The Teacher's Bride

by Kathleen Fuller

  It was nearly dark by the time Christian locked up the schoolhouse. He carried his lunch cooler home, along with his lesson plan book. He still had a few things to add to the plans, but he could do that after supper.

  When he reached the small house he shared with his younger sister, Selah, he went inside, headed for the kitchen, and placed his lesson plan book on the table. Selah was standing at the kitchen counter, slicing carrots. “Where did those come from?” he asked, setting his cooler near the sink. Since they’d just moved here during the summer, they didn’t have a garden. “Did you go to the store?”

  “Nee. Mary Yoder dropped them off.” Mary was the bishop’s wife. Selah continued to slice, her gaze focused on the cutting board.

  “What are you making for supper?”

  “Vegetable stew.”

  He looked at the pieces she’d sliced off and frowned. “I advise you to cut them smaller.”

  “They don’t have to be perfect.” Selah shoved the knife blade through another carrot.

  “Small pieces will heat up faster than large ones, thus speeding up the cooking process.”

  She blew out a frustrated breath. “You know everything, don’t you, Chris?”

  He flinched at the shortened version of his name. But it was his own fault. After the school board hired him, he’d shaken each of the board members’ hands. “Welcome to Birch Creek, Chris,” Freemont had said. “Is it okay with you if we call you Chris?”

  “Of course,” he’d answered, wishing to keep in the members’ good stead, especially the bishop. “Chris is fine.” The name had stuck, and he regretted not correcting Freemont at the time, especially when Selah taunted him with it. It was too late to change it now.

  She suddenly set down the knife a little harder than necessary. “Maybe you should do it, then.”

  He wondered for a moment if she was angry with him, only to dismiss the thought. He’d done nothing to inspire anger. He’d only made a logical food preparation suggestion. Perhaps she did need a little instruction in that department, however. “If you insist,” he said, picking up the knife.

  Selah muttered, but Christian didn’t understand her. Now he suspected she was annoyed with him—which wouldn’t be the first time, nor the last. Such was their sibling relationship, although at times he wished there wasn’t so much strife between them as of late. With a shrug he began cutting the carrots into medallions of equal size.

  “I suppose it’s pointless to ask if you washed yer hands.” Selah pulled a soup pot from one of the cabinets and dropped it on top of the stove.

  He flinched at the banging sound. “I washed them before I left school.” He always made sure to wash his hands several times a day. Good hygiene prevented illness from spreading among the student population, and it was important that he set the example for his pupils.

  As he worked on the carrots, he heard Selah moving around behind him—the sound of water running as she filled the soup pot, the scrape of the peeler as she peeled the potatoes, and then the whoosh of the gas element as she turned on the stove. He had three carrots left when she came up behind him.

  She glanced at the cutting board. “You’re not finished yet?” She let out a sigh and walked away. “The rest of the ingredients are already in the pot.”

  He quickened the pace, but not at the expense of making the carrots uneven. When he’d finished he set down the knife and turned to her. “They’re now ready for your stew.”

  She took the cutting board and knife and dumped the carrots into the pot, barely looking at his careful handiwork.

  He bristled. She could have at least said thank you. “Do you need assistance with anything else?”

  Her light-brown eyebrows knitted. “I’m capable of making stew, Christian. Despite what you might think.”

  “I never said you weren’t.”

  She looked at him, let out another sigh that sounded rather long-suffering, and then shook her head and stirred the stew.

  She seemed overly annoyed with him, far beyond any reasonable response to his taking over the cutting of carrots. No need for her to have such a strong reaction to that. Deciding that vacating the kitchen was the best course of action, he said, “If you don’t need anything else, I’ll be outside taking care of Einstein.”

  “You do that.”

  He left the house, the last rays of daylight illuminating the path to the barn, and took in a breath of the fresh, early-fall air. Other than his sister’s attitude, and the issue of people calling him by a name he didn’t particularly like, he was content in Birch Creek. Here, he was able to pursue his goal of becoming a teacher, one that had initially surprised both his parents. His mother was now supportive. His father . . . well, better to not dwell on how he felt. Neither of them had been too happy when Selah had insisted on moving with him.

  Her decision had puzzled Christian, and he had more than a moment of hesitation before he agreed. Why was she so eager to leave family and friends behind? He had a compelling reason— his job. She had . . . He didn’t know what she had here. They’d never been close. Despite that, he had to admit it was nice not to live alone. And sometimes Selah was fine. Pleasant, even. But her unpredictability was beginning to bother him.

  He set his problem with Selah aside—whatever the problem was—and gave Einstein his oats. As his horse ate, he swept the barn of every strand of stray hay. The barn was nearly as tidy as his classroom, and he worked to keep it that way. He made sure Einstein had fresh water, and then he went back inside the house.

  As he entered the kitchen, the savory scent of the stew simmering on the stove filled the air. He glanced at the clock. It was nearly seven, and they rarely ate earlier than that during the workweek. That was late for some families, but not for him and Selah since he often stayed at school so long. Strangely enough, that was one thing his sister never complained about.

  Assuming Selah was upstairs in her room—his room was on the first floor next to the downstairs bathroom—he checked the stew and tested one of the carrots for doneness. Determining that it wasn’t quite soft enough, he rinsed the fork, placed it in the sink, and then picked up his lesson plan book and went into the living room. He sat down on the chair nearest to the woodstove, which hadn’t been lit since late spring. It wouldn’t be long before it would be running most of the time.

  He opened the book and pulled a folded sheet of paper from the front pocket. He unfolded it and skimmed it.

  GOALS:

  1. Secure a teaching job.

  2. Purchase/build a house.

  3. Get to know people in the community.

  Once he had the teaching job, accomplishing his second goal had been fairly easy. Two widowed sisters, Tabitha and Melva, had put their house up for sale the week before he and Selah arrived in Birch Creek. The small home had been affordable, and he quickly purchased it, glad the house was already up to the Ordnung’s standards and he didn’t have to worry about removing the electricity and putting in natural gas.

  Number three, however, was proving to be a bigger challenge than anticipated. The residents of Birch Creek were friendly enough, but he hadn’t connected with them. That wasn’t anything new. He owned several books on how to make friends and communicate with people for a reason. Yet he hadn’t been able to put that knowledge into practice, at least not the way Selah could. She had quickly made friends with Martha Detweiler, the only single woman her age in the community, and she was genial with everyone else. In contrast, Christian had yet to have more than a five-minute conversation with anyone.

  He had long ago come to terms with the reality that he didn’t need friends. He was satisfied with his career and his books. And the Lord, of course. His faith was highly important to him. He wasn’t a complete outcast, but he enjoyed his own company. His social standing had never been a problem before.

  That had to change, though. Because if he didn’t become more integrated into the community, he wouldn’t accomplish the last goal on his list:

  4.G
et married.

  Christian stared at the words. He hadn’t told anyone else that he wanted to find a bride. Although he was only twenty-one, still on the young side, getting married was the next logical step in life. A job, a house, marriage. Then after getting married he’d have children. That, apart from a few outliers, was the way of life among the Amish. When he joined the church, he had chosen to embrace every part of that life—marriage and family included.

  However, he’d encountered another problem he hadn’t anticipated: Birch Creek had very few single women. Other than Selah, he knew of only two: Martha Detweiler, whose family had moved here two months before he arrived, and Cevilla Schlabach. Cevilla was out of the question, since she was in her eighties, although she looked and behaved more than a decade younger. Martha, however, was a possibility. She was twenty and quite pretty, although looks weren’t that important to him. He just didn’t know much about her, so he’d have to make an effort to learn more soon.

  Christian folded the paper and put it back in his planner, and then he picked up The Diligent Classroom to read while he waited for the stew to finish cooking. He relaxed as he focused on the chapter on classroom management, which was much easier to think about than determining a way to get to know Martha.

  Other than a few hiccups like today, his students were well behaved overall and interested in learning. But he couldn’t let down his guard or he would have chaos. And if there was one thing Christian Ropp would not allow, in his classroom or in his life, it was chaos.

  CHAPTER 2

  On Sunday morning, Ruby left for church with Thomas, Patience, and her nephews in their buggy. Luke cuddled in Patience’s lap in the front seat while Ruby sat in the back next to Tobias.

  “Jesus loves the little children,” Ruby sang softly as she put her arm around Tobias, who leaned against her. “All the children of the world . . .” She sang songs to her nephew until they arrived at Naomi and Bartholomew Beiler’s home.

  Timothy parked the buggy, helped Patience and Luke out, and then took Tobias from Ruby. “We’ll see you at the service.” He walked away, holding Tobias’s small hand and keeping his steps short so his son could keep up.

  Ruby smiled. She wasn’t surprised that Timothy was a good father. She climbed out of the buggy and stood by Patience, noticing all the buggies parked around them. “This crowd is a bit different since I was here before Luke was born,” she said to Patience.

  “It definitely is.” Patience carried Luke on her hip, but he was squirming to get down. His parents had told her he’d started crawling a few weeks ago, and last night Ruby saw him trying to pull himself up, with a little help from the coffee table. He didn’t quite make it, landing on his bottom just as he reached his tiptoes. “We’ve had several families move here and quite a few weddings since then. It’s been wonderful to see how our little community has grown and blossomed. The Lord surely has blessed us.”

  Ruby nodded. She’d known from Patience’s letters to her mother that Birch Creek had grown, but she hadn’t realized how much.

  “I want to say hi to Sadie for a minute before the service,” Patience said. “I’ll see you inside.” She walked over to a small group of women who were carrying babies with one arm and holding on to toddlers with their other hands.

  Ruby slowly followed behind her, taking in the crowd of people gathered near the barn and in the Beilers’ front yard. Although so many of them were strangers to her, Ruby did recognize several people from her visit three years ago. She saw Seth and Ira Yoder, the bishop’s sons, standing near the Beilers’ white house. They were talking with some other young men. Her gaze fell on Seth, the older of the brothers. If she remembered right, he was close to her age and Ira was only two years younger. Wow, they had grown a lot since the last time she’d seen them. Seth was tall and wiry, while Ira was a few inches shorter and stockier. Both were nice looking. She made a mental note to find out if they were available.

  A dash of unease came over her. This didn’t seem the right way to go about getting married. Being this calculating—which she never was—seemed wrong. But as her parents had put it to her more than once, it was time for her to engage her brain more than her heart. There was more than one way to find a spouse, other than waiting around for love to happen. Her parents had been set up with each other by a mutual friend, and Timothy and Patience had exchanged letters for a year before they were engaged. She was simply being intentional about it, carefully weighing her options. That had to be why she was unsettled. She’d never been intentional about anything, especially nothing this important.

  As she was bolstering her confidence in her decision to hunt down a husband, she kept her gaze on Seth. He really was handsome, his sand-colored hair visible under a black hat, his white shirt and black vest fitting him well. Although she could see only his profile, she thought he had a nice smile too. Was that a dimple in his cheek? She took a step forward to get a better look, only to bump into something solid. Or rather someone. “I’m so sorry,” she said, turning to see whom she’d knocked into.

  “Apology accepted.”

  Ruby found herself looking into the startling blue eyes of a man who had the blankest expression she’d ever seen. Thick black eyebrows were set in a straight line over those eyes. He had high cheekbones, a long nose, and unsmiling lips that were set in the same type of line as his eyebrows. She also noticed he didn’t have a beard. Obviously single. “I didn’t mean to run into you. I wasn’t paying attention.”

  “You clearly weren’t.”

  She couldn’t tell if he was upset at their minor collision, but she wasn’t going to let a little run-in keep her from being friendly. “Hi. I’m Ruby Glick. I’m visiting mei bruder, Timothy, for . . . for a while.” No need to tell anybody she was planning to make Birch Creek her permanent home if her quest was successful.

  “Nice to meet you.” His tone remained flat, and his expression stayed the same. Blank. Unapproachable.

  Awkward. “Well,” she said, moving away from him, “I should get to the barn since the service will be starting soon. Nice to meet you too. Good-bye.”

  He didn’t respond as he turned and walked away.

  What a strange man. She could cross him off the list of potential husbands. She wasn’t interested in someone who couldn’t be bothered to say good-bye.

  Ruby went inside the barn and sat down next to Patience, putting Seth and that other strange man out of her mind. It was time to prepare her heart for the service. For the next hour she focused on singing, prayer, and worship, completely involved in the service . . . until Freemont started giving the sermon.

  Not that the bishop wasn’t a good preacher. He had a quiet way of speaking, the importance of his message more in his words than in his tone. Still, it didn’t take long for her to be distracted. No matter who was speaking, she always struggled to concentrate during sermons. She sat on her fingers as she glanced around the barn, making sure to look with only her eyes as she kept her head as motionless as possible. She didn’t want to draw attention to herself.

  The Beilers didn’t have a huge barn, like the Stoltzfus’s massive one back home in Lancaster. The space did accommodate the community comfortably, though. She saw Timothy sitting next to two men, one with dark-red hair and freckles, the other with black hair and a gorgeous profile. She had no idea who they were, but they both had beards, so she moved on with her perusal. She saw the man she’d run into sitting on the bench behind them. He was staring straight ahead, his posture perfectly straight, his palms on his knees, and he appeared to be listening intently. Upon further inspection she had to admit he was a decent-looking guy. He was no Seth Yoder, but he was okay.

  She felt a pinch of guilt and inwardly chastised herself for being shallow. Looks weren’t everything. In fact, they meant very little to her, other than to catch her initial attention. And it wasn’t like she was the prettiest girl around, not by far. Besides, she’d decided early on that the most important qualities in a potential spouse were
his strength of faith and kindness. Of course, he had to be good with children, and a sense of humor was important, considering her ability to get into a pickle or twenty. But it would be nice if she was at least attracted to her future husband.

  “What’s wrong?” Patience whispered.

  Uh-oh. She’d been caught. Ruby turned to her sister-in-law, hoping her face wasn’t as red as it felt hot. “Nix”

  “You’re frowning and staring at Chris Ropp.”

  Her cheeks heated up more, and she faced the front, forcing herself to pay attention to Freemont’s sermon. Chris. Funny, he didn’t look like a Chris. She imagined him with a more formal name. Like Edward or William, although William wasn’t much of an Amish name. If she was going to scout out husband prospects, she needed to be subtle about it, even though subtlety wasn’t exactly in her wheelhouse. Wait, she was supposed to be concentrating on the sermon. She cleared her thoughts. With great effort she managed to keep herself from looking at Chris, Seth, or any other man for the rest of the service.

  When the service ended, everyone went outside. It was a beautiful fall day with few clouds in the sky. Some leaves fluttered to the ground here and there, but most of them were still clinging to their branches. Patience had lingered behind in the barn, talking to another friend. Ruby figured she’d eventually learn everyone’s names.

  She didn’t see Patience, but she did spy two women who looked to be in her age group. They were standing by the front porch of the house, near the steps. She went to them, thinking it was a good time to introduce herself. When she reached them, she smiled. “Hi. I’m Ruby Glick. I’m visiting mei bruder, Timothy.”

  The shorter of the two gave her a sweet smile. “I’m Martha Detweiler. We just moved here a few months ago.” She turned to her willowy friend. “This is Selah. She’s new here too.”