“Depends how motivated he is.” Ben’s dimple was evident as he lifted The Budget. “When he’s motivated, I’ve seen him act pretty quickly.”
“Ja, as much as I don’t look forward to sweeping up behind Gideon and cooking for him while I’m here, I want to intrude on Samuel and Gail even less,” Miriam lamented. “Maybe I’ll have a talk with Gail and see if she can make it a little less appealing for Gideon to keep staying there. But I don’t know if that’s possible. From the very little I’ve seen, she looks to be a gut cook and housewife.”
“Can’t be as gut as mine,” Ben murmured from behind his paper.
The quiet words warmed Rachel as she went into her bedroom and headed for the nightstand. Lighting the lamp upon it, she pulled open the single drawer. She smiled when she saw the blue thread, just as she remembered. Pulling it out, she went to shut the draw. As it was sliding closed, her gaze landed on something she’d forgotten all about. She went still at the sight.
Aaron’s letter.
Pulling the drawer farther open, she stared at the simple envelope. Rachel blinked as she tried to remember when it had arrived. She couldn’t even remember what it said. With a lengthy inhale, she set the spool on top of the nightstand and withdrew the envelope. Darting a look toward the door to ensure no one was watching, she turned it over and pulled out the letter. She quickly scanned the few penned words.
Dear Rachel, I have been thinking of you. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I do care for you. Aaron.
Her breath came faster. Not because of the message but at the possibility that her husband had seen it. Ben never used to enter her room, but since the babes were born, he’d been in and out frequently. He’d brought the babes to her when she was in bed. Would he have had any reason to open this nearby stand? He’d never said anything indicating he’d seen it. But, Rachel gnawed her bottom lip, neither had she when it arrived. Should she have told him?
To do so now might change things. Negatively. And she was...happy. Really happy. In fact, Rachel blushed, the letter crackling as she tightened her fist around it, the only thing that would make her happier would be to have a real marriage with her husband.
Was she happier than she’d have been with Aaron? They’d had a lot of fun walking out, but when Rachel tried to visualize the day-to-day routine of marriage with her former beau, she couldn’t see it working. Not like it was with Ben.
She stuffed the crumpled letter back into the envelope. With no return address, there was no way of responding to Aaron. It didn’t matter. That part of her life was over. She was wife to Ben and mother to his kinner. A soft smile tilted her lips. There couldn’t be a better husband or daed to the boppeli. Besides, she...cared for him. More than she’d ever thought she could.
Pinching the envelope between her fingers, she tore it, the sound strikingly loud in the quiet room. Rachel tore it again into quarters. Frowning at the multiple pieces, she tucked them back inside the drawer. She’d throw them away when Ben was out of the house. Closing the drawer on the shredded letter and that part of her past, she belatedly remembered to grab the thread as she blew out the lamp and headed for the door.
Rachel paused while still in the shadows of the room and peeped out at her husband. Now standing over the cradle, he was gazing down at the boppeli, a look of simple adoration on his face. Rachel’s heart pounded as she watched. Please, Gott. Help me know what to do so that someday he looks at me in the same manner. Before she stepped through the doorway, Rachel pasted a smile on her face. They had their life now. It could be a gut life. The letter was in the past. As were any feelings she had for her husband’s bruder.
* * *
Ben drew Sojourner to a halt in the growing line of black buggies parked in the pasture. He scrambled out in time to help Rachel and Miriam get down with the twins and the various desserts they’d brought to the first church Sunday since the babies were born. Being hochmut was wrong but Ben couldn’t help thrusting his chest out a little in his mutza suit when all the other Amish women came bustling over to exclaim and coo over the two boppeli. Although it wasn’t discussed when a woman was with child, it wasn’t as if the community didn’t know the babies were coming. Many had already seen them. It’d been a regular parade through their house with everyone visiting. Gut thing there were two, because they’d received more blankets of different types than it seemed the kinder could use in their lifetimes. The visits were wunderbar and most welcome. But he missed quiet evenings when, even though Miriam was there, it was like he and his wife had finally become a team.
“Oh, Ben, would you mind bringing in the church spread and bread loaves?” Rachel called over her shoulder.
When the women, all dressed similarly, left in a flock like geese lifting off a pond with about the same noise level, Ben sighed. He was cut off from his wife and family. As Rachel would sit on the side with the women while he’d be with the men, he wouldn’t have minded walking beside her and his kin to the big barn. With another deep sigh, he retrieved two loaves of homemade bread and the church spread from the buggy. Tucking the latter under his arm, he fell into step beside Samuel and Gideon Schrock as they trailed the women.
“’Bout like driving cattle to the barn,” Gideon observed.
“Careful, I think these’ll do more than kick you if you crowd them too much. Or they’ll sure find a way to make you sorry you irritated them. I think cows are easier.”
Ben chuckled at Samuel’s comment. His previous coworker turned a jaundiced eye on him. “Sure, go ahead and laugh. I thought Malachi was bad, but you’re setting an even worse standard for the rest of us, cosseting your wife the way I hear you’re doing.”
Recalling the rounded evidence under Gail’s apron, Ben swung one of the loaves by its twist-tied wrapper, thumping Samuel on the chest with it. “Just you wait until...” His words fizzled out as he reddened slightly, embarrassed to mention the subject. He glanced at the two Schrock brothers. Although Gideon looked oblivious, Samuel wore an ear-splitting grin along with a faint blush under his black broad-brimmed hat.
“Ja,” was all the usually loquacious Samuel said as they followed the chattering women.
* * *
During church, Ben’s gaze kept drifting to the benches across the barn where his wife and Miriam held the boppeli. Things had been gut between him and Rachel lately. Really gut. Perhaps she was growing to care for him. He’d caught her looking at him when he was rocking the babes, a soft, approachable, yearning expression on her face. He’d thought he imagined it, or it was directed at the boppeli he held. Until he caught her sending it his way one night as he was heading for his bedroom, with no babies in the general area. Ben’s pulse had galloped at the possibility the yearning expression was for him.
What might Rachel do if, when he was heading for bed, he dropped a good-night kiss on her forehead as well as the babies’? His pulse accelerated further. What would she say if they started a discussion about maybe just having...one bedroom?
Ben blinked several times at the loud voice that suddenly pierced his thoughts. Startled that someone might’ve caught on to what he was thinking, in church no less, he slumped on the backless bench as he realized the guest preacher was just getting fired up in his hour-long sermon. Flushing, Ben rubbed a hand over his bearded jaw, glad the covering concealed his blush at the prospect of finally perhaps being a normal husband to his wife.
His hand tightened on his chin as he considered the connection between his beard, the visiting minister and the members’ meeting after church. They’d be starting the process of replacing one of the district’s ministers. One had been chosen after Rachel’s daed’s passing. Either the job had been too much for the one selected or the draw of a widow with a large farm in Jamesport, Missouri, had been too tempting. For whatever reason, the man had moved to Missouri to marry the widow, leaving the district short a minister again. One of the requirements for a man when he was baptized into
the church was the willingness to serve in the lifelong role of minister if selected. It was a job few aspired to. For the first time in a selection process, Ben was eligible to be nominated to fill the role.
His hand crept up to cover his mouth as his eyes grew wide. He shifted his attention from the visiting preacher, obviously comfortable with the job, to John Stoltzfus who had preached the first sermon of the day, who obviously was not. Ben felt much more in accord with John, a gut man whom he and Rachel had confessed to last winter.
But if he was selected, he couldn’t say no. Dropping his hand, Ben’s gaze shifted around the interior of the big barn, where the members of their growing community sat on the backless benches, men on one side, women on the other. His heart pounded at the possibility of standing in front of them and speaking for even a minute without notes, much less an hour.
Certainly he loved Gott and wanted to serve Him, but the thought of serving in that capacity made the hands now clamped on his thighs sweat. How could he do such a thing? He couldn’t even tell his wife that he loved her. Ben pressed his lips together as he recalled the story in the Old Testament. Moses had felt incapable of a job and Gott had used him to lead His people out of bondage in Egypt.
Surely if he was chosen, Gott would provide what he needed. Hadn’t He already? Ben’s attention rested on Rachel. Gott had given him Rachel. A blessing more than he could ever have hoped or imagined. She was gently rocking one of the boppeli in her arms. He didn’t know which one for sure, but it was probably Eli because already his son was the more vocal of the two. Not crying, just letting one know he was there.
Ben slid the palms of his perspiring hands along his pants. If he could tell the whole district of his love for Gott, surely he could tell his wife of his love for her? The prospect made him dizzy with fear. Doing so would leave him exposed. What if she didn’t feel the same? Would she pity him? Ben swallowed against the bitter taste in his mouth as his stomach churned. Better to have the whole community pity his efforts as a preacher than to have his wife pity him for declaring unrequited love. Better to be silent and appear a fool than speak and remove all doubt. But was he a fool for not telling her how he felt? For not having the courage to take the steps to make their marriage better?
He wouldn’t remember the words now droned by this guest minister, but Ben remembered the ones of the speaker for the fire department training. You can be comfortable, or you can be courageous. But never both at the same time. At the time, Ben assumed the man was speaking of physical courage. Which for Ben was easier to address than courage of any other sort. But the man’s words were fitting for other types of courage, as well.
Surprisingly, considering their tenseness at the outset of their marriage, he and Rachel had grown comfortable with each other. They were still living contentedly in the same house, unlike the young couple at their wedding who’d started out marriage in the same manner with a boppeli on the way. But was he still comfortable with...comfortable? Or could he summon the courage to make the marriage into what he yearned for? More than friends. True partners. There were no guarantees she’d ever feel the same way if he said the words first. But it was time to have the courage to do so.
Ben leaned forward on the hard bench as he considered his wife’s down-bent head. He would do so at the next opportunity. It wouldn’t be tonight. She and the babies would be tired tonight after their first public outing. But maybe tomorrow? They were making their marriage work. They’d developed a respect, a partnership with each other.
The chasm was Aaron. Ben’s lips firmed in a mirthless smile as he recalled it was the biblical Aaron who had spoken for his reluctant brother, Moses. It was time Ben spoke his heart. It’d been months since Aaron had left. Surely Rachel was over him by now?
His eyes prickled with emotion as he watched Rachel lift the bundle in her arms to kiss the boppeli she held. Would he have ever gotten over Rachel? Widening his eyes keep any hint of sentiment at bay, he forced himself to focus on the preacher’s closing words. He didn’t want to let his mind wander any more. Because he knew the answer was no. Ben just hoped Rachel’s sentiment wasn’t the same regarding his brother.
Chapter Fifteen
Rachel stared in shock at the man on the other side of the screen door. Under the flat-brimmed straw hat, he had her husband’s dark hair and blue eyes. But no dimples were in sight. Even if the action would reveal he had them, this man was far, far from smiling.
“I’d heard I’d find you here.” His gaze touched on where Eli was tucked in her arms, before shifting to Miriam who’d come up behind her carrying Amelia. His jaw clenched under the shadow of his hat. Rachel didn’t know if it meant he hadn’t heard about the boppeli as well, or that he had.
“Aaron.” She couldn’t say the obvious. That it was a surprise to see him. The look on her face must advise that. The look that jolted from shock to joy to yearning to—as she watched him stare at her boppeli—guilt.
“I thought you’d wait for me.”
“I did.” She had. For weeks. Watched and hoped, even prayed for his return. Rachel swallowed as she shifted uncomfortably. All the while pregnant with his bruder’s children.
Through the screen door, Aaron’s unsmiling attention remained on the bundle in her arm. “Apparently not for very long.”
His cynical words stabbed Rachel like the tines of a pitchfork. Aaron had perhaps not even cleared the county line and she’d been in his bruder’s arms. For comfort in her distress at her intended’s departure, but still. Remorse soured her stomach. Eli started to fret. Rachel couldn’t blame him. The soft cradle of her arms had stiffened into a tense, unyielding berth.
Things couldn’t be changed, whether feelings had or not. She had to make Aaron understand that what’d happened with her and Ben hadn’t been intentional. That she hadn’t set out to betray him. That they hadn’t set out to betray him.
“I... We ...” She didn’t know how to start.
“Yah, I got that part.”
Aaron’s set face indicated any explanation would have a difficult time finding a receptive ear. Still, Rachel had to try. She turned to see Miriam, although she’d put Amelia in her nearby cradle, was still a few steps behind her. Closing the distance between them, she gently transferred Eli to her. The young woman tenderly cuddled the baby, but Rachel could tell from Miriam’s fierce expression that she’d be willing to throw the interloper off the porch should Rachel request it. And kick him down the drive, as well. Happily.
“I’m going to step outside.” At Miriam’s sharp look, Rachel continued, “It’ll be all right. Aaron and I have a long history. Seeing each other again is a bit of a...shock to us both. I won’t be far. Call if you or the boppeli need me.”
Miriam nodded, but the protective look in her eyes told Rachel they’d be watched out the window and the hired girl wouldn’t hesitate to dash out the door if needed. Warmed by the young woman’s support and loyalty when she was clenching her own hands to keep them from trembling, Rachel repeated, “It’ll be all right.”
At least she hoped so. She turned to where Aaron remained, stone-faced, at the door. He wouldn’t do anything to harm her physically. At least not the Aaron she’d once known. But his being here was an emotional calamity. Years of having been his sweetheart, of thinking he was Gott’s chosen one for her, tugged at dormant longings, vying against the renewed and deepened guilt that flooded her. Was he staying long? Had he come back for her? What would Ben do if he knew he was here? Trepidation regarding the Raber brothers’ relationship in the short-and long-term weighed her steps as she opened the door and crossed the porch with Aaron falling in behind her.
He didn’t say a word as he followed her to the self-sustaining swing Ben had built for her by the garden. She sank onto it, as, achingly aware of Aaron’s presence a step behind her, she didn’t know if her shaky legs could carry her any farther. The swing’s chains squeaked and the wooden seat shifte
d under her, much like Rachel’s world right now. She looked out at the mostly cleared garden. Some of the remaining vines were dead, just as her feelings for this man needed to be. She strove to prune the rustling dormant longings before they could take root.
Aaron stood stiffly beside the swing.
“How long have you been back?”
“About the length of time it took to stop at your, well, what used to be your home, and then get here. For some foolish reason, I wanted to see you first.”
Exhaling a tense sigh, Rachel tipped her head toward where an older car was parked in the driveway. “Are you staying, or returning to the Englisch?”
Aaron’s lips twisted. “I was planning on staying. At least when I thought I had someone to stay for. Now, I don’t know anymore.”
Flinching, Rachel bowed her head. Regardless of what she felt or wanted—her sentiments were still blunted by shock—Aaron’s folks would want him to stay. Aaron’s bruder would want... What would Ben want? Either way, the thought Aaron would leave the community for good because of what they’d done was unbearable.
“We didn’t intend for this to happen.” Pressing her hands together on her lap, she lifted her head.
“Regardless of what you intended, it did happen. And now it can’t be changed, can it?” Aaron’s chest rose and fell under the force of his emotions. “I wonder, did you ever really care for me?”
Just as he said, it couldn’t be changed. When Rachel couldn’t do anything more than stare mutely at him with crumpled features, Aaron turned in disgust. “I think I’ll go see my bruder.” The last word was spat out like an unripe persimmon.
He stalked to the car. The engine roared to life. Rachel cringed at the spit of gravel as the vehicle spun out. When it charged down the lane, she burst into tears.
She cried enough to water the garden for a summer during a drought. She cried for Aaron. This wasn’t the Aaron she’d known. She couldn’t imagine being the recipient of the kind of betrayal she and Ben had inflicted on him. No wonder he was shocked and agitated.
Their Surprise Amish Marriage Page 15