A Stranger's Wish (17 page)

I quickly toweled myself dry and hurried upstairs to dress. The morning was brisk, forecasting colder days coming. Soon I’d be seeing my breath and longing for the comforts of central heating. I needed to talk to Jake about electric baseboard heat.

The big kitchen stove was still warm when I finally came down, so I scrambled myself an egg and enjoyed it with a cup of tea and some potato rusk Mary had baked yesterday.

By seven thirty Mary and I were in my car, ready to leave for the Bird-in-Hand farmers’ market on 340. The back of the car was filled with jar upon jar of Mary’s delicious preserved goods—chowchow, tomatoes, tomato juice, salsa, green beans, beets, pickles, pickled melon, and relishes. Two large boxes were filled with bags of homemade potato chips and breads.

Though the Bird-in-Hand farmers’ market was neither the biggest nor best known in the area, it was good sized and convenient for Mary. We transferred all her goods from the car to a booth in the market and arranged them for sale. At eight thirty the doors opened, late for a farmers’ market but early for the tourists who often visited it.

“Don’t bother coming back for me,” Mary said as she accepted money from her first customer. “I’ll find a ride home.”

I walked around the market, enjoying the sights and smells and sounds. The largest crowd stood patiently before the meat counter, waiting to buy fresh beef and pork products.

“I just love the ham loaf they sell. It has pork in it as well as ground ham,” said a well-endowed woman with her sunglasses perched on top of her head.

The Mennonite woman standing beside her nodded. “We love the homemade sausage.”

A pair of Amish women sat behind a display of handbraided rugs chatting in Pennsylvania Dutch as they waited for customers. When I stopped to admire their handiwork, they immediately switched to English.

“May we help you?”

I smiled and shook my head. As I turned away, the women picked up their Dutch conversation where they had dropped it.

It fascinated me that, though basically what most people (including me) would call undereducated, the Amish were trilingual. At home they spoke their Pennsylvania Dutch dialect, a form of German,
Deutsch
having somewhere through the years become
Dutch
. They spoke English to non-Amish, and used High German for religious and ceremonial occasions.

The Zooks, ever gracious, always spoke English in my presence, though on the occasions I had come home to find a house full of company, they had all been speaking Dutch. As Mary introduced me around, everyone spoke politely in English. However as soon as I moved on, the conversations reverted to Dutch.

I left the market and drove to the nearest Christian bookstore, spending time searching for new teaching ideas for kindergarten church. I was starting a month’s teaching on the first Sunday in October, and I felt I hadn’t planned my program very well yet in spite of the materials given me. Perfectionist that I was, I didn’t like the unprepared feeling. I skimmed several books of ideas and programs and decided on three. Only one month serving but three books of ideas. Overkill as usual.

Just before I left, I went to the section where books on counseling and psychology were displayed. Clarke’s book was there, prominently promoted under a sign that read “local author.” To keep my promise, I bought one.

“Good book,” the woman at the register said. “Nice man. My daughter has him for a class at Lancaster Bible College.”

“Yes,” I said. “He’s a personal friend.”

I smiled all the way to my car because the woman and her daughter liked Clarke. Stupid.

But Clarke wasn’t my problem. Todd was. I was so glad I’d committed to helping Mary today since her usual ride to the market was away for the weekend. It was a ready excuse when Todd asked me to go with him to his family reunion. I flinched at the idea of being introduced to curious and hopeful relatives as “Todd’s girl.” In many ways he was my closest friend, but the problem was that he didn’t want to be my friend, and I now recognized that I didn’t want him to be anything else.

I spent the rest of the morning at Rockvale Outlet Mall just east of Lancaster City, wandering from store to store, buying an item here and there.

“Mom! It’s my art teacher!” more than one dumbfounded kid whispered to a harried parent as I passed. There was something about seeing a teacher in the real world that undid kids. One of my most vocal and active six-year-olds stood in line behind me in one store, struck dumb and paralyzed as she held on to her mother’s shirt. I smiled at the girl and said, “Hello, Hillary,” but she didn’t even blink.

“Thank you for being here,” her mother said to me. “It’s the first time she’s been quiet all day.”

In the lingerie outlet, I selected a slip with a great froth of lace at the hem. As I waited my turn at the cash register, I stood behind a young Amish girl about Ruth’s age, lovely in her caped dress, apron, and head covering. She was buying a slip, panties, and padded bra in a brilliant shade of yellow. I couldn’t help wonder whether she’d hang her purchases on the clothesline with the family’s somber clothes, or if she’d keep them hidden from the eyes of the general populace, especially her mother and father. I suspected the latter. A little
rumspringa
rebellion, I decided.

On my way back to the farm I stopped at the Bird-in-Hand Bakery, surprised that with the swarm of tourists I actually found a parking place in their tiny lot. Before I went into the bakery, I climbed the stairs to the quilt shop on the second level. I loved looking at the fabric works of art. For many Amish women, quilting satisfied the need to create beautiful things, and quilts, of course, were acceptable because they were so functional.

I thought of Mary and her love of beauty and her artist’s eye. I’d seen her yearning as she studied my painting of the barn. It occurred to me that while the creative urge was a broad human instinct, the way we wanted to create was highly individual. Quilting, as intricate and artistic as it could be, wouldn’t satisfy me. I needed paint and brush, and I suspected that for her inner urge to be satisfied, Mary did too.

I wandered around, separating the great dowels on which the quilts hung so I could see the different patterns and color combinations more clearly. At one point I turned to see if the quilt I was studying really did match a pillow I’d seen earlier. I almost plowed into a man wearing a baseball cap standing behind me as he looked at quilted table runners.

“Sorry,” I muttered as I stepped around him. He didn’t acknowledge me; he just turned away to study the quilted hangings on the far wall. Poor man, dragged up here by his wife, probably trying to hold on to his patience. And fearful she’d want one of the big quilts with their big price tags.

I spotted some pretty postcards with paintings of quilts reproduced on them. They probably caught my eye because I was used to pictures of buggies against the sunset or in the morning mist. I studied the cards and then turned them over to read the credit on the back. Susie Riehl. A new name to me. The information said she was an Old Order Amish woman.

I blinked. An Old Order Amish woman who not only painted but had her work reproduced and sold? How fascinating and how very unusual. Did Mary know about this woman? Did she even realize another woman was doing what she so clearly yearned to do? I bought several of the cards to show her.

I went downstairs and bought a whoopie pie in the bakery. I loved those small chocolate cakes with white icing between. I got a diet soda to assuage my guilt over the whoopie pie’s calories and sat in the car to eat and drink. The only thing missing was an Auntie Anne’s pretzel. Auntie Anne, Anne Beiler, had been raised Amish in Lancaster County, though she’d left the People many years ago. If I was going to ruin my dinner appetite, I might as well do it big time.

I opened today’s
Intelligencer Journal
as I chewed and looked at the handsome, photogenic faces of Adam and Irene Hurlbert at a political gala the previous evening. With them was retiring United States Senator Vernon Poltor, smiling broadly in his support for Adam.

I was pleased. Each day it appeared more and more certain that the Hurlberts would be in Washington in a matter of weeks. One nice sidelight to Adam’s election would be the passing from Lancaster of one Nelson Carmody Hurlbert, aged nine. All the more reason to vote in November.

As I drove slowly back to the farm, I saw a sign for a yard sale and a yard full of tables still littered with items. On a whim I pulled over and climbed out. I didn’t expect to find anything because it was late enough in the morning that the true salers would have taken everything of genuine value.

But I fell in love the moment I spotted the red high-top Converse sneakers sitting beside an aqua vase with a pink rose twined about its base. The Chucks were barely worn, and they were my size. I shoved the two dollars in the woman’s hand and ran before she decided she couldn’t part with such a treasure.

I was wearing a pair of red walking shorts with a red-and-yellow knit top. I had on my matching red flip-flops, but I sat in the car and slipped them off. I slid the Chucks on and laced them up.

They were perfect.

“Perfectly ugly,” my mother would say, and for the courtroom, she was correct. But for me on the farm, they were just right.

I pulled onto the road, driving around a car whose driver looked a lot like the guy back in the quilt shop. At least his cap did. He was studying some old 75 RPM records.
What a nice, patient husband,
I thought. Maybe if he didn’t like the records, he’d like the pair of old baseball cleats beside the nesting mixing bowls so used that their original design was worn off.

I was almost back to the farm when a car backed hastily out of a driveway without checking for oncoming traffic. I stamped on my brakes and squealed to a stop, my front bumper inches from his back one. The young Amish driver, identifiable by his haircut and shirt, screeched off, never even looking my way. A second car followed none too gently, but its young Amish driver, his straw hat pushed back on his head, did remember to look before he roared into the street. He was obviously very unhappy.

With some surprise, I realized I was stopped in front of Aunt Betty Lou and Uncle Bud’s house. As I waited for my heart to regain its normal rhythm after the close brush with a collision, I watched Clarke in the driveway talking with yet another Amish boy, who climbed into a third car and drove off after his companions. Clarke followed him down the drive to watch him on his way.

I lowered my window. “Whatever’s going on?”

He walked over. “It’s the Stoltzfus brothers. They all have cars and keep them hidden in the cornfields most of the time. At least they thought they were hidden.” Clarke grinned. “Ammon Stoltzfus is nobody’s fool, and he told his boys to get all the cars off the property. Church is at their house tomorrow, and he doesn’t want anyone accidentally finding one.”

“So they parked here?”

“And forgot to ask permission. I guess they figured that anyone with a long driveway wouldn’t mind a few extra cars for a night or two. Unfortunately for them, Aunt Betty Lou happened to be looking out the window as they were parking. The boys seemed to have trouble understanding that she wants her drive free for her own guests this evening.”

“Are they related to the Stoltzfus boy who was shunned? Jake’s friend?”

“Cousins. Their uncle, Big Nate, would be very upset if he saw those cars. By the way, I’ve been trying to get hold of you.”

I hoped my eyes didn’t light up as obviously as I feared they did. “I’ve been shopping.” I indicated my packages.

“So I see.” He made believe he was counting the packages. “And doing a thorough job of it too.”

“You wanted to talk to me?” I said to divert his attention from my profligacy.

“Right. Aunt Betty Lou decided this morning that she’d like to have one last cookout as the summer fades into memory. She told me to invite someone, so…I know it’s very last minute, but can you come to dinner?”

I was inordinately pleased. I hadn’t seen Clarke to talk to since the tomato fight and had feared he wasn’t interested in me at all, especially since he’d watched me leave for a date with Todd.

“I’d love to come,” I said. “What time?” I thought of my new jeans lying in a bag on the backseat. I thought of my red V-neck shirt and the white camisole to go under it. I thought of a hairbrush and toothbrush, rouge and lipstick.

“How about six o’clock?”

“Plenty of time to make myself beautiful—or as close to it as possible.”

“You look fine to me.”

I looked up at him, astonished. “I didn’t realize you had such a severe vision problem.”

He grinned. “I’ll walk down for you, okay?”

I nodded. When had I last felt a fluttering in my stomach over a date? I wasn’t sure I’d ever felt it this badly.

“By the way,” he said, “I love your sneakers.”

I looked at my feet, resting on the floor of the car, astonished. “Really?”

“They make quite a statement. Be sure you wear them tonight.”

I drove the short distance to the Zooks, examining the fact that Clarke liked my footwear. He didn’t look askance. He didn’t make snide comments about how ridiculous they were. He took them as the over-the-top fashion statement they were, no more, no less.

I could get used to such acceptance very easily.

12

I
walked into the house to find that Mary still wasn’t home from the farmers’ market and Ruth was working with black permanent press fabric at the treadle sewing machine.

“What are you making?” Ever nosy, I walked over to see. I find anyone who makes something from scratch very impressive. The last time I had sewn was in a class in junior high. We had to make blouses, and mine somehow had sleeves of two different lengths and button holes that didn’t match the placement of the buttons.

“It’s a dress for Mom.”

I wondered how they had decided it was time for Mary to have a new dress. The decision wasn’t dependent on changing fashions, as many of my purchases were. The caped dresses had been the same forever. Well, slight exaggeration, but for a very, very long time.