The Bridesmaid

by Beverly Lewis

  “So what should we make for dinner, then?” asked Mamma.

  Joanna observed her sister more closely. Something wasn’t right. Cora Jane’s lower lip quivered as she moved to the window and stood there looking out, her shoulders heaving.

  Then, of all things, she left the kitchen and went running across the side lawn to the celery patch.

  “What on earth?” Mamma said.

  “I’ll see to her,” Joanna said, leaving the ironing board set up. She rushed out the back door.

  It was so stifling out there under the noontime sun, Joanna hardly wanted to move, let alone run after her surly sister. But run she did, determined to talk to Cora Jane . . . and find out why she’d gone to stand in the middle of the celery patch, holding herself around the middle and weeping like she’d lost her best friend.

  “Cora Jane . . . honey, what’s a-matter?” Joanna said softly, standing back a ways.

  “Leave me be!”

  “I just want to help.”

  “Ain’t nothin’ you or anyone can do,” Cora Jane sobbed.

  Joanna saw Mamma step out on the back porch down yonder. “You’re terribly upset,” Joanna said more softly. “I know you are.”

  Cora Jane leaned over, still holding her stomach like she might be sick. Then she did a strange thing. She fell to her knees and began to yank up young celery stalks, as many as she could grab with both hands, weeping. “I never should’ve planted these! Never!”

  “Aw, sister . . .” Joanna felt like crying now, too. “I’m ever so sorry.”

  Cora Jane turned to look at her, letting the plants fall on the rich, dark soil. “I was a fool.” She wiped her tear-streaked face with her grimy hands. “That’s all I am. A fool, I tell ya.”

  “Come with me.” Joanna held out her arms, moving closer. “Won’t ya, please?”

  Her poor sister sat back on her heels in the dirt, surrounded by uprooted plants. “We’ll never need this much celery come fall.”

  “Maybe things’ll turn around.”

  “That’s impossible.” Cora Jane pulled her tan-colored bandana off and sat there with her soiled hands on her head. “Just leave me be.”

  “You’re in no shape to sit out here. Besides, you’ll get cooked by the sun,” Joanna persisted, stepping near. “I want you to come inside with me. How about I draw you a nice cool bath?”

  “I don’t deserve that. I’m gut for nothin’!”

  “That’s not true,” Joanna said gently. “You heard me, Cora Jane. Get up and come inside.”

  “I’m done for, that’s what.”

  Joanna reached down and assisted her sister into a standing position. “Your heart’s all broken apart, but you won’t let whatever’s happened get the best of ya. I know you, sister.”

  Cora Jane turned, her lower lip trembling, and looked at Joanna. Then she flung her arms around her, just as Joanna had done with Cousin Malinda, crying like she might never stop. Joanna held on to her as she sobbed, her whole body quaking with every gasp. The day had come crashing down around them.

  “Go ahead and cry,” Joanna managed to say. “That’s all right. . . .”

  Once she could gently pry Cora Jane loose enough to walk her back toward the house, Joanna knew it was a good thing the noon meal wouldn’t be outside with their father and brothers relaxing on the back lawn in the shade of ancient trees. No, a picnic was not a good idea on this wretched day.

  Chapter 35

  Cora Jane went to lie down in her room that afternoon, needing some time alone. Joanna truly hoped she’d find a way to rest.

  Returning to her own room, Joanna looked up at the creak of floorboards and saw Mamma standing in the doorway, a frown on her face as she stared down at the bed.

  “I’ve noticed you put the quilt on your bed,” Mamma observed. “Can’t help but wonder if that has something to do with Cora Jane’s tears today.”

  “I decided to bring out the quilt from my hope chest is all,” Joanna explained, standing at the foot of her bed. “A while after Mammi Kurtz told me the story behind it.” She tried to keep her voice calm, her sister’s cries still in her ears. “And I hope you understand, Mamma, my quilt isn’t what set Cora Jane off.” She looked toward the ceiling and heaved a sigh. “I feel sure this was coming on for a while now.”

  “What was?” Mamma’s eyes narrowed as she stood near the dresser, her arms folded.

  Joanna sighed, feeling a bit hesitant. “Apparently my sister’s without a beau.”

  Mamma’s jaw dropped. She glanced toward the hallway, to Cora Jane’s bedroom. “So there’ll be no wedding?”

  “Jah . . . she didn’t tell me a lot, but she made that much clear.”

  Mamma looked fatigued, dark circles beneath her eyes. “I didn’t mean to make it sound like I was accusing you, dear.” Her mother lowered herself onto the bed and sat there gingerly, as if she didn’t want to mash the heirloom quilt. “Since we’re alone, I’d like to talk to you ’bout something else altogether.”

  Joanna went around the bed and sat on the other side, wondering.

  “I want to tell you a little something about your namesake, Great-Aunt Joanna Kurtz.”

  “I’d like that.” Joanna didn’t need to say that Mammi Kurtz had already told her a few things when she’d shared about the quilt itself.

  For a moment, Mamma was very still, looking out the window, then back at the quilt, smoothing it gently with her right hand. “Your father mentioned you’d brought it up to him once.”

  Joanna remembered. “Jah, I’ve been curious for a long time.”

  “From what I knew of your father’s great-aunt, well, I’d have to say I was impressed. She was a unique woman, and in some ways, a woman who put me to shame . . . her unusually strong faith and all.” Mamma sighed. “She knew what she wanted and clung to prayer.”

  “You’ve given me a special gift, Mamma . . . with my name.” Joanna felt the lump in her throat.

  “The name suits ya,” Mamma said, looking at her from across the bed. “As does this quilt.”

  Joanna ran her fingers over one of the double wedding ring patterns. Then, pausing, she covered Mamma’s hand with her own. “This time together, talkin’ like this, I mean . . . it’s just awful nice. Denki.”

  Mamma rose and came around the bed, placing both hands lightly on Joanna’s shoulders. “I see your faith at work in displaying this quilt, even without a serious beau,” she said quietly. “You surely do resemble your namesake, Joanna. I’m ever so thankful for that.”

  Joanna raised her eyes to Mamma’s and held her gaze. “I believe the Lord God has a plan for me,” she whispered. “Just as He did for my namesake.”

  Mamma nodded sweetly. “I believe that, too, Joanna, dear.”

  Truly, she had never felt so close to her mother.

  Cora Jane stayed home from all youth-related activities for the next few weekends, as did Joanna. Not knowing how to draw her sister out, Joanna wrote short poems of encouragement and slipped them under her bedroom door at night. Rhyming poems with such titles as “My Sister, My Friend,” and “From My Heart to Yours.”

  Cora Jane actually brought up the “nice poetry” one night in mid-August after their parents had gone to bed. Joanna had drifted over to her room, hoping to strike up a conversation, and with a small smile, Cora Jane had invited her in. Ever so slowly, Cora Jane began to open up, sharing what she believed had gone wrong between her and Gideon. “But I can’t blame my beau for everything. It takes two to make things work well,” Cora Jane said, grimacing.

  “Now that I’m this far away from our breakup, I can see better that we weren’t right together.” Cora Jane tilted her head and looked hard at Joanna. She opened her mouth, then shook her head.

  “What is it, sister?”

  Cora Jane pursed her lips for a moment. “Well, since we’re talking so openly . . . but I really hesitate to bring this up.”

  “Say what’s on your mind.”

  “Just wondered if ya th
ink Eben was well suited to you.”

  Joanna pressed her fingers to her temples, then ran her hands through her long hair. “I know we’d be engaged by now, or possibly even married . . . if it weren’t for his father’s need for a farming partner.”

  Cora Jane nodded sympathetically. “Seems like something should’ve worked out for you two.” She sighed. “Something.”

  Joanna couldn’t let herself think that way. “The past is behind us.”

  “Did he ever ask you to move there, even though it would take some doin’?”

  “He mentioned it, but I knew it was out of the question.” She stopped for a moment, realizing that what she was about to say surely implicated Cora Jane. “After Preacher Yoder talked so straight to me, I knew I couldn’t leave Hickory Hollow.”

  “The preacher said you couldn’t?” Cora Jane’s eyes grew wide as quarters.

  “He suggested it, jah. Said I shouldn’t get any ideas to transfer my membership out to Indiana . . . not with my story writing.”

  Her sister’s gaze dropped, her face losing its color. “And to think I caused much of that.”

  “Not entirely. I should’ve taken heed, thought twice about it, for sure. It’s not easy, believe me, turning my back on something I’ve enjoyed so much. The writer’s muse is a powerful thing. But I have stopped writing stories—I don’t want to continue doing something others dear to me consider wrong. Lately I’ve been writing poetry instead, hoping maybe I can honor the Lord in that.”

  Cora Jane turned and held out her hand. “Do you still resent me for tellin’ on you?”

  Joanna’s breath caught in her throat. She reached for her sister’s hand and pressed it gently, letting the gesture speak the loving truth. “I forgave ya some weeks ago. And . . . are you still angry with me for pushing you away after Eben came along?”

  Cora Jane shook her head slowly. “Who could ever stay angry at a sister like you?”

  “I should’ve told ya from the first, but my relationship with Eben seemed so fragile and new. ’Specially with the distance between us, I was afraid things wouldn’t work out if we were watched too closely.”

  “Truth be known, I was jealous of you for bein’ so self-assured, as if you thought you could just keep accepting invitations from brides like that, always bein’ a bridesmaid . . . and not heeding tradition.”

  It felt good to set things right. Cora Jane had made it clear she was sorry, and in time, the sting from her sister’s betrayal would surely lessen.

  But it was Cora Jane’s remark that something should’ve worked out with Eben that gave Joanna a fleeting feeling of warmth. At the same time, it was also a miserable reminder of what had been lost. Even if she had a glint of hope, she could see no way to fan it into flame.

  Chapter 36

  August peaches were coming on almost faster than Mamma could keep up. For that reason, neighbors Mattie, Ella Mae, and Rachel came over for a canning bee right after breakfast Tuesday. Mamma, Joanna, and Cora Jane helped set up an assembly line for peeling and pitting. They gave Ella Mae the most comfortable chair in the house, situating her away from the sunny windows.

  They jabbered in Pennsylvania Dutch, midwife Mattie telling stories about the babies she’d delivered—and three she’d nearly lost—over the many years. Rachel and Mamma listened but blushed and rolled their eyes at times, no doubt because Joanna and Cora Jane were present.

  Once Rachel could get a word in, she shared the plans for her daughter Mary’s upcoming birthday. “The children are all makin’ little cards to hang up on a string, over the kitchen doorway . . . like at Christmastime.”

  “Aw, that’s nice,” Mamma said, placing the sliced peaches in slightly salty water to preserve their natural color.

  “The bishop’s son Levi is quite the artist,” Rachel added. “Hard to know how that’ll turn out, with his father overseein’ things.”

  “Just maybe he’ll see the benefit of this wondrous gift from the Good Lord,” Ella Mae said. “That’s what.”

  The room went silent, and Rachel and Mamma exchanged concerned glances. But Joanna knew, as did all the others, that the Wise Woman exercised no restraint in speaking her mind.

  Eventually, the talk turned to putting up pears and plums in the coming days and weeks, and making jam, too. Mattie complained a little about needing to patch her husband’s work pants by hand. “An unpleasant task, ya know,” she said, sighing.

  “Ach, just be thankful your husband still lives,” widow Ella Mae muttered to her daughter, though they’d all heard.

  Later, Rachel mentioned der Debbich—the bedspread—she was looking forward to making come fall. “I’m doing it in blues and yellows, with a perty black border that’ll make the colors stand right out.”

  Ella Mae said she’d laid eyes on a hand-woven coverlet made from wool at an antique shop in Bird-in-Hand recently. “Carded and spun by hand, too,” she said, dimples showing.

  “That’d be a real chore, spinning,” Cora Jane said pleasantly. Though still somewhat downcast at times, her overall mood seemed much better since her heart-to-heart with Joanna a couple nights ago.

  When it came time to stop and make the noon meal, Mamma took charge of the kitchen, requesting some help from Cora Jane, Rachel, and Mattie. She’d asked Joanna in advance to keep Ella Mae company, so Joanna led the older woman into the small sitting area around the corner from the kitchen.

  “How you doin’, dearie?” Ella Mae asked once she was settled in Mamma’s chair.

  “All right some days . . . others, not so gut. It’s the way of life, I’m learning.”

  “Heard your young man came twice to see ya, ain’t?”

  Jake must’ve told her. . . .

  “Well, once to visit and once to part ways.”

  “That so?” Ella Mae scratched her head. “Now, wait a minute . . . didn’t I hear that, too?”

  Everyone’s heard by now, thought Joanna.

  “Thing is, I can’t seem to forget him, even though I’ve tried.” She shared that she’d gone out with a fellow from around here. “Someone lots of fun, and a really convincing storyteller, too.” She wondered if Ella Mae might guess whom she meant, although that wasn’t why she’d mentioned Jake in so many words.

  “Ah, I daresay I know just who you’re talking ’bout. A right nice boy, he is.”

  Joanna wouldn’t say Jake’s name, thinking it could tempt Ella Mae to divulge a confidence. But she gave a little nod. “Honestly, though, it’ll be mighty hard to forget Eben Troyer.”

  By the look in Ella Mae’s eyes, the wheels inside her head were turning. “Are ya wantin’ to know what I’ll say to that?”

  Joanna was taken off guard. “I didn’t bring it up for counsel, no.”

  “Why don’t you tell me more ’bout this young man who’s captured your heart.”

  This time Joanna did not hesitate from beginning to end, every last detail she felt comfortable sharing. “But now I don’t know how to be round anyone but him.”

  Ella Mae observed her intently, then asked if she’d ever thought of going out to Indiana. “To meet his family, I mean. Surprise him like he did you, maybe?”

  “I’m stuck here, I’m afraid.”

  “Well, that just ain’t true, dear girl. No one’s stuck anywhere unless they choose to be. The Lord God guides those who are moving forward.” Such startling words . . . words that resonated in the depths of Joanna’s heart.

  In that moment, she remembered how impressed Eben had been with Cora Jane’s frankness—he’d even indicated that he liked a woman with gumption.

  “Ever ponder Ruth’s pledge to her mother-in-law, Naomi, in the book of Ruth?” Ella Mae asked, seemingly out of the blue.

  “Not really, why?”

  “Well, just listen to this.” Ella Mae wore a smile on her wrinkled face. “ ‘For whither thou goest, I will go; and where thou lodgest, I will lodge: thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God,’ ” Ella Mae recited.

  Joanna
recalled hearing that plenty of times in Preacher Yoder’s wedding sermons.

  “So now, if it was gut enough for a young widow to declare to her mother-in-law, why not a girl to the man she loves?” Ella Mae locked eyes with hers. “Chust think ’bout it, Joanna. That, and pray ’bout it, too.”

  All the rest of the day, and throughout that week, Joanna thought and prayed and thought some more, until that Friday evening. She’d purposely gone walking on the field lanes where she and Eben had strolled together, hand in hand. Again, Ella Mae’s words came back to her, like an echo. Then suddenly, they stopped.

  The phone was ringing in the little shanty in Dat’s field.

  Joanna froze right there. Is Eben calling? Can it be?

  Heart hammering, she ran through the cornfield, rushing past the countless rows, thrusting the stalks away from her face as she ran faster and faster.

  The phone continued its ringing, like a clanging cowbell in the distance, as she groped her way toward its beautiful sound.

  Think, think, Joanna! Which Friday is it? Which?

  Then, stopping for a second, she knew. “Oh, Eben . . .”

  The ringing continued as she peered on tiptoe over the tops of the tasseled corn, the tall telephone shack before her like a lighthouse in a vast green sea.

  She moved forward, dashing to the shack. There, she pushed open the wooden door as the phone continued to ring. Reaching for it, she felt faint at the prospect of Eben’s voice on the line. But wasn’t he long gone from her?

  Still, she had to know. Lifting the receiver off its cradle, she managed a hello.

  Just then, like a feather flying away in the breeze, Joanna heard the line click as the phone went dead. And her heart sank.

  Was it you, Eben?

  She couldn’t help wondering how long the phone had been ringing, perhaps even before she’d come within earshot. Feeling weak, Joanna leaned against the familiar wall, staring straight out the only window at the sky with its billowing clouds. And she cried, unashamed.

  “O dear Lord in heaven,” she wept. “I don’t know what to do . . . or where to turn. Eben’s in my constant thoughts. Please remove my love for him, if it’s your will.” She reached to touch the black receiver, recalling Eben’s voice in her ear, oh, so many times. “If you have a different plan, will you make that path clear and ever so straight . . . and lead me back to Eben? Amen.”