“Oh, I am happy. That’s why I’m crying again,” she mumbled wetly, wiping her face on the sheet like a little girl with a cold.
“You cry too much, Rose. I can hardly keep up with your tears.” I said it jokingly, but secretly, I kind of meant it.
“Why do our lives have to be so…complicated…and difficult?”
I thought for a while before answering. “Maybe God’s throwing all our troubles at us now, when we’re young and strong enough to deal with them. Which means someday our lives will be incredibly boring.”
She rested her chin on the bed railing, pursing her lips, and considering my statement, she muttered, “I just want life to be boring now. Not when we’re old and gray.”
I longed to comfort her, make her forget all her troubles, but there were still so many obstacles standing in the way of our happiness. I tried anyway, saying, “Everything is going to be okay, Rose. We’re together right now and we’re both alive. That’s all that matters.”
I said it hoping that the words would cheer her up, but utterly confusing me, they had the opposite effect and she began crying again. Moving my hand to her cheek, I wiped the tears with my fingers and begged, “What’s wrong now, sweetheart?”
In between gasps for breath she stuttered, “I’m so sorry about Rumor… I was with him when…he died. It was awful.”
Interestingly enough, I hadn’t asked anyone about my horse. Somehow I knew he was dead, and I had pushed it to the back of my mind. I didn’t really even want to think about it. Now looking at Rose’s stricken face, the horror of what had happened to my poor horse hit me full force.
Her tears flowed freely and she leaned over to press her wet face against mine. I kept my own tears bottled inside. But the water from her eyes was enough for both of us, soaking my cheeks as if I were crying also.
“I’m sorry you had to see that, but in a way I’m glad you were with him. That he wasn’t alone,” I whispered hoarsely into her ear.
Her body rocked with the tremors of her sobs. She sucked in with a gulp before saying feebly but with more control to her voice now, “He died with his head in my lap. He just went to sleep. He didn’t suffer long.”
“Rumor was the best horse in the world. He was always willing to do whatever task I asked of him—and he was smart, too, for a horse.” I paused, collecting my emotions before going on, “I’ll never have another horse like him, I’m afraid,” I said, sadly wistful.
She jerked back then, so abruptly it startled me.
Her eyes suddenly shinning, she said, “But you have little Rebel—he’ll be a good horse for you.”
Her enthusiasm was sweet, but that little colt was an obnoxious headache. Biting and kicking all the other horses, even though he was half their size. And then there was the irritating fact that I could barely catch the little demon in the field.
“Where did this name Rebel come from anyway?” I asked, frowning. I couldn’t remember ever having named the beast.
Coyly, she shrugged. Doing the flirty thing with her eyes, she said, “Oh, I named him that the night you bought him at the sale. It just seemed to fit him.” Suddenly appearing unsure of herself, she added, “But, Noah, you can call him anything you want.”
“Well, that name actually suits him fairly well—so Rebel it is, then.”
For some strange reason, whenever Rose was truly happy about something, and she smiled that big smile at me, my heart loosened, and I felt weak all over, weaker even than my broken body was now.
“I’m so glad you like the name,” she breathed excitedly, her face beaming.
I wondered if she’d still be happy when I told her of my decision. I stared into her eyes, searching for her thoughts, and just when I was about to say that I would leave the Amish to be with her, she blurted out in a rush of words, “Oh, Noah, I’ve changed my mind about becoming Amish! I’ll do anything it takes to be with you—anything.”
The breath caught in my throat, and I swallowed. Rose was willing to abandon her world and become Amish after all? My mind rationalized very quickly that the two of us raising a family in the Amish community was much better than me going English. But still, knowing that I had been so close to making the sacrifice, I felt a stab of guilt that I’d let her go ahead and do it and that my horrific accident had propelled her to make the decision. But my selfish mind didn’t really care what changed her mind—as long as she had. Everything would be okay now. We could begin courting and be married by next year this time. I only wished that I could give her a real hug, but I guessed that would be something I could look forward to in the near future.
“Are you sure about this, Rose?” I needed her to say it again to convince me I wasn’t still dreaming.
“Yes, Noah. I am absolutely, completely certain about it. I’ll become Amish…and be your wife,” she said, sounding cheerfully determined.
* * *
Plans were already running through my mind, and I forged ahead. “We’ll need to tell my parents so they can make arrangements for you to stay with another Amish family in the community—are you going to be okay living with strangers?” I started to have doubts trickling in and worrying me.
“I’ll be fine with it, Noah. It’s my dad who’s going to be the problem.” After a pause where she scrunched up her face in thought, she whispered, color flooding her pale skin, “I’d even go through with the—you know—baby idea you had, if you think it would help.”
I couldn’t keep from chuckling even though it killed my sides. She was so willing at the moment that I believed I could get her to agree to anything. That thought was very intriguing, but I was good and said, “I don’t think we’ll need to take such drastic measures as that now. If worse comes to worst, you’ll be eighteen in a year and a few months and then you’ll be able to do whatever you want.” Suddenly realizing I didn’t want to wait that long to be with her, I quickly added, “But maybe my parents can talk your father into it.”
“We’ll have to wait and see, I guess.” She yawned big.
“Were you up all night?”
“Mmm-hmm…” She yawned again.
“Why don’t you come up here and lie beside me,” I said, trying to keep the suggestive grin from my mouth, but unsuccessfully.
Frowning, she replied, “I couldn’t do that, Noah. You’re all banged up, and I might hurt you.”
“My right leg is the broken one. But see—” I motioned to the ten inches available on my left side “—there’s more than enough room for you over here.”
“Won’t your doctors get mad?”
“Oh, who cares what they think. After last night, don’t you think we deserve some time together?” I said encouragingly, hoping she’d agree.
My own eyes were getting droopy again and the prospect of falling asleep with her by my side was very appealing.
Glancing toward the door, she grinned and said, “Okay.”
After slipping off her tennis shoes, very slowly and extremely cautiously, she crawled up from the bottom of the bed, squeezing in between the railing and my side. She was overly careful not to touch my body, keeping her arms pressed up to her chest.
Once her head touched the pillow, she murmured, “I am sleepy.”
Within a minute, I could hear her soft, deep breaths and I knew she was sound asleep. Just when I was going to join her in dreamland, a nurse walked into the room, her eyes bugging out when she saw Rose next to me.
“Young man, I don’t think any of the doctors on your chart would approve of your…friend being in the bed with you,” she said, tilting her head, with a deep frown.
Thinking fast, I played on her womanly sympathies. “I probably shouldn’t be telling you all this, ma’am, but you see, Rose is English and I’m Amish, which means we can’t be together. And we’re very much in love. That’s why I’m lying here in this hospital bed right now, because our families wouldn’t let us be together. I had to sneak off to meet her in the middle of the night. This might be the last time we’re allow
ed near each other.” I paused for dramatic effect. “So if the doctors don’t know, it won’t hurt them—and it would mean so much to me if she stayed.”
Her face continued to soften while I spoke and by the time I was finished, I could have sworn her eyes were wet.
Wiping her eyes absently, she said, “Oh, all right.”
She moved quietly around me, trying not to wake Rose as she took my blood pressure, temperature and pulse. She also removed the oxygen tubes from my nostrils, deeming me able to breathe on my own, to my great relief. When she finally completed all her tasks, she headed for the doorway. Turning, she smiled sadly at me before walking out.
Just when the relief that she was gone filled me, Father, Mother and Sam returned. All three pairs of eyes widened at the sight of Rose sleeping beside me. Before any of them could say a thing, I put my finger to my lips to silence them and whispered, “Father, Mother, I need to talk to you both alone.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Sam barked.
“Shh,” I warned him.
“Oh, don’t worry about her, Noah. Once she’s asleep, it’s near impossible to wake her,” he said smartly, knowing it would bother me that he knew something about Rose that I didn’t.
Father surprised me then, saying to Sam, “Why don’t you go on home, Sam, before it gets dark. Rose can stay the night with us, and our driver will take her and the missus home in the morning.”
What he said was reasonable enough, and he had spoken convincingly, but seeing Sam’s narrowed eyes looking at his sister, I wondered if he’d agree.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Oh, but leaving her alone with one of your drunken buddies was?” I was angry that he had the nerve to think he knew what was best for Rose.
My words cut him, I knew, seeing the conflict settle onto his face.
“Fine. If Dad has a problem with it, he can come get her. I have things to do,” he said, turning on his heel and marching out of the room.
“Was that really necessary, Noah? After all, his father saved your life,” Father said.
“Actually, it was, because if he had taken better care of Rose, she wouldn’t have been out walking the road in the middle of the night.”
Father nodded in understanding and Mother approached the bed, timidly, brushing Rose’s hair out of her face with her fingertips.
“She is such a lovely girl, even with that nasty scratch on her cheek,” Mother commented, lightly touching the cut before retreating to the lounge chair in the corner of the room.
“Father, Rose has decided to become Amish,” I told him, suddenly feeling very much awake as I stared into his face, watching the astonished look develop.
“Are you sure, son, that she understands exactly what she is agreeing to?” he said as he placed his hands on the bed rails, looking down at Rose and studying her face for the first time.
“Yes, I’ve explained most of the details to her.”
“Noah, you must know that your accident probably had bearing on her decision,” he pointed out in a level voice, still staring at Rose.
“Maybe it does, but that doesn’t matter to me, Father. We love each other, and I know that we’re meant to spend our lives together. Can’t you just be happy for me that she’s agreed?”
“I only worry that in time, when the fear of almost losing you wears off, she’ll regret her decision, and you or possibly your children will be affected. Noah, your mother and I don’t want you to be hurt—but if you remain in the church and follow the Ordnung with this young woman by your side, we will be happy for you.”
“Thank you, Father.” And I glanced over at Mother, who seemed to be tolerating the conversation extremely well.
“But what about her family, Noah? Will they actually allow us to take her from them?” he asked with a raised brow.
Looking down at her beautiful dark head nestled against my shoulder, I felt confident saying, “It doesn’t matter what they think, Father. Rose will be my wife someday—and no one is going to stop that from happening.”
29
Rose
A New Beginning
IT SEEMED AS if all I did anymore was wait. I lay draped across the mattress in my comfy cotton shorts and sleep shirt, with the warm afternoon sun spilling onto me from the window. The music coming from the clock radio was low, and I couldn’t help yawning sleepily.
The only plus to Noah being in the hospital was the telephone beside his bed. He had definitely worn the thing out the past couple of weeks. The hospital stay had grown from the expected weeklong event into a three-week ordeal, after the doctors realized that their Amish patient would not be able to rest and recover on the busy farm as easily as he could in the city.
I grinned to myself wondering if his parents had any idea that their son was spending his nights talking to me on the phone for hours until the sun started to rise in the sky each day. The phone calls were the only things that kept me sane over the past few days since Dad had ordered me home from the hospital. But that didn’t matter now, because today, Noah was coming home.
I could barely control my happiness, especially since the Millers had invited us over for dinner tonight. Not that dinner interested me that much. I hadn’t really had an appetite since the accident. It was that I’d get to see Noah again, and we were taking the first step toward being officially together. Noah had told me that tonight his parents were planning to discuss my whole conversion with Dad. That thought made me feel sick, causing my heart to pound unnaturally hard and the breath to catch in my throat.
Would Dad actually go for it? I highly doubted it, but as Noah said, in a little over a year I’d be old enough to do it without his approval anyway. I didn’t want to wait, though. All I wanted to do was get on with my life with Noah, and the prospect of waiting all that time would be difficult.
Yeah, I was definitely intimidated by the whole Amish thing—for sure. I’d be wearing a dress and covering my head with one of those uncomfortable caps for the rest of my life. But after almost losing Noah, feeling the earth-shattering pain of that experience, I knew what I had to do and where I belonged. It was completely bizarre how Mr. and Mrs. Miller were treating me now, as though I was already part of their family. The day I came home from the hospital, Mrs. Miller had insisted I stop by their house first so she could gently apply a soothing home-remedy ointment on all my cuts. She was acting very motherly. I felt as if I was a five-year-old again, being fixed up by soft, maternal hands.
She even took the opportunity to measure me for a new dress she said she’d make for me, telling me I could have one of Sarah’s extra caps. She also informed me that pretty much any simple black shoes would do. I secretly hoped that included the cool black Nikes I bought last spring.
All in all, our time alone together, while the other girls were out working in the garden, was pleasant enough. She wasn’t the scary woman I’d originally thought she was. But I had to admit that all her questions about my mother’s pregnancies were mildly disconcerting. She would definitely be the type of mother-in-law who would hound me about grandkids. I guess if that’s the worst I had to deal with, I could handle it.
Glancing at the clock, I could see it was almost five. Noah should be home any minute now, and he was under direct orders to call me right when he arrived. Stretching, and with one more big yawn, I rolled off the mattress and proceeded to pull on the same brown dress I’d worn to the church service that seemed so long ago now. I figured even though it wasn’t an Amish dress, at least it was a dress and I should start playing the part. I also pulled my heavy hair up into a bun, using several clips to hold it in place.
They didn’t work well. Almost instantly, wisps of hair were escaping, curving around my face. Maybe my hair would be too thick to stay in one of those little white caps? But then again, I groaned, figuring the other women probably had some supertorture pins that would hold anyone’s hair up.
Hearing a car’s engine, I drifted to the window and pe
eked out to see Her getting out of her car. I wasn’t too happy at first that Dad had invited his girlfriend to go with us to the Millers’, but then the idea occurred to me that maybe she’d be the perfect distraction for Dad when the Millers talked to him. She had been Dad’s constant companion lately, and I hardly ever saw him without her by his side. They were obviously smitten with each other, and I finally had to admit to myself that the woman was probably going to be a permanent fixture in our lives now.
Hiding behind the curtains, I spread them just enough with my fingers to observe her walking to the house. She wore tan dress pants and a pretty, white button-up blouse. The outfit would have been perfectly appropriate for any usual dinner date, but going to an Amish household, I looked at her with more scrutinizing eyes and decided her blouse showed too much cleavage and her pants clung to her legs, revealing their shapeliness.
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