by Amy Lillard
Mamm pulled the buggy to a stop and hopped down. She hobbled her horse and nodded toward the box of goods sitting on the back seat of the carriage.
“Can you grab that box?” Then she shook her head. “No, I got it.”
Tillie sighed. “I’m pregnant, not crippled.”
Eunice shook her head. “You’re testy, prickly as a cactus,” Mamm said. “I didn’t want you to get it because I want you to get the sack.”
The cool wind slapped against Tillie’s heated cheeks. “I guess you’re right. I’m sorry.”
“Matilda Sue, stop apologizing. We are a family, and we will get through this no matter what. Because that’s what families do. Jah?”
Tillie had to blink back tears once again. “Jah.”
A screen door slammed and they both turned toward the sharp sound. Levi Yoder stood on the porch in his shirtsleeves. With his hat covering his dark hair and his beard shadowing the lower half of his face, he looked a bit menacing standing there, unwelcoming, like a bear who’d had his hibernation disturbed. It was so very obvious that the man was grieving.
All the more reason to be neighborly, Mamm would say.
“Hello, Levi Yoder.” Mamm waved cheerfully at him.
He raised one hand in a return salute. “Eunice Gingerich, what brings you here?”
“My daughter and I came out to make sure that you’re set for Christmas.”
He nodded but didn’t move from his place in front of the door. It was almost as if he was blocking them from getting any closer to his house. “I am. Danki.”
Mamm was not to be deterred. “Well, now you’ll be extra ready.” She grabbed the box from the back of the buggy and started toward Levi Yoder.
* * *
Levi wasn’t sure whether to help the ladies in order to expedite their trip or to go inside, lock the door, and hope they just went away.
Jah, he wanted to be left alone. Jah, his sister came out on a regular basis and aggravated him beyond belief. Jah, the rest of the women in the district had looked after him as well. And for that he was truly grateful. But what did a man have to do to be left alone for a couple of hours around here?
But he had lived in Pontotoc his entire life, and he knew the force that was Eunice Gingerich. If she set her mind to help someone, she did it. It seemed as if today, she had set her sights on him.
The worst bother of the company? It was Tillie Gingerich.
Tillie and the baby she carried.
He expelled a sigh that even to his own ears sounded a little more like a growl and made his way down the porch steps. He met her halfway between the buggy and the house. “Let me take that.”
She relinquished the box to him without argument. Wonderful smells emanated from it. More food. Perhaps the one thing he didn’t need. He had half a mind to take it down to the bridge under the freeway at the edge of town and leave it for some of the homeless people to have. He hated the thought of it going to waste almost as much as he hated the thought of having to eat it all himself. There was only so much a man could force himself to do.
“Are you ready for Christmas?” Eunice gave him a bright smile.
Levi grunted and he hoped it passed for an answer.
Tillie didn’t say a word, just trailed behind them as he led the way up the porch steps and held the door open for them. Eunice’s youngest daughter carried a sack full of what looked suspiciously like limbs from a cedar tree.
It was a full-on invasion, and Levi settled himself for a morning of company. With any luck, since Mims had come over the day before, she wouldn’t come today.
“I got some coffee on the stove if you have a mind for a warm-up,” Levi said. He might be hurting, he might be in mourning, and he might wish that the world would go away, but he still had his good manners.
Tillie set the sack down next to his couch and rubbed her hands together. “Coffee would be wonderful.”
He expected they would talk about him as he left the room and went into the kitchen, but to his surprise, they followed behind him. They had coffee poured before he could even tell them where the cups were stored. Or, rather, Eunice did. Tillie hovered around the doorway as if she would rather have been anywhere but in his kitchen.
Was his inhospitable nature that obvious to her? Or maybe she had her own reasons for not wanting to be there? He handed Eunice the container of snickerdoodle cookies that Mims had made the day before, then studied Tillie Gingerich.
She was beautiful, he supposed, in the way all pregnant women were. Even though no one was allowed to talk about it. She was round and serene, even if she did look a bit unhappy. Or maybe the word was uncomfortable? Her eyes held a knowing light as if now she knew the secrets to it all. It was one thing about women—mothers—that amazed him. Once they gave birth, it was as if they knew more about the universe than any man alive.
He shook his head at himself.
“No?” Eunice asked. “You don’t want a cookie?”
She seemed crushed that he wasn’t going to eat one of his own cookies, so he grabbed one from the container.
“Let’s sit,” Eunice said.
If he didn’t know any better, he would think that Eunice was trying to do a bit of matchmaking between him and Tillie. But that was impossible. Or maybe he was just too incredibly sensitive now that the holidays were here. Had he ever gotten a chance not to be sensitive? No, not since Mary died. He hadn’t had the chance at all.
With any luck though, this visit would be short. Just neighbors trying to be neighborly, helping out someone they thought was in need. He supposed that to most he was in need. But to himself, he needed only peace and quiet.
“Your dog . . .” Tillie started, then trailed off.
“Jah,” Levi said. “Any day now, I think.”
As if she knew they were talking about her, Puddles thumped her tail against the floor without raising her chin from her paws. It seemed she laid that way most times these days, and it made Levi wonder if it was the only comfortable position the poor dog could find. From the look of her, she was going to have ten or twelve pups running around very soon.
“I’ve always liked cattle dogs,” Tillie said. Her voice held an amusing tone, almost wispy and whimsical.
“You can have a puppy if you have a mind.”
Tillie snapped her gaze from Puddles’s place near the potbellied stove back to Levi. “No,” she said with a shake of her head. “That’s very kind of you to offer, but—” She didn’t finish the rest. It wasn’t so kind of him to offer. He was going to have a bunch of puppies to find homes for soon, but more than anything it was what she didn’t say. She wasn’t going to have time to look after a puppy soon, and about the time Puddles’s litter would be ready to go to homes, Tillie Gingerich would have a newborn baby to look after.
Levi waved away his words. “If you know someone.”
Eunice smiled. “It’s a shame she didn’t give birth earlier. You could have had great Christmas presents for people. I know a lot of kids in the area would love to have a puppy for Christmas.”
Tillie sat up a little straighter in her seat. “Mamm, what about Peter?”
Levi searched his brain to figure out who Peter was to the Gingeriches but couldn’t come up with an answer. “They won’t be ready to go home in time for Christmas,” he said unnecessarily. It was less than two weeks away.
“But if he has the promise of a puppy . . .” Tillie left the rest unsaid.
Eunice beamed her daughter a huge smile. “I think that’s a great idea.” She turned to Levi. “Could you save one for a little boy who would take very good care of it?”
“Of course.” It was one less puppy to have to worry about when the time came.
“You remember Leah?” Eunice asked.
Levi nodded. He did. Leah was Hannah’s twin. They were a little older than he and David, but in a community the size of Pontotoc, most everyone knew most everyone else. Leah had gotten married a couple of years back to a man named Jamie, if he was
remembering correctly, who had a son named Peter. Right. There was more to the story, but for the life of him Levi couldn’t remember it all. Just that Jamie—if that was his name—and Leah were Mennonite, and Peter was their son. Or he was now. And it seemed this boy needed a dog, like most boys do. He would have kept one of Puddles’s puppies as his own, strictly for the baby Mary carried. He had known after everything was said and done that the baby was a boy. His son. His son would’ve had a puppy to grow up with. Now he would keep a puppy because he wanted it. Perhaps even more than one, depending on whether or not he found them homes. Not that it mattered overly much. What was a farm without dogs?
Eunice drummed her knuckles against the tabletop. “It’s settled, then. I’ll send word to Leah when we get back home. Danki, Levi Yoder.”
“You’re welcome.” A smile touched his lips. It felt strange there, and he realized it was the first time he’d smiled in a very long time.
* * *
“What happened in here?” Mims stood in his living room and whirled in a circle.
“It’s not that bad.” In fact, Levi had just about gotten used to it. Almost.
“Are those cedar tree boughs?” She eyed the mantel suspiciously.
“Cedar is very festive this time of year.”
Mims propped her hands on her hips. “Cedar might be festive, but my brother isn’t. What happened?”
Levi sighed. “Eunice and Tillie Gingerich.” Well, mainly Eunice. Everyone in their district knew that Eunice meant well and all that. But when she set her mind to something, there was no getting her off of it. Case in point, his living room.
Trimmed, fresh cedar boughs lay across his mantelpiece, with white candles dotted throughout. When he lit them, they smelled like cookies. Tillie had said they were vanilla scented, but to him that was the same as cookies. They had brought red pillowcases to cover any throw pillows he had on his couch and a red, white, and green afghan that Mammi Glick had crocheted. When he had protested that it was too much, Eunice waved away his concerns. Ever since Mammi Glick broke her hip a few years back, she hadn’t been quite as agile as she was before. Now she spent most of her days crocheting and working word puzzles. Eunice assured him that her mother would be greatly offended if he turned down her gift of a Christmas afghan to brighten his holiday season. So there it was.
Actually, he kind of liked it. Even though he didn’t want to be reminded that Christmas was so near, something about the small little touches that Eunice and Tillie had left in his house had him feeling a little more comforted about the upcoming holiday.
It was ridiculous, of course, but he was going with it.
Mims immediately lost her starchy attitude. She smiled at him, her eyes twinkling with that sisterly love. “I’m proud of you, Levi,” she said. “Who knows? Before long, you won’t be a curmudgeon after all.”
Chapter Nine
“You really think I’m a curmudgeon?”
Levi did his best to make his voice sound nonchalant. It was Tuesday, and he and Mims were on their way to their cousin’s wedding. He had searched half the morning trying to come up with an adequate excuse not to attend, but his conscience kept coming back, telling him that he had promised. So there he sat on a cold morning, headed to a wedding he didn’t really want to go to with a sister he loved almost more than anything else in the world. The things she got him to do.
Maybe that was the secret: stop hanging out with Mims. But he figured that would break his heart. She was his best friend, after all.
Mims stared straight ahead as if she hadn’t heard his question.
Or maybe she was ignoring it.
Or maybe she doesn’t want to tell you the truth.
“I’ll take that as a yes.” The thought shouldn’t hurt Levi’s feelings, but somehow it did. Never in his life had he wanted to be a curmudgeon, only a husband, a father, and eventually a grandfather. Nothing special, nothing more than a leatherworking farmer. Or maybe that was the problem—maybe he hadn’t thought past occupation to attitude.
“You didn’t used to be,” Mims finally said. Still she looked straight ahead, so intent on what was in front of her that it took Levi a second to realize that she really had spoken.
“I miss them, you know. Mary.” And he missed the baby. The thought of the baby. The planning and dreaming, and everything else that went with being an expectant parent. He supposed first babies were different than second babies, but he wasn’t sure. He hadn’t had a chance to go through either.
“I know.” Mims patted his knee. “I just worry that you’re going to miss a few opportunities because of it.” She chose her words carefully, he could tell. She was worried that he would become too angry, too wrapped up in his own problems to be able to see salvation when it came.
Salvation? Was that what he was after?
Fanciful words.
“It’s only been two months.”
“I know,” she said. “And in just a few more weeks it will be three. Then, before you know it, a year.” She shifted in her seat and once again kept her eyes straight ahead. The cold had turned her nose red, and her breath crystallized with every exhale. “I worry about you.”
“No need to worry,” Levi said. He injected as much cheer into his voice as any curmudgeon could. And he was proud of the effect, even if he did say so himself. He sounded downright jovial.
“But you can’t lock yourself away.”
“Mims.” His tone was both warning and beseeching.
“You can’t stop living, Levi.”
Couldn’t he? He felt like he had whether he wanted to or not. Though if he was truly being honest with himself, each day was a little easier. That was, until Christmas. “Just let me get through the holidays. I’ll go to as many weddings and get-togethers and what-have-yous as you want. Whatever else you want me to go to. But after Christmas.”
“You think waiting will help?”
He didn’t really have an answer for that. But he was saved having to come up with one as they pulled into the drive at their cousin’s house.
The crowd had already gathered, of course. Family members who came early to help. The attendants and such who had spent the night before. Buggies were already parked in neat rows at one end of the pasture. It was a lot like church. People came, stayed awhile, clear to the afternoon, even. At least second weddings didn’t last as long. It was one more thing he had to be grateful for.
He pulled the buggy alongside the others and hopped down. Another cousin greeted him, took the reins, and unhitched the horse while he talked about the weather and whether it was going to come a storm like all the English meteorologists claimed. To look at the sky today a person would think it had never snowed in the history of that sky. Clear blue and bright. He supposed John David couldn’t have picked a better day to get wed. And still Levi wished he was somewhere else.
* * *
It was a definite toss-up. Tillie glanced around the crowd of people gathered for her cousin Amanda’s wedding. Everyone seemed intent on having a great time, celebrating with the special couple, but it was definitely a fifty-fifty split when it came to people noticing her and her enlarged state. She was fairly certain that after all was said and done and everyone went home and the wedding escapades had been recounted once and then again, talk would turn to her. Or maybe she was just overly sensitive. She spent the morning pinning and re-pinning the maternity dress her mamm had borrowed from Anna in order to make her growing girth not quite so obvious. But even as she went about the exercise, she knew it wasn’t worth the effort. Too many people had already seen her, too many people already knew that she was carrying a baby, and too many people had already told someone else. She could try and hide it as much as she wanted, but by the time she left the wedding today, everyone in Pontotoc would know without a doubt that she was going to have a baby. And soon.
“You look like you could use this.” Hannah sidled up next to her and presented a small plate of desserts to her. Spice cake, iced cookies, and
chocolate-covered cashews.
Tillie tried to smile. Wasn’t dessert the best part of any wedding celebration? She supposed so, save the happy couple and the two souls bound together in love and harmony and God. Seeing as how she had missed her wedding and would probably never have one now, it made it a little harder to see all that joy. Or perhaps she was just being selfish.
Time. Wasn’t that what everyone said was needed? Then maybe that’s what she needed as well. Just a little more time. Who knew? In a couple of years, maybe ten, everyone in Pontotoc might not care that she had come home pregnant and unmarried and the father of her baby hadn’t cared enough to follow behind.
“Quit thinking about it,” Leah said. Tillie hadn’t heard her sister come up on the other side, most likely because she’d been too lost in her own thoughts about her own problems. It was becoming something of a habit these days, and she needed to shake herself out of it lest she get mired down in all the wrongs with her life. She knew when that happened she would forget all the good things that were around. Those were what she really needed to concentrate on.
“I’m sorry.”
“And stop apologizing,” Hannah admonished. Her voice was gentle, loving, and Tillie immediately wanted to apologize again. What was it about her transgressions that made her so apologetic? Perhaps the fact that there was no making up for the pain and sorrow she was causing her family.
“Maybe I should go,” she said.
“Home?” Hannah asked. Her voice rang with the unspoken We just got here, though in truth they had been there a couple of hours.
Their community, in particular, was small enough that most everyone was in attendance. They were a conservative district and did not have a lot of outside activities available to them. Weddings were definitely a bright spot in all their social calendars, and everyone looked forward to them and the entertainment they provided.
“I have the car,” Leah said. “I can take you home and come back. Are you feeling okay?”
