by Susan Wiggs
“We can’t have the same future. It’s just not possible. We’ll never belong in the same world together, and it’s too painful to keep trying to make it so.”
A heavy ache surged in her chest. Losing him would be like losing a part of herself. “What’s painful is you pushing me away.”
He looked around the darkened landscape. “This is where I belong.”
“And I can never be part of it.” The heavy truth of it sank deep into her.
“I’m sorry. This will not get easier, Reese. My focus has to be on my brother’s children, and now the baby. You once said you wanted a grand passion. A grand life. You deserve exactly that. You deserve everything I can’t give you. You deserve all the opportunities before you—here or any other place in the world. I’d only be holding you back.”
The night breeze stirred the clouds, and a glimmer of moonlight swept across the quiet yard. She could see his face in the faint light, the flash of his eyes, the face she adored. Those lips, she thought. Never to feel them again, never to breathe in his scent. She wanted to be with him in every way—the weight of him on top of her, his warm breath in her ear.
“I’ll always be grateful that I knew you, Reese. That you let me into your heart.”
Then let me keep you there.
It was a church Sunday, and for Jonah’s sake, Caleb had sat through the droning opening sermon and main sermon, the unison hymns printed in the Ausbund. He tried to forget the day Hannah’s name was announced so everyone would know to impose the shunning upon her to avoid being in a state of sin.
The expression of pain and shame on her face haunted him still, made him question his promise to his brother. John would not have wanted this for Hannah, surely. The irony was, Hannah had always been such a good Amish girl, accepting baptism, practicing Plain ways as though called to do so. Even without the guidance of a mother, she had embraced the ideals held dear by the people of Middle Grove.
He let himself in the house and Jubilee greeted him with a swishing tail. “Where are the girls?” he asked the dog. “Hannah, are you there?” He looked up and down the hallway, then went to her room. Her market basket was gone, along with the usual clothes on the wall hooks. The stillness and the absence of all her personal things tweaked his awareness with unmistakable certainty. An old memory reared up from when he was a little boy, of his mother’s empty room after she’d left.
A cold ball of fear tightened in his gut. Where would Hannah have gone? To find Reese, maybe? Doubtful. Reese would have brought her straight back to Caleb. Despite their painful goodbye, he knew Reese wasn’t spiteful.
He clattered down the stairs and sprinted to the horse barn. Minutes later he was on the road to town, urging the black Morgan to a gallop. There was no Sunday bus from the junction, so he guessed Hannah would try to make her way to the main depot—a long walk, but the three-hour church service had given her plenty of time.
He tethered the horse at the mercantile, now busy with Sunday tourists. None of the Amish were at work, but Mr. Jolly was English, and a friend, particularly since Hannah’s quilts were in such high demand. “I need to borrow your car,” Caleb said. “It’s urgent.”
He tried not to panic as he drove to the Martz station five miles past the junction. There were a few buses parked in the bays, their destinations on display—Philadelphia, Newark, Allentown. He walked among the molded plastic benches in the waiting room but didn’t see Hannah there. Maybe she’d already boarded a bus.
He strode to a door marked passengers only.
“Ticket, please,” said an attendant.
“I’m not traveling. I’m looking for someone,” Caleb said. “A young woman with a baby.”
“Sorry, can’t let you through without a ticket.”
Caleb clenched his jaw. He heard the diesel rumble of an engine starting up. “It’s urgent.”
The attendant studied him, taking in Caleb’s broadfall trousers and plain jacket. Then he glanced over at a kiosk marked security. “You need a ticket,” he said.
Caleb pivoted, intending to buy a ticket, any ticket, when he nearly collided with a woman behind him. She didn’t say anything but gestured toward the restrooms across the way. As he approached the entrance, he heard Sarah’s goat-bleat hunger cry. The knot of ice in his gut melted.
“Hannah,” he said, heading into the restroom. It was marked ladies, but he didn’t care. His niece stood at a plastic drop-down changing table, fastening a clean diaper on the baby. “Hannah, what can you be thinking? I was scared to death when I got home to an empty house.”
Her face turned pale, but she didn’t pause as she swaddled Sarah and picked her up. “I’m not coming home,” she said simply.
“You don’t have a choice.”
The woman who had tipped him off came into the restroom. “Is everything all right here?”
Caleb held his breath. Hannah could make trouble if she told the woman she didn’t want to go with Caleb. Runaway Amish weren’t uncommon in the area, and local folks kept an eye out.
Hannah looked at Caleb, and he could see the thought behind her eyes. “Don’t do this,” he said in German. “If the social workers find out, you could lose Sarah for good.”
She hesitated a beat longer. Then she turned to the woman. “I’m all right,” she said.
“Come and sit,” Caleb said, picking up her basket. As they left the room, he nodded a thank-you to the woman. He led Hannah to a bench off to the side. “Running away is not the answer,” he said to her.
“It’s the only answer,” she stated. “I’m going to Sarasota.”
Where Caleb’s mother now lived. Hannah didn’t even know her, but she knew about the Sarasota Express, a bus service popular with the Amish.
“It’s not permitted,” he pointed out. “If you violate the order of the court—”
“Then what? Will it be worse than the shunning? Worse than having the Grabers telling me how bad I am because I won’t marry Aaron?” She hugged the baby to her chest, her small hands curving around the bundle. “I can’t stay in Middle Grove. Everyone will be better off if Sarah and I simply disappear.”
He didn’t blame her for yearning to escape. He studied her face, so soft and young, the image of her mother. She’d endured the misery from the shunning and the intrusive visits from the child welfare workers. He felt rotten for not doing more to ease her heart. “I’m sorry, liebling. It’s been hard, neh? And you’ve been truly brave and strong. What a fine mem you are to Sarah.”
“I’m not strong,” she said. “I’m not brave. I’m scared all the time, and all I want is to be gone.” Her delicate hands shook as she lowered the infant to the crook of her elbow and gazed into her face. “I don’t want to be Plain,” she said. “I don’t think I ever wanted that.”
Caleb felt a jolt of shock. Never had he heard her utter a word about the issue. He’d assumed she was content in Middle Grove, her parents’ daughter to the core. She’d accepted baptism. “That’s a very big statement to make,” he said.
“It’s a very big wish,” she replied, still studying her daughter’s face.
Caleb came home to a ruckus. He pulled Mr. Jolly’s car up to the house to let Hannah and the baby out. Then he planned to return the car to its owner, but as he helped Hannah up the porch steps, he heard yelling.
“Go sit,” he said. “I’ll be right back.”
At the barn, the buggy lay at an odd angle. The horse was pacing in agitation in the paddock. Asa was with Jonah, yelling about something. Jubilee pranced around, barking.
As he got closer, Caleb could hear his father berating the boy in German. “. . . do such a careless thing. The front axle is broken now, thanks to you.”
“I said I was sorry,” Jonah retorted.
“Sorry won’t fix the buggy. So careless! And on the Lord’s day. Get over here, boy.”
That tone and those words raised long-buried memories. The thin whooshing sound of a leather strap sent him running. Red-faced with fury,
Asa held the thick strap high as he advanced on Jonah.
Caleb grabbed the strap from his father’s hand and flung it as far away as he could. “This stops now,” he said. “Stay away from the boy.”
“He’s old enough to drive the buggy, he’s old enough to take his punishment like a man.”
Caleb flashed on another memory, not of Jonah but of himself, young and cowering, his big brother charging in and grabbing the weapon—what had it been? A rake handle, he recalled—from their father’s hand. This was what John had done all those years ago. John had stood up to their father in order to protect Caleb.
Holding his father in his burning gaze, Caleb spoke to Jonah. “Go to the house and help your sister,” he said quietly. “Now.”
Jonah scampered away, the dog at his heels. Asa glared at Caleb. “The boy insisted on driving the buggy. Even though I warned him, he took a corner too hard. He has to learn, and you’re too soft to teach him.”
Caleb struggled to hold his temper in check. Reese had wanted to know the real reason he’d sent her away. It wasn’t because he was distracted by her. It was because this was his life. How could he possibly bring anyone into a situation like this? “He’ll learn nothing from you except cruelty and fear,” he said.
“Nonsense. He’s old enough to accept the consequences of disobedience and carelessness. It’s the way I was raised, and my forebears, and all the others in our brotherhood.”
“I won’t debate that with you,” Caleb said. “Your brotherhood—”
“—is the one thing that keeps our community strong.” Asa surveyed the broken buggy. “Submission and obedience allow us to live in our faith, and our ways must be preserved. Discipline is the way we protect our faith, keep our family close, and prepare ourselves for heaven.”
“Your brotherhood keeps its back turned when men like you are cruel to little boys. That’s not preparing you for heaven. If anything, it’s preparing you for eternal damnation.”
Asa flung off the comment with a wave of his hand. “What is cruel is you putting his salvation at risk by bringing the modern world into our home. That arm is an abomination.”
“That arm is allowing Jonah to live a normal life,” Caleb said. “You can keep your face turned away from the world, but I never could, and neither will Jonah or Hannah.”
“I was too soft on you, then, or you wouldn’t speak to me so disrespectfully. I wish I’d taught you better to be humble and respect our traditions—”
“You nearly ruined John with your ‘teaching,’” Caleb spat. “Or don’t you remember that he tried to take his own life?”
“I didn’t make your brother jump off that bridge,” Asa said. “That was the devil’s work, and God’s miracle that he survived and came into the faith. You leave Jonah to me, and he, too, will come around.”
“Jonah’s my concern now. I won’t have you abusing him. I won’t let you make him so crazy he tries to kill himself like John did.”
Asa caught his breath, and his eyes flared with anger. “You have no say in the matter. I am Jonah’s guardian, and I will assert my rights.”
“I’ve been reading up on guardianship.” Caleb walked into the shadowy barn and went to his work area, furnished with a desk and a lantern. Picking up a printed sheet, he read, “‘The job of the guardian is to ensure the child’s safety and well-being.’ You’re failing Jonah.”
“I’m just getting started with Jonah. You know we don’t hold with using the courts, but I will if you push me.”
“Consider yourself pushed, then. Bring it on.”
“I’ll go to the judge. I am the legal guardian of these children, not you. And I decree that they will abide by my rules, not yours.”
Caleb called his bluff. “Do what you must. And I will do the same.” He took out the court papers Domenico had drawn up. “I was not going to bring this up on a Sunday, but you might as well know. I’m transferring guardianship to me. You can try to fight this, but you won’t win.”
“It’s a terrible thing, stealing those children away from me, their own grandfather. I forbid it.”
“You won’t be able to stop me.” The lawyer had been less certain, but Caleb hoped the case wouldn’t end up in front of a judge. For some reason, he remembered the day he’d been pulled over for speeding, when Reese had told him he should make up some story to avoid getting a ticket. He’d told her then that he wouldn’t lie. Now he realized he’d been living a lie for a long time. He couldn’t lie to get out of a speeding ticket, but he could lie to live a life he didn’t want.
His father slapped the papers away, scattering them to the floor. It was probably as close as he would come to admitting defeat. “You’re just like your mother.”
“No, I’m not. John was like our mother. And he was too good for this world.”
“You can’t take his children away from their family home. He wanted them raised Plain.”
“He wanted them raised in a house filled with love. And they will be.”
“When you walk away, there’s no chance of heaven.” Asa’s face was mottled, his eyes narrowed and flinty. “Think about being in hell. Just think about it.”
“I am in hell,” Caleb said and walked outside to fix the buggy.
In the morning, Caleb gathered up the last of his things. Hannah and Jonah were already in the taxi, waiting in front of the house.
He looked around the kitchen, dim and quiet except for the incessant ticking of the wall clock. He felt like a man without a place in the world. His brother had been murdered by outsiders, yet now he was about to become an outsider too.
He’d barely slept the night before, his mind filled with questions and doubts. What Asa said was true—John had wanted his children to be raised Plain. But Caleb knew in his heart that John would have wanted his kids to be happy above all else. Maybe the best way to honor his brother was to set his kids free and let them go their own way. Living Plain should be a daily joy, not a daily burden.
While putting his belongings in a rucksack before dawn, he’d come across a Himmelsbrief—heaven’s letters—a book that had belonged to John. When Caleb was little, he used to see his brother up late at his studies, his face bathed in lamp glow. “I was so mad at you, John, when you tried to take your own life. I yelled at you, wanted to know how you could leave me. I understand now. And honestly, you were always my hero,” Caleb had whispered last night, looking at the few papers stuck between the pages of the book. Lists of verb declensions and painstaking penmanship practice: Whoever carries this book with him is safe from all his enemies, visible or invisible; and whoever has this book with him cannot die without the holy corpse of Jesus Christ, nor drown in any water, nor burn up in any fire, nor can any unjust sentence be passed upon him. So help me.
On the handwritten page was a pencil drawing of a rocket ship, blasting through the clouds into the heavens. Caleb had tucked the page into a pocket of his rucksack.
The sound of a footstep drew him back to the present. His father came into the kitchen, wearing his work clothes and a dour expression. “It’s a terrible thing you’re doing,” he said. “You’ll live to regret it.”
Caleb drew a long, steadying breath. It was the Amish way to forgive and let go. “I forgive you,” he said.
His father slapped his hands down on the kitchen table. “And what is it you think needs forgiveness?”
It would take hours to enumerate everything, so Caleb said, “I forgive the beatings and belittlings, the harsh words and isolation. Only you know in your heart what made you treat your wife and your sons that way. I’ll never understand your cruelty, but I do forgive you. And now I’m letting you go.” He placed a card on the table. “That’s where you can find me. Goodbye, Asa Stoltz.”
Asa turned away, presenting his back. Caleb walked out the door, out into the jewel-bright autumn day. He glanced up at the sky, so blue this morning that it made his eyes ache. The silver flash of a jet streaked overhead.
23
Reese discovered that gardening helped her think. With her hands in the soil and the sun on her back, she let her mind wander. After hours at the hospital or clinics, bent over reports or seeing patients, the strenuous physical work helped her clear her head. Sometimes she became too enmeshed in her work. The doctor-patient relationship was an awkward dance between distance and intimacy, and she hadn’t quite mastered the steps. Knowing someone’s medical history was not the same as knowing their personal history. Yet when you knew the details of someone’s sexual habits, you probably knew more about them than their closest family did.
The crackling autumn afternoon suited her mood—brisk and bright. Although the vegetables and fruits and flowers had been harvested, there was still plenty of work to be done in the garden. She dug into the soil with a broad iron rake, working the teeth through the fibrous residue of squash and tomato plants and the long curly tangle left behind by the just-harvested pie pumpkins. After loosening a section of soil, she added mulch from a wheelbarrow, breathing in the damp, fecund scent of the earth.
As she worked, a shadow fell over her from behind. She straightened up and turned, feeling a jolt of surprise. “Dad. What are you doing here?”
Her father smiled. “I felt like seeing my girl, so I jumped in the car and drove up here.”
“That’s . . . wow. So un-Dad-like.” She peeled off her gloves and gave him a hug. “I’m a mess,” she said.
“You look wonderful.”
“So do you.” He looked as handsome and slender as ever in jeans and a Princeton sweatshirt. “Where’s Mom?”
He shrugged. “She had a thing. A fund-raiser. I weaseled out of it.” He picked up the rake. “Can I help?”
She narrowed her eyes in suspicion. “Who are you, and what have you done with my father?”
“Okay. I deserved that.” He picked up the rake and started on a row of spent cucumber vines.
She watched him for a moment, then worked at his side, putting the debris into a bin for the compost heap. “I’ve missed you,” she said without breaking the rhythm of their work. “And Mom. More than you know. I wish you were more a part of my life.”