2 tablespoons cooking oil or fat
Cookware:
1 or 2 large and deep casserole dishes with lids
Large frying pan
Method:
Heat oven to 375° F
In frying pan, brown onions in cooking oil or fat.
Layer in bottom of casserole dish (dishes) including liquid from pan.
Place ribs in a layer over onions.
Sprinkle with peppercorns.
Spread sauerkraut over top of meat, adding juice as well.
Add 1 – 2 cups water, then cover with lid.
Bake in hot oven (375° F) for 1 – 2 hours, until bubbling around sides of casserole dish.
Lower oven temperature to 250° F and bake for several more hours.
Add water if needed to prevent drying out.
Done when meat is ‘fall-apart-tender.’
Usually does not need added salt, but put some on the table for individual use.
* * *
Serve with mashed potatoes and garden vegetables of choice.
Chapter 3
Monday, December 18
* * *
"Wake up, Heidi."
A male voice? She must be dreaming. Before she dared open her eyes, she tried to remember the night before. She’d gone to sleep in her own bed, she was absolutely certain of it. Slowly, she opened her eyes and saw a fuzzy figure looming over her. She froze, too scared to scream and then she realized that the man was Derek.
“Derek,” she heard herself say as she looked into his hazel eyes.
"Heidi," he said again.
"Yes, it's me.” She was dreaming! She grabbed hold of his hand and he put his arms around her.
“You’re okay now,” he whispered.
"I thought I’d never see you again.”
He moved back and then picked up her hand and held it tight. “Are you all right?"
“I don't know." It was then she realized she wasn't in her own room. Of course not. How would he have gotten inside? She saw boards running horizontally across the wall, and the furnishings told her she was in a farm house. "Where am I?"
"You're at home. I couldn't wake you.”
She stared at Derek’s beautiful face. He was older, his build was heavier, and his features were more manly than boyish. Her dream sure was lifelike. She looked around the room again. “Where are we?”
He leaned over and stroked her hair. "At home. It's all right, I'll stay home with you today. Your Mamm’s been here and taken the girls for the day. We’ll fetch them later.”
"Who?"
He frowned looking almost sympathetic. "I'll bring some breakfast up to you before Michael wakes."
She couldn’t speak. Who is Michael? Who are 'the girls?' Derek was wearing his usual Amish clothes. She looked down at their hands linked together. Since she could feel his touch, it seemed real and not like a dream. “Where am I? What’s happened?”
“You fell down the porch steps yesterday when you were trying to get the girls out of the rain. Don’t you remember?”
“No. What girls?”
“Are you joking? Because you’re scaring me right now.”
She dropped his hand and scooted further to the edge of the bed. This was real. It was no dream.
He straightened up and rubbed an eyebrow. "You had a fall last night." He ran a hand through his nearly-shoulder-length dark hair. "I should've sent for the doctor then and there."
"Not the doctor."
"Yes, the doctor. I'm sorry, Heidi, but I’m worried. If you’re still like this in an hour or two, I'm going to have to get the doctor. I'll go heat up Michael’s bottle."
She opened her mouth to speak, but he was already out of the room. Then she looked over toward the window and saw a crib. She got out of bed realizing she was in a cotton Amish-style nightgown, but she was more concerned about who was in the crib. Lying there wrapped in a white shawl was a small baby who couldn't have been more than six-months-old. She got a fright when long hair fell across her face. Then she touched her hair and it was long again—not at all the short-cropped hair she’d had when she had fallen asleep.
The baby making snuffle noises drew her attention away from her hair. She looked in the crib again and when she saw he was okay, she swung around. In an effort to make sense of what was happening, she flung open the doors of the closet. There were women’s Amish dresses, boots and shoes, and with a closer look, the shoes were all in her size. In the adjoining closet were men’s clothing.
Next, she looked through the chest of drawers. In the bottom drawer was paperwork. She pulled out a handful and leafed through the pages. The biggest piece of paper was a marriage certificate. Scanning the names, she saw her name and Derek’s—she was married to Derek. It was dated a month after she’d left the Amish community.
Needing to sit, she headed back to the bed, still staring at the marriage certificate. Then she remembered how she’d cried out to God when she had cried herself to sleep the night before ... when she was in her own bed in her own apartment. Had God answered her prayers in a weird and wonderful way, or was she just having a weird dream? Maybe God was giving her a vision to show her what she’d missed out on by leaving the community.
Her gaze traveled to the baby in the crib by the window. He’d never have come into this world because she had never married Derek.
“This is what people mean by their life flashing before them before they die," she said softly. "Except, this is the life I would’ve had if I’d never left the community.”
Derek walked back into the room. “Here you go.” She looked up to see him with a mug in his hands. “What are you doing with that?” He nodded toward the marriage certificate.
“I don't know. Just looking at it.”
“Here’s your coffee.” He placed it down on her nightstand. “I’ll go cook your eggs just as you like them—not runny.”
“Thanks. I’m rather hungry.”
“You’re what?”
“Hungry.”
“Gut. You’ll feel better once you eat.”
“Maybe I will.” Whatever was happening, she’d play along until she figured it out. “The girls are at Mamm’s you said?” She wondered how old they were, and were they hers and Derek’s? They couldn’t have been that old, and just how many of them were there?
“Jah, that’s right.”
She drank a mouthful of coffee. “This is good.”
“Denke.” He chuckled. “You don’t normally allow me in the kitchen. I’m looking forward to making your eggs.”
She looked up at him, still thinking about the coffee. “It’s ground coffee and not instant.”
He frowned at her. “That’s right.”
“I don’t let you in the kitchen?” She lowered the hot mug into her lap. She wasn’t doing a great job of going along with what was happening, not with that stupid question.
“Jah, the kitchen’s your domain, you always tell me.”
Heidi laughed. She found it odd that he said that. She hated cooking and never cooked anymore, not since she’d found the excellent people who delivered the home-cooked freezable meals. All she had to do was pop them in the microwave. She took her mind off food and coffee, and stared back down at the marriage certificate.
He said, “Have you lost your memory?”
She stared at him. She’d touched him and she had felt him, and everything seemed so clear. Normally, her dreams weren’t like that. “Am I dreaming?”
“You think you’re having a dream?”
“I am having a dream, and you’re not real.”
“Aha. Why do you think you’re dreaming?”
“That’s just it, it’s not my real life. I never got a chance to … Gott is giving me this chance to see you again. I’ve always thought about you over the years.”
“You’re not dreaming, and I have no idea what you’re talking about. You fell and you hit your head. Don’t you remember?”
She licked her lips. “When I left to go on
my rumspringa, you never came to find me when I stayed in New York. It’s okay. I’m not mad, I just want to know why.”
He sat down beside her and picked up her hand again and she felt the warmth of his touch. “You never went on rumspringa. You changed your mind when I took you to the bus stop. You had this whole notion that you were going to become a famous supermodel, and you could’ve done it if you’d wanted to, but you changed your mind and never got on the bus.”
It all made sense. She knew she would’ve ended up marrying Derek and having children and living in a sweet little storybook house. Letting go of his hand, she picked up her mug with one hand and pinched herself with the other until it hurt. She still didn’t wake up.
“Heidi!” He shook his head. “What are you doing?”
“Trying to wake up.”
He leaped to his feet. “That’s it. I’m taking you to the doctor.”
“No, I’m fine.”
“Nee, you’re not. You’re even speaking in a weird way. You’re not yourself. I’ll book an appointment and hopefully we can get you in to see him today.” He strode out of the room.
Heidi continued drinking coffee. If he was insisting on taking her to the doctor, she’d have to make sure she didn’t give them any reason to declare her insane. Even if she was having a dream, she didn’t fancy it turning into that sort of a nightmare.
Feeling like a fat useless frump, she headed back to look at the small baby. He had wiggled his wrapping loose, and waved his arms around while his lips moved as well. Heidi stared at him in wonder while his tiny fists opened and closed. Reaching down, she touched his soft skin and then one of his hands encircled one of her fingers and he slowly turned his head and looked at her.
“Hello, little baby.” The baby opened his mouth as though to answer and started wailing. “It’s okay, don’t cry.” She picked him up and held him close against her shoulder and then patted him on his back. “You must be hungry, too.” Holding him with one hand, she pulled a small blanket off the edge of the crib and wrapped it around him, and then left the bedroom. As soon as she was out the door, she saw stairs. Slowly and carefully she made her way down them.
“It sounds like he’s hungry,” she said to Derek when she found him in the kitchen.
“I’ve got his bottle warming. It won't be much longer.”
“Thank you.”
He glanced over at her and it was then she realized she wasn’t speaking in Pennsylvania Dutch.
“I’ve made an appointment at the doctor for twelve.”
“For me?” She jiggled the baby up and down, trying to stop his crying.
“Jah, for you.”
“That was fast.” She only hoped that she would wake up before then. She wasn’t a fan of doctors. When the baby stopped crying, she took her chance to say some things to Derek. Maybe he was having the same dream about her and would remember it when he woke. “I want to apologize for leaving. I never realized what we had.”
“You never left me, Heidi.”
“If I had, I would’ve been silly. That’s what I meant and I just wanted you to know that.”
He moved closer to her and put one arm around her. She closed her eyes and nuzzled into his manly chest while the baby was nestled between the two of them.
“I never would’ve let you go,” he said.
“Really?”
“Jah.”
She took a step backward. “So, let’s just say that I’d gone on rumspringa when I was eighteen, and then decided to stay away, would you have come to find me?”
“Nee.”
She stepped back again. “Nee?”
“That’s right.”
She pouted. “Why not?”
“Gott gives everyone a free will to choose what they want in life. If you had chosen to leave, I would’ve had to respect your decision. Do you understand that?”
Heidi was disappointed with his reasoning.
“What would you have done if I had left?” he asked.
“I would’ve been angry with you and I'd have wondered why you left me.”
“Would you have come after me?” he asked.
Slowly, she shook her head.
He smiled at her. “Why?”
“I would've been too afraid of what I’d find when I got there, if that makes sense. I'd have been afraid you wouldn’t want me and I would’ve gone all that way for nothing.” Now she had a better idea why he hadn’t chased after her. "I would’ve just hoped that you would’ve come back of your own accord because you would’ve missed me so much.”
He chuckled. “I could never have done that. I could never have left you.” He stared at her for a moment. “And?”
He was waiting for her to say she could never have left him either. She had regretted it, but staying with him would’ve meant staying within the community and leading a boring life. Being back in his arms had certainly made her rethink her choices. “I would’ve been a fool to leave you.” And that was the truth.
He chuckled once more and held her close again. Then the baby yelled once more, and shattered the moment. “The bottle’s coming, little bu. It should be warm now.” He left them to get the bottle out of the saucepan.
Heidi giggled at the way he spoke to the baby. “He can’t understand you, so there’s no use talking to him.”
He wiped the bottle off and laughed. “You were the one who told me to talk to our bopplis and then they’ll start understanding.”
“That’s true. Do you want to feed him?”
“Okay. Your eggs are there,” he nodded to the table while he took the baby.
They both sat down at the kitchen table, keeping warm by the stove. She ate the food he had prepared for her while he fed the baby. She looked around the kitchen and it affirmed to her how real everything seemed including Derek and the baby. Could she have hit her head and dreamed her other life? Was this her real life and the other was just a dream—a fantasy? “I need to make a phone call.” She had memorized Janelle’s number just in case she ever lost her own phone.
“Who do you need to call?”
“Just a friend.”
“Do you have to do that now? You haven’t even finished eating.”
“Oh.” She looked down at the eggs on the plain white china plate. “Denke.” She spooned some more into her mouth.
“Don’t go making any plans with your friends. Remember we’ve got the doctor at twelve.”
“I won’t forget.” To be polite, she finished her eggs and then headed outside, hoping there would be a phone in the barn. When she was outside, she saw a shanty that housed a phone. Her hands were cold and shaky as she dialed her friend’s number. When she heard the phone had connected and she was getting a dial tone, her heart pumped hard. It was a real phone number and that meant she wasn’t dreaming.
“Hello, this is Janelle Adams.”
“Janelle, it’s me.”
“Who is it?”
“It’s Heidi.”
“Hello, Heidi. How are you?”
Heidi could tell by how she spoke that Janelle didn’t recognize her name or her voice. Janelle didn't know who she was at all. She tried something else. “Are you in the office?”
“I’m out of the office at the moment. How can I help you?”
“Do you know who this is?” There was hesitation on the other end of the line. “Janelle, who do you work for?”
“Our Town Blinds and Awnings.”
Janelle wasn’t even a realtor and she was going by her maiden name, when she’d almost immediately changed all her business cards and everything else to her married name. “Is this some kind of a joke?” Heidi asked.
“Can I help you with something? Do you need a quote on blinds?”
“Janelle, do you know me—Heidi King?”
“I’m sorry the name doesn’t ring a bell, but I meet hundreds of people every week. I’m sorry. Do you need—”
She tried something else since her married name would’ve been Miller. “Heidi M
iller.”
“I’m sorry—”
Heidi hung up the phone’s receiver. If Janelle didn’t know who she was then maybe this was her real life and she’d just dreamed her whole entire other New York City life, but if that was so, how did she know of Janelle’s existence and, equally mysterious, how did she know her phone number?
If only she could talk to someone. She couldn’t talk to Derek because he was taking her to a doctor, and she certainly couldn’t talk to the doctor about something like that. She heard a noise and turned to see Derek coming toward her with a heavy black coat.
“You’ll catch your death out here, Heidi. Come back inside.” He flung the coat over her shoulders, put his arm around her and together they walked back into the house. “Now sit down in front of the fire and I’ll go make you another coffee. I don't like you getting chilled like that.”
She looked down at the baby who was propped in a wooden crib with his bottle nearby. She reached down and picked him up, held him in her arms and fed him the rest of his bottle. “Do you know what’s going on, little one? Maybe if you were older, I could talk to you. There’s no one else I can confide in. Maybe I am going mad. Shh, don’t tell anyone.” The baby stared up into her eyes while he sucked hard on the bottle.
She said a quick silent prayer. She’d heard of alternate universes. Maybe she had crossed over into one through some kind of portal. She’d listened to the theories and even though she’d always tried to keep an open mind, she never imagined they were a real thing. If that was what was happening, then one version of her was a realtor living amongst the Englisch, and the other was a wife and mother living amongst the Amish. If that was what had happened to her, how would she cross back into her other life?
Once the baby was fed, Heidi headed upstairs with him in one arm. If they were going out, she’d have to change out of her nightdress. No wonder Derek is worried about me. I can't believe I went outside in just my nightie!
She placed the baby back in the crib and opened her closet. She took out a purple dress. Back in New York, she never wore colors and it was confounding to see an array of colors in an Amish wardrobe. At home, all her clothes were either black or cream, and with her interest in fashion, everything had a designer label.
In Time for an Amish Christmas Page 3
