The Memory Jar

by Tricia Goyer

  “What do you mean, yer dreams taken away?”

  He held in a breath. How can I explain? How can I let her know that when I do return, I’ll have little or no time to enjoy Mem’s bakery?

  As much as he’d enjoyed spending time with Sarah yesterday, and as much as he hoped conversations like today could lead to a growing relationship between them, a part of him said to walk away and not get her involved. What he wanted to offer Sarah and what he could offer were two different things. Who he wanted to be and the son and brother he would step back into being when he returned to Ohio were two different men.

  “I suppose I should tell you. My life is planned out fer me. Since I finished grade eight, I’ve been working around the farm and in my Dat’s workshop, but my family needs more money coming in. My Dat has already talked with a friend of his who works in a local factory. They have a job fer me when I return. And then there’s the farm. Dat and Mem had already begun to move their things into the dawdi house before I left. The big house will be mine … and all the responsibilities. They figure when I start my job, they can keep the shop running and keep the farm from going under.”

  “The shop?” She slowly rolled out the dough.

  “My Dat and oldest bruder, Yonnie, are woodworkers. It was Yonnie who came up with the idea of me going to the factory. He and Dat have ideas for expanding their wholesale market beyond Holmes County but need some money to invest to do that.”

  “Money you’ll bring in from yer job?”

  Jathan nodded.

  “But that doesn’t seem right. I know we are called to care fer our elders, but I know you — you’d do that anyway.”

  “I would — in my own time and own way maybe — but all the ways I imagine spending my life can’t help them now, with their current needs.”

  “And how would you like to spend yer life?” She tilted her face up to his. The morning light from the kitchen window sent a beam of radiance across the narrow strip of hair her prayer kapp didn’t cover. More than anything, Jathan wished he could bend down and kiss that spot.

  “Like you, Sarah, I enjoy spending time with people. I appreciate our Amish heritage and faith and know not everyone has that. Day by day, I’d love to interact with customers and remind them it’s the simple things in life that matter most — to share a bit of our heritage with Englischers. To provide fer their needs and …” He looked away.

  “What?” She adjusted her stance, keeping the weight off her sore ankle and reached out and touched his arm. “What were you going to say?”

  He lifted his head and looked to the ceiling, imagining the sky outside and heaven beyond. “I was going to say, I would like to spend my days doing something closer to this —” he waved his hand around the room —“than being part of an assembly line. But you see, Sarah …” He returned his gaze to her. “That’s where my struggle is. It’s impossible for me to honor my Dat and follow my dreams at the same time.”

  He watched closely as she looked away. She focused on the cookbook she’d been holding when he’d first walked in. Sarah brushed her fingers over the cover, curving them to follow the swirl of the cupcake’s pink frosting in the photograph. Then she turned back to him.

  “I know what yer sayin’.” Her eyes pulled him into their blue depths, and then she nodded and crossed her arms over her apron. “It’s too easy to think it’s wrong to want to spend our days doing what we enjoy. It’s easy to give up on that dreaming, isn’t it? To let those who’ve given us life — and who direct us on God’s path — draw us away from what our hearts long to do.”

  Out of all the people he knew, Jathan somehow knew she would be the one to understand.

  He thought about the night before he’d left for Montana. How Dat and Yonnie had sat him down with their accounting books. They’d asked him not to go. They needed him, needed his income. He told them he’d send what he could once he had a job in Montana, and he’d done that. Working with Abe Sommer had given him some money, but not enough.

  He felt selfish for taking this trip, but he needed it. He needed space and time to think and to connect with God. He was thankful he’d met Sarah and felt blessed today more than ever to be with her, but that didn’t shake off the burden of guilt he carried for not doing all he could for his family. It was as if he’d packed guilt into two of the largest cedar chests his father made and had brought them with him, carrying one burden on each shoulder.

  Jathan picked up the biscuit cutter and started cutting small, round discs from the dough Sarah had already rolled out, placing the circles on a baking sheet in neat, straight lines.

  She looked up at him. He could tell from her serious expression that she was pondering their talk of dreaming and of obeying and how the two mixed — or rather how they clashed at times.

  “Sometimes I struggle with thinking my dreams are foolish too,” she finally said. “I also try to weigh my motives. Am I doing what I’m doing because it’s what God desires, or because I’m afraid people will be disappointed if I don’t?”

  Jathan nodded. “Or because I’m following in the ways I’ve been taught, respecting those who’ve gone before me and obeying my father and mother? If I believe that’s what God wants — and I know it is — then I know what I have to do.”

  “So yer parents want you to take over their property and house?” she asked.

  “Ja, and many expenses go with that, and the farm itself takes much work with little profit. The only way to make it will be to get an outside job.”

  “I don’t know what to say,” Sarah finally offered.

  “There is nothing to say. I jest wanted you to know — thought it was important.”

  Sarah tilted her head as if trying to distinguish if there was a deeper meaning behind his last statement. She opened her mouth as if she wanted to say something, then closed it again.

  “Were you going to ask me something, Sarah?”

  “ne. Well, ja, but ne, I can’t. It would be far too forward.” She looked down at the cookbook and flipped through the pages, but he knew her mind wasn’t on the recipes. He knew she was wondering about him — about them — just as he was.

  “Then if you are too shy to ask, I will tell you. I know our friendship is jest beginning, but I wanted to tell you everything, because I care about you, Sarah. Yer exactly the type of person I can imagine spending my life with.”

  She stopped flipping pages and glanced up at him. She smiled and her nose wrinkled, and then she placed a hand to her lips. “A friendship is a wonderful place to start, and I feel the same about you, but there are so many questions. You being from Ohio and my family being here. Your Dat’s expectations and …” Pink rose to her cheeks and she touched them. “Wait, I’m getting ahead of myself, aren’t I?”

  Joy bubbled up in Jathan and it emerged from his lips as laughter. “I don’t mind, really, but I should get to know yer family — talk to yer Dat. See if he’d consider me someone worthy of his daughter’s, uh, friendship.”

  “Ja, that makes sense.” Hope and joy warmed her eyes.

  “I’d like to plan my whole future the way I want it, but we both know that’s not the Amish way. We’re taught the ways of our ancestors from the time we’re children. We know honoring our parents is most important,” he said. “I jest have to trust that my Christian duty is to care fer people as they need and trust that if God has different plans fer me — fer us — he will make a way.”

  “It’s true.” She nodded. “It’s all we can do. And as Patty used to tell me, we jest need to keep walking in the direction God pointed us last, and if we keep looking fer him and waiting on him, God will let us know when to make a change of direction.”

  She finished up the biscuits and put them into the oven to bake. She hobbled over to the list of baked goods she still needed to make, and he wished she’d let him help more. But he also knew it would be impossible to keep her still all day.

  Returning to her chair, Sarah grimaced and then blew out a breath. When she got he
r foot situated on the stool once again, she turned her attention back to him and wore a serious expression. “I appreciate you sharing all that. I like knowing more about you. It also tells me how to pray. And, well, Jathan, there’s something I need you to know too.”

  He leaned forward in his chair. “What’s that?”

  She reached across the counter and pulled a paper sack toward her. Looking into it, she had a satisfied look on her face, and then she handed the sack to him. It was heavy and rattled slightly in his hands.

  Jathan looked inside. Walnuts? “Uh, what is this for?”

  “I need you to know I’m making banana bread today.” Sarah spoke in a serious tone. Then she reached over to the top drawer, pulled out a nut cracker, and handed it to him. “Since yer here to help.”

  “Sure.” He chuckled. “It doesn’t look as if I have a choice.”

  “If you want banana bread you don’t.” She laughed, and Jathan joined in. He liked seeing her this way. He liked the happy, playful side of Sarah. He wasn’t sure if he was just getting to know a different side of her or if something had happened deep in her heart during the night before last. He felt like he carried a different woman out of the woods than the one who’d entered. He’d like to think Sarah opening up to him about Patty had something to do with that.

  “If I didn’t have so much baking to do, I’d be happy to crack the walnuts,” she said. “It’s one of my favorite chores, ‘cept Mem doesn’t allow me to lend a hand too often at home. Seems more of the meat makes it into my mouth than into the bowl. Then Mem always wonders why the banana bread seems sparse. Of course, we don’t have walnut trees here in Montana. We have a friend who brings us a large bag whenever he heads out this way.”

  Over the next thirty minutes, Jathan cracked the nuts. Then he moved to the pantry for wax paper.

  “What are you doing?” Sarah paused from kneading dough to watch him.

  “I have a trick.” He laid out two pieces of wax paper, placed the nuts in between, and then rolled over them with a rolling pin.

  Sarah’s mouth dropped open. “That’s so smart. Out of all my years in the kitchen, I’ve never seen that before.”

  Jathan grinned. “All the years in the kitchen? That makes you sound like an old maid.”

  “To some I am. But hopefully not in the opinion of someone special.”

  Jathan paused and eyed her. Sarah placed a hand over her mouth as if in disbelief that those words had just spilled out.

  “Would this someone be holding a rolling pin in his hand?” Jathan asked.

  Sarah nodded.

  “Then you don’t have anything to worry about, Sarah,” he said as he tossed the walnuts into the batter Sarah had prepared. “You don’t have anything to worry about at all.”

  CHAPTER

  14

  Sarah eyed Jathan as he moved around the kitchen. He acted much more at ease here than when he’d been in the forest the other night. In the forest, he’d fumbled around as he searched for dry wood. He’d woken her at the cry of a coyote.

  Yet here in the kitchen, there was a peace about Jathan she couldn’t explain. He’d pulled items from the pantry with confidence. He watched her closely as she worked, as if he were memorizing her recipes. He tried to act like he was just a simple observer, but the way he crushed the walnuts revealed that he was more.

  What type of Amish man was this? Did he think he could spend time with her here and think she’d not notice how comfortable he was? And what did he mean by saying he’d rather spend days like this rather than working in a mill? Had he considered helping at his mother’s bakery? If so, maybe he wouldn’t consider Sarah’s own dreams so foolish. Her heart leapt within her at the thought.

  He was wiping down the counters and washing up the dirty dishes when Sarah knew she had to get to the bottom of it. She poured the banana bread batter into greased and floured bread pans and then attempted to stand.

  She pressed her lips into a thin line, stood, and took one step. A stabbing feeling radiated through her ankle. Sarah moaned and grabbed the counter.

  Jathan turned, eyes wide. “What are you doing? I’m standing right here, Sarah. What do you need?”

  “I was jest going to turn on the oven. It’s only five steps away.”

  “Jest ask, won’t you? I’ve never known such a stubborn woman.” He shook his head and then walked over to the industrial oven and turned it on to 350 degrees. He hadn’t needed to ask her how to make it work, and he hadn’t asked about the temperature.

  “Ja, gut. Now can you put these loaves inside?”

  He glanced over at her, his eyebrows forming a V. “Now?”

  “Of course now. I’m moving slowly this morning and our customers will be here before I know it —”

  Jathan held up his hands, refusing her request. “ne, you can’t. It’ll ruin yer batter. The oven has to prehea —”

  “Ah-ha!” She picked up a kitchen towel and flicked it his direction. “Caught you.”

  He took a step back, surprised. “Excuse me?”

  Sarah laughed. “You act as if yer jest a casual observer, but yer far from that. You move around the kitchen like my Dat moves around his barn. I’ve never seen an Amish man like you. If I didn’t know better …” Sarah paused. As she watched, a shadow fell over Jathan’s face and an expression flashed through his eyes, breaking her heart. What was that look? Shame.

  He lowered his head and turned away, then moved to the farthest corner of the kitchen, like a young child running to the corner, to start wiping down the already clean shelves. His shoulders slumped heavily as if a great, invisible burden settled on them. It was as if the tall man before her had crumbled inside from her words and had a hard time holding himself erect.

  Her smiled faded. “What’s wrong? Did I say something wrong?”

  “ne, it’s nothing.” He turned and moved toward the coatrack near the door. “I was jest thinking I should get home. Uh, Amos wanted to go shooting today and —”

  “Jathan, stop.” The words shot from her mouth. Thankfully, he did.

  He turned to her slowly. “What is it, Sarah?”

  Pain radiated from his gaze, and deep down, Sarah knew exactly what he was feeling. She knew because she’d held the same feelings — tucked them away inside for many years.

  She cleared her throat. “There is something I should have told you in the woods. Something I should have confessed.”

  His eyes widened slightly and he took a step forward.

  “I have loved getting to know you, and it crossed my mind that when you return to Berlin next year, I’d like to visit. After all, my aunt lives there …” She let her voice trail off. “There’s only one problem, you see.” She bit her lip and, even as she said the words, a small remnant of shame stirred within. “I’m afraid if I ever met yer Mem, she wouldn’t care much for me.”

  He took three steps toward her now and kneeled before her. “ne, that wouldn’t be. Why would you ever think that?”

  She blew out a heavy breath. For many reasons. “I hate quilting. I’ve only finished one quilt, and it was fer a, uh, friend. I don’t like to sew, and Mem gave up trying to teach me how. I enjoy gardening, but I don’t like to can. I’m not much fer cooking meals, and I’m afraid when I have children someday, I’d be tempted to serve them pie fer dinner every night. My Mem calls me a daydreamer too. I spend a lot of time each day with my thoughts — my memories. Jest my experiences with Patty have filled a couple of memory jars. I can spend an hour staring at the clouds or thinking up the perfect ingredients fer a cupcake recipe.” She touched her kapp. “Truth is, I’m not much of an Amish woman.”

  “What? ne.” He reached out and touched her hand. “None of those things matter, Sarah. At least they don’t matter to me.”

  “Honestly?” A lightness filled her chest at his words, and she smiled. She placed her other hand on his. “Do you really mean that?”

  “Ja, of course.”

  Sarah tilted her head. “Jat
han, deep down I had a feeling you’d say that. Out of all the other bachelors in these parts, I wouldn’t admit such things to another. But I have to say my confession is only part of what was weighing down my heart. There is more I must tell you too … about my faith.

  “All my years growing up, I was not so impressed by the people who lived perfect lives, who did everything by the Ordnung,” she continued. “The people I’ve loved are the ones who don’t force themselves to be who everyone else expects but who seek God so they can understand who they already are. Mem and Dat attend Englisch prayer meetings. They pray out loud at times. Most of their Amish friends don’t know, and their family back in Kentucky would be shocked if they knew.”

  She thought of another wild spirit and a sad smile filled her face. “Then there was Patty. My dear friend was not quiet. She was not meek. She would rather have tromped through the forest than sit before a fireplace and quilt. I spent nearly every day with her for twelve years, and I’m afraid I picked up her bad habits.” Sarah touched her hand to her cheek. The confession hurt her heart more than she expected it would. “The Amish in these parts know I’m different. I’ve heard them comment when they didn’t think I could hear. ‘That Sarah Shelter, she’ll be an old maid fer sure. Whoever would choose a wife like that …’” Tears rimmed her eyes, and she touched her fingers to trembling lips.

  “Sarah, ne.” He brushed a tear from her cheek with his thumb. “Don’t listen to those words. Yer faith inspires me. They don’t know what they’re talking about.”

  She could see from his face he wanted to continue. Wanted to tell her he’d like a wife like that. She smiled, realizing it was enough to see it in his gaze.

  “That really doesn’t bother you then?”

  He rose and shook his head. “ne, if anything, it makes me appreciate you even more. That’s why I enjoy being with you, Sarah. Yer not like the other women.”

  “If you believe that, Jathan, and I know you do, then I have something else to say.”

  He looked down at her and waited.