“Mustn’t trouble yourself,” Esther was saying, stroking Rachel’s arm. “Mustn’t go blamin’ yourself.”
But Rachel felt she had to express herself while this one memory was still alive in her. “We were rushing to market . . . requiring the horse to gallop. Oh, Esther . . .”
“The accident wasn’t your fault,” her cousin repeated. “Believe me, it wasn’t.”
Mam was on the other side of the bed now, leaning over to reach for Rachel’s free hand. “The horse became frightened and leaped into traffic, is all.”
“I . . . I don’t remember any of that,” she confessed as she wept. “How do you know this?”
“There were witnesses,” replied Mam. “People saw what happened and told the police.”
This was the first she’d heard any talk of police and witnesses. Why, the whole thing sounded like some made-up story.
Esther continued to hover near. “You mustn’t dwell on what was, Rachel. Think on the Lord . . . how He watched over you and Annie,” she said, her eyes filled with concern and love. “We will trust the Lord for His continued watch over you. And all of us will pitch in and help, too.”
“Jah,” she said, feeling calmer, knowing that what Esther said was precisely true. Still, she felt she was going through the motions, agreeing with Mam and Esther, yet not feeling much conviction, if any. She was now intended by God to be a widow, to raise Annie, her only child.
By herself.
Esther remained close as Mam looked on. “Rest now,” she urged, squeezing Rachel’s hand. “Please, just rest.”
She wouldn’t rest much, not the deep, life-giving rest that comes from a long day of toil. She would nap, but it would not—could not—possibly be restful.
That night, Rachel was alone for the first time. Mam and Esther had left Rachel to sleep, but her slumber was fitful and intermittent. Terrifying visions continued to haunt her as she fought to repress the nagging remnants of memories involving the accident, repeatedly refusing to see the sights her mind thrust upon her.
Giving up, she turned on the bedside lamp to read her New Testament, only to find that the room remained engulfed in hazy darkness. She blinked her eyes, trying to brush away whatever it was, assuming that her eyes were overly tired, strained perhaps. Slowly the darkness subsided.
She had been reading her New Testament only a short time when the words began to rill together like a gray smudge on the page. Thankfully, the distortion lasted only a few seconds, then cleared up. She said not a word to the night nurse but fell into a troubled sleep, the Testament still open in her hands.
Hours later, she awoke to a night sky, a starlit view from her hospital room. Getting up, she wandered to the window, looking up at a shimmering half-moon. “Oh, Jacob, I wish you hadn’t had to die,” she whispered. “You were such a peaceable man. Why did you and Aaron have to go that way?”
Her dreams just now had been filled with more nightmarish images. A horse—a sleek bay mare—lay sprawled out on a highway. Dead. And what might’ve been an Amish market wagon was twisted and on its side, all burst to pieces. She shuddered anew and rejected the repulsive visions. She would not, could not allow herself to see the memories that had torn her world apart. Yet with the shunning of images came shooting head pains, like long needles piercing her skull.
She closed her mind to the recollection of distant screams as well. The ear-piercing cries of a child.
Aaron? Annie?
Turning from the window, she limped back to her hospital bed, though it afforded little comfort. Once again she fell into a troubled sleep, dreaming that she was searching about her on the road, the sharp pain in her womb and the spasms in her head keeping her from moving much at all. She saw Jacob lying helplessly, wounded and bleeding. She began to cry out in her sleep, awaking herself with a jolt, only to find that the dimly lit hospital room had turned hazy beyond recognition.
The next morning, Rachel was sitting in a chair near the hospital bed, wearing her own bathrobe that Esther had so graciously brought to her from home, when the nurse carried a large breakfast tray into the room.
“Good morning, Rachel,” the nurse greeted her, though Rachel could make out little more than a filmy white shape.
“Gut mornin’ to you,” she replied, not able to determine where the coffee or juice or eggs or toast were located on the tray. She didn’t feel much like eating anyway, so she sat silently till Mam and Esther began coaxing her to “just taste something.”
“Honestly, I’m not very hungry.”
“Ach, now, what a nice selection of things,” Mam prodded discreetly.
“Looks mighty tasty to me, too,” Esther said, getting up and picking up something on the tray—maybe a glass of juice or milk; Rachel couldn’t be sure. “Here, why don’tcha just have a sip?”
Though she felt they were treating her like a reluctant toddler, Rachel went along with the suggestion, reaching out toward the shadowy figure. But she fumbled and missed making contact, and the glass crashed to the floor. “Oh, uh, I’m awful sorry.”
“Rachel? What’sa matter?” Mam asked as Esther wiped up the mess.
“I guess it’s my eyes. . . . I’ve been havin’ a bit of trouble, that’s all.”
“What sort of trouble?” asked Esther.
“Just some blurriness every so often. . . . It comes and goes.”
“Well, have you told the doctor about this?” Mam wanted to know.
Rachel sighed, feeling awful about the broken juice glass. And terribly uneasy having to answer so many questions. What she really wanted was to be left alone to grieve for her husband and son. “I hate to bother anyone about it, really. Prob’ly nothing much at all.”
But when the nurse came in to pick up the tray, Esther inquired anyway. “What could be causing Rachel’s eyes to blur up?”
“Can you describe your symptoms, Rachel?” asked the nurse.
“I don’t see so clearly anymore. Everything’s all murky.”
“Do you see light and shapes?”
“Jah, but it’s a lot like lookin’ through a cloud.”
Esther spoke up just then. “Doesn’t seem normal, her having foggy vision—not after a miscarriage, does it?”
“Well, I’ll certainly mention this to the doctor,” the nurse said. “He’ll probably want to do a preliminary check on Rachel’s eyes, then, if necessary, refer her to an eye specialist.”
“Thank you ever so much,” Esther replied.
When the nurse left the room, Rachel reached out for her cousin’s hand and squeezed hard. “Thank you,” she whispered. The doctor wasted no time in coming. He marched into the hospital room carrying Rachel’s chart, a stethoscope dangling around his neck. “I hear you’re experiencing some eye discomfort.”
“No pain, really. Things are just all blurry.”
“Well, we can’t have you going home like that, can we?” he said casually, lifting her left eyelid and flashing a pen light into it. “Just exactly how much can you see now?”
Rachel struggled to describe her vision loss as the doctor led her through a series of probing questions.
“I don’t need to tell you that you’ve been through a lot, Rachel. You’re still reeling from having witnessed something no one should ever have to see. You’ll need time to recover.”
Recover?
She couldn’t see how she would ever recover from such a loss as this. And she didn’t want to be reminded of the grim accident scene. No, she desperately wanted to forget.
“But what would cause her eyes to blur?” asked Dat, sitting on the other side of the room, pressing for more explanation. “I couldn’t say for sure, Mr. Zook, but from what Rachel has just told me, the disruption in her vision may be related to what we call post-traumatic stress.”
“How long will it go on?” Dat asked, his voice sounding thinner now.
“My guess is no longer than a week” came the cautious reply. “Only in rare cases does it persist. But if it does continue, I
’d recommend you see an eye specialist and . . . perhaps a psychiatrist who specializes in grief counseling.”
Rachel’s vision was blurry, but she could see well enough to notice the nervous glances exchanged between Mam and Dat. Esther listened quietly, her gaze intent on the doctor.
He continued. “I’m confident that with love and support of those close to her, Rachel should recover very soon if this is, indeed, the reason.”
Rachel mentally replayed the doctor’s strange description of her condition. It sounded as if he thought she needed a head doctor. I’m not crazy, she thought.
Dat and Mam quizzed the doctor for several more minutes before he left to make his rounds, and Rachel took some comfort in his comment that her eyes would likely return to normal soon.
No longer than a week. . . .
In all truth, she was so discouraged by grief and the suppression of dreadful memories, her eye problem seemed almost trivial by comparison.
Four
The joint funeral for Jacob and young Aaron was delayed a full twenty-four hours, making it possible for Rachel, though sickly and sorrowful, to attend. Her parents and siblings—and Jacob’s family—lovingly surrounded her. And there was Esther, attentive as ever.
Rachel needed help walking to and from the buggy and into the Yoders’ farmhouse. There had been times after her hospital release when her vision actually seemed to be improving. Today, however, things were rather dim again.
A blistering sun beat down on the People, nearly two hundred strong, as they traveled for miles—most of them by horse and carriage—to gather at the farmhouse of Jacob’s father, Caleb Yoder. The Yoders, both Caleb and his wife Mary, had wanted the funeral at home, due to the tragic nature of the deaths and the fact that it was a combined funeral for father and son.
“Has nothin’ to do with us bein’ Old Order,” Caleb had assured her. “A home setting always makes for better.” He said this with eyes hollow, his wrinkled face gray as death itself.
Rachel knew enough not to question, for Caleb Yoder was not a man to tolerate interference. And she wouldn’t have thought of doing so anyway. Being submissive was a result of having been the last daughter in a string of siblings prob’ly. And one of the twelve character gifts her father liked to talk about. Benjamin Zook believed certain traits were handed down through all families, through the ages. “Old” gifts, he chose to call them. Values such as generosity, responsibility, serenity, and simplicity. And, yes, submission.
Three expansive rooms had been prepared by removing the wall partitions so the People could see the preachers from any corner. The air was thick with heat and humidity as folks gathered, sitting on closely spaced wooden benches the length of each room. Women sat on one side of the house, men on the other. A large number of Jacob’s English woodworking clients and friends also showed up to pay their respects. The house was filled to capacity, chairs being added here and there at the end of a bench row, squeezing in an additional person wherever possible.
Rachel sat stone-still, facing the coffins—one large, the other heartbreakingly small—seated with her relatives, Jacob’s and Aaron’s closest kin. Her back to the minister, Rachel recalled the painful, nagging memory of how they’d scurried about that last morning. She held her daughter close, letting Annie lean back against her, careful not to bump the broken arm. Rachel was glad her little one was still small enough to hold on her lap this way. There was something comforting about embracing a child, and she thought perhaps it was because she had lost the tiny baby growing inside her.
While they waited for the service to begin, she struggled with her circumstance, wishing she could go back and unravel the hours, relive their last morning together. A thousand times a day she wished it.
What was it Jacob had said—that they had plenty of time? She dismissed her keen thoughts for now, till her dear ones were safely buried in the ground, though the tragedy was as real to her as the precious child in her arms.
The People waited silently, reverently, for the designated hour. Then the various clocks in the house began to strike nine times, and the first minister in a lineup of several preachers removed his straw hat. The others removed their hats in unison.
The first preacher chose a spot, standing between the living room and kitchen. Rachel didn’t have to turn and try to focus her eyes on him; she knew the scene by heart, from having attended a number of traditional Amish funerals. It was her place to face forward, to keep her eyes, though cloudy and dim, on the handmade pine coffins.
“The gathering here today is an important one,” the preacher began. “God is speaking to us—all of us—through the death of our brother and his young son.”
Rachel listened intently, adjusting Annie’s position on her lap. Her little daughter might never even remember this solemn day, but Rachel wouldn’t have considered not bringing her.
The preacher continued. “We do not wish either our brother Jacob Yoder back into this life or his son, Aaron, but rather we shall prepare ourselves to follow after these departed ones. Their voices are no longer heard amongst us. Their presence no longer felt. Their chairs are empty; their beds are empty.”
He expounded on the grimness of dying in one’s sins, though Jacob Yoder had chosen that good and right path— the only way a just and upright Amishman could stand before God on the Judgment Day, assured of where he stood for all eternity.
Their presence no longer felt . . .
Rachel stared over Annie’s shoulder, down at her own black dress and apron. It was a blessing in disguise that the Lord had allowed her to be this calm and sedate at Jacob’s and Aaron’s funeral. By not looking so much at the small coffin, slightly wider at the shoulders and narrowing at both ends, she was able to keep her emotions in check. Her firstborn lay silent and still inside that box, dressed in crisp white trousers and shirt. She had combed his hair gently, though she hadn’t had the courage to push his little feet into the “for good” shoes before the funeral. Rather, she had kept the black shoes, putting them away in her own bedroom closet. There was something dear about the feet of a child. So Aaron would be buried stockingfooted, in clean black socks. Not something the Lord would mind, she was sure. To the contrary, she was almost positive her Aaron would be running barefoot in heaven—his father, too. It was what they were most accustomed to. Jesus would see to it that their feet were washed and cooled at the end of each day in Paradise.
As for the untimely deaths, she did not question God, for she had been taught to believe that His supreme will was above and over all. Yet the utter sadness had already begun to carve out a hole in her heart.
Their chairs are empty. . . .
The second minister stood to give the main address. “We come together this afternoon, united in spirit under the blessing of God, our heavenly Father, to bury our brother, Jacob Yoder, and his young son, Aaron Yoder.” His words reverberated through the long front room of the farmhouse.
Rachel missed the spirit of her church. It was sadly absent here today, though she’d refused to insist on her opinion. Caleb and Mary Yoder had had their say as to the type of funeral service. Still, she would have been more inclined to have at least Aaron’s service at the familiar meetinghouse, where she and Jacob and the children attended Sunday school and church, packed out each week with Amish Mennonite friends and relatives. By the looks of things, the folk had turned out strong for the somber occasion, despite the traditional service. She would not have been so bold as to request a separate funeral anyhow.
What’s done is done, she determined, paying close attention to the Scripture reading from John, chapter five.
“ ‘Verily, verily, I say unto you, the hour is coming, and now is, when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God: and they that hear shall live.’ ” The preacher read through the verses until he came to the thirty-fourth. Then he began to expound on the reading, saying that the text spoke of passing from death unto life.
When the People turned and knelt at their bench
es, Annie folded her hands in spite of the arm splint and leaned in close to Rachel. As the preacher prayed, Rachel realized for the first time since the accident that her knees were awful sore. She kept her eyes closed for the lengthy rote prayer, yet she reached down and pulled her dress away from her legs, touching curiously the blistered areas on her knees. She wondered how on earth the welts had gotten there, what had happened to cause them, having no recollection of ever scraping her knees . . . or burning them.
The People stood for the benediction. There had been no music, which seemed awful empty and even more sorrowful to Rachel. She loved the rich harmonies of a cappella singing. Another sigh slipped from her lips, and she hoped Jacob would forgive her for not having the sort of funeral service he would’ve preferred. When it came time for her to pass on to Glory, she would try to explain the sticky situation to him. Jacob would understand, she knew.
It was then, thinking of heaven again and the hope of seeing her husband someday, that her tears began to flow, unchecked. Try as she might, there was no stopping them, even as the preacher recited the ages of both Jacob and his son—the only formal obituary statement given at the end of the funeral.
“Jacob Yoder’s memory is a keepsake, as is his son’s. With that we cannot part. Their souls are in God’s keeping. We will have them in our hearts,” the preacher said finally.
We always miss what we don’t have. . . .
Rachel wept silently, accompanied later by uncontrollable sobs at the graveside service. Quickly, little Annie was surrounded by Rachel’s mother and sister Elizabeth as the pallbearers began to shovel gravel and soil, filling the graves.
The thumping sounds of the dirt hitting the coffins made Rachel quiver, and she was grateful for her mother-in-law and cousin Esther, who held on to her, standing with their arms linked through hers as the traditional hymn was read and the men removed their hats one last time.
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