by Emma Miller
The only thing he’d been right about was the solemn service. The sole member of Eve’s immediate family who had attended had been her father, who scowled through the entire service. And while Mari and her mother and sisters had tried to make it a happy affair, not knowing the details of why they were marrying so quickly, those attempts had fallen short. They’d not even had a wedding dinner after the service. There had been no time because Levi and Eve had to get to the station to catch the train to Delaware.
“Why don’t we sit here?” Levi suggested, pointing at a wooden bench in the cavernous waiting room. He glanced at Eve.
She was wearing the same green dress she had been wearing the day he met her and a dingy church Sunday apron over it. He suspected she didn’t have another dress, something he would right as soon as they arrived in Hickory Grove. He was not a man of great means, but he had enough money to provide his wife’s basic needs. She had brought only one small bag to Mari’s that morning, a fact that he’d found slightly embarrassing because he had two large zip duffels and had made arrangements for the Fishers to bring the rest of his belongings to him the next time they came to Hickory Grove.
Levi set his bags down beside the bench and held out his hand to take the old leather case from her. There was an awkward exchange of him stepping toward her and reaching and her trying to set it down herself without touching him before he managed to take it from her. “Would you like something to drink?” he asked. “There are sodas and water in the shop. And snacks, if you’re hungry.”
Eve dropped down on the bench, setting her black cloak and wool bonnet on her lap. The garments were too hot to wear in the June heat and too bulky to go into a bag. “Ne, I’m not thirsty or hungry.” She stared at the toes of her worn leather shoes poking out from beneath the hem of her dress.
Levi stood there for a minute, wanting to say something, but not knowing what. Eve looked so...so...beaten down by all the events of the last two weeks of her life that he was worried about her. She was young, only twenty-two to his twenty-nine—too young to have already been through so much. After a moment of indecision, he sat down on the bench beside her and removed his straw hat. “Eve,” he said quietly. When she didn’t respond, he said, “Look at me. Please?”
She slowly lifted her chin until her gaze met his. She wasn’t what most would call a pretty girl, not like Mari Stolzfus or Trudy Yoder. Still, she had smooth skin that was unblemished, big, dark brown eyes framed by thick lashes and glossy hair beneath the white prayer kapp pinned to her head. She was shorter and rounder than a lot of girls he knew, but she was strong and healthy. And she was a woman of immense faith. Her faith was what mattered more to him because he, too, was a person of faith. So what if she wouldn’t be the prettiest new bride in Hickory Grove? She was his bride, and the thought made him smile tenderly.
“Everything is going to be all right, Eve.” His words were as much to reassure himself as her, at that moment. “You’re going to like Hickory Grove. Everyone is so friendly and kind and...and they’re fun. You’re going to fit in so well, so easily,” he told her.
She pressed her lips together, lips that were the color of the roses in his stepmother’s garden. “You should call your father. It’s not right to show up without warning. Your stepmother won’t appreciate it. She might not want me there.”
He shook his head with a smile. “You don’t know Rosemary. She would welcome anyone I brought into her home, anyone that any of my brothers and sisters brought home. You’re going to like her, Eve. And she’s going to love you.”
Eve thought on that for a moment. “And she’s your stepmother?”
He nodded. Her question reminded him of how little they knew of each other.
“Because the way you talk about her,” Eve continued, “she doesn’t sound like a stepmother. My father was married a few years after my mother died, and she—she wouldn’t have welcomed anyone I brought home. She didn’t even want me there.” Her gaze fell to her lap. “She wasn’t very nice to my brothers and sisters or to me.”
“You said she left.” Levi fiddled with the brim of his hat. “Was that why? Did she not get along with you and your siblings?”
The slightest smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. “I guess she didn’t get along well with my father, either.”
He smiled at her attempt at humor.
“I don’t know where she went or how she managed to leave. There was no divorce. I guess she just went home to her family in Indiana. That’s where my father is from.”
“Well, I didn’t know your stepmother, but I’ll make a wild guess that she was nothing like our Rosemary. Rosemary’s going to be thrilled to have another girl in the house. She was so sad when my stepsister Ginger left home this spring to be married. Of course, we won’t live with my father and Rosemary forever. We’ll build our own house. My brother Joshua and his wife just moved out of the big house to live in a small house my brother Ethan was building for himself and his wife. Only Ethan ended up moving to her parents’ place down the road. So there’s room for us in the big house for now. I’ll talk to my father about where you and I will build our place on the farm. When we’re ready.”
“You need to call your father,” she repeated.
Levi exhaled. She was right. The truth was, he’d been putting off this phone call for days. It was going to come as a shock to his father and he’d likely be at least a little hurt that the family hadn’t been invited to the wedding. But Levi had been focusing on Eve all week and trying to make everything as easy for her as possible. Having his large family or even his parents attend the wedding would only have made matters more complicated. This had been the best way to do it, he was sure. And if he was wrong, it was done.
“You’re right,” Levi told her. “I’ll call him now, and then I’ll get us some snacks for the ride.”
“Do they have pay phones here?” she asked, glancing around the big, echoing waiting area of the station. “They’re hard to find anymore.”
“There are a few here.” He started to get up from the bench, then sat down again. “Eve.” When she didn’t look at him or reply, he spoke her name again. “You have nothing to be nervous about. My vader and Rosemary and my whole family are going to adore you.”
“Until they know why you married me.”
“Ne, they’re not like that. But I already told you, I won’t tell anyone. Not even my father. There’s no need for anyone in Delaware to ever know.”
She looked up at him, seeming so fragile that his first instinct was to put his arm around her and comfort her. He didn’t, of course. It wouldn’t have been proper in such a public place. Besides, they didn’t know each other.
“It’s not anyone’s business. I married you because I wanted to.” He gave her hand that was resting on the bench a quick squeeze. “Remember that. You and I stood before that bishop and before Gott this morning and made those vows of our free will. Ya?” he said softly.
Again, the hint of a smile. “Ya,” she repeated.
He rose again, taking his hat with him. “I’m going to go find a pay phone. I’ll call my father and tell him that the driver I hired says we’ll be in Hickory Grove around six. And then I’m going to buy a Coke and some spicy Doritos.” He dropped his hat on his head. “You sure you don’t want something?”
“Ne. Danke,” she answered.
He backed away, dropping his hat onto his head. “I’ll get you something anyway. Just in case.” He smiled at her, showing more confidence than he was feeling. “Be right back.”
Levi found the pay phones easily; he’d used them before. He’d been living in Lancaster County for almost two years and had traveled from Pennsylvania to Delaware several times. He pulled several quarters from his pocket, fed them into the phone, and then he lifted the receiver and punched in the phone number to his father’s harness shop in Hickory Grove.
Levi took a deep
breath as the phone rang.
“Miller’s Harness Shop,” came a young male voice. “How can I help you?”
Levi had expected one of Rosemary’s girls to answer. They often worked in the shop, either at the cash register or in the back, doing the finer leatherwork. “Who is this?” he asked.
“Jesse Stutzman,” the boy answered. “Who is this?”
It was his stepmother Rosemary’s son by her first marriage. He had to be coming up on thirteen years old. Where had the time gone? When his father and Rosemary had married, Jesse had been only nine. “Jesse, it’s Levi. I didn’t recognize your voice. It’s gotten deeper since I was last home.”
“Everyone says that.”
The boy sounded embarrassed, and Levi smiled to himself, remembering all too well what it was like to be thirteen. It was a trying age, no longer a child, but not yet a man.
“Is my dat around?”
“I just saw him walk into the back, hang on,” Jesse said.
As Levi waited, he turned around. On the far side of the large, marble waiting room, he saw his wife sitting on the bench where he’d left her, still holding on to her bonnet and cloak.
“Levi?” his father said into the phone.
Levi turned his back to the waiting room. “Dat.” The sound of his father’s voice brought a tightness to his chest. It was easy, day to day, to not think about how much he missed his family, but hearing his father speak his name brought up a well of emotion. His father hadn’t been keen on the idea of Levi apprenticing so far away. He preferred to have his adult children live nearby, but he had accepted the decision.
“Are you well?” his father asked in Pennsylvania Deitsch, the language they spoke at home.
Levi cleared his throat, responding in Pennsylvania Deitsch. “I’m fine.”
“It’s the middle of the day, Sohn. It’s not that I don’t like to hear from you, but aren’t you working?” His father sounded calm; it was one of his personality traits Levi had always admired and attempted to emulate. However, his concern was still evident in his voice.
Suddenly nervous, Levi turned around again to check on Eve. She was still sitting where he’d left her, waiting for him patiently. Seeing her, the woman who was now his wife, gave him the courage he needed. “I wanted to let you know I’m on my way home. Today. Now.”
“Is something wrong? Do you need me to send a driver?”
“No, nothing is wrong. I’m... We’re taking the train. And I already have a driver picking us up at the Wilmington station. I’ll be home by supper if there are no delays.”
“You said we?”
Levi took a deep breath. “Eve and me. Eve is my wife, Dat. I’m married.”
His father was quiet on the other end of the line for so long that Levi thought maybe they had been disconnected or that his father hadn’t heard him. But there had been no click, no dead sound. And Levi knew his father had heard what he said because the older man had exhaled sharply.
When his father finally spoke, his voice was tight. “When did you marry?”
“This morning.”
Again a pause. Then, “And you didn’t think Rosemary and I would want to be there?” His tone took on a sharpness Levi rarely heard from his father. While Benjamin Miller had held high standards for his children, he had always been kind in doling out both compliments and criticism. Another trait Levi admired in his father.
“There was no time. The Fishers were there, though,” he added, thinking perhaps that would somehow lessen the blow.
“Do we... Do we know the bride?”
Again, Levi looked at Eve, but this time he did not turn his back on her. He could tell his father was upset. There was no mistaking it in his tone, and Levi had the sudden desire to tell him everything that had happened to Eve and how it had turned his life upside down in only one week. But then he reminded himself of the promise he had made to Eve and a verse from somewhere in the Old Testament came to him: A man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife.
Levi stroked his bare chin with his hand, his chin that would never be smooth again. As a newly married man, beginning today, he would grow a beard. “You don’t know her.”
There was silence on his father’s end of the phone again. Then, at last, he said, “I will see you when you get home, Levi.”
The phone clicked, and Levi felt the backs of his eyes sting. He blinked as he turned to the pay phone and hung up the receiver. His father had not said why he was so upset. He didn’t have to. Marrying a woman suddenly, a woman his father had never met, could mean only one thing in their community. It meant that Levi had taken from a woman that which was meant only for her husband.
Levi sniffed and took a deep breath. He reached into his pocket, took out a handkerchief his stepmother had made for him and wiped his mouth. A part of him was angry that his father had leaped to such a conclusion about him so quickly. Another part was sad that his father didn’t know him better. Didn’t know who he had become as a man.
It hadn’t occurred to Levi that when he had offered to marry Eve, his father would think what he must now think. But what else could Levi have done? Marrying Eve was the right thing to do; he knew it in his mind and deep in his heart. He wished he could explain that to his father, along with why. But he couldn’t because he had made a promise, and to that, he needed to resign himself.
Pushing aside thoughts of his father, of his dismay, Levi put on a smile and went to get some snacks to share with his wife.
* * *
Accepting the hand Levi offered, Eve stepped down from the minivan that had brought them from the Wilmington train station to the little town of Hickory Grove in Kent County. She had never been to Delaware, never been anywhere outside Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, and was feeling overwhelmed. But she also felt a spark of excitement, of hope for this new life before her. A new life with Levi Miller.
Her feet on solid ground, she withdrew her hand from Levi’s, clutching her wool cloak and black bonnet to her chest. Against her will, she trembled a little as she gazed up at the rambling white clapboard farmhouse. It was two stories with multiple additions, rooflines running in several directions and two red chimneys to anchor the proportions. The farmland that surrounded the house was flat with no hills and valleys like home, but beautiful in its own way. There were barns, sheds and small outbuildings galore, painted red, all dwarfed by the enormous old dairy barn that Levi had explained as they came up the driveway housed Benjamin’s harness shop and the new buggy shop where he would work. Beside it had been a greenhouse that Levi’s brother and stepsister ran.
Eve’s gaze settled on the big home again. The house and porches were neatly painted, and blooming shrubs and a colorful assortment of flowers grew around the foundation in wide, cultivated beds. While properly plain in color and design, the house looked nothing like the dull structure with its ever-peeling paint and hard-packed dirt lawn that she had grown up in.
Levi removed their bags from the back of the van, setting them in the driveway, and then paid the driver. As the van pulled away, voices and the sound of dogs barking from inside the house caught Eve’s attention.
The door to the house flew open and a large, ruddy-colored dog with only three legs bounded across the porch toward them. A woman who looked to be somewhere in her forties appeared in the doorway and held open the screen door. “Out with you,” she called into the house. Another dog, almost identical to the first, also missing a rear leg, raced past the woman.
Eve watched in awe as the two dogs bounded down the porch stairs. Her father would never have allowed an animal with a disability on his property. Animals born with any disfigurement were put down at birth “for their own good,” he had explained to her when she was a child. Her father had told her that a kitten with a blind eye or a pig with a clubfoot wouldn’t be able to survive. Yet these full-grown dogs weren’t just survi
ving, they were thriving. Missing a limb didn’t seem to hinder their speed or frivolity one bit.
The dogs ran up to Levi, obviously recognizing him and happy to see him. “Silas and Ada,” he introduced, stroking each on the head before motioning for them to sit. “My brother Jacob’s dogs. Chesapeake Bay retrievers. They won’t bite.” He tilted his head one way and then the other. “They might lick you to death, but they won’t bite.”
Eve’s gaze moved from the dogs to her new husband. While he appeared relaxed, the tone of his voice said otherwise. She could tell he was nervous about bringing her home with him, which made her nervous. What if Levi’s parents wouldn’t let them stay? Where would they go? Would they go anywhere, or would Levi send her far away to live with some distant relative? She’d heard of such things before.
“They’re fine,” Eve murmured. “I like dogs. Animals.”
“Good, because we’ve got plenty of them—dogs, cats, goats, sheep, pigs, cows, horses. Oh, and last time I was home, my brother Jesse had a pet snake.”
Her eyes got round.
The corner of his mouth turned up in a half smile. “Don’t worry. Rosemary wouldn’t let him keep it in the house.” He waved her to follow him. “Come on, meet my family.”
As Levi took the stairs, a man in his fifties who looked very much like Levi, though shorter and rounder, joined the woman on the porch. This had to be her in-laws.
“Vader, Rosemary,” Levi called. “This is Eve, my wife. Eve, my father, Benjamin, and our Rosemary.”
Rosemary met Eve’s gaze, and for a moment, the older woman’s pretty, round face was unreadable. What if they don’t want me here? Eve thought again.
And then Rosemary broke into a bright smile. “Ach, you must be tired from your travels. Come in, come in, Eve. And let me take your cloak and bonnet. It’s too warm on a day like this to be holding those things.” She took them from Eve’s arms. “Come in and meet my daughters. They’re cleaning up. We expected you for supper but figured you must have gotten held up.”
