The Midwife

by Jolina Petersheim

  I’ve had to pause in my writing. My strength is not what it once was and this story is so very hard to recount. But I want you to know the truth, Beth, and I expect that this disease will claim me before I can see you again. The only thing I can say in closing is that I have loved and raised Amelia as if she were my own flesh and blood, my grandchild, and through this love, I hope you can find the strength to forgive me for leaving you.

  My love always,

  Your mother, Sarah Graybill

  I look up to glimpse the sunrise: a citrus peel of orange arranged behind two indigo mountain peaks. Pine branches tinseled in blinding fool’s gold. As I stare at it, I can feel the promise of light on my face. “His compassions never fail. They are new every morning.”

  “You okay?” Looper asks.

  Folding the letter, I slip it back into the envelope. I turn it over and stare at my mother’s handwriting. I smooth the crease between the t and the h of Bethany, my given name. I imagine my mother in the hospital bed—dying of a disease that I, her daughter, cannot even name. I imagine an IV tethered to her shrunken vein as she doggedly wrote out this last will and testament of her undying love.

  I close my eyes to keep from crying, but sorrow streams down my face unchecked.

  In one day, I have found my daughter and my mother only to lose them both again. In one day, I have been both restored and crushed. But more than anything, I have learned the truth in the adage that there are two sides to every story. My mother did the best that she could with what she’d been given. And Meredith and Thom have loved, as best as they could, the daughter they took from me.

  Just as Looper was wise enough not to mention my tears, he is wise enough not to repeat his question or respond to my unspoken answer: I will be okay, but I’m not okay now. Instead, he sets his mug on the step. Then he crouches down before me. His calloused hand wraps my own. My lifeblood stirs as he uses his other hand to tip my chin up toward his face. The two of us are altered by loss and by time—but the gentleness in his eyes remains untouched.

  “Beth,” he says, and my true name sings on his lips. “I want to be here for you. . . .” He swallows hard, turns my hand over, and traces a square thumb across the soft inside of my wrist. “I want to be here for you if you want me to stay.”

  I lean in toward Ernest Looper and rest my forehead on his shoulder. Closing my eyes, I can picture our child—our nameless, ageless son—sprinting through a strawflower field. His fair hair glints in between the blood-red coxcombs and golden dahlias just like the Risser children’s had. Weightless, a homemade kite flutters through the air high above him, buoyed by hope, but anchored to this terrestrial ball by an angel-hair string.

  “Stay,” I murmur. “I want you with me and my Hopen Haus daughters. I want us to begin again.”

  Again, Looper says nothing, just folds me into his arms.

  A flush sweeps Amelia’s neck and cheeks when she comes down the landing and sees me standing here in front of the screen door, holding Lydie’s son. The dynamics of our relationship have literally shifted overnight. She does not know how to proceed on this new terrain, and—honestly—neither do I. Amelia comes down the rest of the steps and rolls her suitcase to the door. Tears that used to fall so sparingly now rush to my eyes. Facing the screen, I hold the infant a little closer, grateful that my arms are not empty when my daughter is about to leave.

  “Thank you for letting me stay,” Amelia says.

  I nod, too choked to speak.

  From the corner of my eye, I watch Amelia look up the staircase for her parents, who have returned from the hotel to help her pack. She places a hand on her stomach, which barely shows the hint of the baby growing inside it. “Will you come to Boston when it’s time?” she asks. “When I give birth? I . . . I want you there.”

  I hear someone descending the steps, the wheels of another suitcase clattering down behind. Reaching out, I place my palm against Amelia’s smooth face. I close my eyes. My fingertips braille her skin like a plea. I open my eyes and say, “Amelia, I’d be honored.”

  Her smile looks so much like her father’s. Adjusting her bag on her arm, she picks the suitcase up and catches the door behind her, so it won’t slap shut and disturb the newborn, Alvin, who has fallen asleep again. Through the screen, I watch Amelia stride out to her car and stow the suitcase in the opened trunk. I can feel the warmth of Meredith’s presence before I pivot to see her staring at me . . . staring at her daughter.

  In the harsh morning light, Meredith’s eyes look tired but calm. She steps closer, and the two of us—our bodies outlined by the frame—stand side by side. For the time being, our past is forgotten, and all we can focus on is the radiance of this young woman who has joined our disparate lives in love.

  Meredith leans in. She cups the newborn’s head before smiling sadly and popping the handle to the suitcase. I hold the screen door open for her, and she rolls Amelia’s items over the threshold: a peculiar parallel of a horrific day that shall never be forgotten but now, at least, doesn’t hold the same amount of sting.

  Dr. Thomas Fitzpatrick is the last to leave. He balances two stacked laundry baskets of clothing in his arms. Setting them on the porch, he hands me a check. “Meredith and I want to say thank you, Beth,” he says. “We owe . . . We owe you our daughter’s life.”

  I open the check, and my mouth goes dry. “You’re welcome,” I say. “Thank you.”

  Nodding, Thom gathers the laundry baskets and plods down the steps. He finishes loading everything and climbs behind the wheel. The sun glints off the windshield as he shifts Amelia’s car into reverse and Meredith follows in their rental car out the long, rutted lane. Holding Lydie’s child close, I then watch my daughter being taken away for the second time.

  Opening the screen door, I slip into Hopen Haus. Looper is slanted against a ladder while rolling a paintbrush on the newly repaired ceiling that now mirrors the smoothness of the sheet protecting the hardwood floor. Flecks of white paint speckle his silvering hair, letting me imagine how he will look when we grow old together . . . side by side. Feeling my presence, Looper turns and smiles at the image of me holding the sleeping babe. Then he looks up at the ceiling and continues working, but I can hear him hum. Smiling myself, I walk down the length of hall where—at the end—a mother waits for the return of her child.

  And this time, I will let her hold him for as long as she wants.

  This time, through the growth of that child and the children to come, a barren midwife’s soul can come to life again.

  Epilogue

  Amelia, 2019

  Staring through the driver’s-side window, I press the brake and let my car idle on the lane. The small boy in a straw hat and black pants folded up to skinny shins continues swatting two fat ponies with a bamboo shoot a head taller than he is. The ponies shake their bridles. They kick their miniature heels and toss their manes, and then meet like outlaws once they believe the tiresome boy is past.

  But the boy eventually manages to grab the ponies’ bridles and lead them through the gate and down to the pond. The ponies snuffle the reeds and cattails at the pond’s edge before lowering their heads to the water and drinking their fill. The boy takes off his hat and runs a hand through his wild red hair. Glancing behind him, he sees my car. His hat is in one hand and the bamboo shoot is in the other, the arc of it hanging over him like a fishing cane.

  The curls and the fronds hide part of his face, but even from this distance, I can recognize him from the color of his hair alone. He’s my birth son, Thomas Looper, whom I haven’t seen since my college graduation five months ago.

  Thomas’s eyes narrow as he studies my new car, and then he looks at me, seated in the driver’s seat. His freckled face brightens in this straight-across grin. “’Melia!” he cries. Jamming the straw hat on his head, he tosses the bamboo shoot and starts running. I jolt my car into park and sling open the door. I scramble across the dirt and rocks and awkwardly scale the split-rail fence.

  �
�Thomas!” I call. “Look at you!”

  He continues running to me—his growing-boy arms pinwheeling—and then we meet in the center of the sloping field. He latches to my waist and burrows there a moment. I hold him tight, feeling his heart beat against my stomach—a distant echo from when I carried him.

  “Does Mamm know you’re here?” he asks.

  I take off his hat and ruffle his hair. “Not yet,” I murmur. “Should we surprise her?”

  He looks up and smiles. “Yes!”

  Dropping the hat back on top of his head, I take Thomas’s hand and help him over the split-rail fence to my car. “Can I drive?” he asks, as he asks every time I come.

  “Of course.” I slide the seat back and Thomas plops on my lap. Shifting into drive, I tap the gas and Thomas steers the wheel. In the windshield’s reflection, I watch him pinch his tongue between his teeth. His pale brows crease. The tires dig in and climb the lane. To our left, the Goods and the Martins have a clothesline snapped between their twin gray houses. From it, dresses and shirts deflate and then fill, deflate and then fill, like wind socks meant to trap the warm fall breeze. To my right, the orchard’s branches are bowed low with harvest. If I squint, I can see the bees landing on the Red Delicious apples already ornamenting the ground.

  The bottom land’s being worked by a dozen or so members of the community, who began to return after the farmer Walt Hollis died and the land he purchased from them went up for sale again. Each time I come, more horses and buggies are clattering down Dry Hollow Road, more houses are being refurbished, and more parcels of land are being turned into self-sustaining farms. I can see acres of Rox Orange sorghum, which Dry Hollow Community is becoming known for, ready to be reaped and cooked.

  One line of men—with heavy beards and forearms—slices through the base of the cleaned sorghum cane with scythes that glint with continual, synchronized motion. Behind them, another line gathers and lays the cane bottom first, so the pieces won’t jam up the mill. The women gather the cane into sheaves of five, and then tote them like wheat over to the horse-drawn mill that is a few yards from the cooker. The mill’s lifted off the ground by a stout wooden base. The year I came to Hopen Haus on fall break and participated in Sorghum Day, Rhoda explained that the base is inspected before and after each squeezing, as the weight of the mill is immense and must withstand the force of the turning log, propelled by the horse that drives the connected pole around the mill.

  “Let’s go!” Thomas begs, pulling on the steering wheel. Sorghum Day does not hold the same excitement for Thomas as it does for me.

  Laughing, I touch the gas, and we make our way to the top of the hill. I place my arms around Thomas’s and guide him to a stop in front of the hitching post, next to two horses and buggies. Parking, Thomas and I get out. I almost lock the doors before remembering where I am. Smiling, I toss my keys on the seat and close the door. The horse with the blaze turns her head at the noise and twitches her silken tail, but she can’t see me because of her blinders. I swat flies away and scratch her neck. I haven’t been around farm animals since the summer after my junior year when Rhoda encouraged me to come and stay at Hopen Haus.

  It was the summer I delayed an internship so I could spend time with my birth son, whom Rhoda and Looper had just officially adopted. It is bittersweet, recalling that time when love, for me, meant not holding on to someone but letting him go until I could find out who I was. And though I’ve since healed from the aftermath surrounding my unique beginning, I know allowing the Loopers to adopt Thomas was the right decision . . . for all of us.

  Breathing deep, I take Thomas’s hand and walk toward the front door of Hopen Haus. It is as if I’m on the set of a film I’ve already viewed. Even my movements mimic those I’ve already made—making me feel like I live in the skin of the girl who came here, to Dry Hollow, five years ago, and maybe every girl who has or will ever come. I’m amazed at the work Looper has put into the property. Two new brick chimneys jut from the tin roof. Below the ten windows, painted flower boxes spill yellow Mirabelle blooms. A shower of hummingbirds zigzags through the air. They are fighting over the glass feeders brimming nectar that hang near the replaced woodwork trimming the house. A treated split-rail fence hems in the grounds.

  Still holding Thomas’s hand, I climb Hopen Haus’s steps and knock on the screen door. I rock on the sockets of my hips, wondering if I’ve made a mistake. I have no real plan for being here. I certainly don’t want to join the church or take up the Mennonites’ Plain lifestyle. I just know that Hopen Haus needs a new midwife since Charlotte’s passing last year, and I can apprentice under Rhoda until I finish my nursing degree in Nashville. I’m just about to knock again when the door opens. A dark-haired woman with a strapless white apron tacked to a dark dress stands in a square of light beamed in from the window beside the door. Her eyes infused with kindness, she looks me over and smiles. “Hello, my meedel,” she says.

  “Hello, Rhoda.”

  The midwife steps out onto the porch and pulls the screen door behind her. Without a word, she wraps her arms around me—her starched apron crackling against my chest like parchment—and pats my back. I lean on her tall frame. I’m sure our embrace looks strange to anyone watching. But I don’t care. Five months have passed since I’ve seen my birth mother, and I hope this hug can make up for lost time.

  “Now,” Rhoda says. She releases me but keeps holding my shoulders. With one hand, she touches my cheek. “You need somewhere to stay?”

  Before I can answer, Thomas wiggles in the spot between our conjoined bodies, holding us together, keeping us from pulling apart. “Look!” he crows. “We make a circle!”

  Yes, I think, smiling at the midwife, whose eyes are bottomless wells of love. A circle by birth and blood.

  A Note from the Author

  I have always heard that the most heartfelt novels are those drawn from personal experience. My daughter was twelve weeks old when I began writing The Midwife. Staring at her perfect, delicate fingers wrapped around one of my own, I struggled with the need to protect her in our fallen world. I believed that overcoming fear with faith—by placing my trust in my daughter’s Creator rather than in my abilities as her mother—was the real-life experience that I would have to learn, and therefore apply to my main character, Rhoda Mummau, as well.

  Little did I know that, fifteen months later, my own faith would be tested as one of my worst fears came true: I miscarried a child. But I do not care for that term, miscarried. I was more than just a carrier, a means to an end. For those ten weeks of my too-short pregnancy, I became a mother of two. My firstborn, toddler-age daughter . . . and, I believe, a boy—my son. I imagined tall, bookend children with their father’s straight-across grin and sparkling hazel eyes. Instead, on a black, drizzling night, my husband and I found ourselves burying our secondborn next to a cedar-rail fence.

  The days after were hard—and yet, even in death, life goes on: laundry needed folding, diapers needed changing, tomatoes needed gathering from the garden before the incoming frost. I took long walks with my daughter and spread petals from the rosebush across my son’s grave. After a harvest celebration, I kissed my infant nephew’s cheek good-bye, and then continued cleaning up the detritus of our evening meal when suddenly I had to go lie down, realizing that kissing my nephew was the closest to kissing my son that I would ever come on earth.

  My publisher kindly granted an extension on my editing deadline for The Midwife. But writing, for me, has often been more of a catharsis than a job. Therefore, in the mornings, I peeled back the covers, went out to the living room, and turned on the computer. As I stared through the French doors at the ember sun rising over the valley, I could suddenly see the midwife Rhoda’s loss through another grieving mother’s eyes. I wept with her as I reread scenes that my own fingers had typed, but that now felt like something God had devised as he portended my loss and knew that this story would bring healing to my own soul.

  One week after we lost our bab
y, I was standing in church when the worship team began reading passages from the Bible. A few recited promises that I had long ago memorized at the urging of my parents or my teachers. And then one man started reading from Lamentations, a book I had read but that had never spoken to me before: “I remember my affliction and my wandering; the bitterness and the gall. I well remember them, and my soul is downcast within me. Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, ‘The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.’” (Lamentations 3:19-24, NIV)

  Hearing those words, I closed my eyes and felt the warmth of the sun slanting through the kaleidoscope of stained-glass windows. Tears began streaming down my face, unchecked. It may sound strange, but I knew those verses weren’t only meant for me, but for the midwife Rhoda, as well, who feels as real to me as anyone I have ever known. Then I realized that those verses weren’t only meant for us grieving mothers; they were also meant for my readers who have suffered loss. And haven’t we all suffered loss, in one form or another?

  And so I pray that the midwife’s story will remind you—even in your darkest nights and most broken places—that whenever you call to mind the Lord’s great love, you will find healing and hope.

  1

  Rachel

  My face burns with the heat of a hundred stares. No one is looking down at Amos King’s handmade casket because they are all too busy looking at me. Even Tobias cannot hide his disgust when he reaches out a hand, and then realizes he has not extended it to his angelic wife, who was too weak to come, but to her fallen twin. Drawing the proffered hand back, Tobias buffs the knuckles against his jacket as if to clean them and slips his hand beneath the Bible. All the while his black eyes remain fixed on me until Eli emits a whimper that awakens the new bishop to consciousness. Clearing his throat, Tobias resumes reading from the German Bible: “‘Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death . . .’”