Exhausted from cleaning her apartment, packing up and traveling, Trina changed into her nightgown. She slipped beneath the quilt, which smelled of fresh winter air—Martha must have hung it on the clothesline—and shut her eyes, thinking of how protected she felt when Seth carried her to the porch. Within minutes she drifted into a deep slumber for the first time in over a year.
She woke to a banging on the door. Disoriented, she blinked several times at her surroundings. It was morning. She was in Willow Creek. The fire must have died out because the floor made her feet ache with cold. She wrapped the quilt around her shoulders and shuffled to the door. Peeking out the window, she saw Seth pacing back and forth. Oh no! I was supposed to be at his house by seven forty-five so he could review the rules for the children with me.
“It’s eight o’clock,” Seth said in greeting. “Look at you, you’re not even dressed yet.”
Trina pulled her quilt tighter around her shoulders. She understood the Amish didn’t place a high value on physical appearance, except for tidiness and modesty. She could only imagine how rumpled she appeared. “I’m so sorry. I must have overslept.”
“I thought you Englischers relied on alarm clocks.”
Rankled, she cracked, “I figured the Amish rooster would wake me.”
Something resembling a grin crinkled the skin around Seth’s eyes, but he didn’t allow it to move to his lips. “Just kumme to my house as soon as you can.”
She pulled on her clothes, brushed her hair into a ponytail and quickly scrubbed her teeth before running across the yard. When she arrived, she apologized again. “I really am sorry I’m late. I didn’t mean to oversleep.”
Seth seemed less cantankerous now. “It’s alright. Fresh air can tucker a person out.” There it was again; the kind of comment that made her wonder if he was joking or not.
“Guder mariye, Trina,” Martha said as she entered the room, her hands extended in front of her so as not to bump into anything. It seemed she only used her cane outdoors. Timothy and Tanner scooted around their grandmother, calling out their greetings, as well. Their curls bounced as they hopped up and down, unable to contain their excitement.
“Guder mariye,” Trina replied to the three of them.
“We’re going to show you the creek today,” Tanner announced.
“Neh, I don’t want you by the creek,” Seth contradicted. “It’s too dangerous. The current is too strong.”
The boys looked crestfallen but they didn’t argue. Didn’t they tell Trina they’d been to the creek just yesterday? It hadn’t rained, so the water couldn’t be any deeper. Then she realized Seth must not trust her with the children yet. She understood. In time, he’d change his mind.
“I’m sure we’ll do something else that’s just as interesting,” Trina said.
“Jah, so will you and I,” Martha chimed in. “When they take a nap, you can look through my fabric to choose what you want to make a new skirt since yours became stained yesterday.”
Trina appreciated the offer, but she had no idea how to make a skirt. “Oh, that’s alright. The stain will come out. My skirt is still wearable.”
“With the way you’ll be running after the buwe, it won’t hurt to have an extra one,” Martha said. “If it’s the material you’re worried about, don’t be concerned. I have an assortment of colors. Blue, green, even burgundy. I haven’t been able to see well enough to sew for ages. It will be gut to know the fabric isn’t going to waste.”
“I don’t think it’s the color of the fabric she’s worried about, Groossmammi,” Seth quietly pointed out. “The Englisch don’t sew like we do.”
Trina bristled. Why did Seth constantly call attention to how different the Englisch were from the Amish? “Don’t be lecherich. Plenty of Englischers sew their own clothes.” She used a couple of Deitsch words to emphasize she wasn’t completely unaware of Amish culture.
“And you’re one of them?” Seth pressed.
Trina felt her cheeks burning. Her mother had tried to teach her to sew, but Trina never had the inclination. “Yes, I can sew my own clothes. I can hem them, anyway.”
Seth snorted. “It’s not the same thing.”
“Just how much do you know about sewing clothes?” Martha chastised him. “As fine as your leather stitching is, I have yet to see you make your own britches, my dear bu.”
Trina’s gratitude for the woman surged. It was obvious Seth wouldn’t contend with Martha. He set his hat on his head and buttoned his wool coat.
“The buwe’s chore for the day is to rid the front yard of sticks,” he instructed Trina. “And they must lie down for an hour in the afternoon, whether they sleep or not.”
“Don’t worry,” Martha said, answering for Trina. “I’ll fill Trina in on everything she needs to know. Now, since you were so worried about being late, you’d better skedaddle.”
After the door closed behind Seth, Trina released her breath. In her experience as a teacher, the parents were often more difficult to manage than the preschoolers were. I should tell Seth that’s one way the Englisch and the Amish are alike, she thought, chuckling to herself.
* * *
Because Seth was in a hurry, he’d forgotten to put on his gloves so he blew on his fingers as he walked to town. He could have taken the buggy, but that would have meant leaving his shop several times a day to make sure the horse was watered, fed and dry—and it looked like rain. Or snow. It was difficult to tell at this time of year.
Besides, he liked the walk and the shop was only about a mile and a half away. He used the time to mentally prepare for work and ask the Lord to guide him in his interactions with the customers, especially the Englisch ones. When Seth moved from Ohio to Willow Creek, all the stores on Main Street were taken. He’d made it his goal to one day open a shop there, because that’s where most of the Englisch customers and tourists came through town. While he had a healthy business selling harnesses and other horse leatherworks to the Amish, the Englisch had little need for such items. Instead, they wanted custom-designed purses, belts and wallets, and they wanted them at their convenience.
Since the workshop at his home was slightly off the beaten path, Seth had recognized that, in order to increase business, he had to meet his customers’ needs—or their preferences—and he watched and waited for one of the Amish business owners to relinquish their prime real estate on Main Street. When one of the bigger spaces recently opened up, Seth jumped at the chance to lease it. It was a stretch for him financially, but the space was so big it allowed him to have a workshop in the back in addition to the storefront where he could display and sell his wares. He figured in time the sales would be worth the initial investment.
Now that I’m paying Trina to watch the buwe, I’ll have an added expense I hadn’t counted on until school lets out, he thought.
As he contemplated his sons’ care, Seth asked the Lord to watch over Trina as she cared for the boys. Once again he second-guessed his decision to hire her. Martha seemed to think highly of Trina, but then, his grandmother had an unusual gift for making people feel welcome and needed—that’s how Seth felt when he moved in with the boys, who were only newborns at the time. What would he have done without Martha’s help? He supposed the least he could do now was make more of an effort to show a modicum of hospitality toward Trina, since Martha had shown an abundance toward him.
He was so lost in thought that when he arrived at his shop, he was startled to find three Englisch women standing on the doorstep, peeking through the window into the store. In his experience, the Englisch customers tended to be more impatient than the Amish. It seemed to him Englischers were often in a rush and they expected others to be in a rush, too, whereas Seth felt if he couldn’t do a job both quickly and well, he’d rather do it well than quickly.
“We were afraid you were closed for the day!” one of them said.
“Neh, just
for the first ten minutes,” Seth replied with a grin as he keyed into the shop. He found humor often kept him from becoming too stressed and his customers appreciated it, too. Especially the Englisch ones, who often seemed taken aback initially, as if they were under the impression the Amish were humorless dullards. But they usually ended up smiling back.
Sure enough, the women giggled as Seth held the door open for them. Soon after, a few more customers trickled in. Seth noticed one of them discreetly lifting a cell phone and he knew he was being photographed. He had half a mind to post a sign forbidding cell phones and cameras in the store, but he decided if people weren’t going to voluntarily respect his beliefs and privacy, it was useless to try to make them do so.
By the end of the day he was relieved to walk home and when he went through the door, the boys bounded into the kitchen to greet him as they usually did.
“Guess what, Daed,” Tanner said. “Trina taught us an Englisch song.”
“And we had lots and lots of vegetation for dinner,” Timothy claimed.
“You mean vegetables,” Seth corrected him.
“Neh, it was vegetation.”
Just then Trina entered the room and said above the boys’ heads, “Hungerich bucks need a lot of vegetation to stay strong.”
Ah, so that was it. Seth had to smile. He and Martha had a difficult time getting the boys to eat any vegetables except potatoes and corn. If Trina had been able to get the boys to eat more greens by appealing to their interest in animals, that was terrific. But he drew the line at teaching them Englisch songs.
“Buwe, please go into the other room while I talk to Trina,” he said. After they scampered away, he asked Trina how her day went.
“It was gut,” she said. He noticed she was using Deitsch words more frequently already. “The buwe picked up the sticks in the front yard and half the sticks on the west side of the house, too. They sure have a lot of energy.”
Seth nodded before getting to the point. “They said you taught them an Englisch song. May I hear it?”
He saw a look of confusion pass over Trina’s face before her cheeks broke into a blush. He regretted embarrassing her, but he had to be sure the boys weren’t being taught songs about superheroes or other ideas that were contrary to Amish beliefs.
“It’s more like a poem than a song. At least it was the way I presented it,” she said and her usually mellifluous voice was marked with defiance.
“All the same, I’d like to hear it.”
Trina exhaled audibly and then began, “One, two, buckle my shoe...” She continued reciting the verse until she got to the number ten, at which point she said, “That’s as high as we went. I was trying to teach them how to count while they were doing yard work.”
“I see,” Seth said. He’d been taught that same verse as a child and he felt as foolish as he’d obviously made Trina feel. Still, he wasn’t sorry he asked her to tell him how the song went. “We didn’t have time this morning to discuss what kinds of activities are appropriate for Amish kinner, so I just wanted to be sure—”
“There you are, Seth,” Martha interrupted from the doorway. “It smells like supper is about ready, isn’t it, Trina?”
Trina peeked inside the oven. “Jah, it’s bubbling,” she confirmed, removing the pan from the rack and setting the chicken-and-cheese casserole on a hot pad on the table. “You should let it cool a bit before you eat it. And don’t forget the asparagus. It’s steaming on the back burner.”
“I thought you were going to stay for supper. You know we made plenty,” Martha said.
So much for demonstrating hospitality; Seth knew he was the reason Trina changed her mind about supping with them. “Jah, you should stay,” he echoed.
“Denki, but I need to be on my way. I’ll arrive a few minutes early tomorrow, Seth, so we’ll have plenty of time to review your list of restrictions about the kinner with me.”
“There’s no list,” he mumbled feebly, but Trina didn’t seem to hear as she zipped her jacket. Unfortunately, Martha was listening intently, and from the look on her face, Seth was going to get an earful about his attitude tonight after the boys were in bed.
* * *
Completely humiliated, Trina slinked home. After spending most of the morning and afternoon outside with the boys, her appetite was raging in a way she hadn’t experienced since before her mother took ill. But there’d been no way she was going to sit down at a table with that smug, controlling Seth Helmuth. She respected that Amish people abided by their church’s Ordnung, and without knowing what it said herself, it was possible she might have accidentally violated one of its precepts. But she’d felt like a criminal when Seth demanded she recite the song like that. She hoped he felt utterly ridiculous when he heard how it went!
In the kitchen, she removed her jacket and hung it on the peg beside the door. Almost immediately she took it back down and put it on again. It was freezing in there. Now she was cold as well as hungry. How was she going to go grocery shopping? The stores within walking distance closed by the time Seth returned home and she didn’t have a car. What was she going to subsist on? Water and Willow Creek’s superior fresh air?
She went into the parlor and lit a fire in the woodstove. Then she looked around for her handbag, which contained half a packet of crackers with peanut butter she’d bought at the train station. When she found it, she gobbled a cracker and then brought the rest into the kitchen where she put the kettle on to fix a cup of the tea Martha had left for her. Once the water came to a boil, Trina filled a mug, put the crackers on a plate and sat down next to the woodstove.
Even with her jacket on and the warm cup in her hands, she was shivering, so she retrieved the quilt from her bed and wrapped herself in it before returning to her chair. The silence was punctuated only by the ticking clock and Trina understood why her mother had felt like time stood still in Willow Creek. Trina had only been there two days and it already seemed like a lifetime. It was enough to make her want to pack her bags right then.
Of course, Trina’s mother had had a far more significant reason to leave Willow Creek behind: Abe Kauffman. But as miserable as her mother’s life with Abe had been, she’d rarely spoken against him in detail. Patience had only described how, after her own mother died, her father changed.
“Mind you, he never lifted a hand against me,” she told Trina. “But he wouldn’t lift a hand toward me, either. Not to help me, not to embrace me. He hardly spoke a word to me. It was as if I didn’t exist—as if I had died when my mother did. All that existed was his bottle of beer. So, in a way, I felt as if he’d died, too. At eight years of age, I felt orphaned.”
No wonder her mother had never wanted to return to this house. When Trina was young and used to ask her mother if they could visit Willow Creek, Patience’s face would cloud with sadness as she said no, it was better for everyone if they didn’t. “We’re happy right where we are, aren’t we?” she’d ask Trina, and Trina always answered yes because it was true. As long as they were together, they were happy. Trina sniffed as she realized her mother would never be with her again. Did that mean Trina would never be happy again, either? She knew she couldn’t allow herself to dwell on such thoughts or she’d never make it through her time in Willow Creek, so she prayed the Lord would give her peace and then she went to draw a bath.
But before she reached the washroom, there was a knock at the door. In the kitchen, Trina peered through the door’s glass pane to see Seth holding a plate wrapped in tin foil in one hand and Martha’s basket from yesterday in the other.
“Yes?” she said coldly after opening the door.
“My groossmammi sent these for you,” he replied, lifting the items in her direction.
Since they were from Martha, Trina couldn’t refuse them. “Please tell her I said denki.” She reached for the plate but Seth held on to the basket, stepping into the kitchen uninvited.
“I don’t know. I haven’t checked.”
He set the basket on the table, crossed the room and pried the cupboard open. To Trina’s relief, he announced, “Neh, nothing yet.” Then he closed the cupboard and rubbed his arms. “Seems a little cold in here. I can show you how to get a gut fire roaring if you’d like.”
Trina didn’t know why he was suddenly being so congenial, but she wished he’d leave. Not just because she was still miffed, but because the aroma of the meal he brought was making her feel even more famished and she could hardly wait to eat. “Actually, I’m rather warm,” she said, tossing her ponytail.
“I imagine you are,” Seth replied, his lips twitching. “Wearing a quilt has that effect on people.”
Trina rolled her eyes and shrugged the quilt from her shoulders. She folded it into a misshapen square, which she held in front of her stomach to muffle the growling sound it was making. “I suppose I could add another log to the fire.”
“I’ll grab a couple more from outside, since the bin in the parlor is probably low,” Seth volunteered and exited the house before Trina could object.
As soon as he left, Trina lifted an edge of the tinfoil from the plate and dug into the casserole with a fork. When Seth returned, her mouth was full, but she mumbled, “Denki for bringing those in, but I’ve gone camping before, so I’m capable of stoking the fire myself.”
“Is that what you think being Amish means? It’s like going camping?”
Why was he suddenly defensive again? “No, that’s what I think lighting a fire is like,” Trina clarified after swallowing. “If you’ve built one outside, you can build one inside.”
Her New Amish Family Page 3