Home on Huckleberry Hill

by Jennifer Beckstrand

  Jethro furrowed his brow. “Am I going the wrong way?”

  The buildings were so close together and the motor home so big, they didn’t have enough room to open their doors and get out if they needed to. Jethro certainly wouldn’t be able to turn around. They pulled forward to a small window. Unfortunately, it was on Mary Anne’s side of the RV. They were going the wrong way. Jethro tapped on the brakes a little too forcefully, but Mary Anne was ready, and the lurch didn’t even bother her.

  A girl with curly blond hair, not more than seventeen or eighteen, slid open the window, and her peppy smile faltered just a bit at the corners. “Um, oh my gosh. Um. Welcome to Betty’s Bakery. You’re going the wrong way.”

  Mary Anne covered a giggle that was threatening to pop out of her mouth. Jethro leaned over Mary Anne and raised his voice so the girl could better hear him. “Sorry about that, but could we get two maple-bacon doughnuts and two large coffees?”

  The girl took a second and a third look at both of them, and then her gaze slid across the RV. “Um. Um, sure. Are you guys Amish?”

  “Jah,” Jethro said.

  Mary Anne thought it might be best to distract the girl from where her thoughts were likely going. They didn’t need to try to explain this to a policeman. “We hear your maple-bacon doughnuts are famous.”

  “I didn’t know Amish could drive motor homes.”

  “I can,” Jethro said. It was a gute answer. True, but vague.

  With an arm still resting on the counter, the girl turned and motioned to someone inside the bakery. “Uncle Gary, did you know Amish could drive motor homes?”

  “They can’t. It’s not allowed.”

  “These Amish can.”

  Uncle Gary appeared at the window. He was a short, middle-aged man with intelligent brown eyes and deep smile lines around his mouth. He wore a Green Bay Packers baseball cap and a Minnesota Vikings T-shirt. Mary Anne couldn’t distract this one. She didn’t know anything about football. Maybe they should make a quick getaway before the police were called in.

  Uncle Gary gave Bob’s RV a look-see, then peered into the cab and stared at Jethro and Mary Anne. Jethro gave Uncle Gary a friendly wave. Mary Anne pasted on a smile that probably looked more like a painful grimace.

  “Well, how about that,” Uncle Gary said, smiling as if he’d just met some long-lost cousins. “I didn’t know you folks were allowed to drive motor homes. It’s nice to meet you.”

  Mary Anne hated to give this nice man the wrong impression of the Amish, but she’d rather not spend the rest of what was left of the night in jail. She glanced doubtfully at Jethro.

  Jethro winked at her—which was an oddly comforting gesture—then grinned at Uncle Gary. “The truth is, we’re not allowed to drive RVs. This is a friend’s RV, and we’re just having a little adventure.”

  Uncle Gary nodded, as if he was in on the secret. “No need to say another word. You people have to do something to relieve the boredom of your dull lives.”

  Mary Anne closed her mouth on another giggle. The Englisch had some funny notions about the Amish. Her smile faded, and she pressed her lips together. Up until a few weeks ago, her life was as dull as a sack of potatoes. Maybe some people were willing to settle. She wasn’t.

  “That’s why we came here for doughnuts,” Jethro said. “To get some excitement.”

  “You came to the right place, even though you came in the wrong way.” Uncle Gary pointed to his right, where three cars were waiting in line in front of the motor home. One of the drivers tapped on his horn and spread his hands in a gesture of irritation. He didn’t look too happy to be staring at the front end of an RV.

  Uncle Gary handed Mary Anne two lidded cups of kaffee and a white paper sack. “You’re going to be sad you only got two. Those doughnuts are so good, you’ll want to buy a dozen next time. Our best seller.”

  Mary Anne relaxed a little. They weren’t going to get arrested today. Probably.

  Jethro handed Uncle Gary some money and got his change. “Denki. We’ll be back sometime.”

  “I know you will,” Uncle Gary said. “Just come in the right way next time.”

  Jethro eyed the three cars in front of him. They didn’t seem willing to move. He gave Mary Anne a wry smile. “I think we’re going to have to go backward.”

  Mary Anne nodded, as if she had all the confidence in the world in his driving skills. How was he going to back this house on wheels out of the alley?

  Jethro put the RV into Reverse and turned to look over his right shoulder. There wasn’t much to see except the small kitchen and the door that led to the even smaller bedroom. He wouldn’t be able to navigate that way, and his side mirror was folded in to keep from scraping against the brick wall.

  “Keep your tires straight and back out slowly,” Uncle Gary called.

  Looking straight ahead—because there really wasn’t anywhere else left to look—Jethro eased his foot off the brake, and the RV crawled backward. “What did I tell you?” Jethro said, suddenly very pleased with himself. “You have to admit the motor home was a wonderful gute idea. We got our doughnuts, and it’s only 5:10.”

  Mary Anne smiled. He was like a boy eager to show his mamm the frog in his pocket.

  They backed slowly down the alleyway as the cars in front of them inched forward. Jethro stuck his head out the open window and looked behind them. “Almost there.” Still going as slowly as a turtle on a stroll, he turned the steering wheel to the left to maneuver the RV around the tight corner.

  “You’re going to hit . . .”

  Once again, Jethro slammed on the brakes as the left front bumper of the RV tapped ever so lightly against the building on the left. “Oh, sis yuscht!” he said, pulling the stick down and cranking the steering wheel to the right. “Do I have to turn it left to go right or right to go right?” He’d pulled forward barely a few inches when Mary Anne heard a sickening scrape behind them.

  She poked her head out the window. “Stop, Jethro. The back end is up against the corner of the building.”

  Jethro looked like a schoolboy who’d been caught doing something naughty. “Oh, sis yuscht.” He pushed the stick up again and turned the steering wheel to the left, taking his foot slowly off the pedal. The RV moved backward, but there was more scraping noise behind them, and the front of the RV nearly hit the brick wall again.

  He stepped on the brake as the car in front of them started honking with vigor. He’d gotten his doughnut and was stuck between an RV and a red sports car. Jethro winced and gave the irritated Englischer a friendly wave. “Do you think we could get them to tear these two buildings down? The man in front of us is getting a little testy, and I don’t want to put any more scratches on Bob’s RV.”

  Mary Anne couldn’t help but smile as she watched the blush creep up Jethro’s neck. “I think you need a few more driving lessons.”

  His mouth fell open in mock indignation. “I’m a gute driver.”

  “That must be why we’re stuck at the doughnut shop facing the wrong way.” It was all so strange. Mary Anne couldn’t help but laugh.

  Jethro laughed with her. “I missed the day they taught us how to back up.”

  The driver in front of them must have thought they hadn’t heard him honk the first fifty times. Either that or he’d fallen asleep with his head pressed against his horn. Between the two buildings, the noise was deafening. Mary Anne and Jethro rolled up their windows.

  “Ach, vell,” Jethro said with a dramatic lift of his eyebrow. “I can’t open my door to escape.” He took Mary Anne’s hand and gazed into her eyes with a pathetic look that almost made her laugh out loud. “Save yourself, Mary Anne. The senior center isn’t far from here. If you get out and walk, you might make it in time for work, even with a sore toe.”

  She grinned and batted her eyelashes. “I can’t leave you, not after you went to all this trouble to steal a motor home and buy me breakfast.”

  A warm, breathtaking smile formed on his lips. “We cou
ld be stuck here for weeks.”

  “We’ve got a full kitchen and a bathroom.”

  He laughed. “What about the angry Englischer with the sparkly beads hanging from his mirror?”

  “He can use our kitchen too,” Mary Anne said.

  Smiling like the cat that ate the canary, Jethro turned off the engine and picked up the sack from where she had set it on the armrest between them. “In that case, we might as well eat our doughnuts.”

  Before they could open the sack, Uncle Gary appeared in front of them, standing between the RV and the little white car that was still honking like an angry goose. He propped his hands on his hips and tilted his head to study the motor home from a few different angles. The man in the white car didn’t seem to notice. He was still trying to bring down the walls with his horn.

  Uncle Gary turned around and shouted at the driver of the white car. Mary Anne didn’t hear what he said, but the honking stopped. She smiled to herself. Some people would only mind their manners if they were scolded into it.

  Uncle Gary turned back and called to Jethro. Mary Anne and Jethro opened their windows so they could hear him. “You’ve got to turn your steering wheel hard to the left and then immediately to the right yet,” he said.

  Jethro stuck his head out the window and nearly scraped his forehead on the wall. “I can’t do it. I’m not that good a driver.” He glanced at Mary Anne and curled his lips. “I’ll sacrifice my pride for the sake of Bob’s RV.”

  She smiled. “That’s very thoughtful of you.”

  Uncle Gary shook his head. “You Amish should learn how to drive your RVs.” He came around to Mary Anne’s side and opened her door, but since the RV was wedged between buildings, the door wouldn’t open all that far, and Uncle Gary was too wide to slide into the cab.

  “You could go in the side door,” Mary Anne said.

  Uncle Gary puckered his lips as if he’d eaten a pickle. “It’s on the other side. I’d have to go all the way around the building.” He shut Mary Anne’s door. “Okay. I’ll get Natasha. She’s a skinny little thing, and she drives her dad’s tractor all summer long.”

  The car in front of them honked again as Uncle Gary walked past it and around to the front of the building. He smacked his hand against the side of the white car, probably as a warning to the driver not to honk again. Gary soon returned with Natasha, the curly-headed slip of a girl who’d filled their doughnut order. She looked too young to drive anything, let alone to be able to unstick a huge motor home from between two buildings.

  Natasha slipped between the wall and the motor home, and Uncle Gary opened Mary Anne’s door for her. Mary Anne stood up and moved back as Natasha slid into the cab. It was a tight fit. Mary Anne could hear Natasha sucking in her breath. “Okay,” Natasha said, “I need to sit there.” She pointed to Jethro’s seat. He practically jumped out of her way, no doubt embarrassed that he hadn’t moved sooner, or mortified that an Englisch teenager was going to have to get them out of their predicament.

  Natasha settled into the seat and turned the key. She looked comfortable behind the wheel, as if she’d been driving motor homes all her life. Uncle Gary stood in front calling out directions, pointing and gesturing and flapping his arms every which way. To Mary Anne, it looked like a strange dance, and she had no idea how Natasha could understand what he was trying to tell her.

  Whatever communication passed between them, it worked. Natasha turned the wheel hard one way and then hard the other, all the while letting the motor home roll without pressing on the gas pedal. There was only one screech as she dislodged the back bumper from the corner of the building. Other than that, the motor home didn’t so much as caress the walls again, even though they came within half inches a couple of times. Mary Anne and Jethro stood just inside the RV kitchen and held on tight as Natasha pushed the side mirror into place and used it to back the rest of the way out of the alley and onto the street. Uncle Gary followed her all the way, still gesturing wildly, even though Natasha didn’t seem to be paying him any heed.

  She pulled onto the street and drove around the corner, then stopped the RV right in front of the bakery. Mary Anne and Jethro gave her a big round of applause. Natasha didn’t say anything, but the corners of her mouth curled upward as she put the RV into Park.

  There was a line of more than a dozen cars at the bakery stretching out of the alleyway and onto the street.

  Jethro made a face. “I caused you a lot of trouble this morning.”

  Mary Anne held the bag of doughnuts in front of his face. “But we got our doughnuts.”

  Natasha grinned. “They’re totally worth it.”

  “Thank you for getting us unstuck.”

  “No problem, but next time you should park on the street and come in. That alleyway is too narrow.” She rolled her eyes with an affectionate smile on her face. “Uncle Gary had to have a drive-through.”

  Natasha climbed out of the cab, and Jethro sat back down in the driver’s seat. He glanced at Mary Anne doubtfully. “Do you dare drive to the lake with me?”

  She lifted her skirts and bounced back into the seat beside him. “I almost got run over, we bought bacon-maple doughnuts, a teenage girl drove us around Shawano, and it’s only 5:25. Why cut our adventure short? I’m expecting to nearly drown at the lake. It’ll be fun.”

  His face relaxed into the sweetest, toastiest smile she had ever seen. “It would be a shame to go home just when it was getting fun.”

  He started the motor home up again and, in his unbridled enthusiasm, tapped on the horn. If he hoped tapping would make the horn quieter, he was greatly mistaken. He could have summoned all the geese on the lake. It probably startled the Englischer in the white car. He was no doubt sitting in the alley wiping kaffee from his white shirt.

  Jethro took it slow, but it was still much faster to the lake than going by buggy. He drove them up to the overlook, and although he parked far from the water, Mary Anne was certain the motor home would lose its brakes and roll right into the lake—especially after the mishaps they’d already had.

  They found a nice patch of grass, and Mary Anne pulled a blanket from the motor home bed for them to sit on. They sipped their lukewarm kaffee and ate their maple-bacon doughnuts while they watched the sun rise. The rhythmic rat-a-tat of a woodpecker echoed in the air, as well as birdsong from at least half a dozen different birds. Mary Anne caught sight of a stunning yellow-headed blackbird and an even more rare red-breasted grosbeak darting among the safety of the budding trees.

  The air felt still and fresh, and the sky was lined with long, thin clouds that caught the light of the sunrise and changed it into a thousand different shades of orange and pink. Mary Anne never in a million years would have been able to paint the beauty of that sky.

  Jethro leaned back on one hand while holding the kaffee cup in the other. He was sitting close, but Mary Anne didn’t mind. The morning air was a little chilly, and she appreciated the warmth that radiated from his body. They had often joked that he was like a furnace and she was like an icebox. She was always cold and slept with two blankets. He was always warm and kicked the blankets off anytime he got a chance.

  His gaze was turned toward the lake, probably searching for fish jumping out of the water to eat their breakfast. She stole a look at him out of the corner of her eye. She had always liked his profile. His dark eyebrows brooded over his eyes like storm clouds, and his jaw was square and firm. She reached out and ran her fingers over the beard on his chin. He liked to keep it as short as was allowed in the gmayna.

  He held perfectly still as she took off his hat and lightly ran her fingers over his thick, dark hair. She loved the look of it, even if he kept it under his hat most of the time. “You need a haircut,” she said, feeling that familiar twinge of guilt and sadness and affection she often experienced when she thought of him. He was so handsome, so steady. So safe.

  “I . . . uh . . . I haven’t thought about it for weeks.”

  Just in time, she remember
ed she lived in a tent and didn’t love Jethro anymore, no matter how handsome he was. She pulled her hand away. “You should ask your mamm to cut it.”

  He turned to look at her, his expression a mixture of pain and hope. “You used to cut my hair.”

  “I don’t do that anymore.”

  Instead of pulling away from her in irritation, he raised her hand to his lips and slowly kissed each of her knuckles. He put down his kaffee and smoothed his palm up her arm. She didn’t take her gaze from his face as the warmth of a summer breeze seemed to penetrate her skin. She held her breath to keep from trembling, but it didn’t work. She hadn’t trembled at his touch for years, and here she was, unable to pull away, shaking like a flame in the wind.

  It didn’t make any sense, but she didn’t want the sensation to stop. His rough skin felt so gute against hers, and it had been so long since his touch had made her feel anything but cold. It was almost as if he adored every little piece of her—her hands, her arms, her potato chip collection. Her quilts, her neck, her throat. Her lips.

  A soft, barely audible sigh escaped her lips as he slid his hand behind her head and kissed her with a gentleness she hadn’t thought possible. His touch was so soft, she wondered if she was just imagining it. She raised her hand to his cheek. Jah. He was there, and the touch of his lips against hers felt almost like the only gift she wanted for the rest of her life.

  And then, her blood pulsed like a swollen river. This was insane. How could she be feeling these feelings for someone she didn’t love anymore? She probably knew the answer, but she couldn’t, wouldn’t look closely enough to see what it was. Her confusion raised too many questions she didn’t want to face.

  He pulled away but stayed too close and ran his thumb down the contour of her neck. “I love you, Mary Anne, my precious ruby.”

  “I . . . I . . .” I don’t love you. She couldn’t say it out loud. She didn’t even know if it was true anymore. He’d bought her a maple bacon doughnut and a space heater. He’d driven a motor home to Shawano and saved her from getting run over. She was sure his efforts had something to do with love.