by Jan Drexler
He shrugged. “I only want to fix things, to make it better.”
She plucked a flower. “Even if you wiped Harvey off the face of the earth, it wouldn’t change what happened. I still have to live with...with the shame.” She bit her lip. “No one can make this better.”
He moved closer to her and brushed a fly off her shoulder. She tensed.
“Maybe you need to go on with your life. Leave those memories behind you.”
“I tried that when I came here. It doesn’t work.”
“You came here to hide. To escape. Not to go on.”
She finished the flower chain and turned it between her fingers.
“You’re right. When Sadie invited Ida Mae and me to come here, I jumped at the chance. Anything to get away. But the memories followed me.” She dropped the flowers onto an old tree stump. “It’s no use.”
Samuel leaned toward Mary, catching a scent of chicken feed and fresh straw. “What can I say to make things better?”
She turned away from him, toward the house. “Nothing. Don’t say anything.”
As she walked away, Samuel waited as a hot stone burned in his chest. But it wasn’t anger. The stone settled. A weight of sorrow only Mary’s forgiveness could ease.
Chapter Fifteen
A week later, the thunderstorms were still coming almost every day.
On Thursday night, a storm had kept Samuel awake until nearly midnight. And then sometime during the night, another storm blew in, the rolls of thunder bringing Samuel fully awake again.
His bedroom was close and hot with the windows closed. When the earlier storm had come through, he had gone around the house, slamming the sashes down against the rising wind. As he had stumbled back to his bed, he had heard the girls closing the windows upstairs.
Thunder boomed again, only seconds after the last roll. Samuel held his clock up to the faint light coming through the window. A flash of lightning illuminated the dial enough for him to read it. Three o’clock.
He settled back into his pillow and tried to sleep again, but to no avail. Between the thunder and Mary...
Samuel sat up, planting his feet on the throw rug next to his bed, and ran his fingers through his hair. Mary had filled his thoughts for the past week. More than that. Ever since she had first come from Ohio.
A loud boom shook the house and Samuel jumped to his feet. Lightning had struck something close. His first thought was Sadie’s barn, and he got dressed as quickly as he could. Shoving his feet into his shoes, he found himself praying, “Not Mary. Protect Mary...”
He ran out the kitchen door, past Esther and Judith standing at the bottom of the stairway in their nightdresses and out to the back porch. The glow that met him was what he had feared, but Sadie’s barn was safe. The glow was coming from his barn. The lightning had struck the cupola and flames were tailing in the south wind. The smoke stung his eyes, even from across the barnyard.
Esther had followed him to the porch. “Samuel! The barn!”
He pushed her back. “I know. I know. Stay back. I’m going to get as much out as I can.”
“The roof is burning. It’s going to fall in.”
He heard Esther’s words screaming after him, but he was already at the barn door. Tilly was inside, shut in her stall to keep her safe from the storm, but now she was trapped.
The barn door latch stuck. He hit it with his fist, then rammed the door with his shoulder until it broke. By the time he reached Tilly’s stall, the haymow was on fire. Embers drifted down around him. He stared at the thick tree trunk, the center post that carried the weight of the whole structure. Flames ran down it, toward him.
Tilly’s scream brought him to his senses, and he swung her stall door open. She ran past him, eyes wide and white in the firelight, out the door to safety.
A crash from above made him look up. One end of the roof had caved in. Waves of heat washed over him. He ran for the harness and threw it onto the buggy. He made a grab for the buggy shafts, but there was another crash and the wall of heat and flames threw him backward. He scrambled toward the door, watching in horror as the lacquered roof of the old buggy burst into flames.
He turned and ran out the door, his eyes on his sisters. Their white nightdresses waved in the wind. The wind that was sending flaming sparks toward the house.
The cattle. Samuel turned to look toward the pasture. The windmill was burning, standing like a torch, and in its light, he could make out the steers in the far corner of the pasture, huddled together. Upwind of the fire, they would be safe.
He grabbed Judith in one arm and Esther in the other, holding them close. The fire roared and he shouted so they could hear him.
“Go to Sadie’s house. I’m going to go to the neighbors for help.”
“We need to get dressed!” Esther tried to pull away from him.
“It’s too late. Look!”
As they watched, the fire engulfed the old, rotten shingles of the roof. The house would be gone before they could do anything.
“Go to Sadie’s,” he yelled. “You’ll be safe there.”
Esther grabbed Judith’s hand and the girls ran down the path. The path he had taken so many times. He started down the lane toward the road, toward Dale Yoder’s, but a strange noise made him look back. The roaring had turned to a groaning sound as the old barn twisted, then collapsed on itself. The apple trees between the barn and house were burning, and the chicken coop... Samuel sank to his knees as the chicken coop disappeared in the flames.
It was too late. Too late to save anything.
As the fire claimed the house, Samuel struggled to his feet and retreated from the blaze. He thought of all the things that the fire was consuming. The room where he and the other children had been born. Daed’s old desk. Mamm’s rocking chair. The kitchen table.
He buried his face in his hands. The steps that had claimed Mamm’s life.
And now the fire was destroying everything. Everything.
Another crash as the roof of the house collapsed into the second floor, and then he felt ashes pelting him.
Looking up, he stared in disbelief as the rain began to fall. Heavy, wet, raindrops. He held his face up to the cleansing rain, letting it cool his burning skin.
* * *
A distant pounding woke Mary up. The first thing she saw was light on her bedroom ceiling. It couldn’t be the dawning sun. The light was too red...
Fire. She sat up in bed and reached for her robe. Through the top pane in her window she could see the angry red flames pulsing against black smoke. Fear stabbed like lightning when she saw that Samuel’s barn was on fire.
When she opened her bedroom door, the pounding was louder. Someone knocking at the back door. She ran down the stairs just as Sadie opened her bedroom door.
“What is going on?”
Mary continued through the kitchen to the door. “There’s a fire at Samuel’s.”
Judith and Esther were at the back door in their nightdresses.
“Come in, come in.” Mary opened the door and ushered them into the kitchen, where Sadie had already lit the lantern above the kitchen table.
The girls clung to each other as Sadie pumped water into the coffee pot. Ida Mae appeared at the bottom of the stairs.
“What is happening?”
“Our barn caught on fire.” Esther coughed, then went on. “Samuel went into the barn to let Tilly out—” She coughed again.
Samuel. Dread filled Mary with a cold spiral. If something happened to Samuel—
“Is Samuel all right?”
Judith nodded. “He got Tilly out of the barn, but the fire was so hot...”
“...and it spread to the house.”
Sadie handed Esther a glass of water and sank into one of the chairs. “The house?
”
“Everything caught fire so quickly, there was nothing we could do.” Esther took another swallow of water. “Samuel wouldn’t let us go back in to get our clothes, or anything.”
Mary slipped out the back door as they continued talking. Esther and Judith would be all right. Sadie and Ida Mae would take care of them. But Samuel...
She ran down the path toward the Lapp farm in the rain, her bare feet slipping in the mud. Where was Samuel?
When she came through the opening in the fence row that opened into the Lapps’ farmyard, she stopped. The scene in front of her was horrific. The barn was gone and only a pile of smoldering rubble remained. The house...two walls still stood, but they were burning, even in the rain. The rest was a pile of black beams and crazy angles. One pane of glass hadn’t broken, but reflected the flames. Smoke and steam rose everywhere.
The rain let up as the storm moved on, but Mary couldn’t see Samuel anywhere. She walked toward the destroyed house, careful not to get too close. Smoking embers lay all around, and she was barefoot. When she reached the lane that led from the road, past the house and to the barn, she stopped. As the brief shower of rain ended, the remaining house walls burned stronger, lending light and heat.
“Samuel! Where are you?”
Her voice met silence.
The wind pushed the storm to the east and the morning sun lightened the sky behind the breaking clouds. The gray, predawn glow revealed more of the destruction...and a man hunched in the lane. Mary picked her way through the debris until she reached him. She knelt and laid her hand on his back. He didn’t look at her.
“Are you all right? Are you hurt anywhere?”
His shoulders shook as if he was crying in deep, silent sobs.
“Samuel, it’s me, Mary. Talk to me.”
He stood and pulled her to him in a strong hug, and she realized that he wasn’t crying, he was...laughing?
“It’s gone.” He gestured with one arm to take in the scene before them. “It’s all gone.”
Mary took a step back. “Why are you—”
“Laughing?” He hiccupped, then laughed again. “It’s gone.” The laugh turned into a sob, and he reached for her again. “I’m not going insane,” he said into her ear as he held her close. “It’s just that this farm...the memories...the work...it’s all gone.”
Mary looked into his face. The growing light was reflected in tears that streamed down his cheeks.
“I know. It’s terrible.”
He shook his head. “Not terrible.”
“But you’ve lost everything.” Mary couldn’t look at the destruction the fire had caused. She jumped when one of the house walls fell in with a crash.
“There it goes, burning up like chaff.” Samuel watched, sober now, as the greedy flames fed on the newly exposed beams.
“But the barn, the house—”
Samuel shook his head. “The girls are safe, and Tilly is grazing over there along the road. What have we really lost?”
“What will you wear? What will you eat? The fire has burned up everything.” She stared at him. Did he lose his mind along with everything else?
“You don’t understand.”
He turned them both away from the fire, toward the rising sun in the east. Mary heard horses trotting on the road. The neighbors had seen the smoke in the morning light and were coming to help.
“At first I thought that my life was over. You’re right, we lost everything. But I also lost this burden. God freed me from Daed’s legacy, and now I can go my own way. I can start over new and fresh. Clean. All the things that were holding me back are gone.”
Samuel cupped her cheeks in his large hands, gazing into her eyes.
“I’m glad you came. I’ve been wanting to tell you how sorry I am. Can you forgive me for being so overbearing and stupid?”
Mary searched his face, looking for any sign that he had lost touch with reality, but she only saw weariness and peace. She nodded and he smiled.
“You’re the most beautiful sight I’ve ever seen.” His thumb traced her cheekbone. “Don’t you have anything to say?”
She felt her own smile answering his. “Only that I’m sorry, too. When the girls came to the house and told us about the fire, and that you had gone into the burning barn—” Tears sprang into her eyes. “I was so afraid for you. What if I lost you, and I had never told you—?” She bit her lower lip. Amish girls didn’t say the things she wanted to say to Samuel.
He lifted her chin. “Never told me what?”
Mary straightened her shoulders. She didn’t care what she was supposed to do or not do.
“If I never told you that I...love you, I would be sorry for the rest of my life.”
He leaned close and brushed his lips against her cheek. “It’s all right. I’m all right.”
“But we’ve wasted so much time with my silliness.”
“It wasn’t silliness.” He tugged the braid hanging down her back. “I’m just glad you aren’t going to marry Martin.”
She pulled her braid out of his grasp. “Who says I’m not?”
He grinned and brought her close to him again. “I do.”
His kiss was tender, yet demanding. As if she was the only answer to his longings.
But he broke off the kiss all too soon.
“Folks are coming, and we shouldn’t be together like this. You had better go home and get dressed.”
Mary looked down. She had forgotten she was still in her nightclothes.
As she left, she heard Dale Yoder ask, “Samuel, is everyone all right? Where do you need me to help?”
When she reached the opening in the fence row between the two farms, she glanced back. Buggies had crowded into the lane and more were stopped along the road. Even an automobile was making its way to the farm. Clean up was already underway.
* * *
By midmorning, the barnyard was crowded with neighbors and church folks. Mary, Sadie and the girls had made a batch of doughnuts and had brought over baskets full of them, along with pots of coffee.
Samuel leaned against a makeshift table someone had put together out of lumber they had brought and held a warm doughnut in his hand, but he had no appetite. Once the initial shock had worn off, the reality of the fire began to set in. There was no feed for Tilly or the cattle. It had been destroyed. There were no clean trousers for him to change into, so he wore his wet, ash-encrusted pants with holes burned in them where embers had landed. He had thought he would wash the grime off his hands...but the soap was gone. The bars of soap Sadie had helped Judith and Esther make last winter.
Everything they had worked for was gone. Every bit of food they had stored. The chickens. The hams hung from the beams in the cellar. Everything gone.
He took a bite of the doughnut, but it tasted like ashes.
“Here’s some coffee for you.” Mary held out a steaming cup. “You need to eat and drink something.”
Samuel took the cup she offered, looking into her eyes. “Are you all right?”
Her brows peaked. “I should be asking you that question.”
“You looked upset this morning.”
“I was.” She broke off a piece of his doughnut and popped it in her mouth.
He leaned into her strength. The moment when she had come to find him in the midst of the chaos was the point he clung to as his world collapsed around him.
He brushed a crumb off her chin. “I would never be able to survive this without you.”
She held him with her gaze. “You won’t need to. I’m here.”
Samuel let his gaze scan the crowd of people. Some were carrying buckets of water to the areas of the house and barn that were still smoldering. Others picked through the rubble, but found nothing worth saving.
Mary
threaded her hand through his elbow. “I was concerned because I didn’t know where you were. I didn’t know if you were hurt or not.” She squeezed his elbow. “And here you were. You had lost everything.”
Samuel sipped the hot coffee. “Not everything.” He pressed his elbow against his side, trapping her hand. “I didn’t lose you.”
She smiled and ducked her head. “I’m not that important.”
“Now that all of this is gone—” he gestured toward the ashes “—I can see what the most important things in my life are. The girls are safe, you’re safe. Nothing else matters.”
Another buggy pulled up the lane. Bram and Matthew got out.
Mary took his cup and the doughnut. “You need to go talk to Bram.”
“I know.” He glanced at her. She looked very kissable in the morning light. “The coffee was good.”
Matthew spotted Samuel and made his way toward him, but Bram stood in the lane, staring at what had been the house and barn.
Samuel met Matthew halfway across the yard. “I wasn’t expecting to see you this morning.” He shook Matthew’s offered hand.
Matthew gripped Samuel’s shoulder. “I don’t think you expected any of this, did you?”
Samuel shook his head. “How did you folks hear about the fire?”
“News travels fast. Someone told Bram, knowing it was his family’s farm, and Bram stopped by to get me. We came to help.” Matthew glanced at the crowds. “At least, to do what we can.”
“I’m not sure what there is to do. As far as I can tell, there is nothing to be saved except the livestock.”
Matthew’s eyes widened. “You lost everything?”
“Everything.”
Bram joined them. “I can’t believe this. How did it happen?”
“During the storm last night, lightning hit the cupola on the barn, and the place went up faster than I could think.”
“The house, too?”
“The wind blew embers from the barn to the house. The roof must have been dry and rotten, it caught so quickly.”
Bram stared at what was left of the house. “All those memories.”
“You still have the memories,” Matthew said. “No fire can erase those.”