by Anna Schmidt
“I am sorry for your difficulties, Darcy.”
“Stay until the end of the year, then.”
“That’s really not possible. My son and I have the opportunity to travel to Central America in two weeks. Our church is sponsoring a relief mission to help rebuild a remote village that was destroyed by last Tuesday’s earthquake.”
She stood up and offered Darcy a handshake. Shuffling her stack of files from one arm to the other, Darcy stood as well. She clutched her files to her chest instead of accepting Rachel’s offer to shake hands. “As I said before, I don’t understand you,” she said.
Rachel smiled. “Then at last we have something in common, for I don’t understand you either, but I know that you are a good person, dedicated to your work. I genuinely admire you and I thank you for the opportunity you and the others have given me here. But I need to focus on my son for now. It really is that simple. So I’ll say good night, Darcy.”
Outside, she stood for a moment enjoying the cool dry night. The sky was filled with stars, the fronds of the tall, thin palm trees silhouetted by the light of a half moon. As she walked to the bus stop she checked her pager to be sure there were no more emergencies she needed to address before she left for the night. Justin was on an overnight camping trip with the youth group from the church, part of the preparation for the mission trip. Once there he and the other young people would help rebuild housing and a school while she helped out in the mobile medical unit that the Mennonite Disaster Service had set up in the village.
Her heart welled with pleasure when she thought about how excited Justin had been when she’d agreed that joining the mission trip was the perfect way for them to celebrate Christmas. Hester and John were going as well as several other adults and young people from the congregation. They would leave two days after she completed her work at the hospital and return on New Year’s Eve.
Across the street, Rachel saw the lights on in the café. She decided to treat herself to a cup of coffee before heading home. Inside the café, she was mildly surprised to see Zeke sitting at the counter. She congratulated him on buying the business, and then she had an idea.
“Have you got a minute to talk?”
“For you? Anytime.” He patted the stool beside him then reached across the counter to retrieve a clean mug and the pot of coffee brewing there. “Regular or decaf?”
“Decaf.”
He filled her mug and refilled his own and then swiveled on his stool to face her. “So, what’s up?”
She knew that he was aware of the missions trip, so she told him that she and Justin were going. Hester and John had asked him to manage the co-op while they were gone. “But once we return I’m going to need a job.”
“Go on.”
“Well, I don’t know what you have in mind for this place, but I was thinking that maybe if you needed somebody to wait tables …”
Zeke frowned. “Wait tables? You? Why would you give up nursing to wait tables here?”
“Right now I need uncomplicated, Zeke. You of all people must understand that.”
“But when Darcy was in here earlier she said she was going to ask you to stay.”
“She did. I turned her down.”
Zeke grinned. “Bet that blew her mind.”
“She’ll find somebody.”
Zeke covered her hand with his. “I get it, Rachel. Sometimes you simply need to sit on the sidelines awhile. It’s just that I’ll be keeping the waitstaff that’s here now.”
“Oh.” Rachel sipped her coffee to hide her disappointment.
Zeke also focused on drinking his coffee. The silence that stretched between them threatened to ruin the good mood Rachel had brought with her into the café. Zeke drummed his fingers on the counter. “Now if you’d be interested in handling the baking—pies, cakes, breads—that position is wide open. And I could probably use a busboy—evenings and weekends—if you think Justin might be interested.”
Rachel smiled. “I’ll ask him.”
“And the baking?”
“Count me in.”
After Rachel turned down her offer, Darcy remained seated in the atrium for several long minutes. What was it with that woman? Who in their right mind walked away from a sure thing—with benefits, not to mention the opportunity to someday take charge of the entire spiritual care department? Maybe if Darcy had offered her the two weeks for the mission trip …
She sighed heavily and went to wait for the elevator. The board meeting was scheduled to begin in ten minutes and she still had to figure out how to put the best possible spin on her report. Rachel Kaufmann’s leaving wasn’t the only bad news she had to deliver tonight. Of even more concern would be the fact that the patient census for the quarter had not lived up to projections.
She wished Zeke Shepherd was going to be at this meeting rather than his brother Malcolm. Zeke had a way of looking at things that helped calm her. Admittedly at first his “no worries” philosophy had driven her to distraction. But ever since Thanksgiving when they’d shared pie at the café and stayed there talking well into the morning, she had realized that Zeke Shepherd was the one person she didn’t have to impress or prove herself to. He liked her. He’d said as much when he kissed her lightly on the lips as she’d dropped him off to pick up the co-op’s van early that Friday morning. And she had carried the memory of that kiss with her now for an entire week.
The elevator doors slid open, and Ben stepped out. “Hi.” He held the door for her. “You look like you’re running off to something. Don’t you ever take a break from this place?”
“Board meeting,” she replied as she stepped onto the elevator.
“How about I meet you, say, in an hour at the café?”
“Can’t. I promised … I have another …” The elevator doors slid shut. Now why hadn’t she simply said that she was meeting Zeke at the café once the board meeting ended? And why not invite Ben to join them?
Because it’s not Ben you want to be with. It’s Zeke.
Chapter 25
This is going to be the best Christmas ever,” Justin exclaimed as he pressed close to the window of the plane that was carrying the relief team to Costa Rica.
Rachel could not disagree. For the first time since leaving the farm in Ohio she finally felt some certainty that she was traveling the path that God had set for her and Justin. In only a matter of days after they moved to Pinecraft and he had enrolled in the Mennonite school there, Justin’s whole outlook had changed.
She could actually see signs of the talkative, inquisitive boy he’d been before his father died. Suddenly he was interested in everything about life in Florida. And the few other boys and girls living in the community seemed to accept him into their circle without question.
Going on the trip had been Justin’s idea. He’d argued that the ten days of relief that they would provide for the devastated inhabitants of the mountain village of Kingstown was the perfect way to spend Christmas.
And Rachel had agreed. This trip was more than a chance for her to spend time with Justin. It was also exactly what she had needed to let go of any regrets she had held about leaving her job at the hospital.
Once they arrived at the main airport in San Jose they transferred to a much smaller plane for the last leg of their journey to reach the devastated village.
“Mom, look,” Justin said in an awed whisper. Everyone on the plane grew silent as they all looked out the tiny windows and saw for the first time the havoc left in the wake of the earthquake. Whole villages were underwater. Piles of rubble that had once been buildings dotted the landscape. Here and there a decapitated palm tree stood sentry over the devastation. A couple of small boats moved slowly over the water that probably had not been there before.
“Search parties from the government,” Pastor Detlef—Hester’s father—guessed. “Hopefully they’ve found everyone by now.”
There was more dry land but no less destruction as their plane approached a short runway surrounded on all side
s by trucks and a couple of other small planes. The tower that had served the airport was tilted at an odd angle, and if there had been a terminal, it was gone.
As the plane landed and taxied, every member of the team prayed silently, and once it stopped the band of rescue workers gathered their belongings and filed off in silence. They were ready to get to work.
After a short but harrowing ride in the canvas-covered back of a military truck to what was left of the village they had come to help, Rachel was pressed into service almost immediately in the large tent that served as a hospital for the area. She soon learned that there were no doctors, only Mary Palmer, a nurse practitioner from the area who had taken charge.
“Where do you need me?” Rachel asked, sliding the straps of her backpack from her shoulders and glancing around at the cots filled with patients.
“Everywhere,” Mary said wearily. “You’re both trained nurses?” she asked, including Hester in her question.
“Yes,” they said as one.
“Good. Why don’t the two of you start triaging those folks waiting out there?” She nodded toward a small gathering of children and adults huddled together as if it were below freezing instead of almost eighty degrees outside.
“We don’t speak Spanish,” Hester admitted.
“Fortunately, most of them speak enough English to understand and be understood. If you need help, there’s an interpreter—Juan Carlos. Just shout out for him if you need him.”
John and the other men took charge of the teen volunteers and headed off to assess the damage to the school that had once been the largest and most stable building in the village. An engineer had told them that if they could repair the roof on the school, they would be able to provide better shelter for the wounded and displaced. Once that was accomplished they could go to work repairing other buildings that could be used to shelter the earthquake victims. Hester’s father, Pastor Detlef, had assured the engineer that there was much that could be accomplished in the ten days they had. The engineer had looked skeptical but then he’d apparently never seen what a group of Mennonite relief workers could accomplish in short order.
As Rachel and Hester checked each person for injuries, they tried to gather each person’s medical information. With the help of Juan Carlos they came to understand that these people were not all from this village. Many of them had found their way here from the surrounding area after the initial earthquake had hit. Some of the children had no idea where their parents or siblings were. Others pointed toward the filled beds of the hospital tent when asked about their parents. It was all so very heartbreaking.
After several long hours, someone brought them prepackaged food rations and bottles of fresh water. “Water’s going to be the main problem,” Hester mused as she held a plastic water bottle for a little girl who was too traumatized to hold the bottle herself.
“Why do you say that?”
“If they run out of clean water then they’ll use what’s available. Contaminated water means disease—likely cholera. Those trucks at the airport were loaded with cases of water. Why aren’t they distributing it?” She directed this question to Mary.
“Because,” Mary said, as she joined them, “the local government is in a turf war with the powers that be in another, less damaged village down the road as to which of them gets the water and other supplies. It’s an oft-told tale—supplies pour in from all over the place and then they sit.” She shook her head and then turned her attention to Rachel. “If you think you can handle things here I could use some help from Hester on the ward.” She indicated the larger hospital tent.
“Yes. I can manage,” Rachel assured her.
The setting sun brought little relief from the humidity. Rachel wiped sweat from her forehead and looked around to face a woman of indeterminate age dressed only in a thin shift, her hair matted and tangled, her face a mask of dirt marked with scrapes and cuts.
“Hola,” Rachel said, using one of the few words she’d picked up from listening to Juan.
“My son is still there,” the woman said, pointing toward a pile of rubble several yards down the road where Rachel could see men in uniform working alongside some of the locals. Her English was perfect.
“The men are searching,” Rachel said. “They will find him.”
Vehemently the woman shook her head. “They are not looking where he is. They sent me away. They believe he is dead, but I know he is not.”
“How do you know?”
“God has already taken the boy’s father. He would not take my son as well and leave me alone.”
In the gathering darkness, Rachel saw that the men were returning to the tents where the volunteers would stay while they were here.
“They are giving up,” the woman said angrily. “We must do something!”
Rachel had no idea why this woman had chosen her to champion her cause, but she understood that she could offer her no comfort unless she at least tried. She followed the woman toward the men.
They were filthy with caked dust, streaked with rivulets of sweat, and so weary that they stumbled over the rubble that passed for a road. They carried their tools over their bent shoulders or hanging from limp fingers. When Rachel told them the woman’s story, they looked at her with sympathy but offered no hope.
“We’ll start again at daybreak,” the soldier in charge told the mother.
“You are looking in the wrong place,” the woman argued.
The man—Hispanic in features but American by his accent—met her gaze. Rachel saw him struggle to hold his temper. “It may seem that way from where you’re standing but trust me, we need to get to him in a way that doesn’t risk having the whole hillside cave in on top of him.” He nodded to Rachel and then walked on toward the kerosene light coming from the hospital tent. Meanwhile the woman walked on down the road in the direction of the rubble.
Justin had come alongside Rachel, and he placed his hand on hers. “Mom?”
She looked at him and knew in an instant why the woman had come to her. Perhaps she had seen Rachel sending Justin off with the others to start work on the school. Perhaps not. But somehow she had known that Rachel was a mother and that only a mother would understand that she could not—would not—abandon her son until he was found.
It was tradition that Ben spent the Sunday before Christmas with his sister and her family. But this year, as a marker of how well Sally’s recovery was going, they decided to drive north to spend Christmas Day with Sally’s grandfather.
“You should come,” Sharon said as they sat by the pool early one morning watching Sally swim laps before the sun could become a factor.
The last time Ben had seen his father had been when his mom had died. On that occasion, his father had greeted him with, “Her last wish was to see you. You should have come sooner.” It did not matter to him that Ben had been halfway around the world attending a medical conference when the call came—not from his father, but from Sharon. It did not matter that his mom had slipped into a coma as soon as she was brought to the hospital after the stroke and never regained consciousness.
Ben glanced at Sharon, but her eyes were hidden behind large black sunglasses. “You’re never going to stop trying to mend that particular fence, are you?” Ben said.
She lifted her sunglasses for a moment and pinned him with her startling blue eyes. “All I’m saying is that it would do you good to get away. I gave up on trying to get you and Dad to play nice a long time ago.” She let the sunglasses drop back into place and returned to watching Sally. “But I will say this,” she added, this time without looking at him. “I will say that you have allowed this feud with Dad to impact everything about your life—and not in a good way.”
Ben could have protested her logic, but Sharon was on a roll and it was evident that she did not expect him to debate with her. She needed to say her piece.
“Here’s the thing, Ben. I get it that you and Dad have always been on different pages when it comes to religion, but you�
��re as guilty as he ever was of wanting things your own way.”
“Dad is—”
“A man, Ben. Just like you. He figured out how to make this life work for him and Mom. He did what he thought was best for you and me and everyone in his congregation. But he can be wrong. There can be another way. Grow up already, and stop blaming him for your restlessness and failure to find your true calling.”
“I’m a doctor,” he reminded her. “It’s what I set out to be and I got there.”
“I seem to recall that your original plan was to go to med school and then use your skills to minister—yes, minister—to those less fortunate, those who could not afford to pay or get insurance. What happened to that?”
“Why are you suddenly so mad at me?”
Sharon sighed and stared out toward the pool where Sally was swimming laps. “Because the one lesson I have learned in everything we’ve been through with Sally is that life is short and we don’t get too many do-overs.”
Ben reached over and took his sister’s hand. “Hey, Sally’s going to make it.”
She turned to him and covered his hand with hers. “I know that. We’re not talking about Sally here, Ben. We’re talking about you.”
“I am fine.”
“Right. And I’m Lady Gaga.” She stood up and laid her sunglasses on the chaise then walked toward the pool’s deep end. “Clock’s ticking, big brother.” Then she pinched her fingers to her nose and bellowed, “Cannonball!” as she jumped into the water.
As the spray from the pool splashed over him, Ben’s phone began vibrating on the small round table next to him. He checked caller identification and saw that it was the hospital calling. “Gotta go,” he shouted over the noise of Sharon and Sally laughing and splashing each other. “Hospital emergency. I’ll be back later.”
When he got to the hospital and walked through the atrium, waving to the security guard and then taking the elevator to the children’s wing, he realized he was hoping to see Rachel.