Of course, he’d said as much. Twice. More than twice. Several times.
How had she given herself away? Or did he truly know her so well from her articles and letters?
Her head pounded with the beginning of a tension headache, so she stopped by a restaurant for a cold drink. When she pulled into the driveway at home, Daadi came out of the barn and met her in the yard, taking control of the horse while she grabbed her purse and a sweating to-go cup full of soda pop and carried them into the haus.
The kitchen was blessedly empty. At the table, chairs were left pulled out at awkward angles, and an abandoned half-full cup of coffee, a half-eaten cinnamon roll, and a note were at Mamm’s place. The note was written on a recipe card with Hallie’s lavender pen. Called to a birth. The visiting preacher and his wife (and possibly their son) are eating the noon meal with the bishop. Your mammi will feed the noon meal to anyone home in the dawdihaus. Start supper if I’m not back. Roast for sandwiches in refrigerator.
Hallie shoved the chairs in, then dumped the coffee and the dried out pastry into the slop bucket. She glanced around. Homemade bread cooled on the counter. She’d check on early lettuce and radishes in the garden and make deviled eggs to go with the sandwiches, too.
She glanced at the cookie jar. She’d made peanut butter cookies and shortbread cookies the day before the visiting preacher arrived. That sweet should be adequate for dessert tonight, especially considering the big meal following the preaching tomorrow. There’d be plenty of pies, cakes, and other treats then.
Kitchen straightened and supper menu planned, Hallie grabbed her writing supplies from the drawer and her favorite lavender pen from the cup and headed upstairs to her shared bedroom. It was empty; Hosanna had probably attended the birth with Mamm. Anna was interested in Mamm’s career and helped out all she could. With Anna working as Mamm’s apprentice, Mamm certainly didn’t need another. Especially not one as uninterested in midwifery as Hallie.
Well, it wasn’t that she was uninterested. It was just there were too many variables, too many things that could go wrong. Too many things that did go wrong. Like the last birth Hallie assisted. The cord was wrapped around the baby’s neck, and he was very blue. Mamm had handed Hallie the baby and told her to rub him hard and not stop. Hallie had rubbed the baby with a soft flannel blanket until he was bright red and screaming. Mamm said she saved the baby from brain damage or worse. Never mind that Mamm also said that Hallie was a natural and stayed calm under pressure. Hallie only knew that she had been absolutely terrified, and she didn’t want to do it again anytime soon.
Never would be too soon.
She plopped down on her bed and sifted through her notes. She hesitated when she came across the prayer she’d started that morning. Send the light.
And light had come flashing across her white paper in unexpected brightness. As well as the unmentioned, but thought about, portion about Gott sending her pen pal to be her boyfriend.
Gott certainly had a sense of humor, dropping Kiah into her life as He had. No warning. Just “Hello” on the first visit. On the second visit, “I love you”—well, technically, that was for GHB, but still. “Won’t you tell me your name?” on the third.
Stuff like that didn’t happen in real life.
At least not to her.
She wasn’t sure she wanted it to. Well, she did, but what if Gott ripped Kiah from her? Still, the excitement of romance made her heart pound and her pulse skitter, and disrupted her quiet, passive world.
She shook her head, rearranged the papers, uncapped the lavender pen, and went to work.
There was a formula to these articles. First the date, then the weather. Sunny and warm. It was beautiful, especially after all the rain they had recently. Some of the creeks and rivers were still overflowing their banks. Fields and gardens were still muddy. That was followed by the community news. Who visited Hidden Springs and why. Who traveled, where they went, and why. Who married, who died, and who was born to whom with mentions of maternal and paternal grandparents. There were a lot of names in there. The Amish loved to read their names printed in The Budget. Then, of course, there were the retractions if she accidentally reported the news wrong. It routinely happened. The mistakes were reported to Bishop Nathan, who slipped the corrections and other news to Hallie’s daed.
Then all that was left were the fun little tidbits that apparently had attracted Kiah Esh’s attention.
She hesitated, pen poised over the page.
Hallie was obligated to mention the kiss since she assured Kiah she wouldn’t, and she wanted to deflect his suspicious attention. And if she deliberately got some of the facts wrong, then that’d prove it wasn’t her.
What was the nursery rhyme about someone kissing the girls and making them cry?
She sighed. She might not have cried, but cry she would when her family slept and she was able to sneak out of the haus to weep alone in a dark loft in the barn. The hoped-for relationship that would never be hers needed to be mourned.
After she made some vague but funny comments about a stranger racing a horse in broad daylight and then celebrating by kissing a bystander—and making her cry—before he ran away, written in such a way it could be attributed to a random storyteller, Hallie trifolded the letter and placed it in the envelope. She addressed it, added a stamp, and ran it out to the mailbox.
The mail carrier generally ran in the late afternoon, so it’d go out that same day.
What would Kiah think about the misrepresented facts? He wouldn’t dare ask the bishop to have the scribe correct them, and it should work to draw his attention away from her.
She kicked at a tall milkweed plant. Guilt ate at her.
What she’d done was lie. In print, which somehow made it worse.
But no one would ever know. Except Kiah and her.
And Gott.
She turned to look back at the mailbox.
None of them would tell.
The ends justified the means.
Tears blurred her vision as she turned her back on the mailbox. It didn’t matter that something about Kiah touched her broken heart. Toby was her one and only chance at love.
The tears flowed, a steady stream. She stumbled into a lurching run. Hopefully, neither Daed nor Daadi would come out of the barn and witness this breakdown.
* * *
Kiah double-checked the address on the mailbox, then parked the buggy next to a curbside tree. There was plenty of shade and grass for Jellybean.
The crowd had dissipated since Kiah’s runaway horse incident. Most people had retired to their homes or outbuildings. A few boys played a rowdy game of street basketball. Kiah nabbed the ball when it bounced his way and dribbled it across the road to the basketball hoop. The ball circled the rim twice before dropping through. He waved off offers to join the game, instead jogging across the street and up to Gideon Brunstetter’s front door. He lifted the heavy knocker and let it fall against the wood. It made a satisfying thump.
From somewhere inside, there was a muffled grunt, followed by tapping. A moment later, the door opened to reveal an elderly man with a yellow-stained beard, dark sunglasses, and a white-tipped cane.
This was definitely a false lead. Gideon was blind.
“Jah?” Gideon squinted at him. “Whatever it is you’re selling, I’m not buying.” He started to shut the door. Then he stopped. “State your piece, boy.”
Kiah wasn’t sure what to say. Except the truth. “Someone suggested that you were the scribe for The Budget.”
Gideon stared at him a moment. “Ha! Do I look like a scribe?”
Kiah grimaced. How could he answer that?
“Probably that fool Gloria who married my twin brother. She likely is the scribe and is just trying to annoy me. You go talk to Gloria Brunstetter.” And then the door slammed shut. At least Kiah had gotten confirmation on a name to check on.
He knocked again to say thank you.
No answer.
A third knock.
“Go away, boy!”
That seemed rather awkward to say thanks in response, so Kiah turned away.
On the plus side, Gideon hadn’t mentioned the kiss, so if he’d heard about it, he didn’t associate it with Kiah.
Fifteen minutes later, he found the other man, Gabe Brenneman, mucking the cow barn at his property. A small boy pushed a toy tractor through the dust on the floor.
This man was married with children. But Kiah would ask anyway. He couldn’t think of a good excuse for his visit otherwise. He cleared his throat to get Gabe’s attention. “Gabe Brenneman?”
Gabe looked up, removed his hat, and wiped the sweat from his brow. He was maybe in his mid- to late thirties. “That’s me.”
“I’m Hezekiah Esh. My friends call me Kiah. I need to talk to you.”
“Sure. That’s my boy, Benny.” Gabe glanced back at Kiah. “Get to work. I’ve several more stalls to clean. I’ll listen.”
Get to work? Kiah hesitated. Talking and working might earn him more information. He grabbed a pitchfork and pitched in to help.
He cleaned half the stall while explaining his relationship—both real and hoped-for—with the unknown scribe and how he wanted to find her. Tons more than he’d intended to say.
Gabe listened politely. The small boy made rumbly tractor noises. A cat meowed.
Kiah finished the other half while Gabe made “hmmm” sounds.
Then Gabe handed him ten dollars. “My middle name’s Stephen. I’m sure you’ll be glad to know I’m not your one true love.” He laughed. “I don’t know who the scribe is, but ask the bishop. He lives across the street. Then write the scribe a letter and ask her out.”
Jah. Good advice. Too bad he hadn’t thought to do that from the beginning.
“Danki.” Kiah tried to return the money. “You don’t need to pay me. I didn’t do much.”
Gabe waved it away. “Appreciate the help. I wish you the best with your one true love. Use it to buy her a malted milkshake. Go on now.”
A malted milkshake sounded good. Real good.
A couple minutes later, Kiah parked behind a horse and buggy across the street. Daed and another man were heading in from the barn. Right. Bishop Nathan. Where his parents were eating the noon meal. Him, too, since he was invited and had arrived in time. At least he’d have sustenance, but asking who the scribe was, and explaining why he wanted to know, in front of his parents? Even though they knew his reason for coming?
Awkward.
But maybe the bishop would admit what Kiah strongly suspected. Hallie was the scribe. He truly hoped she was, though why hadn’t she admitted to it? Then again, caution could be understood.
Both men turned toward him as he exited the buggy. “Glad you could join us, Kiah,” Daed said. “This is Bishop Nathan. Bishop, this is my son, Hezekiah.”
The bishop nodded. “I remember you. You came with the group from Shipshewana after the tornadoes. You worked with George, disassembling the buggy and removing it from my living room.”
Kiah grinned as he remembered that task. And the headache he’d suffered from because everyone shouted at George so he’d understand them. “Jah, I did.”
“We appreciated your help.”
“Glad to be of service.”
“I should warn you, before we go in. My Martha, she has some medical problem that causes her to be freezing all the time. She’s going to specialists to try and figure out why. But in the meantime, it’s very hot inside.” Bishop Nathan opened the door. “Come on in. Wash up and we’ll eat.”
Kiah followed the bishop and Daed into the over-warm kitchen. Sweat beaded on his forehead. Despite the temperature, the older woman bringing over serving dishes wore a black sweater over her dark gray dress. Mamm carried glasses filled with ice water. Her face was flushed and she looked miserable.
After washing, Kiah sat where Bishop Nathan indicated and glanced at the table laden with sausages, sauerkraut, mashed potatoes, and green beans. A heavy meal on a warm day in a hot haus. But it’d be worth it for answers.
“Let’s pray.” Bishop Nathan bowed his head.
Kiah dutifully bowed his head, then after his silent recitation of a memorized portion of scripture—our father who art in heaven—tried to plan the best way to bring up the topic of the scribe.
The bishop cleared his throat. “Amen.” He reached for the mashed potatoes. “So, Kiah. I didn’t expect you to come with your parents to Hidden Springs. What made you decide to join them?”
Mamm gasped and gulped ice water, then lunged to her feet to refill the glass.
Daed dipped his head and focused on lining the silverware up in straight lines.
Kiah’s face burned. “I came to find the scribe,” he mumbled. Why did his parents have to act so embarrassing? And why did this have to be so awkward?
Bishop Nathan startled and gave Kiah a second look. “The scribe, you say? And did you find her?”
So it was a her.
“The boy fancies himself in love with her.” Daed abandoned his eating utensils and accepted the mashed potatoes from Bishop Nathan.
“In love? So you did find her? And she admitted to being the scribe?” Bishop Nathan pinned him with a stare.
Kiah pulled in a shaky breath. Honesty is the best policy. “I think I found her, but she has admitted nothing. So I’m not sure enough to mention any names.” Especially in front of his parents, who might mention something to their hosts, and that would only make things really awkward. Especially since Daed gave him the weekend only. The clock was ticking. “My…my heart recognizes her.”
Daed harrumphed. And took a sausage and a spoonful of sauerkraut when it was passed.
“Hmmmm.” The bishop didn’t look away from Kiah. “Explain yourself.”
“Something in her articles for The Budget spoke to me, so I wrote her, in care of the paper, and we started a pen pal relationship. She always signed her letters GHB. I fell in love with her through the mail.”
“I warned him that she’s probably eighty,” Mamm said.
Bishop Nathan’s eyes shifted to her, then back to Kiah. “But you don’t know her.”
“I feel I know her. I imagine I love her.”
The bishop frowned. “Love is not a feeling. Love is a commitment to listen, care, and serve. The feelings are found therein.”
And with that, the bishop was off and running with a five-point sermon filled with rabbit trails on what love meant and how Kiah couldn’t possibly love the scribe without knowing who she was and her unique issues.
Daed gave Kiah his you’d best be listening to this look. Steely eyes, firm lips, and drawn brows. He also probably planned his own five-point sermon about why Kiah should forgive Molly and marry her regardless of her unfaithfulness.
Kiah listened. And ate. And sweated. And inwardly argued. He knew the scribe. He did. And he loved her. He hadn’t told her, though. It wasn’t time. She would be totally freaked out. Understandably.
Though the bishop did have some good points. What if she was married? Engaged? Much, much older than him? Or too young for him? So many questions Kiah had no answers to.
Thirty minutes later, grateful to be outside in the still warm—but much cooler than the bishop’s haus—air, Kiah gripped the reins with white-knuckled fingers as he drove away. Even after the conclusion of the bishop’s sermon, he still didn’t have the coveted information.
Stubborn and stupid.
Jah, that totally described him.
It seemed like a thin line between the two adjectives.
Stupid and stubborn.
He exhaled loudly, and the horse indicated her agreement with his negative self-assessment by snorting, flipping her tail, and making a hefty deposit on the road.
It was a total waste of the late morning and noon hour.
He’d go back to the Brunstetters’ haus, ask to borrow paper, and write a letter to the scribe asking her to meet him at the restaurant.
How long would it take for a
letter to get from Hidden Springs to The Budget, and for it to be forwarded to the scribe?
His heart rate increased. Would Hallie be the one who showed up? And would she show up? Because if it was her, then she knew it was him and she’d already gone on record as not being ready for a relationship. Would his request make a difference?
A better question: How long would Daed allow him to pursue this foolish quest? Would he give him longer than the weekend?
And if he failed, then what?
* * *
Alone in the silent haus, Hallie retreated upstairs and flung herself across the bed. She was long overdue for a full-fledged pity party. Her pen clattered to the floor. The papers containing her community notes crumpled beneath her and she sat up long enough to shove them out of the way before letting the tears fall.
By the time quiet voices intruded, her nose ran, her throat hurt, and her pillow was soaked. She caught a gasping breath and listened. She couldn’t understand what they were saying, but they were somewhere downstairs. Probably the kitchen since that was the hub of the home. One of the voices was male. Her breath caught. Kiah. Somehow, the timbre of his voice reached deep inside her. The volume increased. Was he coming upstairs?
Hallie pushed herself off the bed. His borrowed room—that belonged to her brother Aaron—was right across the hall from hers and her door was wide open. She hurried toward the entrance to her room and went to push the door shut, but she peeked out first. No one was in sight.
She dashed toward the bathroom and stepped inside, right as the noisy bottom step creaked. Safe. She quietly shut the door.
She started to wash her face, then glanced at the shower. A warm, slow shower would be nicer. Much nicer.
Hallie stayed in the water until it ran cold; then she hurried into her dress. She opened the door and listened but didn’t hear any noises. Maybe Kiah went back downstairs. Leaving her hair loose, she scurried down the hallway to her bedroom.
The door across the hall was ajar. She ducked into her room and shut the door, flipping the lock, then turned.
Kiah stood beside her bed, her favorite lavender pen in one hand. Her community notes were in his other.
The Amish Secret Wish Page 5