washed it down with her tea.

  When she sat down again, Matthew took her hand and squeezed it, giving comfort without words.

  Another month without getting pregnant, she couldn't help thinking.

  Feet hit the floor overhead and then moved around. Mary was up. Then the same thing happened in a different area of the upstairs. Joshua was up, too. No footsteps came from Jenny and Matthew's room. Annie had yet to wake.

  Jenny chided herself for feeling a little depressed that she was once again not pregnant. She didn't need to be Amish to feel that children were a gift from God; wanting more than these precious three Matthew was sharing with her seemed greedy. He told her often that it was God's will if they had more and she believed that. She truly did.

  It was just that she had these moments of disappointment thinking that she and God weren't on the same page. So to speak. But was He listening to her?

  "As soon as I finish the chores and clean up, we'll go get Phoebe at the hospital," Matthew told her.

  "I could go by myself—"

  "No, we'll go together," he said firmly. "She's family."

  Reaching out, she pulled him closer by his suspender and kissed him. "Thanks."

  Mary came into the room a few minutes later. "Annie wasn't in my bed when I woke up and she's not in her room."

  "It's okay. She's in my bed," Jenny told her. "She got up really early and wanted to go get Grossmudder before school."

  Mary's face brightened. "Can we?"

  "No, sweetheart." She hated the way Mary's face fell. "But she'll be here when you come home."

  "Okay. Do you want me to go get Annie?"

  Jenny smiled. "That would be wonderful. And for that, you get to choose what we'll have for breakfast."

  Mary thought for a moment. "French toast?"

  "French toast it is." Jenny got a skillet out, set it on the stove, and rummaged in a drawer for a spatula.

  Mary passed Joshua as he walked into th
e room, rubbing his eyes.

  "You snooze, you lose," she told him smugly.

  "Huh?" He looked from her to Jenny.

  "Early bird gets the worm," she said and walked out of the room.

  "We're having worms for breakfast?" he asked, making a disgusted face.

  "Your mamm would never make you worms for breakfast," Matthew chided, finishing his coffee and setting the cup in the sink.

  "You never know what she might make," Joshua told him."You remember she made scrapple." He grabbed his throat and made a gagging noise as he started for the door." How can anyone eat that with what's in it?"

  "Some people like scrapple," Matthew pointed out.

  "You think you're so funny with the comments about my cooking!" Jenny popped him on the fanny with the spatula.

  "Hey, ow!" he cried. "She hit me!" he told his father.

  Matthew shook his head and tried to suppress a grin. "A wise man always compliments the cook."

  "Right!" Jenny said. Then she frowned. "Wait a minute, that sounds like a backhanded kind of comment. Are you saying you compliment my cooking even when you don't think it's good?"

  Matthew cocked his head. "Did you hear that?" he asked Joshua.

  Joshua listened hard. "I don't hear anything."

  "There it is again. Bessie's calling for us. Back soon," he said quickly and the two of them rushed out the door.

  "Very funny," Jenny muttered. "Like a cow's calling you!"

  "I tried to call you," Phoebe said when Jenny and Matthew walked into her hospital room. "They're insisting on keeping me another day."

  "Another day? But why?"

  "Just more tests. You know how doctors love to run more tests."

  "What kind of tests?"

  "Just the usual stuff," Phoebe said vaguely. "You get older, they want to do more tests."

  Jenny sank into a chair beside the bed. "Now you're getting me worried. Since when would you meekly agree to these? I expected you to be waiting at the front door when we arrived, impatient to be out of here."

  She studied her grandmother, feeling that something wasn't being said, that more was going on here than—

  An aide knocked on the doorframe. "Ready to go?"

  Phoebe nodded. She lifted the covers and her feet emerged, covered with bright red crocheted footies. When she saw Jenny staring at them, she laughed. "The nurse on duty last night gave them to me. A friend of hers makes them for patients.They kept my feet nice and cozy."

  "How about we bring you some of your own things this afternoon? Since you have to spend another night."

  Jenny felt her heart warm at Matthew's suggestion. "Maybe your robe?" she suggested, smiling at the way her grandmother wore a second gown with the ties in the front, covering the one underneath that she would have felt immodest to leave the room in.

  As always, Phoebe wore her kapp over her perfectly groomed hair.

  The aide rolled the wheelchair closer to the bed and Phoebe sat in it and watched him adjust the footrests for her. Then he picked up the blanket from the foot of the bed and tucked it around her. "It can be a bit cold where we're going."

  Jenny wanted to ask where that was but Matthew took her hand and squeezed it and when she glanced at him, he sent her a silent message that husbands and wives quickly learned to interpret after their wedding. This one said, "Leave it alone.Please."

  Even though his look wasn't one of censure, she wanted to object, to say that she had a right as a granddaughter to ask where they were going, what tests the aide was taking Phoebe for. It wasn't nosiness, it was simply concern. If something was wrong, she wanted to know so she could do something.Something.

  And then the sobering thought came that if there was something wrong that there was nothing she really could do about it . . . it was all up to God.

  The aide pushed the chair toward them and then stopped, sensitive to Jenny's mood.

  Jenny bent and hugged Phoebe and noted that her grandmother's arms felt as strong as ever. Drawing back, she forced a smile.

  "I'm not going to worry," she said. "Because—because you always say that worrying is arrogant. God knows what He's doing."

  Phoebe beamed. "Exactly. I'll be back home before you know it."

  Matthew kissed her cheek. "See you later."

  They stood and watched as the aide pushed Phoebe out of the room and then Jenny turned to Matthew.

  "What was that about, that stopping me when I wanted to ask about the tests?"

  Matthew touched her shoulders and his eyes were kind. "She's your grandmother but I've known Phoebe for a long time and she's a very private person. If there's something she wants to tell you, she will. And if she doesn't, you need to respect her privacy."

  "But if she's seriously sick—"

  "We must respect her wishes, lieb."

  "Don't try to distract me by calling me 'love,' " she told him, trying not to pout.

  His lips twitched. "I wouldn't dream of it." Then he sobered."I'm not saying that if her health were to change seriously that I don't agree with you about talking with her about it," he told her. "But I feel she'll talk to us if things change."

  Jenny nodded and sighed. "Well, let's go on home, then.Maybe the children will want to come when we bring Phoebe some of her things."

  "I think if we try to leave them home we'll never hear the end of it," he said with a chuckle as they left the room.

  4

  It's driving you crazy, isn't it?"

  Jenny frowned at Hannah. "It's not funny."

  Hannah sighed and reached for Jenny's hand. "No, it's not. I don't know why Phoebe's being so secretive, either."

  "You didn't know she was taking prescription medicine?"

  Leaning back in her chair, Hannah began rubbing her abdomen, a habit Jenny had noticed.

  "I really didn't," Hannah told her. "I've been concerned by how hard it was on her to climb the stairs here at the house but she kept saying she was fine. Then Chris and I got married and she insisted we should have her bedroom upstairs so that solved that."

  She looked around the room and her smile was soft. "You know, sometimes it seems like a dream. Everything that's happened, I mean. Did you feel that way when you first married Matthew?"

  Jenny smiled. "Yeah. Sometimes I still do. Especially when I look at the children. It already felt like a miracle that Matthew and I got a second chance but to have a ready-made family.Well, I still find myself thinking I should pinch myself."

  "I was remembering this conversation we had not long after I met you," Hannah said. "I thought I wouldn't ever get married.You said I should make a wish list of what I wanted in a man."

  She glanced at Jenny and grinned. "A wish list for a man. Imagine, I thought. What's funny is after I did that, I realized I wanted a man much like my brother."

  "You couldn't do better," Jenny said with a smile. "It's so good to see the two of you so happy. You deserve it. And Chris surely does after all he went through in the military."

  She watched Hannah unconsciously rub at her arm. "Is it hurting?"

  Hannah glanced down at her arm. "Talking about Chris and all he went through being injured overseas probably made me think of it. Who'd have thought someone could hate him so much and come here to hurt him."

  "And hurt you in the process."

  Hannah shrugged. "That's all over now. Look at how well things turned out. Last time I saw Malcolm—"

  Someone knocked at the front door. Hannah started to heave herself up out of the chair but Jenny rose and pressed her back into it.

  "I'll get it. You stay and relax."

  Rebecca Yoder stood on the front porch. "I'm on my way into town but I just had to stop. I heard that Phoebe was taken to the hospital. Is she okay?"

  Jenny filled her in and the woman impulsively hugged her. "I'm sure she'll be fine. Is there anything I can do to help?"

  "If you could make some calls and let her friends know."

  "I surely will. Now don't you go worrying. Phoebe's a str
ong woman. I'm sure she'll be home before you know it."

  Touched by the older woman's caring, Jenny walked back to the kitchen.

  Her sister-in-law was doubled over as if she were in pain. Jenny rushed to her side.

  "Hannah? What's wrong? Tell me you're not going into labor."

  Hannah shook her head. "No," she managed to say. "It's too soon."

  "Like babies ever do what they're supposed to do. You remember how Fannie Mae went into labor at the quilting two weeks ago. She thought she was just having back pain and she'd been in labor most of the day."

  "I'm—I'm not in labor. Pain—" she pressed a hand just under her bust. "Feels like the baby's got his foot stuck—up under—under my ribs."

  Truly alarmed by now, Jenny knelt beside Hannah's chair. "That's not possible, is it? I mean, it's in the uterus and—"

  "I don't need a biology lesson right now," Hannah snapped.

  Then, just as quickly, she turned and gave Jenny a look of remorse. "Oh, I'm sorry!"

  Jenny patted her arm. "It's okay. Is it any better?"

  Hannah grabbed Jenny's hand, pressed it to her abdomen, and held it there. "Here, feel this! Doesn't it feel like it's going to kick its way out?"

  The minute Hannah held her hand to her abdomen, Jenny felt the moving lump kick. She jerked her hand away and stared, shocked, at Hannah. "Wow!"

  "Hurts!" Hannah gasped.

  "I think we better call the doctor."

  Hannah shifted in her chair and frowned. "I'm sure it'll stop in a minute." Then she looked at Jenny. "What?"

  "Has this happened before?"

  "No. Really," she insisted when Jenny looked doubtful. "Trust me, I'd have told you if something like this had happened."

  "I dunno," Jenny muttered. "One family member's already kept a secret from me."

  "Well, I have no secrets. Well, except for telling everyone the sex of the baby. But Chris and I agreed we don't want to know so how can I tell anyone what I don't know?"

  Jenny watched as Hannah broke out in a sweat. She went to the sink, dampened a dish towel with cool water, and wiped Hannah's face with it.

  "That feels good."

  "Where's Chris?"