Sarah turned to me and smiled. “Our little Mary’s such a blessing. We thank God every day that you found her and took such good care of her for us.”
I hadn’t seen Mary since I’d baby-sat for her at the end of last summer, before school started. “What is she now—nine months old?” I asked.
“Jah, you’re right.” Sarah helped her mother-in-law untangle the baby blankets, then asked, “Wanna hold her?”
Did I ever! I took one look at that adorable face and nearly cried as Esther placed her in my arms. “Oh, she’s so beautiful,” I whispered.
Mary tried to babble sweet baby words, probably some simple Dutch, raising her chubby hand up to my face to be kissed. The gesture took me back to that first night we’d spent together, this precious baby and I, when she’d curled her infant fist around my finger and squeezed with all her might.
Rachel’s father was begging for equal time. “Come see your Dawdi Abe a bit,” he said, slapping his knee.
I kissed her baby ear. Gently, I set Mary on her grandpa’s lap, relinquishing her to his strong, loving arms.
Before I could blink an eye, someone had slipped a plate of warm apple pie and a hearty dip of ice cream into my empty hands. “Oh, uh…thanks, but—”
“Don’tcha want none?” Rachel asked, a quizzical look on her face.
“Well, I came to invite you for dessert at my house.” We burst into laughter, standing near the rocking chair where Abe Zook played with his adopted granddaughter.
“’Tis hard to fellowship with friends and not be feeding one’s face, ’least not in an Amish household,” Rachel said.
She was right about that.
“What’ll I tell my mother?” I said. “You know how she loves to cook and entertain.”
She nodded, eyes shining. “My mam and yours could do right fine together—opening up a restaurant somewheres,” she admitted.
“That would never do.”
“Why not?” she asked.
“Because two cooks in a kitchen are always one too many!”
We giggled about that, taking turns making over the baby. “Wouldn’t Miss Spindler be surprised at how quick Mary’s a-growing?” said Rachel.
“That’s the truth,” I said. “But you know how Old Hawk Eyes is…she probably saw Curly John’s horse and buggy pull into your barnyard long before you ever did!”
“Probably so.” Then Rachel’s eyes softened, and she took my hand, leading me into the front room. “When you’re done with your dessert, Merry, we hafta disappear for a bit, if ya know what I mean.”
I must admit, I was thrilled. At long last, she was going to reveal her secret. Whatever it was.
“Wanna come to my house?” I whispered, glancing over my shoulder.
She nodded. “In a bit, we’ll go.”
My curiosity had been piqued. Still, it would take some doing to tear myself away from Rachel’s darling baby niece.
To my surprise, Sarah Zook asked if I could help her out with Mary. “Occasionally, on Saturdays, just during quiltin’ season mostly.”
“I’d love to!” I said, putting on my coat and scarf.
“If you could come over to our place, that would help me an awful lot.” She stepped into the utility room, where Rachel was struggling with her snow boots.
“Maybe Mom will let me borrow her car,” I told her.
“Well, ask your mama, and just let Rachel know, jah?”
I said I would, yet I wondered why she hadn’t chosen someone Amish to baby-sit for her.
Rachel pulled on her boots with a grunt and then located her long, gray woolen shawl on a crowded coat hook. “Ya noticed, didn’tcha, that my own sister-in-law didn’t ask me to help with Mary,” teased Rachel.
Sarah’s cheeks blushed bright pink. “Oh, forgive me, Rachel. I would’ve asked, but—”
“I’s just foolin’ ya,” Rachel replied. “How on earth can I hold a baby and do my best handstitchin’, all at the same time?”
“Gut, then, you’re not mad.” Sarah offered a pleasant smile. “God be with ya,” she bid us.
“’Bye!” I called to her and now to Esther, who’d come to see us off.
Before I could turn around, here came Nancy and Ella Mae, then little Susie, pushing her way against the storm door. “Where’s Rachel goin’?” Susie hollered out.
“Oh, just over to Merry’s for a bit,” Rachel called back, a stream of her breath floating over our heads.
“She won’t be gone long,” I promised.
That is, if she spills the beans on her secret right off, I thought.
Chapter
6
My mother was overjoyed to see Rachel. “Oh, here, let me take your wraps,” she said, playing the ultimate hostess.
“Denki,” Rachel said softly, removing her black outer bonnet and shawl. She glanced down at her feet nervously.
“Forget something?” I asked.
“Shoulda brought warm socks along,” she whispered.
“Don’t worry. I’ll loan you a pair.” And I proceeded to help her pull off her high snow boots.
Mom served up pumpkin pie a la mode, and Rachel and I ate it as if we’d never had any sweets at the Zooks’. After all, we’d just had some wintry exercise, and our eagerness pleased my mother to no end. Upstairs, we had my big bedroom all to ourselves. I’d straightened things up earlier from the sleepover last night. Even spent a few minutes smoothing out my comforter and reorganizing my books and knickknacks while Mom put finishing touches on our dinner.
“Ach, your cats have about taken over the place!” Rachel remarked, looking around at the four of them as I closed the door.
I knew it was hard for her to accept mouse catchers living the pampered life inside the house. She’d always insisted that where they were really needed was outside, in a barn somewhere.
“I think you and my mother must have a conspiracy going about my pets,” I told her, finding a pair of knee-length socks in my dresser drawer.
“Oh? What makes ya say such a thing?”
“Well, my mom put her foot down about taking in any more strays.” I picked up Lily White and cradled her in my arms.
Rachel, watching me, smiled. “Maybe it’s ’cause you treat ’em like they’re babies.”
I laughed. “Oh, but they are babies. Kitty-cat babies.”
She shook her head, puzzled, then pulled out the chair beside my desk and sat down. “I hafta tell ya something, Merry, but ya must promise never to tell a soul.”
I felt my forehead crease to a frown. “What do you mean?”
“Better sit down,” she advised.
With Lily White in my arms and Abednego creeping closer, vying for his position as “top dog” cat, I sat down on my bed and leaned against the bed pillows. “I’m listening.”
“Gut, ’cause I need your help.”
“My help?” Who was she kidding? Rachel was one of the most resourceful teenagers around. Like most Amish girls, she could can peas and carrots to beat the band. She sowed the straightest rows of lettuce and tomatoes you ever did see and knew all about how to spring clean a house up and down and inside out.
Not only that, she had a hope chest already bursting with all sorts of essential linens and household items, ready to settle into keeping house and raising a family, which is what young Amishwomen did early on—when the right Amish fellow came along. That was probably the case; she’d probably said “yes” to Matthew Yoder, her one and only beau. Even though Amish wedding season was months away, Rachel probably wanted me to know before anyone else….
Still, I dared not mention any of what I was thinking, only studied her solemn face and her hands, folded as if she were about to pray.
“Well…do ya promise me, Merry Hanson?”
I took a deep breath before I answered. “I think you better say why you need my help. Then maybe I can make a promise.”
Her eyes darted to the windows. SummerHill Lane could be easily seen from my bedroom, and right acr
oss from the road were acres and acres of field, now dormant.
I spoke up quickly. “I didn’t mean to offend you, honest.”
She looked my way again, making a few quick nods with her head. “Been ponderin’ this for the longest time. I hope ya won’t think I’ve up and gone berserk.”
Now I was really confused. “How could that be? You’re smart as a whip, Rachel. Don’t worry what I think, anyway. We’re friends, right?”
“The best of friends,” she said, looking truly inspired. She reached into her dress pocket and pulled out the old picture. The one of Joseph Lapp. I knew even before seeing the front that it was the same photo, because the edges were yellowed and uneven.
Rachel stared at the picture in her hand. “I’ve been keeping a secret—a forbidden ambition—for ever so long, really. The People would be shocked and befuddled, especially my parents.” She was almost whispering, and my heart went out to her, not knowing what she was thinking or feeling.
“Are you all right?” I asked.
“Don’t rightly know” came the haunting reply. “I feel I may be ready to put some of my upbringing to the test.”
I was worried. What could she be thinking?
“Oh, Merry…I wanna have my picture taken,” she said suddenly, almost breathlessly. “It is the most vain, wicked thing I could possibly think of doin’, yet I want it more than words can say.”
“What about your Amish beliefs?” I asked.
“The People’s opinions are not mine just yet. I must cast aside the Old Order rules for now,” she said, alluding to her Rumschpringe—the Amish term for the running-around years before baptism into the church and marriage.
Beginning at sixteen, Lancaster Amish young people are allowed to experiment with the outside world—try on the various aspects of modern life and decide if Plain living is right for them. Most of them, in the end, choose to remain Amish and take the life oath at the time of their baptism.
“Are you completely sure about having your picture taken?”
“Never more so,” she replied. “Now…ya must be wonderin’ how you could be helping me.”
I’d already assumed she wanted me to be the one to take her photograph. And I was right.
“Dat and Mam are going out to Ohio to visit some relatives next weekend. I thought it might be a gut time.”
I listened—didn’t even nod my head to give consent.
“The moon’ll be on the wane come Friday night,” she informed me. “We’ll hide behind it, ya know.”
I had to chuckle. She’d considered every possible angle.
“Then ya’ll do it? Ya’ll get out your camera and take my picture?”
“How can I?” I protested. “Knowing what your family believes…what your church teaches?”
“Making graven images?” she said. “Is that the problem?”
I moved my cats off my lap carefully and stood up. “Rachel, have you thought about the shame this could bring to your parents?”
“Ach, we’ve been through all this before,” she answered. “A thousand times.”
I realized she was talking about Levi now, her big brother. He’d gone off and embraced higher education, a no-no for Amish offspring. Of course, he’d nearly broken his father’s heart by not joining the church at the appropriate age, instead leaving SummerHill and heading to Virginia to college, of all things.
“Why put your parents through it?” I argued.
She looked at me, her eyes pleading. “You sound so Amish, Merry. You sure ya ain’t?”
I laughed, which was probably a good thing. Our discussion was getting entirely too serious.
“Let’s think about it. Don’t rush into something you might regret later,” I suggested.
She shook her head. “This could be my only chance, Merry. The only chance I’ll ever have to see myself in a picture.”
I leaned down and looked into the face of Joseph Lapp. “Guess my great-great grandfather got something started, didn’t he?”
She stood up, not looking out the window but at my wall gallery of framed photographs, some I’d taken of my twin sister long ago. “Please be thinkin’ long and hard about this, Cousin Merry,” she said.
I simply couldn’t let her push me into this. And at the moment, I wasn’t too receptive to being called her cousin, either. I had to admit, her obsession with vanity irked me.
“What about ‘Children, obey your parents in the Lord’?” I said, picking up my Bible. “Does that count for anything?”
She whirled around. “ ’Course it does! I’ve been following the Ordnung my whole life. Never once strayed from it, neither. But having my picture taken won’t be disobedient to Dat and Mam…not really.”
“Why not?” I asked, amazed at her logic.
“Because my parents never said not to.”
“But the bishop and Preacher Yoder, what about them?” I had her. She couldn’t shy away from the truth.
“Oh, Merry…please don’t go makin’ me feel worse than I already do.”
“Okay, then. How about if I let you know what I decide in a couple of days?” I said at last.
“Gut,” she replied, turning toward me. “We’ll have my first and only picture taken in the barn.”
“What?”
“You heard me,” she said. “In the haymow.”
Hadn’t she listened to a word I’d said? I was flabbergasted, plain and simple.
Chapter
7
Unfortunately, it wasn’t as easy for me to stand my ground on Monday. Rachel showed up at the bus stop, first thing. She came running up the lane, waving at me like there was some emergency.
“Hullo, Merry,” she said, out of breath.
“What’re you doing here?” I glanced up the road for the bus.
“Didja think about it yet?” she asked, her cheeks red with the cold.
“Oh that…”
“Jah, ’cause we need to start making plans.”
“Well, I still don’t think it’s such a good idea.”
“But you’re my only chance, Merry,” she said, eyes pleading, hands rubbing together.
“You could go into town and have your picture taken,” I suggested. “That’s easy enough.”
“What…in one of them little booths with the black curtains?”
“Sure, why not?”
The bus was coming now. I could hear it rumbling before I actually saw it. I was positive she wouldn’t want to be stared at by the public school crowd—I read it in the frenzied look on her face.
Darting her eyes back and forth between me and the crest of the hill, Rachel seemed nearly frantic. “Aw, Merry…”
“Better relax,” I warned. “Go home, and we’ll talk after school.”
“I’ll come right over then.” She dashed off, her long skirt and apron flying under her woolen shawl.
“See you later!” I called to her, hoping I hadn’t offended my friend.
“Jah, see ya,” she replied.
At lunch, Chelsea showed up with Lissa. I was already getting seated at a table with Ashley.
“Well, here we are, together again,” Chelsea said, salting her fries. “Has anyone seen the wizard today?”
“Not me,” Ashley said.
“Not I,” I echoed, correcting her English.
Ashley grimaced. “Where do you think he’s hiding?”
I shrugged. “Jon never misses school—doesn’t seem to catch colds much.”
“True,” Lissa said. “Wish I knew his health secret.”
I laughed. “I think I know. He scares the germs away. As simple as that.”
Ashley gasped. “You can’t mean that, Mer. Jon’s drop-dead gorgeous.”
“Of course she didn’t mean he was homely. Everybody knows Jon’s cute,” Lissa said. “Very cute.”
“Ah, gotcha! Somebody’s got a crush on the Wizard,” I said. But my heart sank.
The four of us leaned on our elbows into the table, whispering comments about som
e of the other guys in our class. And that’s the way we spent our time—eating and sharing girl talk.
When the first bell rang, Chelsea groaned. “Aw, we didn’t practice our you-know-what.”
“Oh well,” said Ashley. “If Jon’s out sick with the flu or whatever, he’s lost a whole day of alliterating, too.”
“What do you mean, too?” I reached for a napkin. “We haven’t lost any time. Let’s practice on other students—locker partners, teachers—you get the picture.”
“Oh! Wait a minute,” Chelsea blurted. “You just said something that reminded me of where Jon might be.”
I frowned, thinking back. “What did I say?”
“You said, ‘Get the picture’…and I do know where the Alliteration Wizard is.” She went on to explain that the basketball all-stars were having group shots made for the school yearbook. “Betcha Jon’s taking pictures right now!”
“Let’s check it out,” I said. My girl friends picked up their trays and followed me right up to the cafeteria window to deposit our empty trays and trash, then down the hall to the gymnasium. I felt like the Pied Piper of James Buchanan High.
“Sure enough,” I said as we peered through the door to the gymnasium.
“There’s our man,” Ashley sighed, her hair falling down over her shoulder.
I didn’t exactly know what to think of her comment. But I realized anew that my commitment to teach these girls how to speak alliteration-eze was actually spilling over into my formerly private territory.
“Why are we spying?” I said at last, stepping back from the door.
“That’s what I wanna know,” Ashley spoke up. “We oughta be working on our secret language.”
The final bell rang.
“Yee-ikes! We have three minutes to get to class!”
It must’ve looked mighty strange, four girls scrambling off in opposite directions. But we did exactly that, and I didn’t see Jon in any of the usual spots—not even at his locker—for the rest of the day.
I did encounter Rachel Zook, however. She’d kept her promise and was waiting on my front porch, all bundled up in her Plain attire.
“Goodness, girl, what’re you doing sitting out here in the cold?” I said, running up the steps.
SummerHill Secrets, Volume 2 Page 21