A muscle near his mouth twitched. “I’m not going back,” he said again.
I let out a huge sigh. “I know you’re not. I know.” I patted the bed. “Come sit down.”
He came to the bed, every step full of reluctance. He sat quietly for a moment, fingering the hem of his T-shirt. Then, he shook his head. “You never told me how you found me so fast.”
“You mean last winter, after you ran away?”
“Yeah.”
I held out my phone and wiggled it in front of him. “Think about it, Jack. Cell phone—GPS. The police helped us track your every move so we knew you took that bus. And that’s how the Rankins knew you were coming before you arrived. We called them, and that satisfied the police—and us—that you would be safe.”
His eyebrows rose. “Oh.”
“Why didn’t you phone me? After you got here? Didn’t you know how scared I’d be?”
He stared at me with rounded eyes, and the guilt reflected there was like a fist to my gut.
He clenched my arm. “I wanted to call,” he whispered. “I just couldn’t. I had to escape.”
His face crumpled. “It was stupid. Really, really stupid.”
I squeezed my eyes shut against the tears. Had it been so awful for him? In Hollybrook?
“Don’t be mad, okay?”
I blew out the breath I’d been holding. “I’m not mad. You know, Aunt Elizabeth and Uncle Benjamin and everyone miss you.”
He stared at the huge bike-racing poster on the wall. “I don’t miss them.”
“Not even me? At least a little?”
He gave me a grudging half-smile. “Maybe you. A little.”
“Aunt Elizabeth wants me to bring you back—”
His eyes flared and his mouth opened.
I held up my hand. “Wait, don’t yell. I know you don’t want to go back. I’m making plans to live here with you.”
His expression relaxed. “Really?”
“Sure. We should be together, right?”
He angled his head at me and narrowed his eyes. “You want to come back here?”
Indecision rippled across my mind. Should I lie to him? A year ago, I wouldn’t have hesitated, especially if I was trying to protect him. But now?
After living with the Amish, lies didn’t come so easily.
Jack slid back off the bed and faced me. “You don’t want to, do you? You like it there, don’t you?”
I opened my mouth, but nothing came out.
“You do. You like it there! Are you going to go Amish now?” His tone shook with disbelief.
“I don’t know what I’m going to do.” I stood and took a step toward him and rested my hand on his shoulder. “But we should be together.”
“I’m not going back. I want to stay here with my friends.”
“I know. I know. I’m not forcing you to do anything. I’m trying to think about what Mom would want.” My voice broke.
Tears sprang to Jack’s eyes. He sniffed and turned away.
I wiped at my own tears. “I’m sorry. How do you not think of her every minute you’re here?”
“It wouldn’t matter where I was,” he said, his voice so low I barely heard him.
I swallowed past the lump in my throat and straightened my shoulders. “I can move back anytime. I’m sure Pastor Rankin will let me stay. I’ll pay him for my keep, too. At least until Mom’s money runs out.”
“You don’t have to.”
I rubbed my fingers back and forth over my forehead and closed my eyes. Jack was wrong. I did have to.
I focused on him again. “I just need to go home and gather my stuff. I can take the bus back here next week.”
Why is Zeke’s face stuck in my mind as if glued?
“Did you notice what you said?” Jack asked.
I stared at his grim expression. “What do you mean?
“You called Hollybrook home.”
“Of course I did! I’ve been living there for months.”
Jack grabbed my arm. “I never called it home. Never.”
His eyes burned into mine. I had the sudden feeling that I was not being gripped by a fourteen-year-old boy, but by a young man. Had he changed so much, so quickly?
“Mom would want us together,” I whispered.
“No.”
“What do you mean, no?” I asked.
“Don’t come here. You don’t want to, and you shouldn’t have to.”
I shook my head. “It’s not as easy as that, Jack. I’m your sister.”
“You’ll still be my sister in Indiana.” He loosened his hold and sank down on his bed, looking again like my little brother. “I don’t want you to come.”
I searched his face. “Are you being all generous and giving, or do you mean it?”
“I mean it.”
My bones hurt like I’d morphed into a very old woman. I didn’t move, only kept looking at Jack, waiting for him to smile and laugh and be the carefree kid of a year ago. But, of course, he didn’t. He couldn’t. He only returned my stare with a look so sad and deep and determined that I wanted to cry out with the injustice of it all.
Where is Hope’s God now? Here with Jack? With me?
I didn’t think so.
“Jack,” I said, my voice soft. “I want to come. I want to be here with you.”
He shook his head slowly. “No. Please. I’ll do better on my own.”
“You can’t mean that.”
He stood, walked over to his bedroom window, and grasped the edge of the curtain. “You remind me of Mom too much. I’ll get over her better alone.”
My lips parted and new tears rolled down my face. “Jack, please.”
He turned to look at me. “No. You don’t want to come here anyway. So don’t.”
I searched my mind for something to say. Had I brought this on? Was this because Jack knew I wasn’t ready to leave Hollybrook? Was he only trying to help me?
And I didn’t look that much like Mom. I didn’t. The tears kept coming, and I wiped them with the back of my hand.
“So that’s it?” I asked.
“For now.”
“I’m supposed to be the big sister, and here you’re acting all grown up like you don’t need me.”
He blew out his breath. “I do need you. And you are my big sister. But I don’t need you here. Not right now. Someday, maybe, we can live together again.”
“But I want to take care of you.” Each word was a stone, scraping over my heart.
“You’re taking care of me by leaving me here.”
He walked to me, and I put my arms around him in a hard, desperate hug. This wasn’t how I saw this meeting ending. This wasn’t how I wanted it to end.
Or did I?
Everything was simply too much. I felt like I was balancing on a thread over a craggy abyss.
“Is Mary here?” Jack asked.
I nodded.
“Is she still mad at me?”
“Mad? No, why?”
“I ran twice.” He looked toward the closed bedroom door.
“She’s not mad.”
“I guess I have to face her.”
“Bryan’s here, too,” I told him.
He smiled. “You still into him?”
“Yeah. He’s a good guy.” And he likes me. More than likes me. And he’s smart and nice and fun and good-looking.
“I’m going out to talk to Mary.”
I watched him leave. He seemed taller, older. I sat on his bed and stared at the wall. One more year of high school. That’s all I had left. If Jack didn’t want me with him right then, I would come after I graduated. In one year, I’d be legal, and we could find a place together.
Zeke’s image floated to my mind and I inhaled sharply. His blue eyes haunted me. He saw into my soul and even thinking of his penetrating stare made me squirm. I had to put him out of my head. I’d been a fool to ever consider becoming Amish. I didn’t belong with them. I belonged here, with Zach.
“Sally?” Bryan
stood at the doorway, a questioning look on his face.
“Hey.”
He came in and sat gently beside me. “You okay?” He put his arm around my shoulders.
My gaze met his. Bryan was safe and known and he belonged to the Englisch world—my world.
I nodded and lay my head against his shoulder. His arm around me tightened and he pressed himself closer to me. Then he took my chin with the tips of his fingers and brought my face to his. He leaned down and brushed his lips on mine.
The look of love in his eyes made my chest tighten. And then the strangest thing happened—in my mind’s eye, Bryan became Zeke. It was Zeke kissing me. Zeke holding me tight. Zeke assuring me that everything was going to be all right.
I blinked hard and bit my upper lip.
I must snap out of it. I was being ridiculous. I belonged with the Englisch.
With Jack. With Bryan.
“You sure you’re okay?” Bryan asked, brushing a strand of hair from my cheek.
I disentangled myself from him and stood. “Yes. Of course.”
He got up and grabbed my hand. “You going to come back here? To Ohio?”
“Not yet. After I graduate.”
Bryan smiled. “Okay, then. We’ll have a year together in Hollybrook. And who knows? I might get a basketball scholarship from a college in Ohio.” He winked down at me with a look of relief and excitement.
I put on a smile and tried—really tried—to make it real.
But it felt wooden as we returned to the living room.
Time. That’s all I need. Time. Time is my answer.
I’d gone through too much over the last year. Mom dying. My leaving everything I knew and moving to the Amish. Jack running away.
I just needed to be patient with myself. Give myself time. It would all come together and I’d be at peace about returning to the Englisch.
And Zeke’s presence would fade out of my head.
I squeezed Bryan’s hand, and he glanced at me with a glowing smile and squeezed my hand back. I looked at his warm eyes, his broad shoulders, and his caring expression. I remembered all the fun times we’d shared over the past months: I remembered cracking up as we walked down the halls telling each other stupid jokes; I remembered chasing each other around the school’s track during gym class; I remembered driving to Dobey’s to share an order of French fries.
Yes, time. More time. That’s all I needed.
Bryan let go of my hand and put his arm around my shoulder. I leaned into his chest, and gazed up into his eyes. My face creased into a sudden smile and this time, it felt infinitely more real.
The End
Amish Days
Second Thoughts
An Amish Romance Short Story
by Brenda Maxfield
Copyright © 2015 Tica House Publishing All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means, including scanning, photocopying, or otherwise without prior written permission of the copyright holder.
One
“Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.”
Hebrews 11:1 (King James Version)
All the way home, I held onto Bryan’s hand. I’d made my choice, and I needed to act like it. Our return trip from Ohio back to Indiana seemed shorter than the trip there—perhaps because the mystery was gone. No more wondering what my brother Jack was thinking.
Now I knew.
Jack had forced me to leave him, and it made my throat burn and my head ache. I sat in Bryan’s car like a wooden post, willing myself not to cry or scream. I wanted to do both. Every few minutes, I let out a sigh that scraped the bottom of my lungs. Each time, my cousin Mary tore her gaze from the scenery to rub my shoulders and act all sympathetic. From the driver’s seat, Bryan peered at me from the corner of his eye.
But I kept my face forward. I wasn’t inclined to chat or share my feelings with either of them. Mostly, I rode in dread of what Aunt Elizabeth would say when I returned without Jack.
“Don’t you need to stop for gas?” I asked Bryan as we edged closer and closer to Hollybrook.
He shrugged. “Not really. I can easily get you home.”
“I think we should stop.” I pulled my hand from his and wiggled painful cramps from my fingers.
Bryan was silent for only a moment. “You don’t want to go home, right?”
I remembered what Jack had said about me calling Uncle Benjamin’s Amish farm home. He’d been right—I had considered Hollybrook my home. Well, no longer. I rubbed my hands over my knees, more determined than ever to follow through with my decision.
“You mean I don’t want to go to my uncle’s house, right?” I asked Bryan. My distinction floated through the car, sounding stupid even to my own ears.
Bryan’s eyebrows raised. Mary snorted behind me but kept her mouth shut.
“Okay,” I said, “so I’m dragging the trip out. But you will stop for gas, right?”
Bryan gave me a concerned look. “You can’t avoid it forever, Sally.”
“I know that.”
Mary leaned forward, resting her elbows on the back of my seat. “Mamm won’t be mad at you—about Jack, I mean. She’ll just be disappointed.”
Mary didn’t know that I planned to return to Ohio for good in one year after I graduated from high school. She still thought all of this fuss was about my brother Jack and our futile efforts to coerce him back to Indiana. He’d run away to Ohio to the place where he and I had lived before and right after Mom was killed, and ever since then, all anyone ever thought about was bringing him back.
Which had been my mission that day according to Aunt Elizabeth.
Bryan slowed his Volkswagen Bug to a crawl. “We can take more time if you need it.”
I squeezed the back of my neck. “No, I’m being stupid. You’re right. Drive us home—I mean, to Uncle’s house.”
I stared out the window. The sky vibrated with streaks of pink as the sun dipped below the edge of the expansive green fields. I tried to inhale some of its beauty, but it didn’t work. Giving up, I squared my shoulders, bracing myself for the waiting inquisition.
Sure enough, when Bryan pulled into the drive, Aunt Elizabeth, Aunt Ruth, and my cousin Ann and her puppy came rushing from the house. They perched in a line across the front step—except for the puppy who tumbled down the stairs. Ann flew after her, snatching her to safety right before Bryan slowed the car to a stop.
Aunt Elizabeth’s eyes quickly scanned the inside of the car. Noting the absence of Jack, her face grew solemn and clouded. I stepped from the front seat and gazed up at her. She gave me a look of infinite distress, turned on her heel, and retreated back inside. Still holding the puppy Apple, Ann rushed forward and grabbed my arm with her free hand.
“Where’s Jack?” she demanded. “Didn’t you bring him home?”
I shook my head. “He wouldn’t come.”
Mary crawled out of the backseat and stepped around me. “It was a wonderful trip,” she exclaimed. “Jack sends his greetings.”
Ann’s face screwed up and her eyes filled with tears. “You were supposed to bring him back!” she cried. She let go of me and ran toward the barn, her bare feet sending up swirls of dirt.
Ruth hurried down the stairs. “Come on in, the both of you. You must be exhausted after your trip.”
Her kind tone almost made me weep with relief. “Thanks, Ruth.”
She leaned down and spoke to Bryan through the open car window. “Would you like to come in for some warm milk or tea?”
“No, but thanks. I should be getting home.”
Ruth rested her hand on the edge of the window. “Whatever suits you. Thank you for taking our Sally. And Mary. It was right kind.”
Bryan smiled and nodded.
“Let’s go in,” Ruth said, holding out her arms to shepherd me and Mary into the house.
“I’ll be there in a minute,” I said. I opened the passenger door and slid back onto the c
ar seat with my feet resting outside on the gravel. “Thanks, Bryan. For everything.”
He gave my shoulder a squeeze. “It was rough back there with Jack, wasn’t it?”
My throat threatened to close, and I pulled at the collar of my shirt, trying to relieve the sensation of choking. “Yeah, it was.”
“You didn’t tell me all what happened.”
“Not much to tell. Jack doesn’t want me there. I remind him too much of Mom.” I shook my head. “I don’t look that much like her.” My voice broke, and I pressed my hand to my chest as I took a slow breath. “One more year of high school after this one. Then I’m going back. I’ll get an apartment and take care of him.”
Bryan’s grip on my shoulder tightened. “You’re a good sister, Sally.”
Tears sprang to my eyes. “No, I’m not. If I was, I’d be with Jack right now.”
“I don’t think so. You’d be doing exactly what you are doing.”
I looked at him through my tears, and his loving gaze made the lump in my throat swell another notch. “Thanks,” I choked out.
He leaned forward to kiss me, but I held up my palm, blocking my mouth. “Not here. If Uncle Benjamin is watching…”
“Just one kiss?”
“No. It’s not done. Simply not done.”
Bryan peered around me toward the house. “No one’s watching.”
“We can’t know that.” I got out of the car and shut the door.
Bryan stretched across the passenger seat and smiled up at me. “Tomorrow?”
I nodded. “It’s a preaching Sunday, but I should be free in the afternoon.”
“I’ll call you.”
“Okay.” I patted the hood of his car, and he took off.
I hurried inside where Uncle Benjamin was waiting for me. His face was tense and his bushy brows sank over his eyes like a shelf. His bulky presence seemed to suck up most of the air inside the front room. “Where’s Jack?”
“I’m sorry, Uncle. I tried, but he wouldn’t come.”
Uncle Benjamin rubbed his burly hand over the back of the rocking chair making soft scraping sounds. “He’s all right, though?”
Amish Romance BOXED Set: Amish Days: Sally's Story (Hollybrook Amish Romance) Page 3
