I smiled. “See you inside?”
“Only if you agree to walk on the beach with me. It’s dry right now.”
“We’ll see.” I gave my best attempt at coyness. From Levi’s expression, I guessed that it worked.
Thirty minutes later, Levi was grease free and we were walking along the beach at Road’s End. The wind whipped at our clothes; Levi held my hand inside his jacket pocket.
“I like your family,” he said, avoiding a crab shell in the sand. “They’re very…”
“Defiant of classification?”
“Fun. Talkative. Protective of you.”
“They are not.”
“Gary threatened me with bodily injury if I didn’t treat you right.”
“Oh. Wow” Impressive, considering I’d seen him maybe four or five times since he and Beth married.
“He was pretty specific about his methodology.”
“Sorry about that.” I wondered if Shane had received that speech. But then, Shane had never participated in a one-on-one activity with Gary. Poor Levi. No good deed went unpunished, I guess.
“I don’t mind.” He squeezed my hand. “I’m glad you have people who care about you.”
“They’re different than I thought they were. I wish I hadn’t missed out on so much time.”
“You’re here now.”
I took a breath. “Your parents aren’t going to be happy if we…stay together.” I didn’t think I should bring up marriage this soon, but I knew I had a point. “They want you to go home and marry Rachel.” I hated myself as soon as I said the words, but the thoughts had been worrying me for too long.
Levi didn’t seem perturbed. “I’ve been worshipping a personal, gracious God for too long. I can’t go back. I like the drums in my church service too much.”
“You don’t miss Rachel?”
“How did you know about Rachel?”
“Ida.”
He sighed. “No, I don’t miss Rachel. She wanted the life her parents had. I didn’t. In fact…now’s as good a time as any to bring this up.”
“What?”
“I’m thinking about selling the shop.”
I pulled my hand away in shock. “Honestly? Why?”
“I bought it and built up the business to be near my family. Near my siblings if any of them wanted to be like me. Sara’s the only one who’s expressed any interest…I don’t know. I worked so hard to leave and learn and do something different. Now I’m building furniture.”
He ran his hand through his hair, an ineffective gesture since the wind restyled his hair moments later. “I’ve been looking around at some other jobs. I’ve even thought about maybe starting my own firm.”
“Would you stay in Albany?”
“I…don’t think so.”
I felt my heart twinge. “Don’t do this on account of me, Levi. What would Spencer and Grady do?”
“I’d offer to sell them the business first.” He shrugged. “I haven’t figured everything out yet. I just wanted you to know what I was thinking.”
“What about Samuel? And Leah and Elizabeth?”
“If they need me, there is a phone on the farm. And they’ve got Grandma.”
“You’re okay not having contact with them?”
“I don’t have contact with them as it is, Jayne. From what I hear from Sara, my dad’s home all the time now. I couldn’t visit if I wanted to.”
There had to be something else. “Why would you voluntarily choose to return to corporate life?”
“I was never a workaholic corporate guy. I took vacations. Sure, I wasn’t traveling up the ladder at the speed of sound, but I liked my job and felt good about what I did during the day.”
“And you don’t at the shop?”
“I feel like I’ve done my brain a disservice.”
“You feel like that because of the shop, and not because you’re overdosing on coffee?”
“Hey now!” He reached out to tickle me, but I was too fast. I sprinted ahead, my feet digging into the sand.
“What are you thinking?” Levi asked as we were driving back to my mom’s.
“Just woolgathering,” I answered.
Truthfully, I couldn’t get my mind past the conversation we’d had on the beach. I felt myself moving toward the ideals of the Amish: simplicity, family, faith. I craved the way I’d felt at the Burkholder farm—for the first time, I didn’t feel my life was spinning out of control. Since then I’d restructured my own life, repairing my family relationships and reconciling with a God I’d ignored for too long. I was learning to quilt, bake, and make my apartment mold resistant.
Basically, I was moving from big-city life to the simple life.
And now Levi wanted to move in the opposite direction.
I knew he wasn’t about to abandon his faith; he was stronger than that. The idea that we were otherwise moving in different directions scared me.
My mind took it one step further.
What if he did move to Portland? What stood in the way of us having a real, serious, adult relationship? The kind that led to “save the date” cards?
Nothing.
I was terrified.
I remained terrified through dinner, and our family-sans-Emilee viewing of Witness, with Levi pointing out all of the inaccuracies.
“An Amish woman would never be so forward toward an English man,” Levi said. “Ever. Even if she were in one of the least restrictive communities, she wouldn’t speak like that with a man she’d just met.”
“Sara would swoon for clothes so tailored,” I added.
Levi chuckled.
“What was it like, growing up Amish?” Beth asked, not caring that the movie continued.
“I have a wonderful family. We were very close. I was raised to be a farmer, but I didn’t want to be one.”
He explained how he left, turning his back on everything he was raised to be, and how he returned to be near his family.
“Now you’re leaving them all over again.” Suddenly all eyes were on me. “Well, he is.”
“Jayne—” Levi started.
“And it doesn’t matter that they need you or that they’re your family. You’re outta there, because they weren’t smart enough, or old enough, to follow you.”
My mom stood. “Why don’t I check on dessert?”
“I’ll help you,” Beth said. Gary joined her.
Outburst over, I took that moment to study my hands. In detail.
“Thanks, Jayne. Appreciated that.”
“Sorry,” I said, although I knew a part of me wasn’t.
“Does it bother you that much that I want to leave Albany?”
I didn’t know what to say.
“Your family has welcomed you with open arms.” Levi’s brow wrinkled. “You show up on the doorstep, and they let you in. I go home, and my brothers won’t look at me. They won’t look at me!”
“Your sisters look at you.”
“My father pretends that I am dead. I don’t exist to him.”
“Your mother misses you.”
“But I’m not welcome in her home.”
“Sara talks about leaving.”
“If she leaves, she’ll be just like me. She’ll never see her older sister again; Rebecca’s husband will see to that. And why do you care if she leaves? You’re mad at me for leaving a second time.”
“I…” Anything I said made me look like a hypocrite.
“I need to take a walk.”
“It’s raining outside.”
“I don’t care.”
He stood, crossed the room, and retrieved his jacket. In an instant, he was out the door.
I stood and walked to the kitchen.
“You can stop skulking now.” I ran a hand through my hair.
“We didn’t want to interrupt,” Mom said.
“If you’d interrupted, I might have stopped talking, and that might have been for the best.”
“Communication is the key to relationships,” said Gar
y, his sage words punctuated by a swig from his root beer.
“We should take Emilee home,” Beth said. To my amazement, she reached out and gave me a hug. I forced myself to relax. “Everything will be okay.”
I was glad she thought so. I wasn’t so sure.
Levi returned half an hour later. I was on the couch reading Mom’s Reader’s Digest when he came back, jacket soaked, hair dripping.
I studied his face. “I’m sorry.”
He hung his jacket on the closet knob. I heard tiny pats of water hit the tile.
“Beth and Gary went home?”
I nodded. “And Mom’s in bed.”
“Do you really want to be with me, Jayne? Or do you just like the idea of me? I’m not a quilt. I’m not your path to a more simplistic existence or whatever else you think you need.”
“I’m just trying to figure things out.”
“So am I. But you didn’t answer my question.”
Beth’s words at the mall floated back through my head. I was crazy for Levi. I knew it. That scared me to death. What I didn’t know, exactly, was why I was so crazy for him. Maybe he was right. Maybe he was the human version of my quilt squares.
That would be the easy answer. Life would be simple if I were crazy about him for all the wrong reasons.
Being with him for all the right reasons? That was serious.
He still waited for my answer.
“I couldn’t stop thinking about you when I was with Shane. You, who you were. I don’t know if how much of how I see you has to do with your job. I honestly don’t know, Levi. All I know is that I couldn’t get you out of my head.”
He took a step closer. “You need to see me for who I am. I’m not my job.”
“I…I want to see you for who you are. We just need time.” I took a step closer to him.
His hand glanced over my hair and then caressed my face. I closed my eyes. “I hope so,” he said.
I did too.
Chapter 30
I don’t know anything about makeup sex, on account of my mother’s voice in my head making me think about cows.
Makeup kissing on the other hand…hadn’t really experienced that one either.
Until now.
We stood in my mother’s living room, cradled in each other’s arms. If I’d believed in ghosts, I might have worried about my father’s disapproving glare. But Dad wasn’t here. His body was in the urn on the mantle, and his spirit was in heaven.
My thoughts concerning Levi were wildly conflicting. I hated the idea of him selling the shop. I met him at the shop. I think I fell for him at the shop. I loved everything it stood for.
Without the shop, though, Levi was still Levi. He still smelled the same. His eyes still crinkled when he laughed. I knew he still cared about his family. I knew he still cared about me.
I knew this, because one of his hands was buried in my hair, the other nestled in the small of my back, holding me steady. His lips caressed mine, over and over.
We came up for air a couple moments later. His eyes burned into mine as he stroked my hair. “I love you,” he said.
I froze. I knew I was crazy about him. I knew I didn’t want to be without him. But love?
Love was a big deal.
Rather than answer, I kissed him.
Kissed him and hoped he didn’t think too deeply about it.
Before church on Sunday, Mom and I worked on piecing my quilt. It didn’t take us long to get the whole thing pinned into strips. Levi checked in from time to time.
“Are things all right with you two?” Mom asked after Levi offered to bring us refreshments.
I didn’t know how to answer. “How did you know that you wanted to be with Dad?” The question was difficult to ask, but I had to know.
“He was everything I was looking for—a believer, a leader. Handsome. I loved him very much. When everything fits together like that, you know.”
I wanted to ask a thousand questions. There were pictures of my dad smiling; I just hadn’t been born yet to witness those smiles myself. Had he always been like that? What had happened—or who? Was there something about me that was so wrong?
“He loved you, you know,” Mom said, using the mind reading abilities she’d picked up the second she gave birth.
For a moment, I was confused. Did she know about Levi? But then my mind reoriented itself, and I knew she was talking about my father. My stern, unyielding father.
“He…he had trouble showing it. I know that parts of your childhood…” she took a deep breath, “couldn’t have been easy. I’m so sorry about that. He was proud of you, though. Proud of your going to the university, proud that you had your job at the paper. Whenever you wrote an article, it spent a week on the fridge. After that, he put it into a notebook. It’s around here, somewhere.”
“I didn’t know.”
We both knew that I might have known, had I bothered to return home for more than a few minutes around the occasional holiday. My mom was gracious enough not to point that out.
I looked over my shoulder, checking the hallway for listeners. “Levi… told me he loves me.”
“Of course he does.”
“Not helping.”
“Do you love him?”
That’s the question that frightened me. I didn’t have a chance to even try to answer; as soon as I heard Levi’s footfalls on the stairs, I turned my attention back to the prickly quilt.
After arriving at church, I received compliments on my flippy navy skirt, printed blouse, and tangerine cardigan, and reveled in the fact that I was the recipient of such comments. On my clothing, no less.
Sara would be so proud.
Miss Lynnie found me after the service. “Who is this young man?” she asked, not looking at all upset that I had a new husband candidate with me.
“This is Levi,” I answered, performing introductions.
Levi shook her hand carefully and complimented her brooch. Miss Lynnie smiled, delighted. “I like this one,” she said.
“Me too,” I answered. “He’s also a believer,” I added, before she could ask.
“Of course he is,” she said with a wave of the hand. “How else would he know all five verses of Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing?”
She shuffled away after patting both of us on the cheek, her version, I think, of a blessing.
“She approves,” I told my mom after Miss Lynnie was out of earshot.
“Of course she does,” Mom answered, smiling at Levi. “Shall we all find something for lunch? Emilee’s hungry.”
We ended up voting for lunch locations, and Hawk Creek Café won unanimously. We started with a large Thai chicken pizza and ended with the crusts drizzled with honey. Near the fireplace in the back, I almost fell asleep.
Levi and I packed up after lunch, despite my yen for a nap. We gave final hugs to Mom, and began the drive back to Portland.
For the duration of the drive, we listened to Levi’s Trace Bundy CD. Levi wasn’t feeling talkative, clearly, and I certainly wasn’t either. I closed my eyes and allowed myself to drift off.
I awoke to the feel of turning into a driveway. I opened my eyes. It was the driveway to the parking lot at my building. We were home. My home, anyway.
“Sorry,” I said, trying to sit up. “I didn’t mean to sleep the whole way.”
“That’s all right.” The tone of his voice told me it probably wasn’t. “Need help with your bags?”
“I…sure.” I’d assumed he’d come in and we’d spend a little time together. Apparently I was wrong.
Levi carried my duffel bag. I carried my purse, windbreaker, and tennis shoes. I opened the door; he walked through it, took my bag down the hall, and deposited it in my bedroom doorway.
“Thanks,” I said, dumping my things in the chair by the door and kicking off my shoes.
“You’re welcome. I should get back.”
“Oh—okay.”
“Bye.”
“Bye.” I watched in confusion
as he started to walk out the door. “So that’s it?”
He stalled in the doorway but wouldn’t look at me. “I don’t know.”
I crossed my arms. “You have to talk to me.”
“What’s there to talk about?” He closed the door, so at least my neighbors weren’t getting their live As the World Turns installment from me. “I told you I loved you. You didn’t say anything.”
“I seem to remember kissing you. If I didn’t like you at all, I probably wouldn’t have engaged in any sort of physical contact with you.”
“I don’t know that.”
“Levi!” I laid a hand on his shoulder. “You know I care about you. A lot. I just…didn’t know what to say.”
“Because you don’t love me.”
“You don’t know that!”
“Don’t I?”
I retracted my hand. “I told you, I care about you.”
“But you don’t love me.”
“I want to be with you!”
“You don’t love me.”
For Pete’s sake, he was slow. “We’ve been together such a short while. Love takes time.”
“You’re saying I don’t love you?”
“No. I believe you. I just need more time.”
“How much time?”
“I don’t know.”
“What about if I sold my carpentry business? Would you still love me? If I decided to think practically instead of allowing my life decisions to be made on the basis of wishful thinking and sentimentality, would you still be there?”
I hesitated, just the tiniest second.
“Thanks. That’s all I need to know.”
“Levi—”
He reached again for the doorknob. “Jayne, I love you. No matter what you do.”
I pulled myself up. “Obviously not, if you’re leaving like this.”
“I love you.” He shrugged. “I can’t help but love you. I’ve loved you since you scheduled an interview with me on a day when you didn’t have anything going but pretended you did and then rode away on your motorcycle. That was the first day I met you. You’re not being honest with me, and you’re not honest with yourself. You like the idea of me. If the idea shifts…” his voice broke. “It makes me sad. I wish you felt the same way about me that I do about you.”
Plain Jayne Page 24
