He could give her a lecture about the easy chair and the butterflies after dinner.
She looked up at him, not exactly happy to see him but not scowling either.
“What are you making?” he said, in the least boring voice he could muster.
Mary Anne lifted the spoon to her lips and took a taste. “Braised beef and vegetables. I think I used too much garlic yet.”
He laughed nervously, afraid she’d see right through him. “I love garlic. Never can have too much garlic.”
She put the lid back on the Dutch oven, stood up, and studied his face, her frown etching deep lines around her mouth. “I’m not going to feed you, Jethro.”
He nearly choked on his irritation. “You’ve got plenty.”
“I’ve been wanting to try this recipe for months. I went to the market today and spent ten minutes picking out just the right cut of beef. I peeled the garlic cloves and even got fresh rosemary leaves. They come in a package with the roots still attached.”
What did any of this have to do with whether she was going to feed him or not? “You should grow your own herb garden. It would be less trouble.”
She smirked. “And less expensive.”
“I suppose.”
She huffed out a frustrated breath. “I’m not going to cook to please you anymore, Jethro. I want to try new things, new tastes, without worrying that you’ll complain because I spent too much on the beef or be irritated that I bought green beans out of season.”
“But you can’t afford to spend all you’ve got on fancy meals. I’ll never get my two hundred dollars back.” He knew it was the wrong thing to say the minute he said it. What was two hundred dollars compared to the fact that his wife had left him?
She pinched her lips together until tiny lines circled her mouth. “You’ll get your money back.”
“I don’t care about the money.”
Her laugh was brief and unhappy. “That’s all you care about.”
“It is not. I want my wife to come home and quit stealing my furniture.”
“I need places for visitors to sit.”
“Visitors? You can’t have visitors out here. My chair is going to get wet.”
She looked at him as if he didn’t have a brain in his head. “I was going to move it into the tent after dinner.”
“It’s heavy.”
“I can manage.”
“You’ll ruin it, and then what will I sit on?”
She huffed out an even louder breath. “You’ll get it back as soon as I have the money to buy my own.”
“If you moved back in the house, you wouldn’t need to buy another one.”
“Pammy says she can sell every quilt I make. On the computer. I brought the sewing machine out today, along with my fabric and scissors.”
Jethro was wonderful impressed and wonderful irritated. She’d hauled her sewing machine from the house? “You shouldn’t have the machine out here. It will get wet.”
She lifted her chin. “It’s safely under your tarp.”
“My tarp? I use that for long fishing trips.”
“I have to keep the machine dry.”
“If you’re so eager to live by yourself, you shouldn’t keep taking my stuff. And because you’ve taken some of the dishes, you should at least offer to feed me.”
She scrunched her lips together, as if she were trying very hard to keep her temper. “I gave up trying to correct my faults when I moved out. I feel no need to be the perfect wife.”
“You’re not being any kind of wife.”
“That’s right. I’m not even trying. So I don’t have to feel guilty when I sew a baby quilt or paint my tent.”
“It’s my tent.”
“It’s our tent, and as soon as I get the money, I’ll buy you a new one. I’m sorry, Jethro, but I need it right now.”
“And yet you had enough money to buy a second tent.”
“I don’t have to defend myself to you. I’m not going to feel guilty anymore. But because you’re so worried about it, it’s my cousin Moses’s tent. He let me borrow it.”
“Does he know it might come back with butterflies painted all over it?”
“I asked them at the store. It’s the kind of paint that won’t hurt the tent. I wanted butterflies. They’ll scare away the bears.”
He folded his arms across his chest. “They look ridiculous.”
She sucked in a breath and blinked back what looked like moisture in her eyes. He hadn’t meant to hurt her feelings. He was simply trying to make her see. “I don’t care what you think, Jethro. I painted those butterflies because I love butterflies. I did it to make myself happy because my husband doesn’t even try anymore.”
Doesn’t even try what anymore? They were married. Wasn’t that what happiness was? “Mary Anne,” he said, cupping his fingers around his neck. “Come home. I won’t say another word about the tent or the two hundred dollars. And . . . and you can buy beef once a week if you want.”
She shook her head. “I’m not coming back.”
The urge to lash out overtook him. “Then I’m taking back my chair.”
“Fine. It smells like fish anyway.”
Jethro picked up his easy chair, grunting at its bulk, and headed toward the house. He turned around with the chair in his arms. “I want my favorite blanket back.”
She huffed out a breath, marched into the tent, and emerged with the blanket in her arms. She draped it over his shoulder and turned away, as if avoiding a bad smell. If she thought she was going to get away with clearing him out of house and home, she had another thing coming.
He was going to fight back.
Chapter Five
Mary Anne shimmied out the window, grateful she’d always been a little on the skinny side. Still, breaking into the house in a dress hadn’t been easy, and she had a nice scrape on her left hip to prove it.
She lowered herself to the ground, made sure the window was tightly shut, and brushed off her shaking hands on her apron. She wasn’t sure she’d even be able to lift a pan to make herself dinner tonight. It felt like she’d been hefting hay bales for two hours.
She hiked back to her tent with her plunder and couldn’t help that the giggles tripped out of her mouth like birds from a cage. Who knew making mischief could be so fun? She didn’t take pleasure in Jethro’s unhappiness, so she had done her best to make it look like she hadn’t even been inside the house. Besides, if he knew she knew how to get into the house, he might buy locks for all the windows, and she’d be sealed out for good.
This morning she had found that she needed tinfoil, spices, and the salad tongs to make dinner tonight, but when she’d tried to get into the house to fetch some supplies, she’d discovered Jethro had put locks on every door. He must have gone to the store very late last night, bought locks, and installed them before he went to bed. He’d put simple sliding locks on the side and back doors, but there was a fancier key lock on the front door. That he had been willing to spend the money on fancy locks was only a sign of how angry he was with her.
When she had found the doors locked, it hadn’t taken Mary Anne long to find a window that was easy to open. The windows didn’t have locks, and it surprised her that Jethro wouldn’t have secured those too. Either he hadn’t thought of it or he didn’t imagine Mary Anne would be so nervy as to crawl through a window.
Oh, she was nervy all right. Nothing was going to stand in the way of her and a tinfoil dinner.
She had unlocked the back door because the chair wouldn’t fit through the window. Surely Jethro wouldn’t notice her sewing chair was missing. Then she’d gotten the other supplies she needed, slid the door lock into place, and climbed out the window. Lord willing, Jethro wouldn’t notice anything amiss. If he did, she’d have to figure out how to pick that expensive dead bolt on the front door.
Mary Anne tried to ignore the twinge of pain and the pinch of guilt right at the center of her chest. Jethro had been tossed off his well-ordered life as if he’d be
en thrown from a horse into the river. He was simply doing all he could to keep his head above water. She bit her lip and quickened her pace toward the trees. Jethro’s happiness was no longer her responsibility. She had already made up her mind about that. She was sorry he was upset, but she had her own happiness to look after. Nobody would do it if she didn’t.
Her mamm would say Mary Anne was being selfish and spoiled and stubborn, and she probably was, but ach, the thought of sitting in that little house while the plain white walls closed in about her was unbearable. Jethro didn’t understand. He was content to let her cook and clean and do his laundry, and so long as she didn’t spend any money or paint any walls, he was happy.
But did his happiness have to come at the expense of hers? Did her happiness have to come at the expense of his? Couldn’t they both be happy in their own lives—never needing the other person’s approval to chase their own dreams?
With the tinfoil, spices, and tongs in one hand and the chair draped over her other arm, Mary Anne walked as quickly as she could back to her double tent. Jethro would be home soon, and under no circumstances must he see her going from the house. Although Jethro didn’t like to spend money, something told her he’d gladly lay down some cash for window locks just to teach her a lesson.
She didn’t enjoy borrowing things from the house, and in truth, Mary Anne was going to need to earn some money. She’d started on three quilt tops, even though quilt frames weren’t going to fit in either tent. Pammy had helped her sell those three baby quilts online for a hundred and fifty dollars apiece. Mary Anne had almost four hundred dollars of the quilt money left to buy more fabric, plus food and paint, but it wasn’t going to go very far. Pammy said she could sell as many Amish quilts as Mary Anne could make. Mary Anne could sew them well enough, but she hadn’t quite figured out where she would set up the frames to quilt them.
The living room in Jethro’s house had plenty of space for a king-size quilt and a whole flock of quilters, but Jethro would never approve. She needed to start behaving as if she didn’t have a house to go to whenever she needed. The sooner she was out of Jethro’s hair, the better.
Mary Anne ducked into her tent, set the tinfoil, spices, and tongs on the bookshelf that now served as her pantry, and went through to her second tent, where she kept her sewing machine, fabric, and painting supplies. She scooted the sewing chair under the sewing table. At times like these, she was very glad the Amish didn’t use electricity. The sewing machine was powered by a battery just bigger than a toaster. She’d carried the machine, the table, and the battery out the very first day. She hadn’t sewn one quilt in more than three years, and she was determined to make up for lost time.
“Knock, knock,” someone called from outside the tent. Mary Anne froze for a fraction of a second. Too bad Jethro had taken back his easy chair yesterday. There was nowhere for anyone to sit but the cot and the bench. And the sewing chair, if she got desperate.
“Yoo-hoo! Mary Anne, are you home?”
Mary Anne ducked back into her first tent, passed her cot, and opened the flap. Mammi and Dawdi Helmuth stood just outside her door, each cradling a casserole dish and smiling like Christmas morning.
“Mary Anne,” Mammi said. She shifted the casserole dish into one hand and gave Mary Anne a one-armed hug. “We came to bring you some food and keep you company. Camping by yourself can’t be very fun.” Mammi drew her brows together. “Camping with other people isn’t very fun either. I think we got here just in time.”
“How . . . how did you know I was here?” Were they aware she’d left Jethro and that he’d locked her out of the house? Or did they think she was just on a camping trip?
“Ach,” Mammi said. “The bishop told us what you were up to. He came over last night to try to talk us out of getting a divorce.”
Mary Anne frowned. If Mammi and Dawdi were having marriage troubles, there was no hope for anybody. “You’re getting a divorce?”
Mammi scrunched her lips together in exasperation. “Of course not, dear. Gossip is like a bag of feathers. Once you scatter them, you never know where they’re going to end up.” She handed Mary Anne the casserole dish. It felt like a pan of cement. “You painted butterflies on your tent. Did you see the butterflies, Felty?”
“I did.”
“They’re a breath of springtime on canvas.”
Dawdi reached out and curled his fingers around the edge of the fire pit. “I like this fire pit. Moses and I helped Jethro pick it out. Nice and sturdy, but not too big to move around if you have to. You’ve got a nice place here.”
Mary Anne relaxed. That was just like Mammi and Dawdi. There was no, “Why in the world are you living in a tent?” or “You should be ashamed for leaving your husband.” They always noticed the beauty and ignored the messy stuff.
Mary Anne wasn’t sure what proper tent manners were. “Would you like to come in and sit on my cot? Or would you rather stay out here where there’s more room and fresher air?”
Mammi shook her head. “Much as we’d love to see the inside of your tent, I think we’d better get ours set up before dark. We borrowed it from Aden, and we’re going to need to read the instructions.”
“We don’t need the instructions, Annie. I’ve set up many a tent in my day. It’s not hard.”
“A tent?” Mary Anne said, completely perplexed now. “You brought a tent?”
“Jah,” Dawdi said, pointing to a short, thin canvas bag sitting on the ground next to the fire pit. “We brought a two-man tent, two sleeping bags, some extra shoes, Anna’s knitting, and our toothbrushes.”
“I brought earplugs in case Felty snores,” Mammi said.
Dawdi handed the other casserole dish to Mary Anne. “And these two casseroles for dinner. Do you still have that bathroom in your barn?”
“But why did you bring your tent?”
Mammi picked up the canvas bag and unzipped it. “It’s Aden’s tent. He let us borrow it because I don’t especially enjoy sleeping under the stars, and it might snow tonight.”
Mammi and Dawdi were both well into their eighties, but as far as Mary Anne knew, they were still sharp as tacks. “You’re sleeping here?”
Mammi nodded and stretched herself to her full height of five feet zero inches. “We’ve come to show solidarity with our granddaughter.”
Mary Anne resisted the urge to look behind her to see if it was another granddaughter Mammi was talking about. “Me? What does solidarity mean?”
“It is a Polish word, I think,” Dawdi said, lifting the bottom of the bag and letting the tent and its poles slide out onto the ground.
Mammi was entirely serious about her solidarity. “Of course, you. I know how you hate to camp, and if things with Jethro have gotten so bad that you felt you had to move out, we’re here to support you. It’s why we brought two casseroles. Camping gives me an appetite.”
Mary Anne’s heart sank. She set the casseroles on the ground next to her tent. “Ach, Mammi. I love that you want to support me, but it’s asking too much.”
Mammi clicked her tongue. “You didn’t ask, dear. I volunteered. And I made Felty come with me.”
“But what if you have to get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom? It’s in the barn. And the ground is hard. At least take my cot.”
“I don’t think a cot will fit in this tent,” Dawdi said, studying the segmented poles in his hands as if he had no idea how they got there. “It’s a two-man tent, but the men must be very little.”
Mammi patted Mary Anne’s arm. “What do we need to do to get dinner started?”
Mary Anne gave her a weak smile. Was it possible to cook a casserole in a fire pit? She had no idea what they’d eat on. She’d only taken one plate from the house. Maybe Jethro would let her borrow two more just this once. “Could we pour the casserole into the Dutch oven? We could start a fire in the pit and warm it over the coals.”
“That’s an excellent idea, dear. It’s my famous cheese and cabbage lasagna
. The layers will get mixed, but I’m sure it will warm up beautifully in the Dutch oven.”
Famous indeed. Cousin Titus had once thrown up for three days straight after eating it. No one had ever told Mammi.
“I’ll build a fire,” Mary Anne said, “while you help Dawdi set up the tent.”
Mammi waved in Dawdi’s direction. “Ach, he can put it together with his eyes closed.”
“What’s all this?”
Mary Anne nearly hopped out of her skin. She hadn’t heard Jethro come up behind her, and the fact that she’d broken into his house today made her a little jumpy.
Jethro stood with his feet apart and his muscular arms folded across his chest. He had strong arms and a trim waist. Mary Anne had always liked that about him. Even after their fight yesterday, he didn’t have a scowl on his face—probably because her grandparents were here and he wanted to be polite. “I saw the buggy parked in front of our house,” he said.
“Ach, Jethro.” Mammi beamed like a lantern and moved in for a hug. She acted so happy to see him, someone might have thought Jethro was her favorite grandson-in-law. Maybe Mary Anne wasn’t the only one Mammi was doing the whole solidarity thing with. “I hope you don’t mind we put our horse in the barn with yours. We’re going to be here for a while, and we didn’t want her to get snowed on. And I must say, it’s a very small barn. No wonder Mary Anne decided on a tent instead of the barn. There’s barely room for our two horses and a cow. And it stinks.”
Bless his heart, Jethro was doing his best not to turn hostile, which was the only emotion it seemed he had felt in the last three days. “What are you doing here?”
“We’ve come to support your wife in her time of need,” Mammi said, putting a protective arm around Mary Anne.
Jethro’s frown was like a deep gash on his face. “I’ve tried to be a gute husband, but Mary Anne is bent on embarrassing me.”
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