An Amish Husband for Tillie

by Amy Lillard

  Back at the house everyone was bringing food, more food than the family could ever eat, but they wanted to pay their respects even if Melvin had never joined the church. He may have left to live with the English for a while. But everyone believed he was coming back to stay. Even his parents.

  They had driven down from Ethridge and were staying with Melvin’s cousin who lived on the other side of town.

  Tillie was surprised they didn’t want to bury their son in Tennessee and instead laid him to rest with the other members of their family there in Pontotoc. The thing she hated the most, other than losing Melvin himself, was the pitying looks she received. No one knew what they had planned. They only knew the first plan: to ask for forgiveness, join the church, and live in the Amish community forever. But it was a secret that Tillie would take to her grave. So she endured the pitying looks. She would accept them as his friend. They had been friends for so long. And she would miss him terribly even if they had decided not to get married.

  And the saddest part of all for her, the part that was hardest to get over, was that she had wanted so badly to stay in the Amish community. With Melvin gone, there was nothing standing in her way.

  Be careful what you pray for.

  Wasn’t that what Mammi Glick was always saying? Of course, Mammi Glick said a lot of things. Sometimes she got them a little off, but for the most part, she got them right. This one was too correct.

  Tillie had wished for a way that she could stay in Pontotoc and raise her daughter Amish. But never in a million years would she have wished Melvin gone in order to do so.

  It’s out of your hands.

  She knew it. And she knew she was not responsible for his death. She didn’t cause it to happen. Most would say it was God’s plan. God’s will that he was gone. Even at such a young age. And she wasn’t sure she would ever get used to the idea of never seeing him again.

  “Can I get you some tea?” Hannah stopped near the chair where Tillie sat. People came in, set food on the table, then came over to tell her how sorry they were and how much they wished that things were different. But God had a plan and they needed to stick to it. She’d heard the speech a hundred times today if she had heard it once, but these good people believed that Melvin was coming back to his Amish home, and there was no way she would tarnish him in their eyes by telling the truth. No matter how hard it was to keep to herself.

  “Chamomile,” Hannah continued. “It might help you sleep.”

  Sleep. She was tired. It seemed like she hadn’t slept in days. Something had kept Emmy awake as well, crying in the night, fussing and restless as if somehow she knew her father was gone. So Tillie had spent both nights soothing her baby and wondering what was going to happen now.

  Emmy.

  “Where’s my baby?”

  “I think Leah has her. Do you want her?” Hannah asked.

  Did she? No, she would share her daughter’s company. “Only if she’s tired of her. Or if she starts fussing and needs to eat.” They would have the nights to stay awake and mourn together. Let her visit with other family for now.

  “Tea?” Hannah prompted again.

  Tillie nodded. “That would be great, thank you.”

  Hannah gave her sister a smile, squeezed her fingers reassuringly, and moved on toward the kitchen.

  She watched Hannah go, so many thoughts tumbling around inside her head. She envied her sister, and then she didn’t. Hannah had had a tough time of it in the English world and was glad to be back with the Amish. Tillie was too, but it came at a high cost.

  “Tillie?”

  She looked up. “Levi.”

  “How are you?” he asked. He took the seat next to her and scooted it a little farther away. Whoever sat there last had been a family member. They had reached over to hug Tillie, scooting the chair too close for propriety when it came to her and Levi.

  “As well as can be expected.”

  “I understand.”

  Of all the people gathered around to mourn Melvin’s passing, she knew that Levi understood more than most.

  “I brought you something,” he said. He reached into his pocket, pulled out a long thin envelope, and handed it to her.

  “Danki,” she said as she stared at the envelope. Whatever was in it was flat, and not very thick—a letter maybe? She had no idea. Why would Levi write her a letter, then hand it to her? She really needed to get some sleep.

  “You can open it now,” Levi said.

  “I can?”

  A lot of sleep.

  “Of course. I’d like to see you open it.”

  “Okay.” She tore the top of the envelope open and pulled out a strip of leather embossed with Melvin’s name. Beautiful tool work, just like he had done on her baby book for Emmy and on Emmy’s pacifier holder. “It’s really supposed to be a bookmark. You can put it in your Bible if you have a mind. Or you could put it in a shadow box with some of his other things.” Levi shrugged as if he didn’t know what else to say. “I wanted you to have something for him.”

  Tears rose into her eyes. She wanted to throw her arms around Levi and hold him close. She wanted to be held as she shed the tears that had been threatening for so long. Levi would understand.

  Or would he?

  She would have to hold her secret forever.

  Tillie dashed her tears away with the fingers of one hand and tried to smile at Levi. “Danki.”

  He smiled in return. “I didn’t mean to make you cry.”

  “It’s okay.” Within a heartbeat the tears were all dried up. She didn’t want to cry. She didn’t want to show emotion, because if she did the dam might break, and everything would come flooding out. She couldn’t have that, not with so many friends and family around. She wanted to be able to talk to somebody, but she just couldn’t imagine who. Hannah? Leah? Gracie? As much as she loved them, she didn’t think they would understand. Not completely.

  “I’m really sorry,” Levi said. He stood and she grabbed his hand to stop his leaving. Then she dropped it, realizing the impropriety.

  “We’re friends. Right?” she asked.

  He nodded. “Jah. I guess friends is a good enough word.”

  “And maybe I could come talk to you sometime?” she asked. “As friends, you know.”

  “Or I could come see you,” he said. “And Emmy. Just as friends.”

  She nodded, then sat back in her seat as Hannah approached. “Thank you, Levi.”

  He gave her a tight smile, then walked away.

  “What was that all about?” Hannah asked.

  Tillie shook her head. “Nothing.”

  * * *

  Levi made his way into his house and through the living room. He stopped there, noting the wilted cedar boughs that Tillie and her mamm had placed there. And the fat white candles. They had brought Christmas pillows and an afghan. Though they had claimed that the afghan was a gift from Mammi Glick, he wasn’t sure about the rest. Maybe he could take it to Tillie tomorrow. As friends.

  Not the cedar boughs, obviously. But the other things. He should return them just in case.

  And he could visit Emmy and Tillie and see how they were.

  But you saw her today.

  At her fiancé’s funeral. Not the best time to talk about anything other than Melvin.

  Levi sighed and grabbed the tree limbs from the mantel. He took them to the back door and threw them out into the yard. Maybe he would move them tomorrow when it was daylight once more. But it was getting dark now. Hopefully no one would come visiting. He wasn’t in the mood for company. He wanted to work out some things in his head.

  Back in the living room, the fireplace looked bare without the limbs. Even after he started a fire to warm the place. He should have put the boughs in the fire. But he hadn’t thought about it at the time.

  The kitchen was still warm from the potbellied stove, where Puddles and her pups had their bed. He should have checked on them when he went through to the back door.

  It seemed he shoul
d have been doing a lot of things.

  Like telling Tillie that she looked good and would make it through. It would seem impossible the first few days, maybe even weeks, but each day got a little easier to bear.

  He knew it because she had been the one to help bring him home.

  And he wouldn’t know what to do without her.

  But those were things he shouldn’t say.

  Not now.

  Not yet.

  Maybe not ever.

  * * *

  New Year’s Eve and she was in mourning. It was fitting. She mourned Melvin and all that he had been and all that he was yet to be. She mourned their love that had made such a sweet child and then faded away.

  The world around her was preparing to have lock-ins and sleepovers and all sorts of fun events. A few years ago, Hannah would have arranged for them to have a sisters/cousin time, spending the night eating popcorn and waiting for the clock to turn over to midnight.

  But those days were gone. Just one more thing for her to mourn.

  Since it was a holiday, her sisters had called off their cousins’ day. That just meant more work come the next week. But there had been too much going on that day with the road being blocked off and all.

  But she was in mourning for a man who wasn’t her husband and would never be. Would never have been even if not for the terrible accident that took his life.

  The men had been trying to lift the large tree using a tractor and chains. But the chains broke and the tree fell, landing squarely on Melvin’s chest.

  She had asked, then begged David to tell her about it. No, he didn’t suffer much or long and his last words were of her and Emmy.

  “He said something strange though,” David recounted just after the funeral.

  “What was that?” Tillie asked. She wanted to know everything about his last moments. She wasn’t sure why it was important, just that it was. She wanted to know for certain that he was happy, or at the very least not unhappy before he died.

  “He told me to take care of you and Emmy,” David said.

  “That’s not strange at all.” In fact, it seemed like a very Melvin thing to say.

  “Then he told me not to let you go. Made me promise and everything.” His forehead wrinkled into a frown. “I don’t know what that means. Go where?”

  Tillie knew. Melvin didn’t want her to go to the English world. He knew that she wanted to stay with the Amish, and he made her brother promise to keep her there. In his last breath, he was concerned for her.

  But for now she would do what she had to do. She shook her head. “Me either,” she said at the time, but knew that she would cry herself to sleep that night. What little sleep she got.

  New Year’s Eve, and she was worn out.

  However she wasn’t in the mood for any parties. Wasn’t sure she would be in that mood again for a very long time.

  Emmy was napping in her cradle, and Tillie had settled down on the bed with a book. It was good enough to keep her attention, but maybe not good enough to keep her awake. Especially if her baby stayed asleep. Then she might even be able to get some rest as well.

  A knock sounded at her door. “Tillie?” Mamm called. “You have company.”

  Emmy arched her back and let out a squall.

  Tillie sighed, placed the leather bookmark Levi had given her between the pages of her book, and stood. He had given her the bookmark to have a reminder of Melvin. But every time she looked at it, she thought of Levi.

  Which seemed very disrespectful of the dead.

  “Coming,” she called. She grabbed the baby’s pacifier and started from the room. She gently bounced Emmy in place, cooing to her all the while she walked. “You don’t need to be fed just because you’re awake. It’s only been a little while since you ate. You can wait a bit more.” She didn’t want Emmy to get into the habit of wanting to eat every time she woke up for the times like this when she truly didn’t need to but only thought she did. So Tillie gave her the pacifier instead. It had taken Emmy a little while to get used to it, but it had been a couple of weeks and she was like a natural now.

  Tillie almost stumbled as she made her way into the living room to find Levi Yoder.

  “Hello, Tillie.”

  “I wasn’t expecting you,” she said. She wasn’t expecting anyone, for that matter.

  “I thought I would drop by and bring you back all the Christmas decorations you left at my house.”

  She rocked the baby and shook her head. “You didn’t need to bring them back.”

  He shrugged and looked down at the sack. “They’re yours.”

  “Jah. I suppose.”

  He set the bag down on one end of the sofa and clasped his hands together. He released them, then clasped them together once again. It was as if he had just gotten them and he had no idea what to do with them yet.

  “Thank you for trying to cheer up my holiday,” he said. His voice sounded unused and a little rusty.

  “We all have to do what we can for one another.”

  It was the Amish way.

  “Jah,” he said. “But I still appreciate it. And what you said yesterday, about being friends . . .” He stopped as if he wasn’t sure how to continue.

  Tillie patiently waited.

  “I want that very much,” he finally continued. “And maybe I might one day want more than that.”

  “Maybe?” That didn’t sound very confident. But it was better than what she had fifteen minutes ago.

  He closed his eyes as if he’d messed it all up, then slowly opened them again. “I’m pretty sure. See, I haven’t been widowed that long.”

  “I know.”

  “But when I think of never seeing you or Emmy again it makes my heart and my stomach ache. When I thought about you marrying Melvin, it almost killed me. So I’m pretty sure.”

  “I don’t know what to say,” she whispered. Was he proposing that they might have something more one day? How did a woman respond to that sort of talk?

  He might not have been definite, but she was thrilled all the same.

  “Say you’ll be my friend,” he said. “You’ll ride home from church with me and go on picnics with me in the spring. Tell me that you want to see if there’s more to us than what we’re seeing right now.”

  “I’m in mourning,”

  “Me too. But I’m willing to wait if you are.”

  She smiled at him as her heart soared. It wasn’t true love, not yet, but he wanted to be with her. Well, he was pretty sure he did. And seeing everything that they had been through over the last few months, pretty sure was all right with her.

  “I would like that,” she said.

  “But for now we can be friends,” he said, outlining a little more of their relationship. “I do want you to come visit. And I want to come visit you. I know Melvin hasn’t been gone but a few days. And—I’m making a mess of this.”

  She shook her head. “You’re doing just fine.”

  “We can take our time,” he said. “Get to know each other.”

  “That sounds like a great idea.”

  “And who knows,” he said, casting a loving look at her daughter. “A couple of years from now, we might have ourselves another Christmas miracle.”

  With a little bit of hope and a whole lot of prayers, she felt certain they would.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Two years later

  “Tell him I need to talk to him,” she told Hannah. “I need to talk to him now.”

  “Calm down, sister,” Hannah said. “I’m sure whatever it is it can wait until after the ceremony.”

  Tillie shot her sister a look that could have wilted bitterweed out in the fields. “If it could wait, I wouldn’t be asking to see him now. So will somebody go get Levi?” Her voice was getting louder. She needed to talk to him. Now. Before the wedding. Before the wedding was very important.

  Leah nodded at Hannah and disappeared out the door of the upstairs room at their parents’ house.

 
It had taken a year of mourning, getting to know each other, and making good with the church before Levi felt comfortable enough with their relationship to ask her to marry him. Last year’s Christmas had been filled with making plans to get married. This year it was all about the wedding.

  But she couldn’t marry him until she told him one very important thing. Really important thing. Not even a small wedding such as theirs. It was his second wedding, and as far as the church was concerned, hers as well. She may not have married Melvin in an official way, but they’d had a child together, and that counted for a lot where Amos Raber was concerned. Second marriages were half-day affairs, not full days like first weddings, but that was fine with Tillie. She’d had to wait two years to marry Levi, and she didn’t want to wait any longer to start their life together.

  After she talked to him, that was.

  An eternity passed before Levi eased into the room, Leah right behind him.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked. His brow was puckered into a frown.

  Tillie cast a furtive glance at her sisters and grabbed Levi’s elbow. She pulled him closer to the window. It would’ve been better if it was just the two of them alone, but she couldn’t make her sisters go out of the room. Well, she could, but if she did, they would forever be bothering her about what she said to Levi right before they were supposed to get married.

  “I need to tell you something,” she said.

  He drew back a bit, his eyes growing hooded.

  “No no no,” she said, shaking her head. “About Melvin.”

  His expression remained carefully guarded, though he gave her a quick nod.

  “Before he died,” she started, “we talked about our plans.”

  “I know that.”

  She swallowed hard. “Yes, but what you don’t know is that we weren’t staying Amish.”

  His expression puckered into a frown. “You wanted to leave?” He shook his head and closed his eyes as if trying to put everything in the proper perspective.