by Sarah Price
Quickly, Elizabeth hurried from the diner knowing that, as much as Carl had impressed her as being a good person, Vivian stood as a clear reminder of the rest of the world. A world full of Vivians: competitive and loud, self-centered and egotistical. The Carls, however, were far and few between. Elizabeth knew that even though she had only been a stay-at-home mother who rarely traveled more than twenty miles from her hometown. Something about that woman lingered with Elizabeth in such a way that she couldn’t put enough distance between herself and Vivian fast enough.
Despite the recommendation of Carl Carlson, she stopped at the first motel that she passed, noticing that the O in the neon sign MOTEL was unlit. A chain-link fence surrounded an empty rectangular pool on the side of the parking lot, the murky green water speaking volumes about how long it had been since someone might have actually dared to swim in it. There were a few cars, mostly pickup trucks, in the lot, all of them with Ohio license plates.
As she pulled into the lot and parked her car by the office door, she couldn’t imagine tourists staying in this place. She couldn’t imagine herself staying in this place. However, she didn’t want to chance not finding another motel, especially since she wasn’t familiar with this area. For now, she needed to figure out where to stay. With the sun setting and darkness quickly approaching, she wanted to find a place to hang her hat for the night, as William always used to say. And a soft pillow wouldn’t hurt either.
“How many nights?”The man behind the counter asked without looking at her, more interested in the small TV sitting on a round table in a corner of the lobby than in hearing her actual answer.
She tried to avoid leaning against the counter.“Just one night, I suppose.”
The man finally eyed her, a tired expression on his face. Elizabeth almost shuddered, thinking of what William’s reaction would have been to this man. Despite their years living in less than exquisite housing, Elizabeth had worked hard to maintain a standard of living that rose above their station in life. The house was nothing more than modest, but it was clean and happy, a home filled with love and laughter.
She paid the man in cash, too afraid to relinquish her credit card information into his care, and took the key. It felt light in her hand, unlike her house keys that were on a heavy ring attached to a worn quilted key fob.
The motel room key made her realize how much she had left behind: the weight of the world was off her shoulders. She could go to her room, not worry about making the bed in the morning or having to report to anyone what she was going to do. She didn’t need to wander the empty rooms of the house, staring at reminders of William and the life they had lived together. No, she had left that burden behind and, despite the fact that the motel was beneath her own standards, she knew that she was facing a new beginning and, as with this motel, there was nowhere to go but up.
CHAPTER 4
She awoke to the sound of a horse harnessed to a buggy and trotting outside of the motel window. The musical rhythm of the horse’s hooves striking the macadam and the gentle whirling of the buggy wheels gradually increased as it neared her window. Opening her eyes, she stared at the white stucco ceiling, disoriented and trying to place herself for a moment. Where was the cracked paint over her bed?
It dawned on her that she was not at home but in that small motel in Berlin, Ohio.
She sat up and leaned back against the headboard, trying to clear her thoughts. The television was still on, something that William always found helpful when he needed to go to sleep. Not the noise but the soft glow of the television in the dark. She had muted it but could see that the morning news was just ending.
She glanced at the clock on the nightstand, surprised to see that it was almost nine o’clock. She hadn’t slept this late in years, even after William’s death. Like clockwork, she always arose at five in the morning, hurrying to make William a cup of coffee before packing his lunch. When he left, his lunch bag in one hand and thermos of coffee in the other, she never went back to bed. When the children were younger, she had used that time to enjoy a moment or two of peaceful solitude before her day began. When they finally left the house, she saw no reason to change her routine. Besides, it just didn’t feel right to fall back asleep, knowing that her husband was working the mines.
Sliding her legs over the edge of the bed, she sat there for a moment and said a quiet prayer, praying to God that she’d find a purpose in the day. Something. Anything. Just one simple thing.
After getting out of bed, she stretched and walked to the window. She felt rested, a first in a long time. Despite the motel being a shabby little place, she found comfort in the clean sheets and soft mattress. William always needed a hard, firm mattress for his back. After so many years working in the mines, he needed the firmness for extra support. Elizabeth had never complained, even though she felt as though she slept on a piece of plywood. For once, she woke refreshed and felt ready to conquer the day.
Reaching out, she pushed aside the curtain. The little town of Berlin was already busy, cars zipping along the road with people driving to their jobs, most likely. She heard another sound of horse hooves on the macadam and peered in the direction from which it came. Slowly the noise increased and she waited, holding her breath for the moment it would finally appear.
“I won,”she whispered to herself when she saw it. A woman dressed in blue with the all-familiar white prayer kapp hugging the back of her head drove the buggy. Elizabeth could see two small children seated beside her. They stared straight ahead, no one seeming to talk. But there was a peaceful glow about them. Sometimes silence indeed spoke louder than words.
She let the curtain fall and turned around, assessing the room. It was small and decorated in late eighties style, more contemporary than she was used to seeing. She preferred history in her own house: a dresser from her mother, a headboard from her grandparents, and a rug from her aunt. Pieces of furniture spoke to her, the memories of those long gone offering comfort in a time of need. Aside from a good night’s sleep, she took little comfort from this hotel room.
Time to get moving along, she told herself.
Twenty minutes later, as she drove along the backroads, she realized that she was lost. All of the roads seemed to have numbers instead of names. For some reason, Elizabeth found this harder to navigate. She stopped at one gas station, requesting directions. With a sigh and roll of the eyes, the attendant had rambled through a litany of turns and landmarks. But Elizabeth was a visual learner and listening to the man, especially with this country accent, made it next to impossible to understand.
Now, she was turning around, for the third time, to go back along the road, looking for OH 634. If only she had listened to Sophia who implored her to join the twenty-first century and upgrade her slider phone for a smartphone that included a GPS app.
Of course, Elizabeth knew only too well that it wouldn’t have mattered. Technology was not her thing. She could have purchased the best gadget in the world. If she couldn’t figure out how to operate it, it might as well be two cans tied together with a string.
Sophia had criticized her repeatedly for not even being on Facebook.“How am I supposed to communicate with you?”she complained.
“I still have a house phone,”Elizabeth had offered as a solution.
“Oh Mom!”Just from the tone in her daughter’s voice, Elizabeth could tell that, once again, she had disappointed Sophia.“Even that is outdated! Couldn’t you splurge for a wireless phone?”
She pulled over to the side of the road near an intersection. Frustrated, she laid her head on the steering wheel, fighting the urge to cry. This was why William always drove. She lacked a sense of direction. The one (and only) time that he asked her to drive while they were on vacation, she had gotten them lost on a long highway with no place to turn around. Her streak of bad luck continued when the car ran out of gas. Luckily, after about thirty minutes, a car passed and offered them assistance. After that, William never allowed her to drive unless it was in the t
own of Worthington. She didn’t mind. She preferred being the passenger anyway. She could look out the window, admire the scenery, or, on longer drives, nap with her head against the window. But those days were over, and here she was, lost again. Only this time it was in Holmes County, Ohio.
“Ma’am, everything okay?”
She jumped at the sound of a male voice on the other side of her closed window. She hadn’t noticed that a vehicle had pulled up behind her.“Excuse me?”she asked as she rolled down the window, just enough so that she was polite but not enough that she’d feel threatened.
“Everything okay?”he repeated. He was a young man, perhaps thirty years of age with a set of curly brown locks and a concerned expression on his face.“I saw your out-of-state plates and wondered if everything was all right.”
There was something familiar about him, something that made her feel safe, as if she knew him. Of course she knew that was ridiculous. He was a complete stranger but with a kind face and big blue eyes. “Actually no, I’m lost.”She reached for a piece of paper and shoved it through the crack in the window.“I have no idea where this is.”
The man took the piece of paper, staring at it for a moment before he smiled, not necessarily at her but at something private that he didn’t share with her and she certainly didn’t inquire about.“You get this from the diner, then?”
She frowned.“How did you know?”
He laughed.“Intuition.”Then, handing the paper back to her, he smiled again when she looked at it, flipping it over to see if there was any reference to the diner on the paper. There wasn’t.“I’m headed to the Troyer farm right now. If you want to follow me, I can lead the way.”He gestured down the road.“You aren’t that far off. Just a mile or so.”
“Oh thank you!”Elizabeth replied. She shoved the piece of paper back into her purse and glanced back at the young man standing at her window. Perhaps she was crazy for trusting so many people. Ryan would certainly have disapproved. However, she felt as though she had no choice and, even more importantly, nothing to fear.“That would be just wonderful…”
Ethan dipped his head in acknowledgement before he jogged back to his car. After a few seconds, he pulled the car off the shoulder and passed her, driving slowly as he made certain Elizabeth followed him.
True to his word, the dirt road with the five mailboxes for the Troyer family was only about a mile and change down the road. When he put his blinker on, she saw immediately why Carl Carlson had told her she couldn’t miss it. Each mailbox had the Troyer name painted in large black letters on the side. There were pretty flowers planted at their base and, down the lane was a cluster of large white farm buildings before a cluster of trees. Clearly, the family kept a well-maintained and immaculate farm. She would have noticed it regardless of whether or not it was her intended destination.
As she followed the young man’s truck into the Troyers' driveway, she took in the surroundings. Further down the driveway, there was a fork in the lane, only instead of two pull-offs, there were three. To the left, the direction that the truck turned, there was a big white barn, its door hanging open, beckoning the midday sun and on right was a large old-fashioned white frame house. She sat for a moment just staring at the house, reminiscent of the Walton’s home on TV. It was simple, but full of hope and love. At least that is how it appeared from the outside.
Horses and cows grazed in the pasture behind the barn. The dying grass seemed patchy at best but the animals seemed to navigate it mindlessly, finding what remained of the late autumn grasses. Closer to the barn, chickens scratched and pecked in the dirt. A rooster flapped his wings as he stretched his neck before crowing to make his presence known. Without skipping a beat, the hens scattered.
Everything felt so serene and peaceful. As Elizabeth parked her car next to the truck, she found herself smiling. When was the last time she had felt such a sense of calm in her life? Even before William died, she walked through each day with fear and worry weighing down her shoulders.
“You’ll most likely find Mary in there,”the man called as he got out of his truck.
Elizabeth looked in the direction that he gestured. The main house with an expansive porch seemed inviting enough. There were no wires leading to the house and a black buggy beside it indicated Amish lived inside. Nodding her gratitude to the young man, she slowly walked to the house, breathing in the farm air that, while repugnant to some, tickled her senses. She always loved the smell of farms, the odor of horses and cows reminding her of her own grandfather’s small farm. With seven children, her grandparents grew most of their own food and the older boys, one by one, went to work at the coal mines, even though it was almost an hour drive from home. After all, work was work and money fed a family.
She knew that her parents met at a church social, her mother immediately capturing her father’s attention when he showed up at the event held at a neighboring town. Within three weeks, they were engaged and two months later, married. For the first few months, they lived with her father’s family until he could afford to rent a small apartment over a garage in town. Gone were the farm smells and happy family meals. Instead, the two of them worked, saved, and prayed for better times.
Elizabeth pushed the memory of her parents from her mind as she ascended the stairs and stood before the door. She hesitated, admiring the bentwood rockers and makeshift tables on the porch, before she knocked. Once, twice. She waited, but no one answered. Contemplating her options, she knocked a second time, a little more forcefully than before. Still, there was no answer.
Disappointed, she turned around. She considered heading toward the barn then decided she might as well leave. Maybe God was sending her a sign that this was not the place for her. After all, a complete stranger sent her here and another complete stranger led her. With no one answering the door, God might just well be telling her to stand on her own two feet and not rely on strangers.
“Hullo there!”A pretty sing-song voice called out from the side of the house.
Elizabeth stopped in mid-step and looked in the direction of the voice.
She was an older woman, her face wrinkled with deep creases. Whether the wrinkles were from years working outside or from age, Elizabeth couldn’t tell. But she seemed pleasant enough, a smile on her face despite missing a front tooth. She was dressed in a simple blue dress covered by a faded sunflower apron. She wore boots on her feet, black rubber ones, that were clearly too big for her. Her hair was pulled back from her forehead, her part stretched and showing almost an inch of skin. A black knit scarf covered her head, tied loosely at her throat.
"Can I help you, then?”the woman asked, looking at Elizabeth inquisitively.
“Uh…I hope so,”Elizabeth said as she walked toward the woman.“Are you Mary Troyer?”
“Ja.”
Elizabeth glanced at the house.“I was told you might have a place to rent out.”
“Ja, we do indeed.”The woman tilted her head and seemed to quietly access Elizabeth as if trying to read her character. The feeling of being scrutinized in such a manner made Elizabeth feel uncomfortable.“You interested in seeing it, then, ja?”
“I…I would, if that’s not an inconvenience for you.”
Mary smiled again. Clearly Elizabeth had passed the Amish woman’s initial inspection.“If you’re looking to rent it, then it’s no inconvenience. Wouldn’t make much business sense to be inconvenienced by a prospective guest, now would it?”Setting the laundry basket on the side of the porch, Mary walked away from the house, gesturing for Elizabeth to follow her.“It’s this way,”she said.“Just behind the barn a spell.”
Elizabeth fell into stride beside Mary, amazed at how spry the woman was. Despite appearing older, Mary moved like a young woman. If she had any aches and pains, she sure hid them well.
“Now, there’s no electricity for you in the house,”Mary said, glancing over her shoulder.“I reckon you already suspected that, ja?”
Truth be told, Elizabeth didn’t suspect anything
. She hadn’t given much thought to the accommodations.“I…I…”
Mary stopped walking and pursed her lips. There was a look of disdain on her face.“I figured as much. Seems you Englische like the idea of staying at an Amish farm but ain’t too keen on giving up the luxuries.”
Elizabeth realized that Mary figured she was no longer interested. Quickly, she reached out and touched Mary’s arm.“No, no,”she said.“That’s not it. I’m fine with no electricity. Honest. In fact,”she paused as she thought for a moment.“It might be a welcome change of pace for me to slow down my life a bit.”
The Amish woman seemed surprised and raised both eyebrows.“Slow down a bit? Why, you certain you’re Englische? You folks always seem to be in such a hurry!”
There was something about the way Mary Troyer said that. Clearly, Mary wasn’t a big fan of the Englische way of life. However, despite her condescending tone when she thought her prospective guest would baulk at not having electricity, she had quickly changed her tune when she realized the alternative was true.
Indeed, Elizabeth found herself smiling, acknowledging the astute wisdom in the elderly Amish woman’s words. How true, she thought as she considered her own daughter. Sophia was on the fast track to something great. At least, that was what Sophia told people. She was the first one in the family to earn a four-year college degree, a degree in management none the less! After graduating from college, she didn’t return to Nottingham but moved to Morgantown where there were more opportunities for careers. She wound up working at the bank, handling their human resources. It was a job she loved, even though Elizabeth didn’t understand the half of what her daughter did.
As they made their way to the house, Elizabeth took in her surroundings once again. The farm was much bigger than she had realized, and seemed…peaceful. She needed that. When they reached the barn, she saw another building directly behind it. There, three men were working outside, busily unloading a truck. One of them, Elizabeth noticed, was the young man who had helped her find her way to the farm. It was his truck they were unloading. It was interesting, in Elizabeth’s opinion, that the young man seemed to fit right in with the other two men who had full Amish beards and dress. Elizabeth decided it was the suspenders the young man had on, but she was almost positive he wasn’t Amish himself.