by Amy Clipston
“Tell your mother I said hello.”
“I will.” Rebecca started to open the car door, then turned back. “Thank you, Anita.”
“You know I’m always happy to give you a lift home.”
Rebecca shook her head. “No, that’s not what I meant. Thank you for caring.”
Anita smiled. “You make it easy. See you in the morning.”
CHAPTER 10
Ben was climbing into his buggy when, out of the corner of his eye, he saw Rebecca. He heard her call his name.
“Ben!” She appeared at the driver’s side of the buggy, sounding out of breath. “I was calling you!”
“Sorry. Did you need something?” He kept his tone brisk and impersonal.
“Yes, Ben.” She tugged at his sleeve. “I need to talk to you.”
“There’s nothing to say.” He picked up the reins, not caring if he was being rude.
To his utter surprise, Rebecca grasped the reins and made him look at her. “I’m sorry, Ben. I’m sorry if I hurt your feelings. But can’t we still be friends?”
He stared at her hand over his for a long moment, then shook his head. “I don’t think so, Rebecca. I’m sorry, but I have to go.”
It felt like something was pressing against his chest; he had to get away.
There was that expression of hurt in her eyes again. But she’d rejected him. He steeled himself against it. “I have to go.”
When she stepped back, he set the buggy in motion. This time, he didn’t look back. He couldn’t look back. She’d told him no, and so he had to move on.
He went to a singing the next night, and after he was there for only a few minutes, Mary Anne walked over.
“I don’t see Rebecca.”
Ben shrugged. “Maybe she’ll come with someone else.”
Mary Anne’s eyebrows arched. “Oh, so that’s the way it is.”
When the singing began there wasn’t another opportunity to talk. But Mary Anne looked over often and smiled at him, and when the food was served, she appeared at his elbow.
“I baked these cookies,” she told him. “Try one.”
He did and found it delicious. Mary Anne was something to look at, too, with her sparkling green eyes and saucy smile. She had this habit of leaning close to talk to him in a low, intimate tone. She was so diminutive and girlish, he felt tall and very male next to her. She was so different from Rebecca, who was nearly as tall as he was and so independent. Mary Anne made a man feel he needed to take care of her. Rebecca let him know that she could take care of herself.
Rebecca came in with Marian a little while later. Ben was aware that people near him were watching as he and Rebecca carefully ignored each other.
“What’s going on?” his brother John came over to ask. “And don’t tell me you don’t know what I’m talking about.”
“Keep your voice down.”
“It doesn’t matter,” John said, but he lowered his voice. “If everyone else didn’t know, they wouldn’t be watching the two of you and trying to figure out what’s going on.”
“People need to mind their own business.”
John just laughed and slapped his shoulder.
Ben had always considered himself to be an average-looking guy. But suddenly he was getting lots of attention, and not just from Mary Anne. He wondered if the other young women had ignored him because he was always with Rebecca.
So when Mary Anne asked him if he’d give her a ride home, he was happy to oblige. She held his arm to keep from sliding on the ice as they walked to his buggy and gave him an openly flirtatious smile as he helped her inside.
As the buggy rolled away from the singing, he told himself he was glad he’d taken some action and not sat around being miserable. But remembering how he’d seen Rebecca talking with Jacob Stolzfus at the food table made him wonder if he was just kidding himself.
He wasn’t a shallow man. Forgetting how Rebecca had been such a big part of his life wasn’t going to happen quickly just because someone like Mary Anne—or a half dozen other young women—flirted with him.
“Well, he certainly didn’t let any grass grow beneath his feet,” Rebecca muttered as she and Marian rode home later.
“Huh?”
Rebecca realized that she’d talked out loud. “Nothing.”
“Who hasn’t let any grass grow beneath his feet? Ben?”
Rebecca sighed. “Yes, Ben.”
Marian just laughed. “Everyone was watching the two of you.”
“Everyone was watching Mary Anne throw herself at him.”
“That too,” Marian said matter-of-factly. “What did you expect? How long did you think he’d hang around?”
Rebecca blinked. “He wasn’t ‘hanging around,’” she said, stung. “He was always at the house because he works with Daed.”
“Right.”
“I never said he wasn’t a friend. That’s hardly ‘hanging around.’”
Marian shook her head. “Rebecca, if you want him, I’m sure all you have to do is let him know.”
Rebecca laughed until tears ran down her cheeks.
“Whoa, Brownie, whoa,” Marian told their horse, and she brought him to a stop. “Are you all right?”
Rebecca nodded, then she shook her head. “It’s not true, what you said. I wish life was that simple. The fact is that he let me know he wants me. Wanted me,” she corrected.
“Oh, how wonderful.”
“Wanted, Marian.” She told her sister what had happened and watched the joy fade from her face.
“I’m so sorry.” Reaching over, Marian hugged Rebecca. “But if you’re interested, maybe you can talk to him about it.”
“He didn’t say he loved me,” Rebecca said flatly.
“No, he didn’t,” Marian said slowly. She called to the horse, and the buggy began rolling again.
“Listen, I haven’t told Mamm and Daed about this,” Rebecca said. “I don’t want to talk against Ben. They think of him as a son. I wouldn’t want anything to get in the way of his relationship with Daed about work, either. I’m trying to forgive Ben, and I hope he’ll forgive me for not agreeing to what he wanted.”
But when she remembered how he’d acted when she tried to apologize, she thought his forgiveness might be a long time coming.
“Sometimes life is a mystery, isn’t it?” Marian mused. “We’re taught that it’s God’s will that this or that happened, that God has plans for us. But I still don’t understand why Lizzie had to die. And I don’t understand why someone like Ben isn’t the man God prepared for you.”
Rebecca sighed. “Remember Hebrews 11? ‘Now faith is the substance of things hoped for . . .’”
“‘The evidence of things not seen,’” Marian finished. “I just wish you didn’t have to see Mary Anne flirting with Ben. It can’t feel very good.”
Rebecca bit her lip. “It doesn’t. I’m still ashamed of how jealous I was when you flirted with Ben.”
Marian laughed. “Like I told you before, I was just practicing!”
Her chatter was driving him nuts.
Comparisons weren’t fair, but Ben couldn’t help thinking how much he preferred being with Rebecca instead of Mary Anne. Rebecca didn’t have to be talking every minute. Sometimes he felt like he couldn’t think, his brain was so filled with the sound of Mary Anne’s voice.
And what she talked about—well, it was all about Mary Anne. She chattered about every little aspect of her day, and oh, how she loved gossip. She never wanted to talk about something deeper, like faith, the way Rebecca did. He wondered if it was because she hadn’t had to deal with something big, something beyond what she’d expected life to deal her, as Rebecca had when Lizzie died. But he was beginning to suspect that Mary Anne didn’t ever think about things beyond surface, everyday happenings.
Mary Anne wound down as the buggy turned into the drive to her house. “Thank you so much for giving me a ride home from services,” she said, turning to him and smiling flirtatiously.
She started to open her mouth to say something else. Clearly, she wasn’t ready to leave him yet.
“Let me help you.”
“You’re such a gentleman,” she told him.
Was she batting her eyelashes at him? Yes, she was batting her eyelashes at him. He didn’t think a girl had ever done that to him. He didn’t think he liked it.
As he rounded the buggy, he saw her bend down to pick up something from the floorboard. She was holding it in her hand when he stepped to her side.
“What is it?” he asked as she studied whatever it was in her left palm.
“Nothing, just a hairpin I dropped.” Her fingers curled around it. She gave him her right hand and he helped her step down from the buggy.
But even after there was no need, she continued to hold his hand as they stood there beside the buggy.
Of course, it was at that exact moment that Rebecca had to drive by with Marian.
“Wie geht!” Marian called.
Rebecca’s eyes met Ben’s, then she looked at him holding hands with Mary Anne.
Great, Ben thought. Just great. He tried to pull his hand back and was surprised to feel it held tightly by Mary Anne. Dragging his gaze away from Rebecca, he was startled to see Mary Anne’s smile as she looked at Rebecca.
Using more force, he retrieved his hand and backed away. But the damage was done. Rebecca was looking straight ahead as the buggy moved on.
“Well, you’d better get inside. It’s cold out here.”
“See you later!” she called loudly, as if she wanted the occupants of the other buggy to hear.
Ben climbed into his buggy and continued on home. What a mess, he told himself. How he wished he could go back and undo what he’d said that day in town. Then he sighed. No, he’d felt it was time to speak to Rebecca as he had, and now at least he knew he needed to move on.
But he didn’t think Mary Anne was the one he wanted to move on with.
Ben’s mother was cooking supper when he walked into the kitchen after work the next day.
“You’re home early. Again.”
He stopped and stared at her. “Ya. Is that a problem?”
She laughed and shook her head. “Of course not. Sit down, I’ll get you a cup of coffee.”
He sat and watched her reach for two mugs and pour the coffee. She moved a little stiffly—her arthritis acted up sometimes in the winter—but she never complained. Her hair was salt and pepper but her face was smooth, the only lines were those around her eyes when she smiled. Mamm was in her sixties. From what she’d told him, he was a surprise gift from God long after she thought she’d borne her last child.
She served him his coffee and surprised him by kissing the top of his head before she joined him at the table with her own cup. “This is the only way I can be on the same level with you, since you’ve grown so tall.”
He smiled at her, then his smile faded as he stared into his cup of coffee. “Guess you never thought you’d have me hanging around the house so long, did you?”
“Now you’re being a bensel!” she said fondly.
“I’m hardly a silly child,” he told her. “I’m twenty-two. Most of my friends have married. Some of them even have kinner.”
“You’re hardly an old man. It just hasn’t been your time yet.”
He traced the grain of wood on the table with his forefinger and avoided looking at her.
“Sohn, do you want to tell me what’s troubling you? I think it must have something to do with Rebecca.”
His head shot up. “Why do you say that?”
She smiled gently. “You’ve been home for dinner every night lately.”
“Maybe I missed your cooking.”
Laughing, Emma shook her head. “I don’t think so. But I think you’re missing Rebecca.”
“I’m seeing someone else. Mary Anne. You know her.”
“You’re missing Rebecca,” she repeated. “Otherwise you would not look so miserable, mei sohn.”
She put her hand over his. “I do not wish to pry if you’ve decided to see Mary Anne instead.” She paused. “But I think something has happened, something that hurts you so much you would stay away from a young woman you’ve cared about for years. She was your friend, if she was nothing more.”
“She turned me down.” Ben looked up. “I asked if she would marry me, and she turned me down.”
His mamm stared at him, clearly shocked. “Did she say why?”
“She said if I didn’t know why, she wasn’t going to tell me.”
“Ach! She didn’t!”
“She did.”
Leaning back in her chair, she studied Ben. “Tell me what you said to her.”
He shrugged. “I just—you know—asked her if she would marry me.”
“Exact words, please.”
He relayed the conversation as precisely as he could remember. His mother listened without expression or comment until he was finished, but he thought he saw her wince once. Maybe it was his imagination.
His father came in then, stamping his boots on the mat by the door.
“Why, look who’s home.” Samuel took off his coat and hat and joined them in the kitchen.
“I found out why,” Emma said, getting up to pull a meat loaf from the oven and set it on top of the stove to rest.
Samuel took the mug of coffee she poured him and joined Ben at the table. “Figured you would.” He turned to Ben. “Good day at work?”
“Ya,” Ben said, relieved at the change in subject.
“Aren’t you going to ask me why?” Emma asked, putting her hands on her hips.
“Emma, you know it’s not our way to pry into how our young people court.”
Ben’s head snapped up. “Court?”
“I didn’t tell him,” his mother assured him. “How could I? You and I were just talking now.”
“I’ve got eyes. And ears,” his father said. “I see things. Hear things. If Ben wants to tell me, he will.” He glanced pointedly at the meat loaf.
His mother let out a gusty sigh. Going to the stove, she transferred the meat loaf to a platter and set it on the table. “Well, I don’t want to get in between a man and his stomach.”
“Gut,” Samuel said with a grin. “That’s why we’ve been happily married for so many years, mei fraa.”
If Ben hadn’t been watching his mother, he might not have seen the gleam come into her eyes. She finished putting the food on the table, bringing a plate of sliced bread and a crock of budder. They bent their heads for the blessing, then it was silent at the table for a few minutes while they filled their plates and ate the savory meat, carrots, potatoes, celery, and parsnips.
Emma cleared the empty plates, brought a snitz pie to the table, cut two large slices, and served them to her men. She picked up her mug of coffee. “I think I’ll let you two men talk over dessert,” she announced.
“You’re not feeling well?” Ben asked her.
She shook her head and stroked his hair the way she’d done when he was a boy. “I’ll have some later. I think I’ll go put my feet up for a few minutes. I was on them quite a bit this afternoon helping a friend with some cleaning.”
“You’re sure you’re feeling okay?” his daed asked.
Emma smiled at her husband. “I’m fine.” She kissed his cheek. “Maybe you can tell Ben how you asked me to marry you.”
Daed tilted his head and studied her. “I could do that, if he wanted to know.”
Ben watched his father’s eyes follow his fraa as she left the kitchen. Then he began eating the pie.
It was quiet in the room, with just the scrape of fork on plate and an occasional slurping of coffee by his father. Ben could hear the ticking of the kitchen clock.
Ben was used to his father’s stoic ways, but finally he could stand it no longer. “Well, are you going to tell me?”
Samuel looked at him. “Ya, sure, if you want
to know.”
More silence filled the room, as Samuel cut another piece of pie and poured himself more coffee.
Ben rolled his eyes. “Ya, I want to know.”
He was ready for winter to be over. As he hunched inside his coat, riding to Rebecca’s house, he looked for signs of spring.
Each year, when winter came, Ben saw a sadness come over Rebecca. Then, this year, he’d seen a change in her, a moving past the tragedy of Lizzie’s death. She was growing, changing, even laughing. Oh, how he loved her laugh!
Perhaps he hadn’t waited long enough for her to really look out at the world around her—and at the man looking at her. He’d thought only of his own wants and needs. He’d convinced himself that it was God’s will that they should be together. Now.
She’d tried to apologize to him for saying she didn’t want to be courted, and he’d been angry and turned her away.
It wasn’t one of his shining moments.
He needed to tell her he wasn’t angry with her. She had a right to say no. Maybe she’d grown so used to seeing him in her home that she’d begun to think of him as a brother. He shuddered at the thought. He certainly didn’t think of her as a sister.
But just because she wasn’t interested in him as a future husband, was he really willing to throw away the years of friendship with her, the memories? The answer was no.
But he didn’t know what to do with the love he felt for her.
Ben jerked on the reins, and Ike stopped abruptly, then turned to look at him as if to say, “What?”
Glancing around, Ben was grateful there were no cars behind him. He could have caused an accident. Pulling over to the side of the road, he stared at the frozen pond in the distance. What he’d said that day in town came rushing back.
He hadn’t said anything about love.
No, he’d been so nervous, rushed at things as if it were a job to be completed quickly instead of a foundation to build a future on. He had talked about how they “suited” each other.
As if they were socks and boots pairing up to stay warm for the winter, he thought, instead of two souls who loved each other and would merge in God’s presence to form a loving union.
What a fool he’d been!