So James did his walking at the clinic and kept to the chair at home and in public. Knowing he could stand on his own, he was losing that feeling of being trapped. Now that he wasn’t stuck in the chair all the time, he didn’t mind it so much.
One day after church, when he’d been left off near a group of men his father’s age, he noticed how they seemed to forget he was there. Was it because he was quiet among them, or because they thought his brain had stopped working along with his legs?
Most of the people James’s age were eating at tables or going through the line for a sandwich or to spoon out some coleslaw, beets, or potato salad. Children were scattered here and there, some of them corralled by their mamms to come and eat. Having finished their church supper, the older men talked about the weather and the growing season. Now they were on the topic of Englisher doctors.
“We’re glad for Doc Trueherz making the house calls and staying on top of things,” said old Jacob, who was out of his wheelchair and walking with a cane. “When I had the breathing problems and coughing attacks, I thought it was from the accident. Turned out that was wrong. Ha! What do I know? Doc Trueherz found that I have a heart problem. Ay-fib, they call it. Got me on a heart medication now and I’m feeling fit as a fiddle again.”
“Glad to hear it!” Bishop Samuel grinned. “Sometimes these Englisher doctors can bring us back to health, Gott willing.”
“And sometimes the Englishers are the ones causing the problems,” Dat said, singing his usual refrain. “Did you hear about that buggy accident in Berks County?”
“A tragedy, and it could have been prevented,” said the bishop. “The car that hit the buggy was driven by a drunk driver.”
Holding a bird’s head that he had whittled, Mark came over to show James, but James held up one finger, a signal to keep quiet for a moment.
“Our cousin knew the woman killed in the buggy. Ida Fisher was her name.” Jacob’s forehead wrinkled. “She had twelve children and a hundred and fourteen grandchildren.”
“The English are so careless on the roads,” Jimmy said.
Samuel shrugged. “Sometimes. Folks make mistakes, Englisher and Amish.”
“But the Englishers, with their buses and trucks and fast cars.” Dat folded his arms across his chest. “They make the road dangerous for Plain folk.”
“This is true, but these accidents, they are not mistakes. Gott doesn’t make mistakes.”
“I’d be happy if I never had to see an Englisher again.” Dat scowled. “Nothing but problems.”
“We must live in peace with all of Gott’s creation.” The bishop narrowed his eyes. “What is this bad feeling toward Englishers, Jimmy?”
“It’s about that bus driver, isn’t it, Dat?” James moved into the conversation.
“Nay. I simply choose to live separate, as the Bible says.”
“What happened with the bus driver?” Samuel asked.
“When Dat was a boy, a bus hit one of his friends,” James offered, glad that the bishop was probing a bit.
“This I don’t know about.” Samuel pushed his spectacles up on his nose. “Was there an accident when you were a child?”
Although Jimmy had never wanted to share the details, he was compelled to answer when the bishop asked the question.
“It was long ago. I don’t talk about it.”
“Your friend was hurt,” James said, leading the way. “Mamm said he recovered over time. How did it happen, Dat? You never told any of us the story.”
“This is something to hear.” Samuel’s gray eyes were thoughtful. “Tell us, Jimmy.”
“It was a terrible day. Even thinking back on it now, all these years later, it gives me indigestion.”
“That will ease with time if you get the bad memory out,” the bishop said. “How old were you?”
“Just a boy. My friend Paul and I were around the same age … eight or nine years old. Paul Beiler. We were inseparable. We played together all the time, and he helped out here at the orchard when he wasn’t needed at his parents’ chicken farm. We each had a scooter. A scooter was very important to us boys, because it was our only way around. It makes a five-mile trip to your friend’s farm go a lot faster. Well, one summer day it was very hot, and Paul and I, we decided to ride our scooters into town to get ice cream.”
“Was the ice-cream shop around back then?” Mark asked. “The same one?”
“It was.” Jimmy nodded. “Only we didn’t make it there that day. We were riding along the highway, the two of us side by side, talking. I was on the right side, near a cornfield. It was August, and the corn was yay-high, far over my head. Paul was scootering along beside me, and we were talking about something and then …” His brows creased as he stared off in the distance. “It just happened.”
James knew the chilling feeling that came with remembering, although his memory of the highway collision that had injured his spine was blessedly hazy.
“A tourist bus came up behind us. Suddenly. It must have been coasting because we didn’t hear the engine or the brakes. It was just there. And one minute Paul was riding along beside me, and the next minute, he and his scooter were flying, right in front of me. They landed in the cornfield. And the bus, it just kept on going.
“A hit-and-run.” Jimmy let his chin drop to one hand. “When I found Paul in the cornfield, facedown, I thought the life was gone out of him. Thank the Almighty, I was wrong.”
“And you being a boy.” Jacob shook his head. “You must have been all shook up.”
“I was,” Dat admitted quietly.
Mark’s shiny eyes were on their father. James felt the same keen interest. It wasn’t every day that Dat opened up.
“Later on, when the police found the driver and asked him what happened, he told them that he never even noticed hitting anything. He didn’t see or hear anything. It was like Paul wasn’t even there.”
“Did you go and talk to the driver?” Albee asked. “Did the bishop and your dat take you there to offer forgiveness?”
Jimmy shook his head. “We were told to stay away.” He waved his hand. “Some legalities. The bus company was worried about the driver getting blamed in a lawsuit.”
“Were you mad at the driver?” Mark asked.
Dat turned to him and frowned. “I was very angry. My father told me that Gott wanted me to forgive that driver. He said I had to let it go.”
And had Dat forgiven the man? Although James couldn’t know the answer to that, he now understood why his father struggled with the summer invasion of Englishers in local towns.
“What happened to Paul?” Mark asked.
“He was in the hospital for months, but when he got out, he was able to walk and talk again, same old Paul. His family moved north, up to another district, so that they could afford to buy some land to farm. But I still see him when he visits. Ten children, and already a grandchild.”
“Gott is merciful,” Samuel said.
As the conversation moved on and James talked to Mark about his whittling, he was glad to have learned this about his father. Sometimes, to understand a man, it helped to know something about the boy.
The rubber soles of Shandell’s boots trod quietly on the path as she walked by the light of the bright sliver in the sky. Moonlight cast a blue sheen over the grass and leaves, a silver glow over the stone and dirt paths. Trekking through the night was surreal; she felt as if she were an actor in a movie.
I’m like a pioneer, or an undercover agent, stealthily cutting through woods and fields. She had made it past the Lapp farmhouse, a white two-story home that was now dark and quiet. These country folks really did rise at dawn and go to sleep at sundown, and now that she had lived without electricity for a few weeks, she understood how that worked.
She’d made so many trips to this phone shanty, she’d stopped counting. But tonight she was propelled by worry for her mom and concern for her own health. The stabbing cramps had been coming on more and more frequently, and when they were at
their height, she worried that she was going to die all alone in that sugar shack.
By the time she reached the phone shanty, the song of the crickets had died down, but the chorus of frogs was on, full force. Usually she couldn’t see them, but one rainy night, they’d come out along the path to the outhouse. Now, that was creepy.
Closing the little door of the hut behind her, the tiny space seemed warmer, then suddenly too warm—airless and blazing hot! Groaning, she pressed her hand to her forehead, as if that could tell anything. Was she getting a fever?
She called Mom’s cell phone number and closed her eyes as it began to ring.
“Hello?”
Shandell was so startled to hear her mother answer after all this time, she couldn’t find words at first. “Mom? Is that you?”
“Shandell! Honey, I’ve been so worried about you.”
Her knees sagged in relief. Her mom missed her.
“Where are you?”
“Still in Lancaster County, in that small town. Halfway. I’ve been calling a lot, but Phil always answers at the house, and whenever I call your cell there’s no answer.”
“I’m sorry. Things have been crazy here. Phil hid my cell phone from me, and … It’s hard to talk about, especially on the phone.”
“That’s okay. We can talk about it when I get home. Some people are helping me here, and as soon as they’ve saved the money, I’m coming home.”
“I will send you the money right now, but I have to warn you, there’s no going back to the house.”
Shandell wondered if the fever was making her hallucinate. When she pushed her hair out of her eyes, her forehead was on fire. “I—I can’t come home?”
“There is no home, nowhere to go, not anymore. I had to, to …”
Her mother’s voice cracked.
What the heck? Mom was crying.
“I’ve moved out of the house,” Chelsea told her. “I’m staying with my friend Teresa, sleeping on her couch, actually. Teresa’s been great, but I …”
“Mom, what happened?”
“Everything is falling apart.” Chelsea let out a breath. “I should have seen this coming, but I was so buried in work. Head in the sand. I’m sorry, honey, but I just couldn’t do it anymore. I couldn’t put up with Phil’s drinking. You were right about that. I didn’t realize how bad things had gotten until I went to take the recycling out one night and there were six shopping bags full of beer cans. Six shopping bags!”
Shandell’s lips curled as tears filled her eyes. Phil had really lost it.
“I told him he had to stop drinking or get out of the house. I tried to reason with him, but it was a waste of time. He refused to leave, and the police can’t kick him out from his place of residence. So we’re stuck for the moment.”
“Stuck how?”
“He gets to stay in the house, and I’ll have to look for another place for you and me. But first I have to get my name off the lease. What a mess. I’m so sorry, Shanny. I know I’ve let you down.”
The words were lost on Shandell as she pictured her bedroom. Gone. She would never get to sleep there again.
She had nowhere to go.
“I’m sorry, honey. I know I’ve been hard to reach, but things will get better from this point on. I’ve got a lead on a place for us. You can help me check it out when you get back.”
Listening to Mom talk about moving furniture and finding a new place, Shandell fought to hold back the tears. These past few weeks, she had longed for the comforts of home and now it was gone? She ached for her mother and for herself. That house was her home. All her things were there. Her bed. Her clothes and jewelry and posters. Her stuffed animals and a fat box of notes she had collected over the years from her friends.
“Mom? What about my stuff?”
“We’ll retrieve it from the house. Don’t worry about that right now. Tell me how you’ve been? Still in Halfway? Where should I send the money? Western Union?”
“I’m fine,” Shandell lied, pressing a hand to her hot forehead as she tried to sort through Mom’s questions. She pressed her face to the tiny window of the shanty and wondered why her thoughts were so jumbled. Swirling like the stars overhead.
“Shandell? Do you want me to come and get you right now? Tell me where you are.”
“I’m staying at an orchard outside Halfway, but you won’t be able to find me in the dark, and I can’t … I can’t walk into town right now.”
“I wouldn’t want you walking after dark. Give me an address and I’ll use my GPS.”
“I don’t know the address.” She rubbed the sweat from the back of her neck. Why was it so hot in here?
“Then I’m going to wire you money. I’m sure there’s a place in Halfway. Tomorrow go into town and ask around. There’ll be a hundred dollars waiting for you.”
“Okay.” Shandell’s voice sounded hollow, echoing the feeling inside her. The emptiness. Exhausted, she sank down to the rough floor of the shanty. Her head was a ball of fire and she was hundreds of miles from where she wanted to be. Hundreds of miles from home. No … there was no home. She would never return to the home she had focused on these past few weeks.
As Mom talked about apartment hunting, Shandell leaned against the whitewashed boards of the shanty and found herself drifting … adrift. The little shack floated off, gently rising over fields and rolling hills, lifting into the sky like a hot air balloon.
When she opened her eyes, she was slumped down in the tiny shack and her mother was saying good-bye. Somehow, the rest of the conversation had slipped through her fingers like water from the creek. “Come home as soon as you can, honey. I’ve been so worried about you. Call me tomorrow if you want a ride.”
“Okay, Mom,” Shandell said on a sigh.
She hung up the phone, put her hood up, and braced herself to step into the night air. It wasn’t that cold, but she shivered as soon as she stepped out the door.
What a wreck I am.
Sorrow weighed down her feet as she tried to walk. She plodded on, her mind racing away from her then circling back like a boomerang. Oh, what was wrong with her?
The crushing cramps came just as she passed the Doddy house, and she had to stop and hunch over as the pincers dug into her belly and held on for what seemed like an eternity. And then, the pain lifted and she was able to straighten and continue on. The sugar shack was a dark hulk against the blue night. She was glad to see it, but it wasn’t home. That made her want to cry, but no tears came. She was all dried out.
The next thing she knew, she was back in the sugar shack, frantically slipping her boots on for an emergency visit to the outhouse. She was really falling apart! As she hugged her jacket closed and traipsed down the dark path, she tried to bring logic to her warped brain. Her cramps were getting worse, and now she felt weak and feverish, wracked by chills and sweating. She needed to see a doctor. Sick at mind and heart, she put up her hood, folded her arms, and pushed into the darkness, one step at a time, one foot in front of the other.
“What else can we do?” Rachel asked James as they waited for Mark to hitch up a buggy for their ride into the clinic. “I found her passed out in the dirt. She’s taken a turn for the worse, and I’ve tried every remedy under the sun.”
“So she must go to the clinic with us.” James shrugged as he pulled himself out of the chair and held on to the hitching post. He had kept the news of his progress a secret for the most part, but he had revealed a bit to Mark as he couldn’t bear to have the boy lifting him in and out of a buggy. “What did you tell Mark?”
“That she’s my friend, and she’s sick, and we’re taking her to see Doc Trueherz.”
“Well.” James’s dark eyes met hers, and the understanding that glimmered there melted her heart. “You told him the truth. That’s good.”
“She’s already in the back of the buggy, lying down, with a blanket.”
Concerned about Shandell, Rachel had brought her some medicine made from the boiled-down leaves of b
lueberry shrubs, but found her collapsed on the ground when she arrived at the sugar shack.
“Shandell, what happened?”
“The path to the outhouse, it’s too long,” Shandell had murmured as her head lolled back toward a lacy green thatch of weeds.
“Did you have a rough night, honeygirl?” Rachel asked gently.
“I can’t go home.” Shandell’s eyes shone with a strange light. “There’s no home, no house. It floated away. Floated over a cornfield.”
“Maybe in your dreams. Did you have a nightmare?” Rachel pressed her hand to Shandell’s hot forehead. “You’re burning up with fever. Can you sit up?”
Shandell propped herself up on her elbows for a moment, then lay down. “My head’s too heavy.”
Worry was a thorn in Rachel’s throat as she rode her scooter back to the Lapp barn. The Englisher girl needed a doctor, and since they were headed to the clinic, there was no reason not to bring her along.
Quickly, she hitched up a cart and brought it back to the sugar shack. Since there was no way Shandell could walk the path through the orchard, this would have to do. Although Shandell wasn’t particularly fond of riding in a cart after her manure experience, it wasn’t difficult to get the girl to lie down in the wooden cargo area. Rachel felt a bit guilty, involving Mark in helping the Englisher girl, but he seemed unfazed as Rachel helped Shandell ease out of the cart and settle into the backseat of the buggy.
As they rode into town, the rocking motion of the buggy and the steady clip-clop of the horse’s hooves seemed to soothe Shandell a bit, but every now and then she would stir and murmur feverish things that Rachel could not make sense of, calling for her mommy and whimpering that she couldn’t go home.
A Simple Hope Page 24