Through the Autumn Air

by Kelly Irvin

  They crawled into town at the usual buggy speed—snail’s pace. Nicole sank into her blanket. Occasionally she sighed, then wiggled. A cell phone appeared in her hand. She thumbed a message, then stuck it in her pocket. It chirped like a cricket. It came out again. She thumbed some more.

  “How hard is it to become Amish?”

  The question seemed to emanate from nothing and everything the girl hadn’t said. “That’s a long conversation, and I’m probably not the best one to explain it. Do you think you want to be Amish?”

  “It seems easier.”

  Nicole worked hard waitressing at the Purple Martin, but she likely gave no thought to what it was like to cook, clean, and do laundry for ten children with no electricity, no dryer, no microwave. How would she survive without a cell phone, a hair dryer, and two hundred cable channels? Without internet? Mary Katherine smiled in the darkness. “Easy is a relative term.”

  “I know it’s not easy, like you work hard and you don’t have cars or electricity. I mean you’re nice to each other. You have big families and you’re never, you know, alone.”

  An unexpected knot formed in Mary Katherine’s throat. Her arms ached to dispense a medicinal hug. “We have our moments. We’re not always nice. But we try. We make mistakes and get mad like everybody else.”

  “You’re always nice.”

  “I try.”

  “I can’t believe you have ten kids. That’s a ton. I don’t even have one brother or sister. My mom couldn’t have any more. I always wanted a sister.”

  “I have four. And four brothers.”

  “With you that makes a baseball team.”

  “True. But I liked volleyball better.”

  “I guess I wouldn’t want to be Amish, but someday I’m having at least four kids. I won’t let my baby be an only child.”

  “It’s not the worst thing in the world. Parents lavish their love on their only child.”

  “And want them to be everything they wanted to be but weren’t.” Bitterness laced the words. “My dad wanted a boy.”

  “But he loves his girl.”

  “I suppose.”

  Her phone chirped again. She studied the screen and sniffed. Thumbs engaged in rapid-fire typing. This time, she didn’t resume the conversation but sank back in the blanket, her head turned toward the countryside she couldn’t see in the dark.

  Mary Katherine held her peace, but her imagination wrote half a dozen scenarios, each wilder than the next about the girl’s countryside adventure. Nicole wasn’t getting attention at home so she sought it elsewhere? Not uncommon. Mary Katherine had ten children, but she never worried about giving them enough attention. They had each other, and they spent hours together as a family, every night before bed and on Sundays. Life on the Farm, Dutch Blitz, checkers, chess, puzzles, story time, volleyball, baseball, fishing, birding, camping, wagon rides with their pony. Free time was family time. Work was family time.

  What couldn’t Nicole tell her? A simple kegger wouldn’t cause her such distress. Why couldn’t she tell Mary Katherine? Because it was a bigger crime than underage drinking? Drugs? More than taking drugs? Making drugs? A meth lab?

  “What do you think of Tony?”

  “Tony?” It took Mary Katherine a few seconds to place the name. “The busboy?”

  “My dad says he looks like a girl with his long hair.” She wiped her phone’s screen with her sleeve. “I don’t think he looks like a girl at all. I think my dad says that because Tony doesn’t play sports. He doesn’t play sports because he has to work a lot to help his family.”

  “That’s a good thing, helping his family.” Mary Katherine’s knowledge of Tony was limited to the fact that he had pretty hair for a boy and he seemed to think she was hard of hearing. “Amish boys work a lot. They play basketball, but only for fun. That doesn’t make them like girls.”

  “That’s what I said. The boys on the team make fun of Tony’s car because it’s old and rusty. They have big diesel pickup trucks.”

  “We don’t measure anything by the size of cars.”

  “That’s what I’m saying. I like the Amish.”

  “Me too.”

  Nicole laughed. She sounded less like a weary old woman and more like the sixteen-year-old girl she was.

  It sounded as if she might like Tony too. Mary Katherine smiled to herself. Young love was so hard to decipher. Come to think of it, so was old love. Or love at all.

  Lights blazed in every window of the Wilsons’ two-story red-brick house. Coach Wilson stood on the front porch, a cell phone to his ear. Mary Katherine reined in her imagination and the buggy. She pulled into a wide cement driveway that held an enormous silver diesel pickup.

  Wilson put the phone to his chest and turned toward the open door. “She’s here, Phoebe. She’s here,” he bellowed. “Where in the . . . ?”

  He clamped his mouth shut, stomped down the steps, and marched across the grass to the driveway. The white picket gate had been left open as if in anticipation of their arrival. After a fierce glare filled with a mix of parental fear, angst, and anger, he opened his mouth again. “Are you all right? What happened? Where have you been? I was ready to call the sheriff ’s office and the state police, the National Guard, you name it.”

  “I’m cold. I’m tired.” Nicole’s glance directed at Mary Katherine was filled with misery. “Can I get my punishment in the morning?”

  “No explanation? Are you kidding me—?”

  “Larry.” Phoebe’s voice held a measure of warning. She stood at the porch railing, hands on the belt of her pink paisley-print housecoat. “Let’s bring it inside. No need to wake the neighbors.”

  Scowling, Coach Wilson snorted and kicked at the ground with a scuffed cowboy boot. “Get in the house.”

  “Thanks for the ride, Mrs. Ropp.” Her voice trembled. “You’re always so nice to me.”

  Like she somehow didn’t deserve the kindness. “Anytime. I mean that.”

  Nicole unwrapped the blanket, dragged herself from the buggy, and trudged toward her father. Coach Wilson’s hand went out when she passed him. Nicole dodged it and kept going. On the porch she paused long enough to accept an embrace from her mother, who followed her inside and shut the door.

  Coach Wilson’s cell phone played a country music song Mary Katherine recognized. He glanced at it and grimaced. With a growl he stuck it in the pocket of his purple Mustangs windbreaker emblazoned with CoACh on the left pocket. “How did she end up with you?”

  “I found her out on the road.” Mary Katherine described the location and circumstances. “She looked half frozen and very upset, so I offered her a ride.”

  “Did she tell you what she was doing out there?”

  “She wouldn’t say.”

  “I’m better with boys, and all God gave me was one girl.”

  A blessing. Ask couples with no children at all. Mary Katherine bit her lip to keep from opening her mouth.

  Coach Wilson ran stubby fingers through thinning gray hair. “I don’t know what’s gotten into her. She’s never done this kind of thing before.”

  He couldn’t be that naive. Surely he asked himself what the players on his teams did after the games. Hadn’t he heard from the other parents? “Maybe she’ll tell you. She hardly knows me.”

  He growled deep in his throat. “That’ll be a first.”

  One by one, lights extinguished in the Wilson house. “I’m sure she’ll talk to her mother. I should go. I didn’t even say thank you.”

  “No need.”

  “She’s grounded until forever.”

  “I’m sure you’ll do what’s best.”

  He slammed the fence gate again and paused on the other side. “Be careful driving home. If it weren’t for the horse, I’d offer to take you in the truck. It’s cold and dark out there.”

  “I don’t mind.” She pulled out of the driveway. At the corner she looked back. Coach Wilson stood on the porch, his cell phone to his ear, gesticulating with his free h
and.

  Parenting was hard, whether a person had one child or ten.

  SEVENTEEN

  The boys were up to something. Ezekiel was sure of it. They never came to the produce auction with him. They had work to do on the farm. Even in October. Still, they’d insisted on coming with him, claiming he needed help picking up the boxes. Diabetes did not make him weak. Shaking his head, he squeezed past the owner of the local grocery store, a farmer’s market coordinator from Gallatin, and a bunch of women who wanted to can peaches. An Englisch couple took photos with their phones as their kids tried to climb on a 1,072-pound pumpkin on display. The buzz of conversations reached a crescendo and echoed against the gargantuan shed’s tin roof. Several days a week, the auction teemed with folks waiting for the auctioneer to turn on the microphone and blare that singsong voice of his.

  His sons followed along behind him like faithful puppies past rows and rows of enormous boxes of pumpkins, multicolored gourds with wrinkles like fat tumors, flats of tomatoes, and boxes of potatoes, peaches, onions, and cantaloupe. Both had an air of something to be said about them. Finally, he veered between the wooden columns into the late-afternoon sunshine. He halted between two flatbed trailers filled with clay pots of mums, their yellow, burnt orange, red, white, and mauve blooms arranged in brilliant stripes against a blue autumn sky.

  “What?” Ezekiel faced his two sons and crossed his arms over his chest. It was like seeing double. Himself at twenty-four and twenty-two. Before the top of his head became smooth as an egg. No glasses. Smooth, tanned skin. Brown eyes. Nose on the long side. John had Lucy’s smile and her chin. Andrew, her cheeks and dimples. But mostly they looked like him, which made life easier. “Tell me whatever it is and get it over with.”

  Andrew shifted from one boot to the other and looked at his big brother. John hooked one hand around a suspender and rubbed his nose with the other. “You should sell the restaurant. Shut it down and sell it.”

  “Excuse me?” He squinted as if seeing them better in the bright sun would make him understand their intent. They suddenly spoke Greek or Chinese. Or both. “What are you talking about?”

  “Carlene and Leah agree. As the men in the family, they thought we should tell you, even though they’re older.”

  “Oh, they did, did they?” He tugged at his beard and turned his back on them. “I have to get the produce and get back to the restaurant. We’re out of potatoes and they have a good price on the onions. I want a bushel of peaches. Burke says he makes a pretty gut pie. I believe him. He’s a fine cook.”

  “Daed, wait!”

  “Nee, you wait.” He whirled around. Then stopped. Deep breath. In and out. No sense in making a scene in front of neighbors and friends—or strangers, for that matter. “I opened that restaurant ten years ago as a way to earn a living and keep this family together. It has done that. It’s a place where our kind go and get a meal and see friends, talk to neighbors. The food’s decent. There’s no reason to close it.”

  A family in another Gmay decided to sell the restaurant only months after Lucy’s death. It had been a godsend. They simply wanted someone to take over the payments so they could move to another state. His heart wasn’t in farming anymore. The decision had been made in a heartbeat. The money from the sale of the farm had provided the seed money for his new venture. His new life.

  “It served its purpose. We all liked working there when we were younger.” Andrew jumped in when John seemed to waver. “Now you’re working yourself into the ground for no reason. Running a restaurant is a young man’s business.”

  “I’m not dying.”

  “We know that.” John gritted his teeth. His pulse jumped along his jawline. He took a breath. “It’s in Gott’s hands. We know that, but we figure He took Mudder early. We’d like you to stay a little longer.”

  The slightest quaver in his voice sent Ezekiel ricocheting backward in time to a thirteen-year-old who tried so hard not to cry as he crouched next to his mother’s body, calling for her, calling her to come back. He’d come into the kitchen to see if supper was ready. A hungry, growing boy who played practical jokes on his sisters and wanted to fish every chance he got. He’d changed that day. They all had.

  “You’re right. It’s in Gott’s hands.” Ezekiel softened his tone. “In the meantime, stop worrying. The doctor says my ticker’s fine. Nothing else is wrong with me. If I eat right and keep my weight down, I’ll be around a while longer.”

  “At least think about it.”

  “Nothing to think about.”

  “Daed!”

  “You want to do something to help? Tell Leah and Carlene to make extra pies and bring them over when they can. Your fraas could do the same with cookies and cakes. It’ll take a little of the load off me and the cooks.”

  “We’ll do that. They can do that.” John’s jaw jutted, his smile grim. “But it’s not necessary. You’re getting up there. What, sixty-five—?”

  “Sixty. Young. Way too young to sit around and twiddle my thumbs.”

  “You can farm with us.” John threw out both hands as if encompassing the countryside where the crops would grow. “Nobody said anything about twiddling thumbs. You liked farming. You only stopped because you couldn’t make a living.”

  He had liked it once. When Lucy met him at the kitchen door after a hard day in the fields. “If it was hard then, it’s ten times harder now.” Ezekiel chucked John on the shoulder in a gentle gesture. “The big super farms have taken over. You’re hanging in there, but I see the restaurant as a fallback. We’ll have it if you can’t make a go of it. We can all work there, together again.”

  “It’s not likely that will happen.”

  “People always have to eat.”

  “They can’t always afford to eat out.”

  Andrew watched the argument like a man watching a volleyball game, his head moving side to side with his gaze.

  “I’m your daed. You don’t tell me what to do.”

  “Nee, we don’t.” John cleared his throat. “Just think about it.”

  “Let’s get those potatoes.” He jerked his thumb toward the building. “And pumpkins. I reckon Burke can make pumpkin pies. Nothing says fall like pumpkin pie.”

  “I could make some pumpkin pies.”

  He turned at the sound of the familiar voice.

  “Mary Kay, I figured you’d be working at the Combination Store today.”

  The words came out crankier than he’d intended.

  Her smile died. Her eyebrows rose. “I wanted to see how you’re feeling.” She held two pots of mums, one burnt orange and one red, in her arms. Her blue eyes were made bluer by her mauve dress and her now scarlet cheeks. “Carlene told me about the diabetes.”

  “He’s too stubborn to take care of himself.” John threw that in. Andrew’s head bobbed in agreement. “Don’t be giving him any of that pie. He’ll probably eat it. Take it to the restaurant.”

  “Like I can’t eat all the pie and cake and cookies I want at the restaurant?” Ezekiel turned his best scowl on his sons. “Go. Bid on the potatoes, onions, tomatoes, zucchini, cantaloupe, and peaches. And grab a box of gourds and some mums. Miriam can make something pretty to sit by the front door. But don’t overdo the tomatoes and cantaloupes. I don’t want them to spoil—”

  “We know what to do.”

  They stomped away, two angry peas in a too-tight pod.

  “Grumpy seems to run in the family today.” Mary Katherine nudged aside a few pots and set her mums on the flatbed. She dusted dirt from her hands, her expression pensive. “Are you upset because I can’t cook at the restaurant?”

  “I reckon I had a hand in that. You’re not mad at me for siding with the elders?”

  “You did what you thought was right.” Her tone could cut a tree stump in half. “I’m sorry about the diabetes.”

  “Nothing to be done about it. No sense fussing.”

  “Why are you so grumpy?”

  She didn’t beat around the bush. �
�My suhs want me to sell the restaurant. They say it has served its purpose. I should come farm with them.”

  “Funny how kinner start to think they know more than their parents.”

  “Funny like finding a rattlesnake under the pillow on your favorite chair.” He tried for a chuckle. It sounded halfhearted. “They always think they know more than their parents. It’s just that when they get older, they feel free to say so.”

  She smiled. The morning sun beamed down on them, warmer than it was a second before. Her smile stirred something inside him that had been dormant for years. It was a summer evening sitting in a lawn chair on the riverbank, pole in hand, hook and line in the water. It didn’t matter if he caught anything. It only mattered that the sun shone, and the wispy clouds floated on a breeze scented with mud and honeysuckle. Life was simple. The smile was lazy.

  He blinked. “Are you buying produce for the store?”

  “Nee. Thomas and Dylan are selling produce. I came along for the ride.”

  “It would’ve been nice to work together.” Nice. She would think him forward. He hadn’t thought those words until he said them. They served no purpose.

  She ducked her head like a teenager. Her smile deepened. “Did you ever get the chocolate off your shirt?”

  Her thoughts had gone back to Barbara’s wedding day too. That encounter in front of God and everyone. The sun shone even hotter. “Carlene did. Sure is hot for fall.”

  The auctioneer’s singsong voice boomed. First up, tomatoes.

  “Sure is.” She picked up the pots. “Thomas will be looking for me.” She paused at the opening to the shed. “How’s Burke?”

  “Still waiting for the other shoe to drop.”

  “Me too.” She chuckled, winked, and disappeared into the crowd.

  Ezekiel looked around. No one else had noticed. He shook his head and chuckled. Mary Katherine had winked at him. Reminding him of that wink in Dan Rogers’s car. What had he been thinking? Nothing. He’d been delirious. Diabetes would do that to a person.

  So what was Mary Katherine’s excuse?

  EIGHTEEN