The Narrow Path

by Gail Sattler

  Miranda opened the menu, but leaned forward toward Ted."Discount?" Ted opened the menu, skimmed it quickly, then closed it and laid it on the table. "I come here often."

  Between the leftovers she knew people gave him and his spending so much time at the restaurant that they gave him a standing discount, she wondered if he even cooked. "I almost was going to tease you about not cooking, but I can't really. I don't cook much either. My father does most of the cooking at home."

  "Your papa? I know life is different in the cities, but your mama does not cook?"

  "My mother died when I was a little girl. It's just me and my father."

  "Ach, I am sorry. Both my mama and papa have also gone to glory, so my heart is with you."

  A wave of guilt rushed through her. On Sunday, she had wondered why she hadn't been introduced to Ted's parents.She'd simply assumed they hadn't gone to church that day, even though in this community that would be rare. Now she knew why as a single young adult, Ted lived alone.

  "I'm so sorry. If there's anything I can do for you, please ask."

  "Do not worry. My house is often messy, but Tante Odelle helps me."

  Miranda blinked. "Not housework—I meant if you needed help with something I'm good at. Like if you need some advice with your income tax return, because you probably have a lot of things that could be written off as business expenses that you don't know about. Or if you need your spark plugs gapped or changed, I'm not too bad under the hood of a car, unless it involves lifting the engine."

  "Oh." He paused and looked at her arms, then back up to her face. "I thought—"

  Miranda held up one palm toward him and sighed. "Please, don't say it. I know that's not typical girl stuff around here. It's going to be a huge adjustment for me, but I'm going to do my best to fit in. You can't begin to guess at how much I'm out of my league here."

  His frown tightened. "I think I can."

  Miranda thumped her elbows on the table and buried her face in her hands. "I'm sorry. You do know how much I don't fit in here. I want to do whatever it takes to make this work, but I don't really know what to do. Dad and I aren't exactly a typical family unit. Without my mom, and because Dad was so busy as a pastor, I've had to learn to do a lot of nontypical things for the two of us to survive. You know, instead of shopping today, I should have been at the library, learning the history of your town and community."

  "After we eat, I can take you to our museum, if that is what you desire."

  She spread her fingers and peeked between them. "You have a museum?"

  "Ja. It is at the end of our downtown area. A few more blocks."

  She lowered her hands to grasp the edge of the table, and leaned toward him. "That would be great!"

  Elena returned to take their orders. She looked at Miranda first, her pencil poised above her notepad.

  Miranda stared at the menu. It wasn't in English. If she sounded some of the entrées out carefully, many of the dishes were familiar to her. But many were not. "There are so many choices, I can't decide. Ted, what are you having?"

  He left his menu on the table. "Today I will have Graesht Mehl Grumbara Supp."

  Miranda slapped the menu closed. "I think I'll have the same."

  Ted smiled as Elena returned to the kitchen. "As you can guess, Elena and Mary have a different menu for the tourists."

  "Yes, that's a terrific idea. These tourists are just non- Mennonite people who live in the area, right?"

  "Ja. Right."

  Miranda nodded. Then those were the people his church wanted to attract on Sundays and spread their ministry to."Elena and Mary are definitely doing something right. All the shopkeepers here are doing great at attracting the tourists. I can see why they keep coming, and I've got some great pictures.Do you want to see what I've taken so far?"

  He shrugged his shoulders. "I hope I am not in any of them."

  "No, you're not." But the fact that he mentioned it set her mind racing. She hadn't yet had the chance to e-mail home, and she hadn't told her friends or Bradley what she had walked into. A photo of Ted in his hat and frumpy coat standing against any of the old storefronts, the sidewalks piled high with snow, would say more than a thousand words.

  She hadn't finished showing him all her pictures before Elena returned with two bowls of steamy, fragrant soup.

  Since no one brought soup to the potlucks, she had no idea what was in it. As a classic Old Mennonite dish, she doubted it would contain green peppers, which was the only food she truly hated.

  Ted bowed his head to lead a beautiful and heartfelt prayer, thanking God for the time they would spend together at the museum and asking a blessing on the food they were about to share.

  "Amen," she said quietly.

  Ted blew gently onto the soup as he stirred it a few times, then began to eat.

  He closed his eyes and sighed. "Mary makes the best Graesht Mehl Grumbara Supp I have ever tasted. It is even better than my mama's."

  Cautiously, Miranda took her first taste. It was some kind of potato soup full of tender vegetables, but it wasn't the same color as she'd had before. Still, she liked it. "Yes, this is delicious.Was your mother a good cook?"

  He smiled, and his eyes glazed over. "Ja. This was why my papa said he married her."

  Even though the ability to cook meant more to the Mennonites in Ted's world than it did to Mennonites in suburban Seattle, it was still important for hospitality and showing love for others. Even though it wasn't the same, some of the best times she had with her father were when it was just the two of them in the kitchen sharing a meal, even if it was the special from the local Chinese takeout.

  She watched Ted, who still seemed lost in thought over the relationship between his parents.

  Being initially attracted to a woman because of her cooking and family skills was better than some of the things she had heard in some of her clients' workplaces. One of the men proudly proclaimed to everyone in the office that he'd married his wife for various parts of her anatomy.

  "I'm afraid I don't remember any of my mother's cooking.The only thing I really remember is making chocolate chip cookies, but I don't remember eating them. So either they weren't very good, or once we finished mixing them, I was no longer interested. Did you ever make cookies with your mother?"

  "No." His face closed up, reminding her that in his world, a boy spending time in the kitchen was a fate worse than death.

  Miranda sighed and continued to stir her soup. "When I get married I dream about making cookies with my kids. But I know realistically that I'm not going to do a lot of cooking, so I'm going to have to marry a man who knows his way around a kitchen or we'll all starve to death." Either that, or they will all learn to love Chinese takeout real fast.

  "The woman I marry will be a good cook, like her mother, so there will always be plenty of food on the table."

  Since the soup was now cooled to a more comfortable temperature, they ate in silence until the last drops were gone from both bowls.

  "Come. We can go to the museum now. They will put this on my account. Elena and Mary make my lunch every day, and I stop here on my way to work to pick it up. It is easier to pay once a week."

  That shouldn't have surprised her. As he stood to slip on his coat, and probably because they'd just been talking about him not cooking, Miranda noticed that while he wasn't carrying too much extra around his middle, he wasn't exactly starving.She suspected he received many invitations to supper from mothers of the single ladies.

  The soup had warmed her from the inside out, but by the time they reached the end of the block, Miranda felt as if she had made a trip through a deep freeze. Back when she'd had a part-time job at the local supermarket, even the freezer hadn't been this cold.

  The museum, small and smelling of old books and newspapers, had a plaque near the door proclaiming that the building used to be a school. One corner of what appeared to be the main room was dedicated to the history of the area and the early colony days, before the commun
ity had allegedly modernized and settled on the outskirts of this town, which had now joined theirs in its population growth. Faded black and white photos displayed a blacksmith, a gristmill, and many old sod houses that she had never realized were built so low in the ground.

  She pressed her finger to the glass in front of a picture of an old windmill. "Is this still intact?"

  "Ja. If you want, I will take you there. But it is only open to people in the summer. Would you like to go into the other room now? This room is all pictures, everything else is over there."

  She could have spent the rest of the day looking at the old photos. One day she would return by herself. But since Ted wasn't as interested in the pictures as she was, she followed him to the other, smaller room.

  "Wow. Look at this stuff . . ." The expected farm and kitchen implements were displayed, as well as clothing and a prayer kapp, which wasn't much different from what the ladies wore now. The precision in the crafted items caused her to stop."I've never seen a quilt like this in my life."

  A glass case in the center of the room displayed what looked like children's arts and crafts. Each item had been dated back to different stages of the school's growth, up to the time when one-room schoolhouses were discontinued and this school was closed.

  She studied the dates. "Everything here was made by people who actually lived in the area, right?" She had never met anyone who had gone to a one-room schoolhouse. A million questions about what it must have been like bounced through her head. But she doubted there was anyone left who had lived through that kind of history.

  "Ja. That picture over there was made by Gretta, who is Sarah's grootmutta. We should be going. They are going to close soon. And it is almost dark out."

  Miranda checked her watch. Sure enough, it was nearly five- fifteen. She turned to smile at him. "I doubt you're thinking the same thing as I am about the dark. For me, I worry that the nutcases come out worse at night, and it's dangerous when you can't see them coming."

  "When I go to the cities, I am cautious about unsavory characters too. Here, I say this about the dark because I know how cold you are feeling, and it is colder after dark."

  "I don't want to think about that." She immediately started fastening Lois's coat, which was so large it hung on her like a sack. At least it was a warm sack. "I guess I'm as ready as I'll ever be."

  "I do not know if I told you. We have been invited to Pastor's home for supper tonight. He said to be there at five- thirty."

  Miranda looked down at her jeans and grimaced. "Great."

  6

  Ted swung the car door open, holding it from being blown shut, until Miranda got all the way in. While he waited, watching her struggle to gather up the length of Lois's coat so it wouldn't get caught in the car door, her desperate words about trying to fit in came back to him.

  He believed that she would try. But the fact that she openly admitted she didn't fit in proved the truth of her statement.Some things, no matter how hard one tried, were not attainable by any means except through the grace of God, and this was truly one of those times. At the same time, the Bible also warned about not putting God to the test.

  As Miranda finally pulled the coat hem into the car, he closed the door, jogged around to the driver's side, and got in.Miranda was pulling down the sun visor.

  "You do not have to worry," he said as he started the engine. "The sun is almost set. We will not be driving into the glare.Pastor's house is to the north from here."

  She quickly clicked on her seatbelt, then began digging through her purse frantically. "I hope you drive slowly."

  "The roads are clear. There is no danger. You have already learned that I do not speed. I have never had a ticket. I . . ." His words trailed off as she pulled a small, square plastic container out of her purse.

  She flicked it open and fumbled for a miniature brush with a solid foam end instead of bristles, and brushed it through a cake of brown powder. "Please drive real slow. This won't take me long, but I know his house can't possibly be far from anywhere in this town." She closed one eye, stretched her neck to look at her face closely in the visor mirror, and began to apply the powder to her eyelid. After a few seconds, she looked at herself, blinked three times, then applied more powder to the brush and began the same process with the other eye.

  "What are you doing?"

  "I'm putting my makeup on. I can't go out like this."

  "Like what?"

  She sighed loudly and snapped the container closed. She then pulled out a thin pencil and pulled the cap off, although why a pencil would need a cap, he didn't know. Then she moved the pencil up to her eye.

  He didn't know what she was about to do, but he didn't want her to poke her eye out. "Wait!"

  "Just don't move the car until I'm finished with the liner.Then we can go. I don't want to make us late." She drew a line under each eye, then smudged the lines with her finger. "Okay.We can go. I'll do the rest while we're moving."

  "But—"

  She waved one hand in the air quickly, then continued to dig in her purse. "Don't worry. I do this all the time in a moving car on the way to work. Just tell me if you're going to hit any potholes."

  He considered the engine to be sufficiently warm, so he started moving, but it was difficult to keep his attention on the road. Even though he knew women in the cities looked very different from everyone he knew at home, he'd never witnessed the process of making the change.

  Next she pulled out a cylindrical container, which unscrewed in the center. When she pulled at each end, a black brush with a strange curly shape came out. Again, she held it up toward one eye.

  Ted gritted his teeth, slowed his speed, and drove slower than he usually did, keeping a close watch for potholes, yet at the same time glancing to the side to see what she was doing.She brushed a dark substance to her eyelashes, taking more care at the sides of her eyes than the middle, then screwed the pieces back together and returned them to her purse.

  The next procedure involved a short tube-shaped container, which pulled apart into two pieces, but this time there was no applicator. He feared it was broken until she started to turn one of the halves, and a red extrusion appeared. She pressed this gently to her lips, which transferred the red color.

  He thought she was done, but next she pulled out another square plastic container, larger than the first one. This contained a skin-colored powder, and this brush was larger and actually had bristles. She swiped the brush into the powder, and this time brushed the powder onto her cheeks.

  She snapped it shut and dropped it into her purse. "There.It's not perfect, but it's done. Do I look okay?"

  He stopped the car in front of Pastor's house and turned to her.

  "Ja. You look . . . uh . . ." At her request, he studied her face. He didn't know why, but even though she looked exactly the same as she had before they got in the car, something was different about her. Prettier. Somehow more interesting to look at. Although it didn't make sense because he'd seen exactly what she had done. The entire process had only taken seven minutes. The small bit of powders and applied colorings enhanced the flecks of green in her eyes, and the darker color of her lips drew his attention. Looking at her face, he could feel a difference in himself. Then her lips quivered, and she licked her top lip. Something fluttered in his stomach.

  Ted looked away.

  If he could feel this way while looking at their exasperating visitor, then he could understand that this was exactly why young unmarried people required a chaperone.

  He turned off the engine and pulled out the keys. "You look fine. Let us go in."

  The second the door opened, Ted could tell Kathleen had been working hard all day. Unless he was mistaken, he could smell brotevascht mit eppel, which meant that Kathleen would probably have schnitz pie for dessert.

  "Kom ein! Welcome!" Pastor greeted them and waved them inside, to the living room.

  Miranda tugged off her boots, wiggled her toes, then sighed."It's so cold out there.
Is it like this every winter?"

  Pastor nodded. "Ja. But we have not yet had the coldest part of the winter. That will be in a couple of weeks, in the middle of February."

  She mumbled something about a mistake, but Ted couldn't quite hear. Before he had a chance to ask her to repeat herself, she started walking toward the kitchen. "I think I'll see if Kathleen needs me."

  As she disappeared into the kitchen doorway, he couldn't help but wonder if she would be more of a hindrance than a help. He didn't understand how any Mennonite woman could know so little about cooking. Life was different in the cities, but he had no idea that it would be that different in the church as well.

  Pastor motioned him to sit on the couch. "How was your day with Miss Klassen?"

  "Uh . . ." Ted tried to think of something encouraging. "Uh . . . she is very friendly."

  Pastor waited. "And?"

  And she didn't poke her eye out in the moving car.

  Miranda appeared from the kitchen. "Kathleen says supper is ready."

  Pastor looked at him, but Ted deliberately looked away.Once in the kitchen, he seated Miranda, then took his place at the table. After bowing their heads for the blessing, everyone completed the prayer with an "amen."

  Miranda closed her eyes and inhaled deeply above the fragrant main dish.

  "Mm . . . sausages and apples. Mindy at my church makes this. It's one of my favorites, and yours smells even better."

  Ted grinned. A quick glance at the counter proved he was also right about what Kathleen had prepared for dessert.

  Miranda's grin widened. "I see you also made apple pie.I'm so awful with pies. My crust is always too thick and never tender."

  Pastor smiled. "I am sure your talents are in other places."

  Ted could only hope so.

  Not only did Miranda help herself to a portion of brotevascht mit eppel suitable for a man, she also piled a large amount of buttered green beans onto her plate.

  She smiled as she chewed. "This is so good. Thank you."

  Kathleen watched, then smiled back. "It does my heart good to see a young woman eat like this. From what I have seen, women from the cities are always on a diet."