Jenny's Choice (Apple Creek Dreams #3) (28 page)
Read Jenny's Choice (Apple Creek Dreams #3) Online
Authors: Patrick E Craig
“You showed me that, Lord!” Jenny cried out. “You showed me that Mama and Papa had a special kind of love. The kind that only comes once.”
Yes,
dochter,
a special love. And I gave that kind of love to you too.
“When you gave me Jonathan.”
Yes, Jenny, I gave you what you always needed, and what you will never need again.
“Because it was enough…because loving Jonathan was enough for me, because it was real love. Love born of You, Lord, and not from my own needs.”
Jenny knelt beside her bed and spoke to her
Gott.
“Thank You, Lord, for the gift of Jonathan. Thank You that our love was born in Your heart and was pure and complete. Thank You, Lord, for my papa, who showed Jonathan and me how a real man loves his wife. And thank You, Lord, for my precious mama, who showed me that one love is more than enough for any woman if it is true love. Thank You, Lord, for showing me on the night they died that they were two lives with one heart. And now I know that is how it was with Jonathan and me. We were two lives with one heart.”
And you still are, My
dochter,
you still are.
After that night, Jenny felt the turmoil and the emptiness slipping away. There were many questions still to be settled, but now she had a surety in her heart that the Lord would give her the answer. And He did in a most unusual way.
One night Bobby Halverson had come by after work. The three of them shared a meal of fried chicken and mashed potatoes with corn and beans on the side. When dinner was over Bobby had pushed back his chair and groaned.
“Jenny, you sure learned how to cook from your mama.”
Jenny smiled and said, “Jonathan used to say that my cooking had become at least edible over the years we were together.”
“It’s more than edible, Jenny. It’s downright good eatin’. What do you think, Rachel?”
“My mama makes the best fried chicken ever!”
“Even better than
Grosmudder
?”
“
Ja
, Uncle Bobby, even better.”
Bobby put his hands on his full stomach and smiled. “Well, Jonathan must have been pulling your leg, Jenny.”
They both fell silent for a moment.
“I miss Jonathan,” Bobby said. “He was a wonderful young man.”
“Yes, he was, Uncle Bobby. The years I spent with him in Paradise were the happiest of my life.”
“Jenny, do you think you’ll ever marry again?”
“Funny you should ask, Uncle Bobby. A man I like very much has asked me, but—”
“But he’s not Jonathan, is he?”
Bobby smiled and Jenny laughed.
“Why is it that everyone says that to me, even the Lord?”
“Because it’s true, Mama,” Rachel chipped in.
“Well, I have turned him down again. I sent him a letter yesterday. He is a very good man, but—”
“But he is not Jonathan,” Bobby and Rachel said together.
They all laughed. It felt good.
Finally Bobby asked, “Jenny, if Paradise was the place you were the happiest, why don’t you go home?”
“Home, Uncle Bobby? But this is my home.”
“Is it really, Jenny? Reuben and Jerusha are gone, and this house is just a house now. If you’re going to live out your years, why don’t you go back to Paradise? Seems to me that’s really your home. Doesn’t the Bible say something about that?”
“Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife,” Jenny replied.
“Seems that would go for a woman too.”
“Uncle Bobby, are you trying to get rid of me?”
“No, Jenny. I just see you drifting here. You don’t know what to do with yourself. You used to read me things you had written, but you haven’t done that in a while—not since…” Bobby paused. “Jenny, I think you should sell the place and go back home to the place you and Jonathan made together. Just a thought.”
Jenny sat silent for a moment and then said, “If I go back to Paradise, would you come live with us?”
“
Me
?” Bobby said with surprise in his voice.
“Yes, you. You’re the only real family I have left, and from what you say, I’m the only family you have. Your mom and dad are gone, and
you’ve been sheriff a long time. Isn’t it about time for you to retire? I have more than a hundred acres of land, and there’s a small house on the property that
Grossdaadi
Borntraeger’s helpers used to live in. It would be perfect for you.”
“Well, I have been thinking about retiring. It’s been almost twenty-five years, and it is wearing me out. But what would I do there?”
“First of all, you would be with two people who love you, and we would take care of you. And second, you could help on the farm or go hunting or just sit around if you felt like it.”
Bobby had a bemused expression on his face. “It’s a very interesting proposition. Let me think on it. It would be strange leaving Apple Creek, but I suppose I could get used to it. Especially if we had chicken like this about three times a week. What do you say about me coming, Rachel?”
“Yay!” Rachel shouted. “I say yes!”
“Okay, Jenny,” Uncle Bobby said. “I’ll give it some thought. I can’t promise anything, but I’ll definitely consider it. And what about you?”
“You know, I think you may be right about Paradise. It was the one place that I really felt was my own home—a home I made for Jonathan and me. Maybe I should go back. I think I would see it in a different way if I did.”
“You let me know what you’re going to do, and I’ll help you any way I can. Now, how about we go sit on the couch and have some rhubarb pie?”
Rachel clapped her hands. “Yay again!”
In the days that followed, Jenny realized that the Lord had been speaking to her through Bobby. The thought of going home to Paradise grew on her until she knew moving back was what she should do. So she went to Johann Troyer and talked to him about it.
“We will be sorry to see you go. But it’s not as though the Springers
and the Hershbergers will be gone from Apple Creek. Your family is deeply rooted here.”
“I’ve spoken to Papa’s brother, Amos, who lives in Galion,
Bisschop
Troyer. He has always loved our place and would give me a very fair price for it. Mama’s brother died long ago, but my mama’s cousin has been farming
Grossdaadi
Hershberger’s farm for many years. So that land would stay in the Hershberger family.”
“
Ja, das ist gut
,” Johann said. “You are a Borntraeger by blood. To go back where you made your home on the Borntraeger farm in Paradise
würde ein sehr gutes Ding sein
, a good thing indeed. I will help you however I can.”
The next month was a blur. Jenny packed up the things that were important and sent them ahead—her mother’s dishes, some of her clothing, and Jerusha’s collection of quilts. She shipped a few pieces of furniture off to Paradise, including her desk and her mama’s porch swing, and the rest she left for Amos. She kept the Rose of Sharon quilt with her. Her Uncle Amos came, and they went through Reuben’s tools. Amos kept many of them, and what he didn’t want, Jenny gave to Henry Lowenstein, who was delighted to take them.
“When I was a kid, your dad used to teach me how to use these,” he said. “I’d hang out in his shop, and we would talk about all kinds of things. He’s the one who told me about Jesus, and it’s the greatest gift he ever gave me. I’ll think of him every time I use these tools.”
“Henry, it’s not that far to Paradise. Won’t you come and visit us?”
Henry brightened at the idea. “Why, sure, Jenny. I’d love to. I could make it there in about six hours. That would be great. And by the way, don’t ask anybody else to drive you there because I’m going to. I’ve been driving the Springers and the Hershbergers for too many years to quit now.”
Bobby helped her sort out a lot of the other things, and soon the
day came when they closed the house on Richenbaugh Lane for the last time. Jenny stood on the lawn with Bobby and Rachel and said goodbye to the old place. Then she turned to Bobby.
“Have you thought any more about my offer?”
“I’ve been thinking it over, Jenny. I can’t come yet because I need to finish out my last term before I retire. But I might come visit in the spring and see how I like it.”
She took his arm as they walked to Henry’s car. “Yes, Uncle Bobby, that would be wonderful. I’ll look for you when the daffodils start to bloom.”
When I left Paradise in 1978, it was a time of great bitterness in my soul. The days were dark, my heart was empty, and my future stretched away before me like some great desert—a place of burning sands and bitter winds. Thorns came up in my palaces, and nettles and brambles, and my life became the habitation of dragons.
But today I look homeward, and though my heart is weary with the adversities of the last years and I bear their scars like great scourgings, in my heart a joy begins to rise as I remember the words from Isaiah 51 and Ezekiel 36.
I will make your wilderness like Eden, and your desert like the garden of the Lord; joy and gladness shall be found therein, thanksgiving, and the voice of melody.
And they shall say, this land that was desolate is become like a garden.
And I will dwell among the trees of Eden, and I will be glad.
“The Trees of Eden”
from the journals of Jenny Hershberger