Still Life in Shadows

by Alice J. Wisler

  “You’ve been busy,” Gideon observed as nostalgia filled him. It seemed only yesterday he had been down here, dreaming about his future, a future he hoped was far away from this confined place.

  She removed her black bonnet from her head, exposing a headful of hair secured in a tight bun. “When I heard the news from Mr. Swartz about Moriah, I came down here. There was nothing to can, so I went to the store and bought tomatoes and pumpkin and squash. After cooking them in the kitchen, I filled the jars. I ran out of jars.”

  Gideon recognized much of the food she’d canned. When he saw three jars of apple butter, involuntarily his eyes closed as though he couldn’t bear to see or feel any more.

  “I can cry down here,” his mother said.

  He opened his eyes and looked into hers. How she’d aged over the long years since he’d last seen her. For some reason, he’d still pictured her as a woman of forty, the age she’d been when he left home. “Why can’t you cry upstairs?”

  At first she wasn’t going to reply. He could tell by the way she touched a quart jar of canned butterbeans and changed the subject. “We had a good crop last year.”

  Persistently, he asked again, “Why can’t you cry upstairs?” He knew he was being dogged about it, but he wanted to hear her reply.

  Reluctantly, she responded, “You know he doesn’t like to see me cry.”

  Her words evoked a lump in his throat. The old Gideon would have let it go, but the new Gideon, the one who’d left the old lifestyle, was more determined to show that the Amish way was not the only way to live a life of wholesomeness and faith. “Sometimes tears are okay, Mother. They show that we have heart.”

  She wouldn’t look at him. She only lifted a hand to her forehead and pretended to be studying the shiny bottles of pickled beets.

  “Were Esther, Yolanda, and Irene’s husbands and children not invited to be here?” Gideon had to know the answer.

  “He thought it was best—”

  “Is it really best that the entire family not be here for a son’s funeral?” Gideon felt the saliva thick and hot in his mouth.

  Quietly, she said, “He has his rules, his ways.”

  “Yeah, Ordnung mixed with his own pride.” Gideon rammed a clenched fist against the wall. The jars rattled on the shelves. “There have been more compassionate Nazi guards than him.” He’d actually written that line for his creative writing class and felt that now, it was time to let those words skip off the page and be heard.

  A shadow hovered at the top of the stairs and immediately after seeing it, Gideon heard a gruff, “Are you coming back upstairs? We do have guests here, you know.”

  Gideon wanted to shout up at his father, “Stop trying to control everything!” But he would not give in to that retort. Not now when his mother had already suffered enough.

  She was bent over a small pine table, one where she often sat to view her shelves full of harvested goods and make inventory in a little notebook she kept. There were sections for each variety of canned good. The cellar was clearly her place, her sanctuary, her respite. Now her face was covered by her narrow hands.

  He drew her to his chest, feeling her sobs against his heart. “It’s okay,” he repeated, for he knew nothing else to say, no words of comfort that were fitting for her at a time like this. “It’s all going to be okay.”

  As Father started down the stairs, his shoes clicking against the concrete, she sniffed, pulled from Gideon and called out, “We are on our way up.”

  Father hesitated on the third step as Gideon waited for his angry words. But none were spoken. Turning, Father started his climb up the stairs, his shadow not large and impressive, but thin and wary.

  After rubbing her nose with the back of her hand, Mother said, “You cannot change others, Gideon. You can change yourself.” With that, she followed her husband.

  Gideon guessed he’d better head upstairs as well and resume the chitchat with the others. At the first step he halted—the respite of the cellar was inviting. No wonder this dark and hidden storage space was his favorite part of the house, as well as his mother’s. This underground place almost seemed free from the restraints of Ordnung.

  Back in the living room, Kiki and his sisters were eating. Mari held only a glass of water without ice. Gideon guessed she’d either already eaten or was not going to. As she gave him a weak smile, he felt she had not eaten. She’d once said that funerals and food made her uncomfortable, and when her grandfather died, she had dished out the prepared-by-friends-and-neighbors-meals, but had not touched a bite.

  Gideon acknowledged her smile and watched her until she turned from him to Esther who was asking her yet another question.

  “Do you like working in the tearoom?” Esther’s voice had a monosyllabic quality to it, and Gideon remembered how he had once spoken in the traditional faltering Amish tone.

  “We have all missed you, Gideon,” Mother said, her voice low, as she pulled out a box of matches. Gideon followed her as she lit various kerosene lanterns to offer light to the living and dining rooms.

  “I see you still have some of the furniture I made.”

  The oak table by the dining room entrance was one he’d built the winter he turned thirteen. He’d hit his fingernail with a hammer and it’d turned purple and eventually came off. To the left was the hutch that held a shelf where his mother’s royal teacups sat. Each one was like a soldier holding a trophy over the lone battle she’d won with her spouse. The teacups were not too fancy for a proper Old Order Amish house. They were permanent, part of the landscape, like her bonnets and unadorned clothing.

  “I’m glad to see the furniture,” he added. For some reason, he had envisioned that they’d thrown out everything that he’d touched the minute he left them.

  “Of course—we keep it and use it every day.” She blew out a match. Shadows fell across her face. “Did you know that ever since you went away, Moriah was ready to follow in your footsteps? Five years old and he wanted to be just like his big brother.”

  “He had his own mind.”

  “Oh, I’m not blaming you.”

  “I think everyone else does.”

  “There is so much we don’t understand.” She quoted a few lines in the German dialect that to the world was called Pennsylvania Dutch. He was amazed that he understood most of it, the meaning of the words coming back to him like a familiar melody.

  Then with a smile she said, “Do you remember the day you asked me what this means? We grow too soon old and too late smart. Do you remember?”

  He forced a smile. He’d seen those words cross-stitched in cobalt blue on a throw pillow at an old Amish souvenir shop when he was about six. He repeated the saying during the whole buggy ride home with Father and then entered the kitchen to ask his mother what it meant and if in fact, it was an Amish quote. “They said it was Pennsylvania Dutch,” he quipped.

  “That’s what they call what we speak,” Mother said.

  “But we speak German.”

  “Yes, we do. But someone made a mistake.” She used the German word fylschlicherweise. “They called our language Pennsylvania Dutch and that stuck as its name. But you and I know our language is not at all any form of Dutch. Someone thought the word sounded like Dutch. Really what was being said was Deutsch, the German word for German.” She’d smiled at him. “Do you remember?”

  “I do. I remember how you taught me the Twenty-third Psalm in German. I often think of all those songs that great-grandmother used to sing. There was that silly one about cabbage salad.”

  “I’m glad you remember the good things, Gideon. We must always hold on to the good.” He had the feeling she wanted to say more, perhaps even hum a few lines of the familiar tune. Instead she ran her hand through his curls and down the side of his face. He felt her love in each fingertip. Her love was giving and free, and he hoped he could love like that one day.

  At 7:15, just before leaving the house, Kiki followed Gideon into Moriah’s bedroom. The simple room held
only a twin-sized wooden bed and one cedar dresser. Gideon opened the top drawer of the dresser and sure enough, as though time had not forgotten, there was the keepsake box he’d made for his brother. Taking it out of the drawer, he admired the cedar wood. He’d sanded it for days and then with a chisel had carved Moriah’s name into the lid. Once, he had been a good craftsman. But since then he’d given up wood and nails for Pennzoil and engines.

  Gideon handed the keepsake box to Kiki. “For you.”

  “Me?”

  “Moriah would have wanted you to have it.”

  “Is this one you made?” She clasped it in her hands. “It says Moriah on it. Wow, he was right. He told me you made him a box.” Then she set the item on the foot of the bed and lifted the lid. “What’s inside?” she asked.

  Gideon peered into the box. Inside was a piece of gray cloth, a scrap from a quilt, perhaps, and as Kiki removed the material, there lay a block of wood. Gideon knew then. The wood was the gift Moriah had given to him. He must have put it aside, and Moriah had added it to his box.

  Quickly, Gideon shut the box, handed it to Kiki, and ushered her from the room before memories of Moriah could take over and squeeze him into a ball of emotions.

  “He told me you made him a beautiful keepsake box,” she said with feeling as they walked into the living room.

  “He called it beautiful?”

  Kiki pressed the box to her chest and merely smiled. To his father, she said, “I got a box. It’s very special. Gideon says I can have it.”

  Father glanced at her and then took a look at his son. “Gideon is a skilled builder.” Gideon thought he almost smiled, but no, it was probably just the way the lanterns in the room flickered their light against his face.

  As Kiki ran her fingertips over the box, admiring it over and over, Father’s face grew more sullen than it had been before. Awkwardly, Father stood from his chair, opened the front door, and walked outside onto the porch—as though he had shown too much heart.

  37

  The weather was gloomy in Twin Branches the following Friday, and as she listened to the rain beat against the roof above her room, Kiki spread her arrowheads out on her kitten-patterned bedspread, one on the head of each of the kittens. Admiring the treasures, she felt each one’s soft surface, letting her fingers gently glide over every smooth stone. The keepsake box lay opened by the lines of arrowheads. One by one, she laid the arrowheads inside the box. They fit like they belonged, like this box and they were meant to be, made for each other. She thought of her grandpa and the way he got a twinkle in his eyes when he was about to share a secret or a story about the early days of living in the mountains. He’d take a puff on his pipe, lean back in his worn recliner, and close his eyes. Kiki knew a good tale was about to begin then. Now she swallowed back the tears that sprang to her eyes.

  She would not cry. She was not a baby.

  She went to the shop to work her shift. She was grateful when Ormond said a man had dropped off his kid’s bicycle with a broken chain. She labored, concentrating on getting the chain repaired until it was time to go home. As she washed oil from her hands, she asked where Gideon was, but Ormond just said that Gideon would be back to the shop tomorrow. He was getting the new guy situated into an apartment.

  “Fresno,” said Kiki.

  “What?” asked Ormond, lifting his head from the sports section of the paper.

  “The new guy wants to be called Fresno. He met us at a gas station after we left Gideon’s parents’ house and rode with us all the way back here. He wants to start a new life and doesn’t like his old name. So he chose Fresno.”

  When Ormond chuckled, Kiki didn’t mind. He wasn’t laughing at her, he was showing that he could laugh. Gideon hadn’t in weeks, and Mari was worried, she knew. But some people, like Ormond, just seemed to spring back to their normal selves, and the world was better for it.

  She, on the other hand, was aware that she wasn’t one of those types of people. She couldn’t laugh and although she wanted to slam her hand against the wall, she knew she couldn’t get angry. Look at what being angry did to Moriah. She wanted to be able to smile and feel happy about important things like macaroni and cheese, pirate hats, and oatmeal cookies.

  When Luke finished working on a black Nissan, he entered the shop to wash his hands. Kiki remembered when Luke and Moriah had a water fight at this very sink. Moriah had started it, splashing water onto Luke. Luke had splashed back until Moriah had droplets dripping off his chin. Laughing, they each got a few more splashes in until Gideon came along and told them to wipe up the floor. If customers slipped on the wet floor, they might get hurt and sue. Suing was, after all, the American Way. Recalling the water fight, Kiki felt her eyes burn from tears. She hugged Luke. “I’m sorry your friend is gone,” she said.

  Luke’s eyes watered. For a few seconds he was silent until he was able to speak. “I’m sorry, too.”

  Kiki left the shop after that, tears nearly blinding her bike ride home.

  “Now if you need someone to talk to, don’t hesitate.” The words Principal Peppers had spoken to her earlier today were fresh in her mind. “You can come talk to me or any of your teachers.” She figured he knew about Moriah because this was a small town and word got around fast. Mari had also had to write her a “please excuse Kiki” note when she’d returned to school on Monday. Angie said Mr. Peppers had invited her inside his office, too, to make sure she was “handling the situation.” Handling? What a funny word to use at a time like this.

  At her house, she placed her bicycle inside the garage. She remembered to turn off the overhead light and shut the door. She was trying to remember to be more responsible these days. Mari didn’t need any more stress. Dr. Conner reminded Kiki that she could be very helpful if she just thought about other people more.

  Seated on her front porch step, Kiki thought of her sister, of Gideon and Luke and Ormond. Could she really make their lives better? She supposed she could go inside and start by cleaning her room like Mari had asked her to do yesterday. But she didn’t want to go inside the cramped house. Although she shivered in the evening wind, she preferred to be cold and stay outside.

  January was over. She was glad she wasn’t born in January. No one would have remembered her birthday. It had been a terrible month. February had to be better. Blowing on her hands, she tried to warm them. Looking up to the sky, she wished she could see heaven and the warm sea she was certain Moriah must be enjoying. Mari said she trusted that Moriah was at peace, not having to run anymore, with a new body, free from addiction. It was these creatures still on earth who needed so much help, and Kiki so wanted to be a help to Gideon.

  As Kiki zipped up her coat, Angie walked across the lawn from her grandma’s. Stuffing her hands inside her coat pockets, Angie made her way up the steps to sit beside her.

  “I haven’t done any homework,” Kiki said. Seeing her classmate made her well aware of the three math pages Miss Stevenson had assigned. Math would never matter to her, and now with Moriah gone, she doubted she’d ever have the strength to figure out another pointless word problem about miles, rates of speed, and cost per ounce again.

  “Me neither.” Within moments of her own confession, Angie’s arm was tight around Kiki’s shoulders. Kiki could fight it no longer. Burying her face in her friend’s neck, she let the tears come. “It is okay to cry, Kiki,” she heard Dr. Conner’s voice from her last session with him. “Tears serve their purpose.” These were making her nose run. She wiped her nose with the lone mitten she found in her pocket.

  “The new guy is cute,” said Angie. “I like his name.”

  Not as handsome as Moriah, thought Kiki. No one would ever be as good looking as Moriah. She stuck the mitten into her pocket and for some reason, the action made her think of Moriah’s coffin, how it fit so perfectly in the grave and how she’d sprinkled dirt over the top of it.

  Angie looped her scarf around her neck. It was orange, the color of the Tennessee Volunteers, and Kiki k
new it had been a Christmas gift. “Uncle Reginald is locked away for the rest of his life.”

  “I know. He did a bad thing.”

  She bit her lower lip. “He did.”

  “But you were brave.”

  “Brave?”

  “You shed light on the truth. That’s what my sister told me. You shed light. The truth is supposed to always win out.”

  “My grandma says she’d like you to come over for dinner sometime.”

  “Really? That’s cool.” She’d heard that Luva was a good cook. Hopefully that meant that she could make more than fried potatoes, onions, and green peppers.