by Jo Ann Brown
“Be careful,” she said.
“I will.” His shoulders stiffened with his resolve.
The other kinder watched and chattered with each other and her as she cut Ammon’s almost white hair. It was as fine as corn silk and clung to her fingers. She shook them to send the strands drifting to the towel on the floor.
The kitchen door opened, and Isaiah came in as Clara was finishing the last section of Andrew’s hair.
“No pizza?” she asked.
“I thought we’d go to the pizza parlor and eat it there,” he replied.
The twins cheered, and she had to put a hand on Andrew’s shoulder to keep him from jumping like the others. She made the final snips before unhooking the towel from around his neck. “There.” She shook the towel over the wastebasket, making sure the hair fell into it. “All done. As soon as I clean up, we can go for pizza.”
“But what about Onkel Isaiah?” asked Ammon, who was talking more and more each day.
At that thought, she handed the device to him, and he slipped it into place with ease. It hid behind his ear and was almost invisible beneath his hair. More than once, she’d had to peer at him to make sure it hadn’t fallen off.
“Aren’t you going to cut his hair?” Ammon continued. “It’s too long, too.”
“Ja,” interjected Nancy from where she was dancing around Isaiah with her twin sister. “Cut his hair, too! Mamm cut Andrew’s and Ammon’s and Daed’s.”
The little girl halted as she mentioned her parents. Her face didn’t crumble, but she was on the verge of tears. As she had with Andrew earlier, Clara put her arm around the youngster’s thin shoulders and gave her a gentle hug. The little girl grabbed two handfuls of Clara’s apron and pressed her face into it.
Knowing she needed to do something to lighten the mood in the kitchen, Clara asked, “Well, Isaiah, do you want me to cut your hair?”
Isaiah gave the slightest shrug, which meant the decision was in her hands. Hoping a quick trim of his hair would bring back the kinder’s gut spirits, she motioned toward the chair.
Andrew had already pulled the booster seat off it by the time Isaiah crossed the kitchen and sat. The twins gathered around the table to watch her cut his hair.
“Ready when you are,” he said with a smile and a wink for the youngsters.
She hoped they’d giggle at him, but they only grinned. She had to be content with that.
Moving behind Isaiah, she listened to the twins tease him while she wrapped the towel around his shoulders and closed it with the clothespin. Where the towel had draped over the boys to their waists, it barely covered his broad shoulders.
She averted her eyes and picked up her scissors. “Your hair is longer than the boys’ was,” she said as she clipped and combed and cut more as he watched in the mirror to make sure his hair was the proper style and length set by the district’s Ordnung.
“Getting my hair cut wasn’t at the top of my list of priorities in the past few weeks.”
“I know, but you don’t want the deacon coming around to chide you for letting it grow to your shoulders.”
He smiled. “You know if Marlin comes here, it won’t be to chide me about my hair.”
“True.” His hair was almost as soft as the boys’, but its color was much richer. “And it’s true you’d do anything to avoid his matchmaking. Even let me cut your hair.”
“You did a gut job with Ammon’s and Andrew’s, so why not?” He continued to tease her and the twins as she made sure his hair was even.
When she stepped around him to do the front, his gaze rose and locked with hers. Her fingers froze as she held a section of his hair between them. Had she believed cutting his hair would be no different from doing the boys’?
His almost gray eyes were unlike the bright blue of the kinder’s, but revealed so much more. The emotions within them were not the least bit childish. Nor was the tingling response his steady gaze created within her.
She dropped the hank of hair and started to move away. Gently he caught her wrist, keeping her where she stood.
“Don’t,” he whispered.
Don’t what? Don’t move away? Leave his hair half-cut? Look at him as if her heart was about to dance right out of her?
“Clara, it’s okay.” His quiet words wouldn’t reach the twins, who’d gotten bored and gone to color in the living room. “We know where we stand.” One corner of his mouth quirked, and she couldn’t tell if he was trying to grin or trying not to. “Okay. Where you stand and where I sit.”
She didn’t smile as she finished trimming his hair. What would he say if she said her brain had lost complete control of her heart? She knew it would be foolish to fall in love with a man who had told her right from the beginning he didn’t want to marry her. Hadn’t she learned anything from her relationship with Lonnie?
But this was different.
With Lonnie, she had fallen hard and fast, but, in retrospect, she realized it hadn’t been more than a crush and the opportunity to have a life with a man who appreciated her instead of believing she made a mess of everything, as her daed did.
But this love—and she couldn’t pretend it was anything else—for Isaiah was real.
Utterly real.
Real and unrequited, and she was a fool to heed her heart when it was leading her to a grief greater than she’d ever known.
Chapter Fourteen
The news of an Amish family in a neighboring district needing money to pay for the hospital bills after the daed severed his finger while repairing a piece of equipment spread rapidly through Paradise Springs. His two sons had been in the field with him and had swiftly brought help, so there was hope the reattached finger could be saved. Isaiah heard about the accident the next morning when one of his regular customers came in to get his horses reshod. By the time he returned home that evening, Clara had learned about the tragic events from his mamm. Reuben had told her. The family of the injured man was in their bishop’s other district.
By the next morning, someone had come to his brother’s store with a stack of flyers announcing a chicken barbecue to raise money for the family. Amos put the flyers next to the cash register where everyone could see them, and he slipped copies into each bag of groceries when people checked out. The barbecue was going to be held at the school not far from where the man’s family lived, about two miles from the Beachys’ house.
Clara offered to bring her special potato salad along with other favorite dishes, and Isaiah packed a dozen horseshoes for the men to enjoy tossing. The twins were excited to wear the new clothing she’d made for them, and Clara agreed, though the garments would come home with green splotches from playing in the grass. Vinegar would loosen the stains, and she’d made the blue dresses, dark pants and light green shirts as play clothes.
Isaiah hitched up Chip to the family buggy while Clara made sure the older twins were sitting as still as possible while they held covered dishes on their laps. The girls perched on the front seat between Clara and him. Nettie Mae held a package of napkins, and Nancy cuddled a plastic bag filled with paper cups. The youngsters looked serious about their obligations to get what they held to the school without letting it fall.
“All set?” he asked when Clara climbed in, tying her black bonnet over her kapp.
“Ja.”
“Checked the stove and the faucets?”
“Ja. I know the Bible doesn’t say we’re better safe than sorry, but it’s something my mamm taught.”
“Mine, too.” He smiled as he slapped the reins on Chip, and they began driving toward the road.
As they approached the school, the road became crowded with buggies and cars and pickup trucks. It was like a mud sale but in the summer when nobody had to worry about ruining their shoes in the mire.
The aroma of chickens
sizzling over a charcoal fire reached Isaiah before he drew the buggy to a halt. In spite of himself, his mouth watered. He hoped his stomach wouldn’t grumble and embarrass him. Parking the buggy where a boy directed, he got out and helped Clara with the kinder before he went to unhitch Chip. The boy who was handling the parking wrote the number thirty-two on the side of the buggy with a piece of chalk, then marked Chip’s halter with the same number before turning him out in a nearby field with the other horses.
By the time he was finished, Clara and the twins had vanished into the crowd. He hoped it wouldn’t take too long to find them after he delivered the horseshoes to the near side of the school where they could set up a game. The kinder’s ball field was on the other side of the building, far enough away to keep everyone safe.
Isaiah drew in another deep breath of the delicious scent of cooking chicken and the unmistakable aromas of lemonade and chocolate. As soon as he found Clara and the kinder, they’d enjoy a gut meal.
He edged through the crowd, greeting those he knew and nodding to the people he didn’t. His steps slowed when he saw Orpha standing by one table and putting out bowls of baked beans. She glanced at him, smiled and turned away to talk to Larry Nissley. Isaiah saw Larry was grinning like a fool. Larry must be the man walking out with Rose’s sister. Orpha was quick-witted, and Larry was quick to speak before he thought. Theirs would be an interesting match, but he wished them well because they looked happy together.
“Having second thoughts?” Daniel and his twin brother Micah joined him. The two dark-haired brothers looked almost identical except Daniel had a cleft in his chin and Micah didn’t.
Isaiah accepted the glass of lemonade Micah held out to him. “Second thoughts about what?”
“Orpha Mast. Word was going around you two would be making an announcement this fall.”
“You know better,” Isaiah said after he took a sip of the fragrant lemonade, “than to listen to rumors.”
“I told you.” Micah nudged his twin with his elbow. “Isaiah planning to marry Orpha was a rumor.”
“But what about the other rumor?” asked Daniel, and his eyes began to twinkle.
“Which rumor would that be?” Isaiah enjoyed his brothers’ teasing. Often when he saw Andrew and Ammon jesting with each other, he thought of how the Stoltzfus siblings always found ways to make each other laugh.
Laugh? How were they going to convince the Beachy kinder it was okay to laugh? He’d tried everything he could think of, and Clara had done the same, but the twins still refused to laugh. When asked why, their answer was the same. They’d been told not to laugh. Who could have done such a thing to young boys and girls?
“I’ll give you a hint,” Micah said. “Starts with C and sounds a lot like Clara Ebersol and you walking out together.”
“Oh, no, not you too.” He gave an emoted groan.
The twins exchanged a glance before Daniel asked, “Us too what?”
“Matchmaking.”
Micah held up his hands. “Whoa there, big brother. All I did was ask if you’d heard the rumor about you two. A simple question.”
Isaiah had to admit his brother was right. He apologized and added, “It seems anywhere I go with Clara and the kinder, someone is trying to make sure we spend time together.”
“I thought you liked her.” Daniel’s dark brows lowered. “Is there some problem with her?”
“No. She’s very nice, but nice isn’t enough to base a marriage on.”
“No?” Daniel began counting off on his fingers. “Ruth’s husband, Elmer, is a nice guy. Joshua’s Rebekah is nice. Ezra’s Leah is nice. Amos’s—”
Isaiah chuckled and held up his hands in surrender. “You don’t have to go through the whole list of our siblings and their spouses to make your point.”
“Gut.”
“But in addition to being nice people, our siblings’ spouses are in love with our brothers and sisters.”
“And Clara is in love with you.” Jeremiah, the brother who was a year younger than Isaiah, said from behind him.
Looking over his shoulder, Isaiah hid his shock. Jeremiah was the quiet one in their family. He spoke only when he believed he had something to add to the conversation. He was the least likely to try to get a rise out of someone or to tease them. If anyone in the family could be described as serious, it was Jeremiah. And Jeremiah was saying Clara was in love with Isaiah, as if it were the least unexpected news in the world.
“She loves the kinder, not me.” Something sliced into his heart at his own words. “Once the twins’ family comes for them, she’ll head home. End of story.”
“Stories often end with happily-ever-after.” Daniel’s smile broadened. Draping an arm over Jeremiah’s shoulders, he said, “I saw ice cream being brought out. You know you’ll want a sample.”
Isaiah was relieved when the two walked away, but was surprised when Micah remained. He liked ice cream as much as Jeremiah did, and they’d often vied to see who could get the last spoonful out of the container.
He waited for his brother to say something, but when Micah remained silent, he asked, “How are you doing, Micah?”
“You know how you’re annoyed about matchmaking?”
“Ja.”
“That’s how irked I get when someone asks me how I am. And there have been a lot asking since Katie Kay Lapp left the community.”
“That’s very irked.”
Micah nodded. “Very, very irked.”
“But how are you?” Isaiah asked, serious. “And I’m not asking because of Katie Kay.”
“I’m fine, and that hasn’t changed because she’s gone. Katie Kay and I were something I thought might work out some day, but it’s not going to happen.”
“Sorry that—”
“Don’t be sorry, Isaiah. I’m not.” He winked and chuckled. “To prove that, I’ll tell you that I’ve noticed Tillie Mast giving me the eye lately. Maybe I’ll see if she needs a ride home tonight.”
“Be careful with a Mast girl. Curtis and Ida Mae are ready to marry them off to anyone who looks at them twice.”
Micah laughed and slapped him on the shoulder. “Look who’s talking. The man everyone is talking about. They’re interested in whether you’ll marry Orpha or Clara by year’s end. I’ve been asked about that close to a thousand times.”
“You’re exaggerating.”
“Ja, but not by much. Hey, it’s my turn to toss horseshoes. See you later, bro.”
Isaiah smiled as his brother crossed the schoolyard to where the horseshoe games were underway. Micah had picked up a lot of Englisch slang while working on various construction projects with Englischers.
Where were Clara and the twins? The crowd seemed to be growing by the minute, and he wanted to make sure those hungry youngsters got fed before the food was gone.
When he found them, the boys were already discussing if they wanted their chicken with the barbecue sauce or without. The girls were more interested in the pretty cakes set in a row on a pair of tables. They smiled, along with Clara, when he suggested they join the line waiting to select what they wanted.
It took him and Clara as well as Neva Fry to get their six plates from the serving line to one of the blankets spread on the grass. He thanked the schoolteacher, who waved and hurried to help other parents with more kinder than hands to load and carry plates.
They enjoyed the delicious meal, and he smiled when the boys asked about getting seconds. Nobody left hungry from an Amish fund-raising meal. He went with the boys to get more chicken and sides. Though he wondered how they’d eat everything, their plates were soon clean again.
“Why don’t we walk around a bit before dessert?” Clara asked when the twins began to discuss which sweets they wanted. “Let what we’ve eaten settle a bit.”
“The best idea
I’ve heard in a long time.” Isaiah pushed himself to his feet and smiled as he offered his hand to help her up. When she smiled and let him take her hand, his heart felt lighter than it had in longer than he could recall. Though she withdrew her fingers from his as she turned to help the kinder pick up their plates and forks so they could carry them to one of the long plastic washtubs, she wasn’t scurrying away as she had before.
He was too aware of her fingers close to his as they walked side by side among the crowd. He itched to grasp hold of her slender hand, but he couldn’t be unaware of the eyes following them and the twins. Giving the rumors substance would be the worst thing he could do for her, the twins and himself. Clara would be leaving once the kinder were settled. He couldn’t forget that, but he also knew he’d never forget her.
“Isaiah, can I talk to you for a moment?” came an all-too-familiar voice from behind him.
He turned to see Orpha. “Certainly.”
“If you’ll excuse us,” Clara began, reaching to herd the twins away.
Orpha put out her hand. “No, please stay, Clara. You should hear this, too.”
When Clara bent and whispered something to the twins, they nodded and scampered away toward where his mamm was putting plates of cookies and sliced pieces of pie on a folding table. Isaiah smiled, realizing Ammon had been able to hear Clara’s soft voice as the others did. What a blessing she’d been in the kinder’s lives as well as in his!
“I don’t want to keep you, but I do want to say I’m sorry.” Orpha rubbed her hands together as she looked from him to Clara. “I shouldn’t have taken out my frustration with my parents on the two of you. Neither of you have been anything but kind to me.” She turned to Clara. “What you said at Hersheypark about spreading vitriol made me realize how I was making you into scapegoats. Danki for the reminder that our Lord taught us to treat each other as we’d want to be treated. And I wasn’t, but I’m going to try harder to do that.”
