by Cyndi Myers
“No.” Alice started the truck again. “Not yet. I’m not ready to die yet.” She drove slowly to a sheltered underpass and stopped. “We’re staying here until the storm lets up,” she said, and switched on the hazard flashers.
“Good idea.” I sat back in the seat and tried to relax.
“What do we do now?” Ruth asked.
“We wait.” Alice reached behind the seat and pulled out a big tote bag. “Anyone want a snack?”
When in doubt, eat. It was a motto I’d lived by for most of my life, one whose allure I’d resisted for most of the past year. But after narrowly escaping death or disfigurement on the slick highway, junk food sounded like the perfect sedative. “What have we got?” I asked.
“Twizzlers, pretzels, Cheetos, beef jerky, Oreos and salted peanuts.”
I’ll take half a dozen of each. This is what my brain said. My mouth said, “Twizzlers and peanuts. And one Oreo.” I was a wild woman.
“What are Twizzlers?” Ruth asked.
“Good question.” Alice handed her one of the skinny red ropes. “Candy. Pure sugar. Probably some artificial dye. Guaranteed to have little children bouncing off the walls.” She bit off the end of another rope and chewed thoughtfully. “My theory is the sugar revs up my metabolism enough to offset the calorie intake.”
“Dream on,” I said, and took a bite of my own rope.
“Pretty good,” Ruth said between chews. “A little artificial tasting.”
“That’s the point,” Alice said. “Junk food shouldn’t be real food. If it was the same as what you ate all the time, what would be the attraction?” She ripped open a bag of Cheetos. “Try these. Crunchy, cheesy, salty—and they turn your fingers orange. What could be more decadent?”
Ruth giggled and plunged her hand into the bag. “These are good,” she said.
“Don’t tell me you’ve never had any of this stuff before.” Alice looked shocked.
Ruth nodded. “I’ve had the Oreos, at a friend’s house, but mostly we ate food my stepmother made at home.” She crammed another handful of Cheetos into her mouth.
“So what’s it like being an Amish kid?” Alice asked. “Are there a lot of rules you have to follow?”
Ruth shrugged. “Don’t all children have to follow rules? I don’t think most of ours were that different. Pretty much everyone we knew was Amish, so it didn’t matter much, especially when we were little.”
“What about when you were a teenager?” I asked. The teen years were when I’d become most aware of my own differences from my peers.
“Then it’s a little different.” She tilted her head, considered the question while she chewed. She licked orange salt from around her mouth, then said, “When you’re older, you have a little more freedom to come and go. And on trips to town, you notice things—all the people who don’t dress the way you do, all the cars and the things for sale in shops. My friends and I would sneak around to the magazine racks in the stores and look at the clothes and hairstyles and read the stories about celebrities. It was like reading about people on another planet, but we knew they were right there all around us.” She frowned. “That’s when I think I really noticed all the rules. Especially all the things I could never do, not just because I was Amish, but because I was an Amish woman.”
“Is that why you left?” Alice asked. “Because you didn’t like living that way anymore?”
“Not just that. I mean, when we turn sixteen, we’re allowed to experiment more, see what the world of the English is like.”
“You mean, like, go to the mall?” Alice asked.
Ruth nodded. “It’s called rumspringa. It means ‘running around.’ We can drink and party and listen to rock music or go to the mall—whatever we want. Some kids get really wild.”
“Amish kids?” Alice asked. “Then what happens to these wild kids?”
“Most of them get it all out of their system and decide to go back to being Amish.”
“But not you?”
Ruth shook her head. “I didn’t do much. I mean, I wore makeup and listened to rock music and had a few drinks, but I didn’t start using dope or having sex with a lot of different boys like some girls I knew.”
“Then why did you leave?” I asked.
She looked at her hands in her lap. “Once girls join the church, they’re expected to settle down. To marry and have children and be good Amish wives and mothers.”
“And you didn’t want to do that?” I asked.
“I didn’t want to marry so young. And not the man my father picked out for me.”
“He chose someone for you to marry?” Alice asked. “Like, arranged it without talking to you?”
“He talked to me,” she said. “He told me I must marry his friend Mr. Fisher. That he was a good man who needed a mother for his children.”
“How many children?” I asked, both horrified and fascinated by the scenario she was describing. “Six.”
“Good grief. You’re still a child yourself,” Alice said. “How are you supposed to look after six others?”
Ruth frowned. “I’m sixteen. In our community, I’m an adult.”
“How old is Mr. Fisher?” I asked.
“He is my father’s age. Thirty-seven, I think.”
I felt sick to my stomach at the idea of this child—and she was a child, no matter what she said—and a man twenty-one years older. “I don’t blame you for not wanting to marry him,” I said.
“The worst part is not even that my father wanted me to marry this old man,” she said. “I was already a servant to my stepmother. Being a servant to Mr. Fisher and his six children would not be any worse.”
“My God. Then what was the worst part?” Alice asked.
Ruth sighed. “The real reason my father wanted me to marry is that Mr. Fisher agreed to give him forty acres of pasture if I agreed to the wedding. My father wanted to trade me for a hayfield, as if I were a cow.”
She began to cry then, silent sobs shaking her shoulders, big tears rolling down her cheeks and splashing onto the hands clasped in her lap. I put my arms around her and pulled her close. “You were right to leave,” I murmured. “You deserve better than that.”
“Are you sure your cousin will help you?” Alice asked.
Ruth sniffed. “I think so. She’ll understand how I feel. Her father wanted her to marry a man from their church. He was her own age and not a bad man, but she didn’t love him. She loved Rob Sutler. She was brave enough to follow her heart, even if it meant going against her whole family.”
It sounded terribly romantic. And tragic.
“We’ll get you to Sweetwater,” Alice said. “We’ll find your cousin and things will be better for you then. You can start over, have a new kind of life. A better one.”
A different one. I wasn’t sure about better. Some things would be better, certainly. But for every gain there was a loss. I’d started my own life over when I was no older than Ruth. Moving to California with my sister had been exciting and it made me feel very grown-up. I’d pictured long summer days on the beach, fun parties with beautiful people and everything flowers and sunshine.
The reality had been lonely afternoons at the trailer park while Frannie worked, summers watching soap operas on television and eating myself out of any hope of wearing a bikini. The only beautiful people I saw were on TV and the reality in my own mirror was so depressing I stopped looking after a while.
Frannie kept telling me we were better off than we’d ever been in Virginia, but at least there I’d had friends. I’d had Alice. In California I’d had only Frannie, and that wasn’t enough—not then, and not now.
It was after four o’clock by the time we reached Sweetwater. The rain had dwindled to a heavy mist and the lights from the storefronts reflected off the wet streets like spilled watercolors. Alice parked the moving truck at the curb on Main Street. “We need to find a phone book and see if there’s a listing for Rob Sutler,” she said.
I looked up and down the stree
t. “I don’t see a phone booth. With almost everyone having cell phones these days, they’re not too popular.”
“Maybe one of these businesses has a phone book they’ll let us flip through,” she said.
I considered the options: office supply store, bakery, dry cleaners, florist… I grinned. “I’ll try the florist.” Before either one of them could object I was out of the truck, hurrying down the sidewalk.
A string of brass bells behind the door chimed as I entered the flower shop, and the familiar sweet-spicy smell of carnations and roses surrounded me. I felt hollow inside as I stroked the feathery tips of a potted fern and admired a shelf of African violets. While I didn’t miss Frannie so very much, I did miss my florist’s shop. It was always the one place where I felt complete and truly happy. Even when I was at my fattest I could lose myself in arranging flowers and tending plants.
“Good afternoon. How can I help you?”
I whirled and found myself face-to-face with a brown-eyed man. I know his eyes were brown because they were looking right into my eyes. I’d never realized eyes could hold so much warmth and laughter in a single glance.
Gradually I became aware of the rest of him—the smile lines fanning out from the corners of his eyes, medium brown hair with a touch of gray at the temples, a strong jaw and the weathered skin of someone who spent a lot of time out of doors.
“Can I help you?” he asked again, startling me out of my stupor.
My tongue felt thick, my brain mired in a fog. “Um, is this your shop?”
“Yes, I’m Martin.” He pointed to the sign in the window. Franklin’s Flower Wheel. “Martin Franklin.”
“I’m Ellen. Ellen Lawrence.” I offered my hand. “I own a florist’s shop in California. In Bakersfield.”
“Can’t stay away from it, even on vacation, can you?” He took my hand and grinned. Both his touch and the grin made me feel weak, my stomach fluttering as if I’d swallowed moths.
We stood there staring at each other for a long moment. I knew I should say something. Do something. But I was paralyzed. He must have thought I was an idiot.
“Would you like me to show you around?” he asked.
“I’d love that.” I was finally able to pull myself away, and managed to look calm as he showed me the two walk-in coolers, the small section devoted to gifts and cards, and the larger workroom in the rear.
“This is really nice,” I said when we were back at the front counter. “I love your workroom and your front window displays.”
“I’ll bet your place in California is larger,” he said.
“Not really. I don’t have a retail business like this. I do flowers for movie and television sets.”
“Really? So if I’m watching a show and see a really nice arrangement, that could be one of yours?”
I nodded. “It could be.” I shrugged. “Most people probably don’t even notice.”
“I would.” His smile was so…so warm. Like a blanket wrapped around my shoulders. I wanted to snuggle into it.
Who was I kidding? I wanted to snuggle into him.
“We don’t have anything like that in Sweetwater,” he said. “Though I have been thinking of expanding. The space next door is going to be vacant next month and I’ve been considering adding more gift items. But it would mean hiring more help and I’m not sure I’m ready to do that.”
“Yes,” I agreed. “More employees mean more responsibility and expense.” I casually glanced at his hand. No wedding ring. Not a sure indicator but promising. “Do you and your wife run this place alone now?”
“No wife. I have an older woman who helps me part-time, and a man who takes care of some of the deliveries, but mostly it’s just me.”
“I’d say you’re doing very well.”
I could have stood and talked to him all day, but the bells on the door rang again and Alice and Ruth came in.
“Did you find the number?” Alice asked.
The number! Flustered, I turned back to Martin. “Do you have a phone book I can look through?” I asked. “We’re trying to locate a friend we think lives here.”
“Sure.” He reached behind the counter and handed me an inch-thick directory. “What’s your friend’s name?”
I couldn’t remember. At this point I was doing well to remember my own name. I looked at Ruth.
“Rob Sutler,” she said. “His wife is named Mary.”
Martin shook his head. “Doesn’t ring a bell, but then, there are a lot of people in town I don’t know.”
Alice came and looked over my shoulder. Using my finger to keep my place, I scanned the columns of names. Slater, Statton, Super…
“Here’s a Robert Sutler,” I said. “On Orchard Street. That could be it.”
Alice grabbed a slip of paper and a pen from the counter and copied down the number.
“Would you like to use my phone?” Martin asked.
“Thanks, but we have a cell phone,” Alice said. She dragged me to the door.
“Thank you,” I called to Martin. “You have a lovely shop.”
“Come back anytime.”
Alice didn’t let go of me until we were out on the sidewalk. “What was that all about?” she asked.
I smoothed my hair. “What was what all about?”
“The goo-goo eyes you and the flower guy were making at each other.”
“We weren’t making goo-goo eyes.” My face felt hot, and my clothes were suddenly too tight.
“Yes, you were.” She glanced back at the store, the beginnings of a smile making dimples on either side of her mouth. “He’s kind of cute. Is he single?”
“Yes.” Her glee irritated me. “What difference does it make? We talked about flowers.”
“Well, that’s a start.”
“Don’t be silly. I’m never going to see him again.” I spoke the words with a pang of regret. Why couldn’t I have met Martin in California, where we might have had a chance to get to know each other better?
“Can we call my cousin, please?” Ruth said.
“Do you want one of us to call, or do you want to do it?” Alice asked.
Ruth pressed her lips together in a thin line. “You do it,” she said after a moment. “I’m too nervous.”
Alice handed me the slip of paper with the phone number and I punched it into my cell phone. A woman answered on the third ring.
“Hi. I’m looking for Mary Sutler,” I said.
“This is she.”
“Mrs. Sutler, I have someone here who wants to talk to you.” Then I handed the phone to Ruth.
She looked startled, then cautiously put the phone to her ear. “Mary? This is Ruth Beiler.”
Alice touched my arm. “Let’s give her a little privacy,” she said.
We walked down the sidewalk, past the dry cleaners and the office supply store, and stopped in front of the coffee shop on the corner. “If you want, we could hang around here a couple days,” Alice said. “Make sure Ruth gets settled.”
“I think she’ll be fine with her cousin.”
“It would give you a chance to get to know your handsome florist better.”
My heart fluttered, but I shook my head. “There’s no point. I live a thousand miles away from here.”
“No reason not to have fun for a couple of days. You said you wanted this trip to be an adventure, didn’t you?”
I stared at her. “Why would I want to start something with a man that I couldn’t stay around to finish?”
“There’s a lot to be said for loving them and leaving them. You’d probably both enjoy it.”
I shook my head. The words I’m not that kind of girl crossed my mind, but I didn’t say them. Some other time, with someone else, I might very well want to be that kind of girl, but I couldn’t see it with Martin. Not when one smile from him had me so flustered. Loving him and leaving him didn’t seem possible.
What was I thinking? Loving him at all was impossible. I didn’t even know the man. “I doubt if he’s interes
ted in me at all,” I said. “He was just being friendly.”
“Trust me. I’ve known a lot of men. When they look at a woman the way he was looking at you, they’re interested.”
I shook my head, too afraid of what might come out if I tried to talk.
Ruth came running up to us. “She said to come right out to her house. She said I can come live with them, no problem.”
“That’s great.” I hugged her and we started back toward the truck. “This looks like a nice place to live,” I said. “I hope you’ll be happy here.”
She nodded. “I’m feeling a little better about my future.”
“That makes one of us anyway,” Alice said.
I glanced at her. I guess Alice was worried about what awaited her in California.
Me, I told myself not to think about the future. It was too easy for my thoughts to drift into a hazy daydream of some perfect day to come that was always just out of reach. Reality was never as lovely or easy as my dreams and the letdown all that much harder to take for the build-up I’d given myself.
Better that I learn how to be happy right now. Right. As if I could wave my hand and make it so. I had a feeling that kind of contentment was one of those Zen things that was easier to accomplish when I thought happiness was a piece of chocolate cake or a top that hid my thighs.
7
We drove Ruth to the Sutlers’. Her cousin Mary turned out to be a petite twentysomething dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, a blond toddler balanced on her hip. As soon as Ruth climbed out of the truck, Mary enveloped the younger girl in a hug. “I’m glad you’re here,” she said. “Let’s go inside and get you settled.”
Alice and I trailed after her. The house was small and neat and decorated in country-cute. Mary poured iced tea and we all sat around the kitchen table looking at each other. “Tell me everything,” Mary said.
Ruth told her story, including some details she hadn’t shared with us, such as the fact that her stepmother had already sewed Ruth’s wedding dress and a date had been set for the nuptials—the following Tuesday—hence Ruth’s haste to get out of town.
“We’ll have to call Uncle Samuel and let him know where you are,” Mary said. “Just in case he’s gone to the police.”
