Between You and Me

by Susan Wiggs

  One Sunday, Caleb overheard John asking the bishop for help. The bishop said a man was obligated to discipline his family to achieve the peaceable fruit of righteousness.

  Later that same day, Caleb raided the apple bin and ate as many apples as his belly could hold. When his father discovered him, Caleb explained that he was tasting the fruit of righteousness. Asa flew into a rage and dragged Caleb out to the yard for a beating. That was when John stepped in, at fifteen already a full hand taller than their father. He planted himself like a wall between Caleb and Asa.

  “You’re not to lay a hand on my brother,” John said. “Not today. Not ever. If you’re going to hit anyone today, it’s going to be me.”

  Now Caleb’s mother deflated, curled into herself. “John, he was always the protective one. Knew how to stand up to his father. And look at you. How handsome you are. I knew John would look after you, and you would be all right.”

  “If that’s what you want to think.”

  “You look wonderful,” she said, her gaze devouring him. “It’s a miracle, seeing you again, Caleb. I never thought it would happen, but I dreamed of this day. Why, see how tall and handsome you are, just like John. So confident and smart. How is John doing now?”

  “John tried to take his own life,” he told his mother.

  She went completely still. “Oh, dear heaven,” she said. “No. No.”

  “He jumped off the bridge over Stony Gorge—”

  “No,” she said again, a horrified whisper.

  “He was seventeen years old. And he didn’t die. He wasn’t even hurt too bad. According to folks who saw it happen, he got up and brushed himself off and walked all the way back to Middle Grove. Dr. Shrock set his broken arm. The only thing he lost was his hat.” And himself, Caleb added silently. After the incident, John was so different. He looked the same—though after the baptism his face had been fringed by a beard. Yet there always seemed to be less of Caleb’s brother. Yes, John had latched onto his faith with a powerful fervor, but he was altered, somehow. Not himself. Almost like a clockwork John, mechanically reciting proverbs from Rules for a Godly Life.

  “My poor darling John.” A tear squeezed from Mem’s eye and slipped down her cheek. “He wasn’t hurt. It’s a miracle.”

  “He’s married now. He and Naomi have two kids, Hannah and Jonah.”

  “I wish I could see him,” said Mem. “And those children . . .”

  “You’re under the Bann,” Caleb said. “Now that he’s in the church, he won’t speak to you. We needed you years ago, and you weren’t there. Eventually, we learned to get along without you.”

  She flinched and started to cry again. Caleb looked around the room, dim and chilly with the musty-smelling air blowing in. There were photographs on a shelf of Nancy at different ages, and another shelf with a collection of books of the self-help variety—Survival After Abuse. Change Your Brain, Change Your Life.

  Even now, Caleb still flinched at the memory of his father’s face, twisted by fury, and John’s steadfast refusal to budge. If John hadn’t stuck up for his younger brother, maybe Caleb would have been the one teetering on the cable bridge over the gorge, not John. He owed his brother devotion and loyalty. It was a debt he could never repay.

  In the mechanical hospital bed, Jonah stirred and opened his eyes wide as he seemed to shake himself awake. His gaze darted immediately to the bandage, then to Caleb. “I wish I still had my arm,” he said.

  “So do I,” Caleb told him. “I was just thinking about your dat, my brother, John. He was the bravest, strongest, kindest man in the world, and you’re his flesh and blood. It’s going to be real hard, but you’ll be just like that one day.”

  “What if I can’t be brave and strong?”

  “You can be. I’ll help you, the way your dat helped me.” Caleb reached out and gently touched Jonah’s head. “And that’s why I will never leave you.”

  There was no door on the SICU suite where Jonah lay, just a wide doorway open to the nurses’ station. A nurse was always present at the computer in the suite monitoring everything on the screen. At each shift change, the nurse asked Caleb if he needed anything, if there was anyone he wanted to call, but he always politely declined. He did help himself to a book about snorkeling in the Caribbean, and he read it cover to cover by the dim, artificial light in the room.

  He was just about to share some of the pictures with Jonah when Reese Powell showed up. She wore loose blue trousers, a shirt to match, and a hip-length white jacket over that. She carried a number of steel and rubber objects in her many pockets, and when she came into the room, she brought with her something Caleb had not expected: the smell of flowers. Must be the soap she used, he thought, then felt guilty for noticing the way she smelled at all.

  “Good morning,” she said. “I came to see how Jonah is doing.”

  “He woke up a few minutes ago. He’s waiting for his breakfast.” Caleb’s nephew had awakened in a state of fear and anger. Everything about the hospital was strange and new to him, and he was still struggling to accept the loss of his arm.

  She fixed her gaze on Jonah, her eyes soft and friendly. “Hi there, Jonah.”

  The boy regarded her with narrow-eyed suspicion as he mumbled, “Morning.”

  “I was hoping I would get to meet you,” she said. “My name is Reese Powell. I was working in the emergency ward when you came in. Everyone worked hard for the best outcome.”

  “This is not a good outcome,” said Jonah.

  “It’s not,” she agreed. “I’m sorry.” She gave Caleb a paper-wrapped parcel. “Your clothes. I had them cleaned for you.”

  He studied the label on the parcel—City Wash & Fold—and wondered what she would make of the ancient washtub and hand-crank wringer back at the farm.

  Jonah glared at her with uncharacteristic anger. “Reese,” he said in a caustic voice. “That’s not a name. It’s a candy.”

  “At least I never got swallowed by a whale,” she shot back.

  Caleb stood there, amazed. He was amazed because Jonah had never in his life spoken rudely to a person until now. And he was amazed because Reese didn’t seem to care one bit. And in spite of everything terrible that was happening, he couldn’t stop himself from feeling a glimmer of amusement.

  Jonah settled back against the pillow, and Caleb could see his fear go down a notch. “I always liked that story,” he muttered. “Are you a doctor?”

  “Almost. I wanted to stop by, because I thought you might have some questions. You’ve got a super-talented care team. I’m not on that team, because I work in a different department, but I can talk with you about your arm if you want.”

  “Why is it gone?” asked the boy.

  “It was so badly injured. They wanted to save it, but there was too much damage.”

  “Where is it?” Jonah asked.

  She caught her breath. “Your arm, you mean.”

  The boy nodded.

  “It—the part that had to come off was taken away.” She shifted her stance and stuck her hands in her coat pockets.

  “Taken away where?” Jonah persisted.

  “I don’t know the exact location, but the hospital has a special way to take care of it.”

  “What’s the special way?”

  “Well, there are rules. It had to be incinerated and then disposed of. That probably sounds horrible.”

  “We incinerate the trash back home.”

  “Your arm wasn’t trash, Jonah.”

  “I wish I had my hand back.”

  “We all wish that. Now you have to work with what you’ve got. You’ll get what’s called a prosthetic arm and hand. Maybe more than one, depending on what you need. It’s going to take a while, because there are lots of steps involved. You have to heal and have physical therapy. I promise, you’ll get lots of help from your care team.”

  “What’s my care team?”

  “The doctors, nurses, therapists, and all the people who are going to help you. It’s a differ
ent world today than the one yesterday, that’s for sure. Eventually, you’ll be stronger than ever. I know it doesn’t seem possible right now, but it’s true. I’ve seen it.”

  “How do you know?” Jonah persisted.

  She folded her arms and looked him in the eye. “I know stuff.”

  “What kind of stuff?” Jonah asked her, narrowing his eyes in suspicion.

  “When they move you to the ward, I’ll introduce you to some kids who are going to amaze you with their superpowers. Do you know what a superpower is?”

  “Course I do. And I know they’re just made-up stuff in books.”

  “Ah. That’s where you’re wrong. There’s one patient who had a heart transplant, and he still comes in every week to make balloon animals for the other kids, just to see them smile. If that’s not a superpower, I don’t know what is.”

  “The surgeon said I was lucky,” Jonah said. “Do you think it’s lucky to get your arm cut off?”

  She looked from side to side, then bent toward him. “Let me tell you something about surgeons. When they say you were lucky, you weren’t. What it really means is they thought you were going to die and you didn’t. So maybe your superpower and the surgeon’s superpower were working together.”

  Jonah’s eyes widened. Caleb could see his fear go down another notch. Could be Reese Powell’s blunt honesty was what the boy needed. He liked her compassion, and the way she spoke plainly to Jonah, not trying to sugarcoat the troubles he faced.

  She turned to him and seemed a little flustered at the way he was staring at her. “How did you do last night?” she asked. “Did a social worker come, find you a place to stay?”

  When Caleb didn’t answer right away, Jonah angled his gaze at the molded plastic chair in the corner. Caleb’s hat still lay beneath it. “I bet he was right there all night,” the boy said.

  “You were, weren’t you?” she asked Caleb.

  He didn’t want to get anyone in trouble, so he merely shrugged and said, “I wanted to be here in case Jonah woke up.”

  She bit her lip. She had very white, straight teeth and soft-looking lips he had no business noticing. “You’re not going to be good for anything if you don’t eat and sleep properly,” she said, her female bossiness reaching across any and all cultural lines between English and Amish. There was much to admire about this woman—her thoughtful gestures, taking the time to help him through his first evening in the city. And she had a clear, honest way of explaining things to Jonah.

  He wondered what her world was like outside the hospital. Did she spend time with her family and friends? Did she live nearby? What did she do when she wasn’t working?

  He pictured her in English clothes, driving a car, getting her fingernails polished by someone in a salon—a concept so foreign to the Amish it was almost inconceivable. Did she go out to bars with friends? Surf the Internet? Study her phone as if it held the secrets of the universe?

  One of her pockets emitted a buzzing sound. She took out a flat mobile phone with a shiny screen. “I have to go,” she said.

  “I wish you could stay,” Jonah said.

  “That’s nice to hear. But I work in the ER, not surgery. I just came up here to see how you’re doing.”

  “Oh,” said Jonah, clearly not understanding the difference between emergency and surgery.

  She backed toward the door, still talking. “Tell you what. At the end of my shift, I’ll come back to see you again. If they move you to the ward, I’ll find you. And you know what else? We’ll figure out a place for your uncle to stay. Maybe get him a more comfortable chair.”

  That drew a flicker of a smile from Jonah. “Yeah, that would be good, Reese.”

  She gave him a look that even a wounded boy couldn’t resist. “You’re going to be okay, Jonah Stoltz,” she said. “That’s a promise. And you know what?”

  “What?”

  “Keeping promises is my superpower.”

  6

  For a place of healing, the hospital was a cold, noisy institution. Folks were so busy working that they barely noticed the visitors and bystanders. As they rushed about their business, most of them skirted around Caleb as if he were a piece of furniture. He didn’t mind so much, though. He didn’t feel like fending off what the English referred to as “small talk”—a habit of filling the silence with pointless chatter.

  The Amish had no equivalent Caleb could think of. If there was silence, they let it be. No one felt obligated to fill the void.

  In this world, if there was no one present to talk to, people talked to their phones, which they connected to with headphones, or tapped the screen, shooting text and pictures back and forth. They did so even while they walked, barely watching where they were going.

  Patients were referred to by their afflictions rather than their names. Sometimes they were called a “code” or “that liver biopsy in room ten” as if their illness defined the sum total of who they were. The hospital staff members didn’t seem to want to acknowledge that “the aneurysm” was somebody’s grandmother, or that “the bypass” had worked at the public library for twenty-seven years.

  Jonah drifted in and out of sleep as the hours crept by. When he was awake, he seemed like a boy Caleb had never met before. He was hollow, joyless, with the look of someone being punished for a crime he hadn’t committed.

  While Jonah was napping, Caleb went to the men’s room and washed up, using a kit given to him by a nurse, with soap, a toothbrush and toothpaste, and a plastic-handled razor. Then he changed into his newly cleaned clothes, which had been washed and pressed and folded into a neat packet. His plain shirt had never been so crisp at the edges, better than brand-new. In his own clothes, Caleb felt slightly more like himself and was grateful for the bossy, thoughtful Reese Powell.

  Slightly refreshed, he inhaled the manufactured air blowing through the hallway. At the end of the corridor was a window framing the blue sky and the tall, modern buildings. He told Jonah’s nurse where to locate him, then made his way down the stairs and out the door. He had discovered a garden on the hospital grounds, and during Jonah’s naps he would step outside, trying to find his balance in the chaos. He sat on one of the wrought-iron benches and stared at the grass and trees, taking refuge from the glaring lights and manufactured air of the hospital’s beeping, hissing wards. Jonah had to endure that every second of the day; there was no escape for him. Caleb felt vaguely guilty for escaping the strange and harsh environment, even for a few minutes.

  There had been further questions from Child Protective Services. Different people had asked him the same question a dozen different ways to determine if the accident was caused by negligence, either Caleb’s or the Haubers’. He talked to a half-dozen folks with clipboards and laptop computers and name badges, but after all the questioning—or “interviews,” as someone called them—it was determined that the incident was exactly what Reese Powell had said it was—an accident. No one’s fault.

  But Jonah’s to suffer.

  As the day wore on, and Caleb met with doctors and other staff members, one thing became clear to Caleb. Reese had been right about something else—Jonah’s recovery was going to take a long time.

  It was going to cost a lot of money, too. Various staff members had asked for information about his “status,” which Caleb soon discovered was their way of trying to find out if he could afford Jonah’s care. It was probably well known to the hospital folks that the Amish almost never carried insurance, as purchasing commercial insurance violated the rules. The notion behind this was that the people in the community took care of their own, fiercely independent of outside help. Middle Grove had an aid fund overseen by a committee, and when a huge medical expense came along, the community banded together to raise money, holding fund-raisers and benefit auctions.

  But Caleb was a realist. Given what had happened to Jonah’s parents, he had been diligent about insurance coverage. Over the strident objections of his father, he had enrolled himself and the children in a
comprehensive insurance policy. Here at the hospital, he’d shown them the card he kept in his wallet. He filled out forms, offered the necessary information, and everyone seemed to calm down.

  It was one of the few things that had been easy about this ordeal.

  In the garden, the shadows of the beech trees and of people strolling along the walkways lengthened, and the traffic sounds from the busy streets increased as folks hurried about their business.

  Passersby sent veiled looks of curiosity in Caleb’s direction. Amish people were used to being stared at. As far as he knew, they were the only group of people in America who constituted a tourist attraction simply by being who they were. Folks came on tour buses and in their cars to the Amish towns in the countryside. Visitors seemed drawn to the sight of farmers and artisans going through their everyday chores. Most tourists were pretty respectful, treating the Amish like rare, elusive birds, to be spied on from a distance and photographed without their knowledge.

  A few were bold to the point of rudeness, poking and prying at the Amish like a cat sticking its nose into a mouse hole. More than once, English girls in short shorts and halter tops had planted themselves beside him for a photograph or a phone selfie without even asking his permission.

  Jonah used to think it was funny to posture for the camera lens, even though it got him in trouble with the elders if they caught him at it. Caleb wondered if that laughing, teasing boy would ever come back to him.

  A long, slender shadow fell across the grass at his feet. He looked up to see Reese Powell with the sun on her hair and an uncertain smile on her face. “Caleb?”