by Amy Lillard
His mother stepped into the house first, turning around to give Sadie a big hug before she rushed to Chris’s side.
He hadn’t talked to her since the accident. In fact, he hadn’t talked to anyone in his family. He had so badly wanted to talk to Johnny, but they told him that the painkillers he was taking made him loopy and hard to understand. Somehow they convinced him that he didn’t want to talk to his brother when he was like that and it was better to wait until Johnny had a clear head. As much as Chris hated it, he had to agree. He had apologies to make, and something that important needed to be said with clarity, not on a whim.
His mother took his hand and squeezed his fingers in her strong grip. “He’s going to be fine, Chris.”
Chris swallowed back the lump in his throat and managed to reply, “I’m so glad, Mamm.” But he almost choked at the uncharacteristic tears that had risen into his father’s eyes.
“Can you come in here and sit down, please?” Chris asked. “I have something I need to talk to you about.” He wasn’t looking directly at Sadie, but he did notice that her eyes widened and she shook her head. She had no idea what was coming next.
His parents settled down around the table. Chris turned to Sadie. “Can you get them some coffee, please, or something to drink?”
His mother gave a nervous laugh. “I feel like a guest in my own home.”
Sadie still hadn’t moved. “Please,” Chris asked again.
“Chris,” Sadie started with a shake of her head, but he cut her off.
“I’ll be right back,” he said, turning on his heel before she could protest and heading for the stairs. He knew that she wouldn’t follow him up there. And for that he was grateful. He had things to do, and he didn’t need her behind him interrupting the entire time.
He pulled his bed away from the wall and eased the mattress off to the side so he could reach the slit he had made there. He reached into the envelope-sized hole and pulled out the zippered bank bag where his money was stored. Then he pushed his bed back into place and started down the stairs once again.
His parents were right where he left them. Sadie too. No one had moved at all in the time since he had been gone.
“I’m not sure how to say this,” he started. In his dreams he had told them a hundred times he was going to Europe. He told them he was off to see the world, they didn’t need him on the farm, and he was headed for a grand adventure. And a hundred different times they reacted a hundred different ways. Never before had he played out the scenario that was about to happen. “I’ve been saving some money for a while. Just a dollar or two here and there. And since this happened . . .” Chris stopped to swallow the lump in his throat. Lord, give me strength to get through this. “But now the family needs this money for something more important than anything I had planned for it.” He took another step forward and laid the bank bag on the table in front of his dat. His father sat back in his chair away from it as if it had been tainted with some type of poison that couldn’t be contained.
“It’s okay,” Chris said. “It’s money. Johnny needs it more than I do.”
His mother looked from his dat to the bank bag and then back to his father’s face. Dat didn’t move an inch. He stared at the bag like he wasn’t sure if it could be trusted or not.
“Oh, Merlin.” His mother took the bag and unzipped it. She looked inside, and her eyes grew wide. “Chris, where did you get all this money?”
In that moment Chris was glad that he hadn’t managed to buy the plane ticket to Europe yet, so that money was still amongst the thousands he had stashed. “I’ve been saving it for a while.”
“What were you going to do with it, son?” His father kept staring at the table. Even though the money bag wasn’t there any longer, his gaze did not move from that spot.
Chris should’ve known that he couldn’t give them such a grand sum without explaining how he came to have it. Or what he intended to use it for. “I was going to take a trip,” he said.
His mother continued to thumb through the bills, all neatly stacked in order. “You were going far.”
“I was coming back.” Behind him, Sadie stifled a sob. He couldn’t look at her, knowing that if he saw tears in those hazel eyes, he would surely fall apart himself. “I was.”
“And now?” his father asked.
“Johnny needs it.”
His father pushed back from the table and stalked out the front door, slamming it behind him. He left his coat hanging on the peg inside the door and his hat right above it.
For a moment Chris thought his mother might rush after him. She half stood from her chair, then sat back down. Sadie came around and eased down in the chair opposite his mother. They sat there like stoic bookends, staring at nothing in particular.
“I was coming back,” Chris said, though he wasn’t sure if either one of them believed him. He hoped they understood that it didn’t matter anymore. His brother was paralyzed, and he was not leaving. Not ever.
Chapter Nineteen
Ezra waited on the phone for Sadie to answer. How many times in the last week had he called the restaurant only to be told that she was busy or over with Chris or some of the other excuses that whoever answered his call gave him? Sometimes he talked to Cora Ann, sometimes to Melanie, and other times it was their mother. Occasionally he got the young girl who helped out at night. Millie he thought her name was. But mostly he got excuses.
She was slipping away. He could feel it. He wasn’t sure how, but something had happened. And he was desperate to get her back again.
“Ezra?”
It had been so long since he heard her voice he almost didn’t recognize it. “Sadie?”
“I’m glad you called.”
That sentence could have a hundred implications, none of which he liked except maybe she missed him too.
“Can I pick you up at the library tonight?”
“Tonight?”
“It’s Monday. You don’t normally work on Monday nights. I . . .” He ran his hand through his hair. “I just really want to see you. I miss you.”
“I know. It’s been—”
“Hectic,” Ezra supplied. “You’ve mentioned that before.” Every time he called, as a matter of fact.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. Just meet me there. We don’t have to go anywhere. I’ll come to you. We can sit and talk. Anything you want to do, okay? Please.” He had resorted to begging to see her. The thought made him feel weak. But he couldn’t help himself. He loved her. He loved her more than anything he had ever loved in his life. He was losing her. And he didn’t know how to stop it.
Silence met his ears. And she finally answered. “Okay. I’ll meet you.”
“Six o’clock?” he asked, his breath held as he waited for her answer.
“Jah. Six o’clock,” she agreed. “I’ll be there.”
He hung up the phone and stared at it a moment. This was what love did to a man. It made him pathetic. And he gained a little more understanding of his mother and her bitterness toward everything that her father had put her through.
Love was supposed to be a happy emotion. It was supposed to make a person feel like they were walking on clouds and all those other wonderful things that people said about it. What they didn’t say was how bad it hurt, how confusing it was, and how it was anything but simple.
“Where are you going?” Somehow in his mental rant he had overlooked the sound of her chair coming into the room. He whirled around to face his mother.
“Just out.”
“On Monday night?”
“Yes.” He didn’t want to explain it to her. She wouldn’t understand anyway.
“It’s that Amish girl again, isn’t it?”
Ezra felt as if his patience was about to snap in two. “Tell me, Mom. Does it bother you that she’s Amish or that I love her?”
“Don’t talk to me like that,” she said, her voice firm, unyielding. “I’m still your mother.”
�
��I know that.” He propped his hands on his hips. She was his mother and he loved and respected her, but he was not backing down this time.
“Did you hear what I said?” he asked.
“I need you here tonight,” she said.
Ezra shook his head. “I’m going out.”
“Not tonight.”
Ezra felt like he was beating his head against a brick wall. “I love her, and I’m going out tonight. And with any luck, I’ll come home engaged.”
His mother acted as if she was going to push herself up out of her chair. “Engaged? You can’t get engaged to an Amish girl.”
“And why can’t I? I love her, and she loves me.”
“I loved your father too, and you see where that got us.”
“That has nothing to do with this.”
“You are so naïve. You think love is going to solve everything. You have no idea how many problems you’ll have to face. Where will you live? What about the ranch? You surely can’t go to Wells Landing and live there. Can you be Amish, Ezra? You won’t give up your church. Do you think she’ll give up hers?”
“Why would she not?” He’d thought about this many times. He had a beautiful house here. Of course, he shared it with his mother. But one day it would all be his. He had a ranch with organic domestic and exotic meats, a thriving business. Why would she not want to come here and live with him? They loved each other. And love could overcome anything they wanted it to. Of that he was certain.
“You’re not going anywhere.”
“I am twenty-four years old. I have devoted the last seven years of my life to taking care of you, and I am willing to devote the next seventy years of my life to taking care of you. But tonight I’m going to see Sadie. I’m going to ask her to marry me, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”
She stared at him, mouth gaping, as he whirled on his heel, grabbed his jacket up by the door, and headed out the front. Luckily the keys were in his pocket. He hopped into the truck and started the engine before the door had even shut. He loved his mother, but he’d had enough. Enough of her self-pity and drama. It was time that they all started living again. That was her problem. She was jealous that he had found someone he loved and who loved him back. He felt sorry for his mother. His father was a cad, but that wasn’t Ezra’s fault. And Ezra deserved to be happy, as did his mother. And tonight he was going to find his happiness.
He threw gravel up as he spun his tires out of the driveway and headed down the road. He barely got a quarter of a mile toward the highway before he pulled over. He fished his cell phone from his pocket and dialed Logan’s number from heart. His cousin picked up on the second ring.
“Hey,” Logan said.
Ezra sucked in a deep breath, trying to calm his nerves as he collected his thoughts.
“Ezra?”
“I’m here.” He took another deep breath. “Listen, I just had it out with Mom.” He was embarrassed to say the words. He shouldn’t argue with his mother. She was all he had left in the world.
“It’s about time,” Logan said.
Ezra didn’t ask him to qualify that remark. He had other things to discuss. “I left in sort of a hurry. Can you go by and check on her? Please.”
He almost heard his cousin smile on the other end of the line. “You know I will.”
“You’re a good nephew,” Ezra said.
Logan scoffed. “I bet you say that to all your cousins.”
Ezra hung up and started the truck back toward Wells Landing. He couldn’t believe he was going to propose to Sadie without a ring at hand. But with her reaction over the elephant necklace, it was probably better this way. They would figure out all the details later, where they would live and all that. But he felt confident she would want to come to Taylor Creek with him. The thought brought a smile to his face as he continued down the highway toward the girl he loved.
* * *
Sadie looked at the clock one more time. Five fifteen. She still had forty-five minutes to go before she got see Ezra. She’d missed him so much in the last couple weeks. She almost felt selfish, missing him when she was trying to help a family get back on their feet. But it was true. She missed Ezra terribly.
“That’s the third time you’ve looked at the clock in just as many minutes.” Cora Ann came up beside her, carrying a stack of the trays they used to take drinks to the tables.
Sadie sighed. “I’m sure you’re mistaken.” She turned to look at the clock again.
“You did it again!”
Sadie shook her head.
“What are you waiting for?” Cora Ann asked.
Sadie wasn’t sure how much to tell her sister. She didn’t know how much Cora Ann knew. Probably not much, since she and Ezra had been keeping their relationship completely hidden.
“Are you going to see Ezra?”
Maybe they hadn’t been keeping it as hidden as she had thought.
“I like him,” Cora Ann said.
Of course she did. An exotic animal rancher was a foodie’s dream, though Sadie didn’t say as much. “I do too.” But she more than liked him. She was crazy about him. Crazy in love.
“Why don’t you go ahead and leave now?” Cora Ann glanced around the restaurant. “The dinner crowd is hitting, but it’s Monday. We won’t be that busy today. And Millie will be here soon.”
She didn’t have to ask her twice. Sadie reached behind her and started untying the cook’s apron she wore. In short order they would be able to take off the terrible mourning black and wear their colors again. That time couldn’t come soon enough. With the spring came renewal. A time to start over. A time to wear bright colors and rejoice and maybe start a new life with someone she loved.
She smoothed her hands down the sides of her regular apron. “Thank you, sister,” she said.
Cora Ann smiled. “Anything for you.”
Sadie made her way to the back office and grabbed her purse out of the desk drawer where her mother kept them. For once, Mamm wasn’t in the office doing bills or trying to weed through the papers for Zach Calhoun to enter all their business transactions into his many spreadsheets he had started for them. She must’ve gone down to the bakery to see if she could figure out Esther Lapp Fitch’s new piecrust recipe. Rumor around town was she was using a vinegar piecrust, but Sadie wasn’t so sure.
She slung her purse over her shoulder and started winding her way between the tables, just as Chris came through the restaurant doors. He was perhaps the last person she thought she’d see now.
“Chris, what are you doing here?”
Please let him say he came to get something to eat. But something in the soft look in his eyes told her that he’d come for her.
“Can you walk with me?”
Sadie wanted to protest. She wanted to tell him that she had plans, that she was on her way to . . . She couldn’t tell him any of those things. Besides, she was early for meeting Ezra anyway. She had a few minutes to talk to her best friend before she got to see the man she loved.
“In the park?” Sadie asked.
“If that will make you happy,” Chris said.
Sadie smiled. That was Chris, a gentleman to the end.
She nodded, and in tandem they walked back through the restaurant doors and out to the street. Side by side, they made their way to the park that sat in the middle of Main Street.
Traffic in Wells Landing was quite busy for an early Monday evening. Sadie loved the bustle. It was just enough. Not so slow that it felt like it stood still, but not nearly as busy as Tulsa or even Pryor. Wells Landing was perfect.
They made their way across the street, but instead of settling in the swings, Chris led her over to the picnic table. They sat, their elbows braced on the table, across from each other.
“How’s Johnny?” She had asked that very same question this morning, when she had called out to the farm to talk to Chris’s mother, but she had to ask Chris. She had to know as often as she could that Johnny Flaud was going to be okay.
/> “He’s okay. He’s wanting to get up, even though his legs don’t work. And he can’t do much with his arms. But they’re thinking that maybe . . .”
Sadie nodded, then gave a slight start as Chris reached across the table and took her hands into his.
“I didn’t come here to talk about Johnny.”
Sadie’s mouth went dry. “Then why are you here?”
“I came to ask you to marry me.”
“Marry you?” It was the last thing Sadie expected him to say.
“I know that’s what you wanted. You wanted a family and a house and kids. I can give you all that. I’m not leaving. I’m not going to Europe. I have my family’s farm. I’m staying right here.”
If only she had heard those words four months ago. That was all she ever wanted. But now things were different. “What happens if Johnny gets better?”
“You know he’s not going to ever walk again. I will need to be here to take care of the farm. It’s my job now.”
Sadie wasn’t sure what to say. She had loved Chris her entire life, but it wasn’t a romantic love. It wasn’t what the romance authors talked about in their books. She only felt that zip and zing when she was with Ezra. But would something like that last? She had no idea. And she didn’t know who to ask. Caroline? Or maybe Emily, or Lorie? She didn’t know. They all had found their loves, but did they feel that tingle when they were with their husbands? She had no way of knowing. It wasn’t something the Amish normally talked about. She had so many questions and no answers. She was twenty-two years old and clueless when it came to affairs of the heart.
“I take it this is not what you expected.”
“I-I—” she stammered, unable to find the words. What could she say to him? That she didn’t want to be a second choice? That she loved him but she wasn’t sure if that love was the end-all be-all love? Or that the love was just friendship—how did a person know? Was it possible to love two men?
She pulled her hands from Chris’s grasp and pressed them against her temples. A headache was starting to pound. She had thought way too much about this. Was that the problem? Should she be listening to her heart? What did her heart even have to say on the matter? She just didn’t know. “I’m confused,” she said.
