Jenny's Choice (Apple Creek Dreams #3)

by Patrick E. Craig

  Abel shifted in his chair. Jenny put her hand on his arm.

  “Don’t worry, Bisschop, I am not upset with you. We have discussed this matter.”

  “Yes, Jenny, we have, and to me, this marriage would be the answer to our concerns. I’ve known Isaac since he was a boy. He is honest, hardworking, true to the Ordnung, and a decent, kind man. You would do well to consider his offer.”

  He paused and then went on. “The elders and I have given this much thought, Jenny. We feel that you have come to a crossroad in your life. The Amish way is simple and straightforward. You either live it or you do not. You cannot be in the world and of it too. You cannot serve two masters. We do not wish to control you. You must make the choice for yourself. But we feel that you cannot go on with one foot in the world and one in the Plain way. It is too hard.”

  Jenny sat silently for a moment. Then she spoke. “What about my book? I thought you said you liked it.”

  “Ja, it is a good book, and we feel it has served a purpose, as we explained. But we have also seen that the danger of being drawn away from our ways is too great if you continue writing. The Amish do not seek notoriety. We do all we can to remain apart from the world. We feel that you should give up your writing, marry Isaac, and return to our ways with all your heart. That is what we wish for you.”

  Jenny listened hard for the voice of God in this. Then she said, “You’re right, Bisschop. It’s a question I’ve struggled with all my life. And now it seems the Lord has at last set two doors before me. One leads to the safety and simplicity of the Amish way, the other to the fulfillment of a gift I believe God gave to me to bless others. But it seems I cannot have both.”

  Jenny rose from her chair with a sigh. The two men stood with her.

  “I need to consider your words. I must seek the Lord. So I will say this. I will give you my answer in three days.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  Questions

  SO NOW THE GREAT CRISIS of Jenny’s life was upon her. All her days it had been hidden in her heart, and now at last the Lord had drawn it out and laid it before her. She lay upon her bed in the midnight hour, sleepless and with one thought on her mind.

  Choose this day whom you will serve.

  The question was clear, but the answer was not. Was staying Amish what the Lord wanted for her, or did He want her to pursue the gift He had given her? Why couldn’t she do both? She did not know the answer, and the heavens were like brass above her. The gentle voice of the Spirit was strangely silent. When Jenny went to bed that night, she felt as if she were being crushed between two great stones. She longed to go to Jerusha and seek her mudder’s wise advice, but her mama was gone and no one else was there to help. It was for her alone to decide.

  Choose this day whom you will serve.

  Finally, too restless to sleep, Jenny rose from her bed. She put a shawl around her shoulders and slipped outside. The screen door creaked softly behind her as she went out onto the porch. It was perfectly still outside, that time of the night when the old day has passed and now all nature is taking a breath before traveling on into the next morning. The moon stood still in the heavens high above her, almost full. The soft light illuminated the yard around her house, and she stepped down into the front yard. The silver grass was cool beneath her bare feet, and she stood and waited as though earth and sky would give her the answer. Night sounds began to filter into her hearing—a frog croaking, the hoot of an owl in a tree near the pasture. In the far reaches of the night a train whistle lingered mournfully. It seemed that all her life was hemming her in, corralling her step-by-step toward this great battle in her soul.

  She had a choice to make, and though she felt helplessly caught on its horns, she knew that in the end there was only one answer that would serve the purposes of God. Everything else would take her down side roads that might eventually bring her safely to the end of her days but would keep her from the fullness of God’s plan for her life. She knew this without knowing the answer. And the enormity of the consequences weighed hard upon her spirit.

  Jenny went around the side of the house into her garden. Beyond the garden gate was the path that led out onto her land. Her land! This place—the houses, the barns and fields—was a reminder that she had a place in the great scheme of things, an identity that had been passed down to her by her Amish grossdaadi…

  …as a memorial to the blood of my people, which flows in me.

  She went through the gate and started up the path toward Bobby’s bungalow. The trail was well worn with no stones to bruise her feet. Still, it felt like the road to Calvary. Did her cross stand on that hill ahead of her?

  As she looked ahead, she saw a tiny glow in the darkness. For a moment she wondered what it was, and then she realized that Bobby was up too, smoking a cigarette on his porch. She went on up the path and stopped by the gate into his tiny yard. Bobby spoke out of the darkness.

  “Hello, Jenny. Can’t sleep?”

  “No, Uncle Bobby, I can’t. I…I have a lot on my mind.”

  “Got some choices to make, little girl?”

  “Ja, and they are very hard choices. My whole life seems to be hanging on this moment, and I’m afraid that choosing the wrong path will send me plunging over a cliff of my own making.”

  “And no one can make the choice for you, right?”

  “Ja. It feels like the Lord stripped everything away from me to bring me to a place where my life is resting on what I alone decide. My mama and papa are gone, Jonathan can’t help me…”

  “Come sit a while, Jenny.”

  Jenny went through the gate and sat down by Bobby. He took a drag on his cigarette and looked over at her. The moonlight illuminated his face, and Jenny could see the kindness in his eyes. He reached over and patted her awkwardly on the shoulder.

  “I don’t have a way with words like you do, Jenny. I’ve always had a hard time articulating what’s inside me. So bear with me for a minute.”

  “You’re a man whose advice I trust. I’m ready to listen,” Jenny said, settling in.

  “I was there the day your sister, Jenna, died. I carried her to the hospital in my arms, and when the doctor told me she was dead, I never thought I would ever love a child again the way I loved her. But then you came along. Ever since the day your dad and I found you with Jerusha in that old cabin, you’ve been linked to my life. I’ve watched you grow and struggle, I’ve seen the challenges you faced, and as you grew up, you became like my own daughter.”

  Jenny put her head on Bobby’s shoulder. His arm crept around her.

  “I know the choice you have to make, and I know it’s not easy. But whatever you decide, I will stand with you. You’re not a girl anymore, Jenny Hershberger. You’re a strong, lovely, brilliant woman who I’m very proud of, and I have no doubt you’ll make the right decision. I just want you to remember one thing. When your dad and I were on Guadalcanal, we had to make many decisions in an instant that dictated whether we lived or died. But the hardest thing I ever learned came at the most unexpected moment.

  “We were resting in an abandoned Japanese camp. They had all run off when we approached, and they left everything behind—even their dinners were still on the table. Compared to how we had been living the last few weeks, the place seemed like paradise. After we ate, we sat around, just shootin’ the bull like Marines do. It almost seemed like we were back stateside. It was quiet and still, no war going on. We let our guard down. One of the guys stood up to stretch, and a sniper shot him right in the head. He was dead before he hit the ground. I learned in that moment that we have to be the most careful when we think we are the safest.”

  Jenny realized the wisdom in what Bobby was saying. And then a great clarity burst upon her mind. This choice that was before her would define every other moment of her life. It was a God-given moment of destiny that she couldn’t shy away from. She knew that it was important that she seize it without fear because everything that would come after would be changed when she chose.
But still she waited.

  “Thank you, Uncle Bobby. That’s a great help to me.”

  They sat together without speaking again until the first light of dawn began to peek over the hills away in the east. Then Jenny kissed Bobby on the cheek and went back to her house. In her room, she sat at the desk and took out her journal. She paused a moment and then began to write.

  Sometimes I think life is like a rushing river that begins its journey high in the mountains, tumbles down over jagged rocks, rushes headlong over cliffs, and pours booming through nameless chasms until at last it escapes the harsh stone walls to the broad plain spread before it, flowing deep and quiet through lush meadows between banks that hold it tenderly.

  On the way to this place, we usually make choices quickly and without thinking, like those a boatman makes as his vessel poises on the brink before it plunges headlong into the rapids. We look back on these instantaneous choices and understand, with a quiet shudder in our soul, the eternal enormity of a moment.

  But even so, the choices we make as we drift in the place of safety and security can be the most consequential. For every soldier knows that in the lush growth beside a quiet river, or beneath the deep underbrush of a peaceful forest, the enemy is most likely to be hidden.

  Now I must choose, and although the choice will not determine whether I live or die, it will indeed establish all the rest of the days of my life. And once more I come to a moment when I must surrender again to the One who has always guided me, for I cannot decide in my own flesh, but I am assured that I will know these things by His Spirit.

  She looked at what she had written and then closed the book and rose to the work of the day. In her heart she ceased to strive because she finally knew that if she simply trusted the Lord, He would help her know what to do. One step at a time.

  Richard Sandbridge drove his BMW along the Long Island shore. It had been a long time since he visited the coast. He didn’t like the ocean. Something about the endless gray-green swells disturbed his sense of balance. He thought it must be the interminable movement, the rushing away to unknown places to break, unheard, upon some distant fog-bound coast that seemed so unplanned to him. Since the day he awoke in the hospital, he had tried to do everything he could to bring order to his life because his memory was missing so many parts. He often felt as if he were taking a jigsaw puzzle out of its box and working feverishly to solve it, only to find in the end that most of the critical pieces were missing or from another puzzle entirely.

  He pulled his car into one of the public parking lots along the beach, turned off the engine, and got out. The wind was chill, and the blowing sand stung his face. He stared out at the open water.

  Why do I hate the sea?

  The day was cold, and not many cars were in the parking lot. Richard was lost in his thoughts. Ever since his experience watching the Amish men dig potatoes, his waking moments had been filled with unrecognizable fragments and pieces, like the old psychedelic light shows back in the sixties at the ballrooms in San Francisco.

  How do I know about the ballrooms in San Francisco? I’ve never even been there…or have I?

  One very disturbing picture kept thrusting itself into his consciousness—the face of a man with a long greasy ponytail and a three-day beard. The man was looking up at him and saying words he couldn’t make out—something about going home. And then the man died. And then a long, terrible journey and the Amish men again and through it all, the feeling that something enormous was missing from his life.

  Lord, will you help me? I can’t go on this way. Who am I, Lord?

  “Hey, buddy, got a light?”

  The voice broke in on him. Richard turned to see an unkempt man standing next to him with a cigarette between his lips.

  “Sorry, pal. I don’t smoke.”

  “Well, how about some spare change? I could use a beer.”

  Richard looked at the man and then reached into his pocket. As he glanced down he didn’t see the short piece of pipe that came out of nowhere and crashed into the side of his head. After that he didn’t see anything.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  Jenny’s Choice

  Fire and water, fire and water and the sea—the endless sea. He was drifting, drifting in the middle of the raging sea. The wind tore the tops off the waves, and the driving foam stung his face like lashes from a whip of ice. The freezing, killing water crashed down on him from all directions. Something flew through the air and struck him in the head, and there was no sense to any of it, no meaning. Terror gripped him.

  And then he heard a voice and wasn’t afraid anymore…

  “I will never leave you or forsake you. Lo, I am with you always. Rise up and walk.”

  Richard groaned.

  “Richard? Richard?”

  The voice seemed to come from far away—through the fire, through the water…and then the mist cleared, and he opened his eyes and saw Jeremy’s face.

  “Jeremy?”

  “Richard, thank God!”

  “Where am I, Jeremy?”

  “You’re in a hospital in Far Rockaway.”

  “What happened?”

  “You were mugged out at Jones Beach. The guy robbed you and stole your car, but some witnesses called the police. The State troopers caught him about a mile down the road.”

  “Did he hit me?”

  “Yes, he cracked you a good one with a pipe. You’ve been out for a whole day.”

  “How did you find me?”

  “Your office called me as soon as the police identified you. I’ve been here since this morning.”

  “What day is it?”

  “It’s Wednesday.”

  “Tonight’s our announcement party!”

  “That’s right.”

  “I’ve got to get dressed, Jeremy. You’ve got to take me to my apartment so I can get ready.”

  “Richard, you’re in no shape to go. We should call it off.”

  Richard grabbed Jeremy by his shirt and pulled him down. “No! You don’t understand. I have to go.”

  Even though the answer wasn’t yet clear to Jenny, she spent her morning in peace. All she knew was that she needed to do her best to follow the leading of the Spirit. And then, around eleven, she saw Abel’s buggy coming up the lane. For a moment she wanted to run away and hide, but she steeled herself.

  “Lord, I trust You to give me the words to say.”

  In that instant her course of action became clear. She didn’t wait for the men to come in, but rose up and went out to meet them. She stood by the gate as the buggy came to a halt.

  “Gut Mariye, Jenny.”

  “Gut Mariye, Abel, Isaac.”

  The men started to get down, but Jenny waved them back to their seats. “There’s no need for you to come in. I have made my decision.”

  Isaac leaned forward in his seat.

  “Isaac, I know you to be a good and righteous man. I know you would be a good husband. But I cannot marry you. I do not love you in that way. I would be untrue to myself and to you if we were married. You deserve to be loved completely, and I cannot do that.”

  “But marriage for the Amish need not be about love, Jenny. It’s built on the needs of our community and our faith first.”

  “Ja, Isaac, I have heard that. But I need something more.”

  Isaac pressed his case. “But love could grow between us, Jenny. Could you give it a chance?”

  “I’m sorry, Isaac. I know this is the decision I must make.”

  Abel spoke up. “And what will you do in regards to your place in the church? Do you think you can go out into the world and still be true to the Plain way? I’m deeply concerned for you, Jenny Hershberger. I do not think it can be done. You cannot serve God and mammon.”

  “I appreciate your concern, Bisschop. I don’t know the answer to that part of the question. I have a strange feeling that I will know by tonight, but at this moment, I can’t say.”

  Isaac tried once more. “You are sure, Jenny? You will
not reconsider? I can give you more time if you need it.”

  Jenny walked over to the side of the buggy. She took Isaac’s hand and looked up at him.

  “You’re a good man, but even if you gave me a year, my decision would be the same. Do not be angry with me. I must do what I believe the Lord is telling me.”

  Isaac sighed. “As you wish, Jenny. As you wish.”

  He nodded to Abel, Jenny released his hand, and the bisschop cracked the reins. The horse started up, and the buggy moved off. As Jenny watched it go, fear rose in her heart.

  Did I hear You right, Lord? Am I giving up everything I know because I think I have heard You? Lord, this is too hard.

  And then she heard the gentle voice.

  “And thine ears shall hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right hand, and when ye turn to the left.”

  Then Jenny knew what she must do.

  Bobby looked at Jenny with a wry smile on his face.

  “Are you sure, Jenny?”

  “Yes, Uncle Bobby. But I need you to take me into town first. I have to go to the department store and do some shopping. Then we’ll go.”

  “Okay. What about Rachel?”

  “She went to Lem’s house. They have a cow that’s about to calve, and Rachel wanted to help. She’ll stay there tonight.”

  “Let’s go then.”

  Bobby and Jenny walked out to Bobby’s pickup, climbed in, and headed for Lancaster.

  Richard’s head was pounding, but he was determined to go. The doctor had protested, but Richard was adamant. He signed the release papers as the doctor shook his head in warning.

  Richard turned to Jeremy. “Will you take me home, or must I call a cab?”

  “You’re a stubborn man, Richard,” Jeremy said, shaking his head. “But there will be no need for a taxi.”

  The two men went out to the car, where Richard winced as he climbed in. Jeremy drove the car out of the hospital garage and headed toward Manhattan and Richard’s apartment. The sunlight was bright and hurt Richard’s eyes.