The Solace of Water

by Elizabeth Byler Younts

  Sparrow pulled at her sister and they bounded up the three creaky porch steps. It was a wonder they didn’t stomp through the wood slats.

  Mallie looked at me with that darn hope in his eyes. He wanted to know if it was his turn.

  “Go on, boy. You and George go see what the girls left you with.”

  The boys took off running.

  “Y’all, look,” Harriet called from an upstairs window. “I like this one. I can see the church.”

  I turned to see the church house. Our new church. I knew it was there all along, but a new flock was as hard to accept as a new house. I hadn’t been ready to settle my eyes on it more than a passing glance. I took in the view. The sun was setting just on the other side of the church. It looked pretty.

  Pink. Purple. Orange.

  God was painting His love across the sky, but I didn’t deserve to see it. All I could think was that the sun had already set for the last time on Carver’s life. I’d give up all the sunsets for the rest of my life if I could just have Carver for one more hour . . . the hour before I sent him to his death.

  EMMA

  The grass was so long that I saw every blade turn and twist instead of it looking like a soft green blanket. Even though I was frustrated that Johnny hadn’t mowed the lawn, I still felt a line of poetry move in the breeze and I pulled out my pencil and notebook from my bedside table. I jotted down a few words. I had to be quick before they flew away—and because I had dumplings in the oven and a house full of company. I crossed through a few words and replaced them.

  The blades of grass twist and turn.

  I didn’t know what came next until I saw a storm rolling in from the western woods behind our house. A gust of wind washed the trees. I extended my arm and smiled as the heaviness of the wind cupped in my palm.

  “Emma, vas bish en du?” John bounded into the bedroom asking me what I was doing.

  I pulled my hand inside like I’d been burned. I closed my notebook and stuffed it away. “I just had to put something away.” This was true until the open window had wooed me.

  “Bish du en schravah?” He shook his head as he asked if I was writing. “That’s nonsense. Your time would be better spent seeing to what’s burning in the oven.”

  I didn’t say anything to my husband, but I hated being scolded like a child even though he was right—I was not a good hostess. I was embarrassed and stayed silent. As I passed him he grabbed my arm, and though my instinct was to pull my arm away, I didn’t want to make things worse. He was too sober.

  “Don’t give them a reason to gossip.” His voice was low.

  The brew on his breath lingered just over the chicken and noodles since he’d been drinking just before his brother’s family’s arrival. It was how he would get through the evening. He’d slip into the basement again after everyone was asleep. This was always an issue when we had overnight visitors. We didn’t want anyone to know about the things that happened behind our closed doors. And even we didn’t talk about them openly with each other, like an unspoken agreement.

  “If you don’t want gossip, you might want to chew on some peppermint leaves,” I said through clenched teeth and pulled my arm from his grip. My anger toward him in this moment frightened me.

  “Emma. You know I need your help.” He whispered, “I—I can’t— can’t do it.” His lips pinched together and his eyes were steeped with a familiar desperation.

  I lifted my chin but didn’t respond. I would help him. I always did. I didn’t want us to lose our lives with my husband losing his reputation. But I couldn’t agree to it like this—it was too humiliating.

  The air downstairs smelled more of sweat from the added bodies than of the scent of my overcooked dumplings. When I got to the bottom of the stairs, I ignored the curious sidelong glances from those who sat in the living room. How long had I been upstairs? My fourteen-year-old niece, Rebecca, pulled the dumplings from the oven when I entered the kitchen.

  Berthy sat at the table and rested her hands around her swollen abdomen that held her eighth child. I was accustomed to the ache I felt inside at the sight, but for just a moment I stared.

  I smiled at Rebecca. “Dangeh. Maybe I should get you to make the dessert tomorrow.”

  A shy smile crept over the girl’s face. “They’re only a little dark,” Rebecca said with the gentleness of a lamb. “With some ice cream it’ll . . .”

  Her words faded when John strutted into the kitchen. Though he appeared eager for dessert, I knew why he stayed close to me. Was he worried that in my nervousness I’d surface his secret? I would never let that happen though. I was too afraid of the consequences our whole family would face.

  We made eye contact and after a few moments his face softened slightly. I knew he didn’t want to hurt me, but protecting himself was more important than anything else. He watched me for a few more moments, then returned to the living room. I cleared my throat to disguise the shudder that ran through me.

  Rebecca asked me what was wrong. “Vas ist letz, Aunt Emma?”

  “Vas?”

  “You winced.”

  “Hap ich?” Had I?

  For dessert I put on the table the shallow bowls we’d just washed, dried, and stacked. What was one more round on rarely used dishes? I sent Johnny and my nephews for the ice cream I’d made earlier that day when my laundry was on the line. From the living room my husband cleared his throat and I turned to watch him fidget worse than a child. He needed another drink.

  “Larry, coffee?” I asked my brother-in-law, who was engrossed in talking about how their bishop was allowing Englisher farm equipment. He looked over and nodded with a thumbs-up but kept talking.

  I took two mugs and filled one all the way and one halfway. With Berthy and several of her children behind me, I whisked from the back of the cupboard the unmarked wine bottle and filled up the second mug.

  “I’ll take them.” Rebecca stood right behind me and started for the mugs.

  I panicked and handed her a mug. “This one is your dat’s.”

  “They’re both black?” Rebecca was confused.

  “John takes his sweet.” The lies I told to hide our truth were starting to suffocate me.

  My niece smiled and picked up the other mug with an “okay” on her lips.

  And as I fumbled to put away the amber bottle she seemed not to notice, I held my breath. I had no way to stop her and breathed a prayer—as if God would hear such a prayer.

  I turned as both Larry and John thanked Rebecca. My gaze met John’s as he lifted the mug to his lips, and before I knew which mug he’d gotten, Larry sprayed his first swallow of coffee all over the living room.

  “What’s this?” he yelled and started laughing. “Emma, you got me good. I know John put you up to this because he knows how much I like my coffee.”

  Rebecca started laughing and pointed at me like I’d played a good joke. Everyone else joined in, thinking I had accomplished quite a prank.

  “Gotcha, Larry,” John said and laughed with his brother. I played along and made a few jokes while I cleaned up the coffee spray and let Rebecca fill another cup for her dat.

  I couldn’t look at John. In all the years this had never happened before and it made my every nerve twist and turn like my writing about the blades of grass in a burning wind. Later that night I thought John was going to hit me. He never had, but maybe he would start. Surely my stupid mistake would bring it. But he ignored me like I didn’t exist.

  I began to wish I didn’t.

  DELILAH

  A man as dark as pitch stood at my door the second morning. It was our mover.

  “G’morning, ma’am. Clyde Green.” His voice was so deep it touched my toes and maybe dug through the floor. It reminded me of my daddy’s voice, like he chewing on every word before he spit it out. “Would’ve been here sooner, but the truck broke down.”

  I waved him in. “Coffee, Mr. Green?”

  I turned back to my kitchen and had to take it in again becau
se it didn’t feel quite right yet. The sink was ahead under the window. I’d hide the water pipe with a curtain this week. The stove was to the left. A small fridge was against the same wall. The cabinet against the opposite wall was painted the same cream wall color. It looked like it was built right in, but it wasn’t. My table would sit between the kitchen and the front door. Bigger kitchen than Montgomery, but it wasn’t home.

  “Thank you, ma’am.” He ducked through the doorframe when he stepped inside and his shoulders filled up the space.

  “You better call me Deedee, Mr. Green.” I handed him some instant coffee.

  “Thank you kindly, Ms. Deedee.”

  “I’ll go get Malachi. He over at the church.”

  I left the man standing in the kitchen. When I walked out the breeze caught the skirt of my dress and I pushed down the pleats. It was my darkest shirtwaist dress, an olive color. Didn’t seem right to grieve in the springtime when the outdoors was coming back to life. But the dress was thin enough to grieve in the Montgomery heat and dark enough to be respectful. But this place was different. It was warm, not hot, and the trees and grass was always moving around.

  My Harriet was dancing with her doll in the morning sun. Mallie and Sparrow was picking through the garden ruins for more wild vegetables. And my little George was chasing butterflies with a fistful of wildflowers.

  When I caught Sparrow’s eyes I pointed at the church. She yelled, “Okay,” and returned to weeding through the wild onions and beans. Even from a distance I saw she wasn’t a little girl no more. She looked like a young woman with curves that come from chicken-fried chicken and beans and an extra serving of growing-up stuff happening under that skin of hers.

  She reminded me of myself when I was fourteen. My mama wrapped my bosoms under my church dress because she said the boys wouldn’t look at my face or hear my words no more. Made me sweat like the choir director. Mama finally gave up on her notion and just sewed me up some new dresses.

  But this wasn’t as easy as that. I didn’t know what to do with Sparrow—not just because she was growing up but because of Carver. I just kept her at arm’s length and knew it was wrong. Everything changed when we lost Carver.

  The moment after Sparrow was born Grannie Harriet put her in my arms and she looked like a little brown bird. She made the littlest sounds from her puckered lips and her eyes opened to look right at me. She was so small, a little early, and God just said to my heart, My eye be on her. He named her Sparrow. Grannie Harriet thought I was nuts so I made sure to name my next daughter after her.

  When I walked into the church, the door creaked and a mouse scurried across the floor. My gaze roamed over the old building. I hadn’t even come inside yet. Just kept my distance. It wasn’t nothing fancy. Just four walls and a roof. Six rows of old wooden pews on a wide plank floor—an aisle down the middle. There ain’t no choir loft, no altar, no pulpit to preach behind neither. But there was a cross. It was way up high—the highest point inside. It all felt so heavy on my soul my knees let go of my weight and I grabbed hold of the pew in front of me. The commotion echoed in the dusty air.

  Malachi stood from the front. His face wet. He pulled out a hankie from his pocket and wiped it down his face. I’d seen him cry plenty—preaching at the pulpit, at funerals, and when our boy died. But those times we were together as a man and wife or as a church family with all of us sniffing on tears. But these tears was different—lonely—and for nobody but hisself. Did this happen often without me knowing?

  “Deedee?”

  I wanted to ask him what’s he crying for but I don’t. Carver. Leaving Montgomery. Maybe ’cause I wasn’t the woman he married so many years ago.

  “Clyde Green here with all our stuff.” I threw a thumb over my shoulder toward the house. “Anyone coming by to help unload?”

  “Baby, I don’t know. Sister Marlene said they needed a preacher but nobody is here.”

  At the mention of Marlene my back stiffened. She was Malachi’s longtime old girlfriend and the one who brought us to Sinking Creek. His burdened-filled voice tramped on down the aisle toward me, but I stood stiff so it didn’t touch me.

  “I tried to talk to them yesterday but nobody answered their doors.”

  “Is that why you crying?” I just ’bout lost my breath. We had a boy in the ground and he was crying about this?

  “I just want our family—” He stopped for a long swallow, then he looked at me real serious. “This should be a new beginning for us. I thought they would welcome us and make you feel—”

  “Make me what? Feel better?” I raised my eyebrows and let out a breathy laugh. “You think a group of strangers from this Podunk place are gonna make me feel better just like that?” I snapped my fingers.

  In the distance I heard Sparrow’s voice and then the door flew open. Mallie rushed in, his eyes so big all I seen was white.

  “What’s the matter, boy?” I said it like he was exaggerating real good because I didn’t want to believe that something could be wrong. There was too many things wrong already.

  “George is gone,” he said between deep breaths.

  “What you mean, George is gone?” His face formed in my mind, both him and Carver. They were identical. But George had that special way about him. He didn’t breathe right away when he was born, almost didn’t breathe at all, and it made him—special. Carver had always looked after him. But Carver gone now.

  “Mama, come,” Mallie yelled.

  Then Sparrow’s voice came at me so loud it made me think of church bells calling for everyone to come. I ran.

  EMMA

  I studied my reflection in my pond. My face was too thin to be pretty. It hadn’t always been that way. When I was young my mammie told me I was her prettiest granddaughter so I wouldn’t have to try quite so hard with my baking to catch a husband. She knew I wasn’t as good in the kitchen as most Amish girls. I told her I’d rather write pretty lines about nature than bake. Later my mem told me that I wouldn’t need to finish the eighth grade, that working at home was more important than school. I never went back to school a day after that, but I already had the love for words in my heart and I never stopped writing my lines. It didn’t matter if anyone else thought they were pretty. I liked them.

  Looking glass lake.

  I imagined my new words floating in the water next to my face—I would write them down later. My love for words about nature was in part due to all the time I spent in it. From the beauty and peace of it to the harvesting of wild herbs. The need for the herbs drove me now.

  The clinking of metal a short distance away made me stand and stare back at my house. Berthy’s younger children cheered. Someone had gotten a ringer, playing horseshoe. Berthy had pulled a chair outside. She sat near her children with a bowl of snap peas held between her knees.

  Since we were all eager for wild mushrooms in our dinner tonight, it was my job to gather them. I picked up my basket with tools. There weren’t many other things I would rather be doing than redeeming the good from the earth.

  I glanced to the tethered boat that floated next to the small dock, then pushed past the long grass toward the woods. The young trees greeted me with their low swaying branches and my hand brushed against the thin bark of several before I got to the sassafras trees. It was a little late for digging up roots for tea, but I had been so consumed with my sugar maples earlier in the spring, I had forgotten. I used my trowel to find a root, severed it, then pulled it up. After cutting it with my knife to fit in my basket, I moved on.

  My sugar maples waved at me as I continued farther in to find nettles and yarrow with my eyes out for mushrooms. After a few minutes the road noise and the squeal of my nieces and nephews playing had disappeared. The cry of hungry baby birds and the long whistle of the cardinal tickled my ears instead, along with the rustle of wildlife against the dead leaves and twigs that had lain under the snow.

  In this part of the woods nettles grew everywhere. I put on my gloves and held the stalks t
o cut about five inches down. I cut, wrapped, and pinned them in cheesecloth—I’d been blistered by the nettles because of carelessness and I wouldn’t do that again.

  The deeper I walked the heavier the humidity became and sweat dripped from my jaw and onto my evergreen dress. Rain whispered against the high trees, but I stayed dry until I spotted mushrooms in a small, lush clearing. I rushed to cut them no matter the rain. With my basket full of mushrooms, I walked a short way to see about my wild turnips—Jack in the Pulpit.

  My most-needed wild herbs were scant and not at all the hearty plants from previous seasons. We’d had a difficult spring with a freeze after everything had started to bud. I’d check on them again soon. There wasn’t much time left to harvest the root.

  What would I do if my harvest was too light to last me for a year?

  Just around the other side of that patch, I squatted down at a small grassy mound where my too-early baby had been tucked in so many years ago. I brushed away the wilted black-eyed Susans atop her place. This was not the first time I’d found the flowers here. Johnny didn’t know about his long-ago sister and I couldn’t imagine John doing this—he’d never shown any tenderness over our loss. As I let my mind linger on that time long ago and on how it had changed everything, I heard a distant scream.

  It sounded like a child but too far away for it to be one of Berthy’s children. I stood and looked around. It could’ve been an animal. When it came again I stepped through the brush and back onto the path. Then the screaming became continuous.

  I ran toward the screaming. Twigs broke and leaves rustled beneath my feet. An overgrown thistle bush snagged my dress. My heart was pounding inside my ears. I didn’t stop running until a small Negro boy came into view.

  I dropped my basket. Herbs and mushrooms scattered everywhere. The boy was waving his arms around. Bees. His eyes found mine and he ran toward me.

  A dozen or more bees swarmed him when I closed the gap between us and pulled him into the front of my skirt, covering him with my apron as much as possible. I swatted at the bees. After a sting of my own and more swatting, the remaining bees flew away.