MEN OF LANCASTER COUNTY 01: The Amish Groom

by Mindy Starns Clark

  I laughed and tossed the photo of the Corvette onto the table. “Not this many problems.”

  Sitting back in my chair, I met the eyes of my tutor and friend and told her, reluctantly, that I had a feeling we were about done.

  She blinked. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, the point wasn’t to become some expert photographer. It was to learn enough about how it’s done to get inside the mind of my mother, to figure out what the draw was for her.”

  “And?”

  “And I’m realizing now that I’m never going to figure that out. Not from this.”

  Lark just stared at me, waiting, so I continued, understanding flowing into me even as the words came out of my mouth.

  “Photography is too singular of an experience, I think. The way I feel when I’m taking pictures is completely different from the way you feel—and from the way my mother would have felt. It’s not one size fits all, even though I had hoped it could be.”

  Lark pulled in a breath through pursed lips, held it, and then blew it out again before she spoke. “I hear what you’re saying, but just because that’s why you got into this in the first place doesn’t mean you should stop. Whether it helps you understand your mother or not, you should be doing photography for your own sake.”

  I shook my head. “Yeah, if I enjoyed it. But I don’t.”

  Her eyes filled with surprise and then hurt.

  “I’ve enjoyed spending time with you, of course,” I added quickly, “but the picture-taking itself really hasn’t done anything for me. Mostly, it’s felt tedious, you know?”

  Lark sat back, the hurt in her eyes lingering. “So all of this was for nothing.”

  I felt bad for her, and I realized I should have reminded her along the way of my motivation. Somehow, she had managed to forget the one reason I was doing this at all. “Seriously, Lark, I’m really grateful for everything you showed me. More grateful than you know. It wasn’t a waste of your time. Okay? I learned a lot.”

  “But we’re done. You don’t want me to show you anything else.” She met my eyes. “Do you?”

  I hesitated. “I don’t know. I don’t think so. I have a lot of other things on my mind.”

  “I see.”

  She grew silent, hurt clearly evident on her face, so finally I leaned toward her, searching for the words that would make her feel better.

  “That first night over sushi,” I said softly, “I told you why I wanted to learn photography, so I could understand what my mother saw in it, what she liked about it. Do you remember that?”

  After hesitating a moment, she nodded.

  “I’ve been honest with you from the start. That’s all I wanted from it, but now I can tell that it’s not going to pan out. And believe me, I’m even more disappointed than you are.”

  She seemed to take that in, and then her expression softened. “You really thought that learning to take pictures would help you understand why your mother took pictures?”

  I nodded.

  “And that if you knew that, you might know her a little better? Understand her a little better?”

  “Yes.”

  “And that if you could understand her, you might understand yourself? That you might even know what she would want you to do now?”

  I laughed lightly. “Yeah, I guess I did. Pretty big leaps, I suppose. Dumb, huh?”

  Lark reached for my hand and squeezed it. “No, not dumb. I can’t imagine making important choices without asking my mom’s advice. Of course you want to know what your mother would say to you now. I really do wish you could ask her. I wish you could just say, ‘Mom, what would you do if you were me?’ ”

  “But she was me,” I said, and my voice seemed to break a little. I looked down, willing myself not to tear up.

  “Then it makes even more sense.”

  I stared at Lark’s hand on mine, liking the sensation. It was warm and soft, far softer than any hand I had ever touched. Even Rachel, who was so beautiful and delicate in other ways, had the rough hands of an Amish woman, of someone who had spent years hand-washing dishes and scrubbing clothes and working the garden and tending animals and more. Rachel’s hand in mine always felt solid and caring, but Lark’s hand in mine felt gentle and tender and silkier than anything I could ever have imagined.

  “I just don’t know where I belong, where I fit,” I said. “I am not truly Amish, and I’m not truly Englisch. Which means, I suppose, that I’m…nothing at all.”

  With her other hand, Lark reached up to my face and cupped my jaw, turning my head toward hers. “Oh, Tyler. Don’t say that. I’ll tell you exactly where you belong, where each of us belongs. With the people we love and who love us. Everything else is secondary.”

  I considered that for a moment. “There are people back in Lancaster County who love me, that’s for sure.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “There are people here who love you too, you know.”

  Again, I nodded. “Of course.”

  “So it’s no wonder you’re torn. But you know what this means, don’t you? It means you can’t make a wrong choice. You have love in either place.”

  She smiled at me. The thought that she might possibly be right made the sudden weight in my chest lift a little, and I returned her smile without speaking.

  “Look, I know there are pros and cons for both places, but…” her voice trailed off, but I knew what she meant.

  “Yeah, I think—”

  “I want you to stay.”

  I heard her but I couldn’t quite wrap my head around what she had said.

  I met her eyes. “What?”

  Her hand was still holding on to mine, and now she gripped it even harder. “Stay, Tyler. You finally have the power to come home. You should be with your dad and brother. And besides all of that, I want you to stay. I like you. A lot.”

  As I sat there undone by her words, she leaned forward, bringing her lips to mine. She kissed me, and before I was even aware of it, I found myself responding. I kissed her back, the power of physical attraction and emotional affirmation surging inside of me, creating a force beyond my control. My Amish life seemed in that moment like a dream I had awakened from. I was just an ordinary man in ordinary clothes kissing a beautiful girl in an ordinary house in a sunny Southern California suburb.

  My hand went to Lark’s cheek, brushing across the delicate bones of her face, learning them, continuing on to her hair. I ran my fingers through its softness, both hands now gripping her head, pressing my mouth even more fiercely against hers. In that moment, I was the man in my mother’s pond, the one who stared back at me on crisp autumn mornings when I looked into the water of the world beyond Lancaster County. I was an everyday man who drove a car and had a cell phone and texted the girl he liked and went to his brother’s football games and ate sushi and had clothes with buttons and wore a watch on his arm. I was a man who took pictures with a camera. Looked up the weather on the Internet. Made coffee with K-cups.

  I was the man I would have been if my father had kept me. If my mother had not died.

  I felt Lark’s arms sliding around my back, pulling me closer, and I did the same. As we clung to each other, our mouths melded together, everything about the last seventeen years suddenly began floating away from me. Floating away. Any moment, I realized, it could all disappear.

  And then, with sudden and shocking clarity, I realized I didn’t want it to.

  I didn’t want to be this man.

  I pulled away, breaking off our kiss even as I stifled a gasp.

  “What?” Lark’s eyes were half closed. Glistening.

  I swallowed hard, took my hands from around her slender shoulders. Shook my head. Tried to speak but could not.

  I didn’t want to be this man.

  I saw it now, all too clearly. I wanted to be that other man. The Amish one.

  The one I truly was.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  I have to go.”

  I got to my feet, nearly knocking over my ch
air, and headed for Lark’s front door.

  “Tyler!” she called after me.

  “I’m sorry, Lark. I really have to go.” I couldn’t look at her. I had to get out of that house and away from any physical remnant of the kiss I would have taken back had it not revealed to me who I was.

  “Tyler, please! Wait!”

  But I could not wait. I called out to her over my shoulder, saying I would contact her later once I figured things out.

  The thing was, I already had figured things out. And I couldn’t wait to tell Rachel what I’d discovered. I felt so close to an answer, a final knowledge of who I was and where I belonged. I finally understood that the world I treasured most, the world I would always consider my home, was the Amish one.

  It’s not that I wasn’t drawn to Lark in a powerful way, because I was. Spending time with her had been one of the highlights of my days here. And kissing her had been…well, it had been amazing. Lark’s kiss—and all that it spoke of—was enchanting, nearly intoxicating. Complex.

  I had only ever kissed one other person, Rachel, and those kisses had been stolen in courting buggies when no one was looking or at singings when a walk outside under a sky of stars made us think we were on the threshold of heaven. Every kiss I had ever shared with her whispered to me that here was a taste of what it would be like to be married. But the kiss I had shared with Lark shouted to me that here was a taste of what it would be like to be Englisch.

  And as much as I’d thought that might be what I wanted, I knew now that it wasn’t. Lark was a lovely girl, but she wasn’t for me—because this life wasn’t for me. Finally, I understood.

  The man in the pond was merely a reflection of my options, not an indication of my destiny.

  That night Brady’s team lost by a touchdown but not due to any mistakes or missed opportunities on his part. They were just outplayed. By the time the game was over, Liz was clearly in pain and ready to be home. Brady would be riding the team bus back to the school, with a friend giving him a lift from there.

  “I think I did a little too much today,” she said to me as we took our time walking to the car. “I just want my pain medication and sleep.”

  Once we were home, Liz dressed for bed and then called me in to help. Sitting on the edge of her mattress in sleep shorts and an oversized T-shirt, she let me tend to her, retrieving an extra blanket and a glass of water and her pills.

  “I guess pain is the great equalizer, huh?” she mused, uncapping the bottle and tapping out one round white pill into her palm. “Let me tell you, it’s not easy for an independent, headstrong woman to be so vulnerable. So needy. It’s making me crazy.”

  “And yet it is often in need that God’s voice can most easily be heard,” I said.

  She tossed the pill into her mouth and then reached for the glass of water.

  “Oh, yeah?” she asked after she’d swallowed. “And what might God be saying to me now, if you don’t mind my asking?”

  I shrugged, wishing I could help her understand. “Maybe that independence is overrated. That need creates community. That by allowing others to help you, you are actually giving them a gift in return.”

  She handed back the glass of water and then leaned against the pillows, shifting to raise her injured leg onto the bed. “I was with you till you got to that ‘gift’ part.”

  I set the water on the nightstand and then grabbed an extra pillow from the side chair. She held her leg up while I propped the pillow under it.

  “Really? But you’re a nurse, Liz. And you do mission work. You more than anyone should know how good it feels to help others.”

  Her eyes widened as she seemed to connect the dots.

  “The way I see it, the needier you are right now, the more blessed I am to be able to care for you. It’s really that simple. And in the caring, the bonds we share are strengthened and renewed. That’s how community works.”

  Her eyelids were looking heavy. I pulled the covers over her and then asked if she needed anything else. She said no, she was fine, so I wished her a good night and headed for the door.

  “Hey, Ty?” she said as I reached for the light switch.

  I turned to look back at her. “Ya?”

  “How did you get so wise?”

  The question touched me deeply even as it brought heat to my cheeks.

  I smiled. “It’s God’s Word that is wise, not me,” I replied, not knowing what else to say. She didn’t respond, so I shut off the light and was just pulling the door closed when she spoke again.

  “You’re a good son,” she uttered in a voice so soft I wasn’t even sure if she’d meant to say it aloud.

  The next day, Saturday, I checked my cell phone the moment I awoke to make sure it was fully charged. It was, but I left it plugged in anyway, just to be safe. My last call with Rachel had ended so badly that I would do whatever it took to make this one okay.

  I served Liz some oatmeal with nuts and raisins and then told her I thought I’d spend the morning detailing the inside of my dad’s new muscle car if she didn’t think he would mind.

  “I think he’d like that very much. He’s calling me later this morning. I could ask him, but I think we should keep it a surprise.”

  “Sounds good to me.”

  Having the car to work on made the morning hours fly by. I knew very little about what was under the hood, but the leather upholstery was something I could clean, mend, and fix like a pro. After all, I’d been doing the same thing on buggies for years.

  Out in the garage, I opened the doors to let in some air and light and set to work on the backseat. When I came in at lunchtime, Liz was on the couch with her leg on its bed of pillows and Brady, still in his pajamas, was watching TV.

  I offered to make grilled cheese sandwiches, and then Liz told me my dad was hoping to get home by Wednesday. The TV was on during lunch and everyone did their own thing while they ate. Rachel and I were supposed to talk at one o’clock, so at ten minutes till I finished up the dishes and told Liz and Brady that I would be unavailable for the next half hour or so and why. Then I retrieved my phone and headed out into the backyard.

  The device trilled right on time, and I answered it by blurting out the first thing that came to my mind. “Rachel? I’m so glad you called!”

  The line was silent in response, and after a moment I feared she wasn’t the one on the other end after all. I pulled the phone from my face to check the number on the screen before putting it back to my ear. “Hello? Rach?”

  “Hi, Tyler, I’m here,” she replied, her voice lilting and familiar. “You just startled me, is all. I wasn’t prepared for…It’s just that our last phone call…”

  “Our last phone call was a disaster, and then my stupid cell died before I had the chance to say goodbye and to tell you that I love you. But I do. I love you so much. And I miss you like crazy.”

  She exhaled a sigh, one that felt weighted by more than just air. It was as if she’d been holding in a breath she’d been afraid to let go. In that moment it felt as if all had been restored between us.

  “I love you too, Tyler. And I miss you like crazy.”

  “You do?” I whispered.

  “Ya. I do.”

  We settled into the call and soon were chatting easily, this time with the focus on her end. Rachel caught me up on life in Lancaster County, and with every word, I found myself longing to be home more and more. Best of all, she and I were laughing and talking and getting along as if our last nightmarish phone call had never happened.

  “I’ve been to two weddings this week. And both times I had to sit with the poor girls who weren’t chosen by anyone.”

  I sat back in the deck chair, grinning like a fool.

  “Gut. I’m happy to hear it. Though I’m surprised Wally Yoder didn’t ask you to go to the table with him.” Wally was a good friend of mine, but I knew he’d had his eye on the beautiful—and taken—Rachel Hoeck for years.

  She was quiet for a moment. “Actually, Tyler, he di
d. So did Angus Fisher. But I told them no, that just because you were away didn’t mean I was available for courting.”

  I swallowed hard, surprised at the impact her words had on me. I had never been the jealous type, but something about the thought of those two guys putting the moves on my girl the moment my back was turned made me a little crazy.

  “So am I?” she asked, snapping my mind into focus.

  “Are you what?”

  “Available for courting?”

  I took in a deep breath, wishing I could just will her to understand every single step of this complicated and confusing path I had been on.

  “The answer to that is no. Definitely, positively no, you are not available for courting.” After a beat, I added, “Unless, of course, you want to be.”

  I heard a soft intake of air on the other end of the line—I had caught her by surprise—and then she replied, “No, Tyler. I definitely, positively do not.”

  In that moment I wished I could simply fly through the phone, all the way to Pennsylvania, just so I could look into her sparkling blue eyes.

  “So what’s going on out there?” she asked. “You sound different. Has something happened?”

  I wondered where to start. The last time we talked, I’d told her about the various elements of my quest—the mysterious conflict with Brady, the photography lessons, the word from God that I was to honor others before myself. So I started from there, summarizing all I had seen and done since and explaining how God had been moving in so many ways throughout every circumstance and conversation. I told her what Liz had shared with me the other day, how my mother had spent her years as an Englischer longing to return to the Amish world she’d left behind.

  At that Rachel sighed. “Oh, Tyler, I’m so sorry for your mamm—but so glad you found that out. Don’t you see? It would be the same for you too. I just know it would. If you left for good, you would spend the rest of your life regretting it.”

  “I know that now, but I didn’t then. It took even more than that to finally open my eyes.” With mounting excitement, I told her about my experiences yesterday, starting with my lesson being postponed and how I’d wanted to use the time to break into my father’s storage unit and find my mother’s photographs. I told her about the busyness of life out here and my search for a quiet place to pray and my time at the coffee shop. I told her about the puppies and that feeling of always being a visitor.