A Simple Autumn: A Seasons of Lancaster Novel (17 page)

His first hint that he’d gotten it wrong with Annie was the fact that she kept darting
away from him like a delicate butterfly. The few times she came close, she always
made a point of telling him something about Hannah: how she had baked these cinnamon
rolls that morning, that she was bringing him hot coffee, or that he could find her
in the garden after lunch. Always, it was about Hannah.

He’d sensed that something was off early on, but it took him a few days to see her
plan. She was pairing him off with Hannah, a sweet girl, but not the girl for him.

He came up on a slow-moving carriage, passed it, and flew ahead.

This morning, when he came out of the barn and saw the sun rising in the east, flaming
gold over the bright trees and shining on the low-lying mist, he knew he had to tell
Annie the truth. Even if she laughed in his face, it was better to put the truth out
there than to live a lie.

He had wanted to tell her today. He’d been ready, but the look on her face when she
saw the men loading the van had stopped him in his tracks. Although Annie had kept
her chin up with a smile on her face, Jonah had seen the sorrow in her eyes. He could
tell her heart was aching, and he couldn’t bear to make her feel any worse.

While helping to load the van he had overheard Sarah talking with Annie. Sarah had
said that she should come to New York to find a beau, and Annie had said she’d think
about it.

That was salt on the wound. It was bad enough longing for Annie from nearby. Losing
her to a settlement hundreds of miles away would shatter any hope of ever winning
her heart.

They came to a four-way stop and Jigsaw slowed to a trot, then paused with barely
a twitch of the reins. The horse seemed to understand traffic laws, but Jonah figured
it was probably force of habit. They turned left and headed down the final stretch
toward home.

Jonah sighed at the thought of telling Annie his feelings. He’d made a joke about
it after the van left, hoping that Annie would pick up on it, but no, she hadn’t.
He would probably have to spell everything out very carefully. Open his heart. Brace
himself for the answer she was bound to give.

A flat no.

He grunted. Tomorrow would be soon enough for that bad news.

When he rose over the last hill and looked at the two silos of their farm, he thanked
Gott for the good feeling of coming home. Whatever the world handed him, he was grateful
to have a good, loving family to return to.

The lawn needed mowing and weeds spilled over onto the lane. Next week, the whole
family would pitch in to make the farm neat and tidy for Sunday’s church service.
Preparation would take a day or two, but it was always a good reason to make the house
spic-and-span once a year.

On the side of the house, Mary had set a kitchen chair in the yard for haircuts. Sam
sat there, bobbing like a pickle in a barrel. Jonah grinned. Mary had her work cut
out for her with that one.

By the time he’d unsaddled Jigsaw and set him out to pasture, he saw that Mary had
a new customer. Simon sat there, his lips pursed,
a towel over his shoulders as she tried to even out the line of his hair.

“Stay still,” Mary said softly. “We just need to cut over your eyes and then you’re
finished.”

The scissors snipped along Simon’s brow, sending glittery hairs into the air.

“It itches.” He waited until she leaned back, then furiously rubbed his nose.

“That’s one way to get it off.” Mary slid the towel from Simon’s shoulders and shook
it out. “You’re done. You can go back to training your horse.”

Simon let out a sigh of relief. “I don’t like haircuts.”

“Then be glad yours is done.” Mary turned to Jonah and patted the top of the chair.
“You’re next.”

“I don’t like haircuts either.”

She frowned. “I don’t like lima beans, but I eat them. Have a seat and don’t complain
about it. You need a trim. Or else you’ll have to move to the stables.”

Reluctantly, he sat in the chair and braced himself.

“Don’t look so worried. So far I haven’t taken an ear off anybody.”

“So far.” He frowned. “But that wouldn’t be the worst thing that’s happened to me
lately.”

“Why are you so glum?” Mary asked, the scissors whooshing at the back of his neck.
“That’s not like you, Jonah, especially after the smiles we’ve seen these past few
days.”

“Nothing is going right today,” he admitted.

Mary came around to face him, hands on her hips. “Is this about Annie?”

He nodded.

“What is she doing now?”

“It’s not really her fault. But it’s a tangled mess, and I don’t know
how I walked right into it with my eyes open.” He told Mary how Annie had come to
him saying that someone was sweet on him. “I was sure it was Annie herself, and that’s
why I was walking on clouds a few days ago.”

“But you found out it wasn’t Annie?” Mary squinted at him. “Who is it?”

“Her sister Hannah. Annie has been trying to get us together. She’s been playing matchmaker.
Only I’m not sweet on Hannah. So now I’ve got to tell Annie that I’m not going to
court her sister, and she’s not going to like me at all once I dump that bit of bad
news on her doorstep.”

She laughed, but her dark eyes were full of sympathy. “Oh, Jonah! You’ve hit so many
twists and turns on your path to find a good and fitting wife.”

He grunted. “It’s not a wife I want, and I won’t settle for good and kind. I’m holding
out for one girl. She’s good and kind, all right. She’s just not sweet on me.” He
turned to look up at his sister.

“You’d better hold still if you don’t want your hair to look like it was cut with
a handsaw.”

He frowned, staring off at a section of yellow trees along the lane. It had probably
been foolish to hold out for one girl. Foolish and stubborn. But Jonah just couldn’t
see it any other way. He closed his eyes as the scissors moved over his forehead.
“Do you think I’m selfish?”

“Not selfish, but stubborn as a mule.” Mary cut through a dense crop of hair. “And
with Annie being stubborn in her own way, she’s not likely to figure out her mistake.
Do you want me to talk to her? I have a knack for saying things nice and gentle. I
can set things right.”

“No,” Jonah insisted. “And don’t say a word to anyone else, especially Adam. He doesn’t
have real fond memories of Annie.”

Mary leaned back to scrutinize his hair. “You don’t have to worry
about Adam. He’s put the past behind him. These days, he’s able to see the good in
everyone. That’s the blessing of love.”

The blessing of love …

Mary was right. Love was not something you earned, but a blessing from Gott in heaven.
It was not a broken pipe he could weld together or a field he could till and tend
and harvest. It was out of his hands. Jonah knew that was true, but he didn’t like
that at all.

A
t last, he’d made it back.

Although it had been a week since he’d been on a bike, once Gabe swung his leg over
and grabbed the handlebars, it all came back to him. The way his fingers slid into
the molded grips, the curve of the seat—it all fit him perfectly.

“I feel like I was born on this bike,” he told Blake.

“Yeah? Well, you look like you’ve been riding a long time. My dad and I built a lot
of obstacles into the course, but you dominate out there. You got skill, man. I’m
glad you’re moving up to a bigger bike. I think you’re ready.”

Gabe grinned, warmed by the compliments. The dirt bike track had been in the back
of his mind all week, calling to him like a coyote in the night. He was eager to get
out there again, to fly through the wind and roar over the land.

“I’ve been thinking about this all week,” Gabe said.

“You like it? Sounds like you caught the bug. That’s cool.”

Gabe got off the bike and went to the assortment of helmets on
the rack. Sleek and shiny, they all looked good to Gabe. He chose a black one with
orange and red flames painted around the visor, and wondered if he could get someone
to paint flames on his buggy. He stowed his hat in the empty spot of the rack.

“I finally chose one.” Ben rolled a third bike out of the big garage.

“Took you long enough,” Blake said. “But that’s one sweet ride. Little light in the
rear.”

“Is that a good thing?” Ben asked.

“It can be. Depends on how you ride it.”

Gabe listened. He wanted to learn all there was about this motor biking, and Blake
had been doing it for a long time.

Ben tipped his hat back. “Okay. I almost forgot—we brought you some money for gas.”
Ben set the kickstand and reached down to pull up a pant leg. He fished a rolled-up
bill from his sock. “Twenty dollars.” Ben had earned the money delivering milk and
cheese for the family dairy.

“We’ll bring more next time,” Gabe said. He was annoyed that he had no way to earn
his own money. Adam didn’t understand that he was no longer a little child. He was
a man now, and though he liked working on the family farm, it was time that he earned
some money of his own.

“That’s cool. Thanks.” Blake pushed the money into a pocket of his blue jeans. “I’m
glad you guys are coming out to ride. The bikes are no good when they’re sitting here
gathering dust. But the gas gets expensive. This’ll help. So do you remember how to
work the gears and stuff?”

“I remember how to crash into a hay bale,” Ben joked.

“Yeah, I thought you got a little banged up that time.” Blake glanced toward the obstacle
course. “It’s probably pretty muddy out there with the rain we’ve been having.”

“A little mud never hurt anyone,” Gabe said.

“But it’ll be slippery. Just warning you. And if we get sick of the
track, we can head back into the woods. There’s some killer trails, but you got to
watch for other people back there.”

“Sounds good.” Gabe couldn’t imagine getting sick of riding the track. He could do
that all day and all night. He raked his hair back and pulled the helmet on.

“Ben, you need a helmet, too,” Blake called from the garage.

“Right.” Ben hurried past Gabe, joking, “Got to have a shiny hat.”

“Always gotta have a helmet, or Dad will freak.”

Gabe slipped on his helmet and started the bike’s engine. It rolled cleanly down the
paved driveway, then bumped and twisted a bit when the tires hit the soft dirt of
the trail. He gave a burst of throttle and the bike shot forward. This was what he’d
been waiting all week for—the freedom and power of a bike with a roaring engine.

A cold, gray rain filled the air, but Gabe felt like he was riding a ball of fire
through the now-familiar course. He took it easy the first time around, slowing for
the turns. Blake had been right about the mud; it slowed the bike and sometimes the
wheels spun wildly, spitting up muck behind them. He turned sharply to miss a fat
tree, and the rear wheel slid. The bike wiggled and shook under him, like a crazed
animal.

Gabe laughed, trying to regain his balance.

He pulled out of the skid and roared off with a yelp.

After an hour or so on the course, Blake suggested that they try the trail into the
woods. Gabe wasn’t so sure about leaving the privacy of Blake’s property. What if
someone saw them?

“We’ve got helmets that make us look like superheroes from comic books,” Ben said.
“Who can recognize us when we’re wearing these?”

“He’s right,” Blake said.

Gabe looked down at the helmet with the flames curling around the sides. “Okay, then.
Show us the way.”

They followed Blake down the farm access road, past mown fields
to a hilly area, too steep for good planting. Blake led them around to a narrow path
through the tall weeds. Chaff and seed went flying when Gabe went off course, but
he pulled back onto the trail as the bike dove into the damp darkness of trees.

Gabe grinned as he hit the throttle. These things that he saw every day—leaves and
brambles, weeds and tree roots—everything seemed different when he was flying past
it on a motorbike.

He gave a burst of throttle then lifted out of the seat to hop a twisted tree root—a
trick Blake had shown him. His pulse raced with the effort of jumping with the bike,
and he likened himself to a young buck, leaping and bounding through the forest.

A stone jutted out of the path ahead, and he hit the throttle to leap again. But this
time, the tires slipped on the ground, and he couldn’t get the bike up.

The rubber spun sickly against the ground, and before Gabe knew what was happening
the bike skidded off to the side. It slipped out from under him, and he went down.
Hard.

“Aarrrrr.” He rested against the sodden ground for a minute, mentally checking. Two
arms, two legs. He could still move, but his shoulder screamed with pain.

He pushed away from the ground, sat up a moment, then reached over to turn off the
growling bike.

His shoulder still reeled. He’d have a good bruise, but nothing was broken.

The drone of another bike grew louder as Ben whirred up the path. He switched direction
when he saw Gabe on the ground, heading straight for him, then skidding to a stop
in the mud.

Ben flipped up his visor. “Gabe, are you hurt?”

“Not too bad.” Gabe stood up and looked down at his pants. One side of his body was
caked in mud. His black sleeve and pants leg were brown. Mary was going to wonder
what he’d been doing on the Sabbath to get his church clothes so dirty.

“Gabe?” Ben’s mouth dropped open. “You’re bleeding.” He got off the bike and moved
behind Gabe to check it out. “Your jacket is cut clear through right up to the top.”

More damage. “I’m going to have to hide these clothes.”

“And you’ve got a cut here. Not so bad, but there’s a nasty mark on your neck.”

“I don’t care about a mark.” As soon as he said it, Gabe realized that other folks
would notice it. Adam and Mary. And Emma …

How was he going to explain it?

“Good thing you had a helmet on,” Ben said, still poking at Gabe’s back. “I can’t
see much more.”