A Daughter's Truth

by Laura Bradford

  She didn’t mean to laugh, but just the notion that she even had prospects for marriage was silly. Still, she appreciated his kind words and the intent behind them. “I am happy for Mary—I am. It is just that I will miss our talks at the hymn sings.”

  “That will not change because of Leroy.”

  “If they marry, she will not go to hymn sings and then . . .” Blinking hard against the tears she heard lapping at her words, Emma made herself stand. “Thank you for checking on me, but I should go. I do not want Jakob to leave without me.”

  Levi, too, stood, his hand finding its way between his chest and his suspender. “Jakob has already left. So have many.”

  “Oh.” She sagged back against the barn. “I did not know. I am sorry if I have made you late.”

  “I told Mary I would find you and that I would make sure you were okay.”

  “And you have done that.”

  “Yah, I have found you, but”—he studied her closely—“I do not think you are okay.”

  “I want to be,” she whispered. “But I do not know how to be.”

  “Perhaps you need someone you can talk to without worry. Someone who will listen to your troubles and help you to know what is best.”

  “I don’t know if anyone can tell me that.”

  “I do not know, either. But if there is one who can, it will be Miss Lottie. She knows of things I do not know, even if I wish that I did.” Removing his hold on his suspender, Levi swept his hand toward the line of buggies on the other side of the barn. “Come. I will take you to her now. And when you are done, I will bring you home.”

  “But we don’t know if Miss Lottie is home. She could be out or busy or—”

  “Or she could be there, happy to listen, happy to help.”

  Happy to listen . . .

  Happy to help . . .

  Emma’s thoughts drifted down to her hand and the stomach that suddenly seemed a little less unsettled. “Yah. Perhaps we could ride out to Miss Lottie’s and see if she is home.”

  Chapter 17

  For more than a handful of years, Emma had fantasized about this exact moment. Sitting beside Levi on a wagon seat . . . His horse, Hoofer, dutifully pulling them through the countryside. . . No Liddy Mast to flutter her eyelashes . . . Mary otherwise occupied, giving them a chance to really talk . . .

  Now that it was here, though, there wasn’t any talking. In fact, the only sound beyond Hoofer’s hooves against the finely graveled country road was the occasional command of her owner to slow down or move faster. Twice, she’d gotten the sense Levi was about to say something designed to start a conversation, but both times he’d remained silent, freeing her to remain lost in her own thoughts.

  The Emma of two weeks earlier would have been mortified at the silence, no doubt trying to scramble for something, anything to say to make Levi see her as courting material. But that Emma was gone, shoved to the side by someone who still looked the same, yet no longer was.

  “I remember once, when I was not much older than Esther, bad storms took Dat’s crops.” She surveyed the land to their left and right even as her mind’s eye replaced the view with one from seventeen years earlier. “Dat did not question the Lord’s will, but he said something about how fast things could change. When we went to bed, the wheat was plentiful and soon to be harvested. When we woke up, it was gone.”

  Tugging softly on the reins, Levi glanced across the seat at Emma. “Yah. I remember that storm. I was seven. I stood beside Dat in the kitchen and listened to the hail on the roof. The next morning, there was much worry about how to feed the animals that winter.”

  “That is how I feel right now.” She inhaled the cold winter air into her lungs and released it in a smoky plume. “Only it is not crops that have changed in one night. It is me.”

  “You?” Levi asked over the slow but steady clip-clop of Hoofer’s hooves. “You look like the same Emma to me. You have the same hair, the same”—he pulled his left hand from the reins long enough to brush at the area flanking the bridge of his nose—“freckles here, and the same blue eyes.”

  She shook her head at his words. “I do not mean those things. I mean the things you cannot see. The things that make me . . . me.”

  “I do not think you are different.”

  “Of course I am different. I am not born from Mamm and Dat. I am born from Mamm’s sister, Ruby, and an Englisher. And Jakob, Sarah, Jonathan, Annie, and Esther are not my brothers and sisters.”

  “That does not mean you are not still Emma,” he said with a gentle pull of his hand as he guided Hoofer to turn left onto Miss Lottie’s dirt driveway.

  Torn between trying to find a way to verbalize her feelings and the ready-made distraction that was the white cottage with the wide front porch, she opted for the latter, falling silent as she did. Lottie Jenkins was a staple inside Emma’s district, the elderly English woman’s wisdom, quiet lifestyle, and utmost respect for the Amish way endearing her to the plain people she lived among.

  For as long as Emma could remember, Katie Beiler’s mamm had been a summer staple on Miss Lottie’s porch, likely sharing a moment of conversation over lemonade and baked treats while Katie’s younger siblings chased bubbles nearby with Digger the dog. It had been such a common sighting, in fact, that when Katie’s mamm went to the Lord the previous year, her absence from Miss Lottie’s porch had been particularly jarring. But while the Beilers had spent the most time there, many in Emma’s community stopped by, as well, their lives and troubles always seemingly lighter after time spent on the same porch that was now no more than a few buggy length’s away.

  “It is too cold for Miss Lottie to sit on the porch with me,” she whispered as her gaze gravitated upward to the plume of smoke rising from the simple chimney. “Perhaps it is not a good time.”

  “There is room to sit and visit inside.” Levi drew Hoofer to a stop beside the hitching post at the base of the walkway and turned to Emma. “Go. Spend some time. Share what is troubling your heart.”

  Again, Emma looked at the house, and again, a hint of calm enveloped her. “Yah. I will go.” Turning back to the handsome man behind the reins, she mustered up the smile he deserved for his kindness. “Thank you, Levi. For the idea, and for the ride. Now it is your turn to go. To enjoy the hymn sing and the fun.” She stopped, took a breath, and infused a lightness into her voice she didn’t feel. “Perhaps you will like Liddy Mast’s oatmeal cookies better today.”

  He started to speak but stopped as a telltale creak drew their collective attention back to the cottage. Seconds later, a light to the left of the door switched on, bathing the porch in a muted glow. “Levi Fisher? Is that you, dear?”

  “Yah.”

  “Come in out of that cold, young man. I’ll make us some hot tea.”

  Tucking the reins onto the floor of the wagon, Levi stepped down off the seat and crossed around to Emma’s side of the wagon. “I am going to a hymn sing, Miss Lottie, but I brought someone who would love to have some of that tea with you.”

  The thump of Miss Lottie’s cane preceded her steps onto the porch. “Oh?”

  Levi nodded up at Emma and then reached up for her hand. She took it, stepped down onto the driveway, and made her way toward the walkway. “Hello, Miss Lottie. It’s me—”

  “Emma Lapp!” Miss Lottie tapped the end of her cane against the wooden floor with delight. “What a wonderful surprise this is! Come in! Come in! It’s nice and toasty warm inside.”

  Emma stepped closer, the light from the porch glinting off the upper edge of Miss Lottie’s thick glasses. “If it is not a good time, I-I could go.”

  “You will do no such thing, child! After my breakfast this morning, I made a pie. I didn’t know why, just that I was called to make one.” Miss Lottie beckoned Emma onto the porch. “The Lord clearly knew you were coming.”

  When Emma cleared the top step, Miss Lottie peered around her, eyeing Levi across the top of her glasses. “There’s plenty for you, too, Levi. It�
�d give me a way to thank you again for clearing that tree from my driveway.”

  “You already thanked me, Miss Lottie, and it was no trouble. Just neighbors helping neighbors.” Then, stepping forward a half step, he trained his attention back on Emma. “If you’re not ready when the hymn sing is over, I will wait right here.”

  “You are not to get me,” Emma protested. “I can walk. It is not far.”

  “It will be dark. I will stop and bring you home.” Nodding first at Miss Lottie, and then Emma, Levi crossed back around to his side of the wagon. With one last nod of encouragement at Emma, he climbed up to his seat, took his place behind the reins, and headed back toward the road, the wheels of his wagon squeaking and groaning with each new rut he encountered.

  When Levi and his wagon disappeared from view, Miss Lottie rested her leathery hand atop Emma’s arm. “Come inside, dear. We can visit in front of the fire.”

  “Are you . . . certain?” she eked past the lump in her throat. “It is not too dark to walk home now.”

  “I am certain, child. Come.” Miss Lottie led the way back to the door, pulled it open, and caned her way into the hallway. Where it split, the elderly woman pointed Emma toward the tiny sitting room and its quilt-draped sofa and matching armchair. “Why don’t you put a log in the fire and I’ll get us some of that pie I told you about. The smell has been tickling my nose and my stomach long enough.”

  Emma waited for her stomach to react to the notion of food as it had after the Sunday church service, but it didn’t. Progress . . .

  Stepping into the sitting room, Emma took a moment to look around, the look and feel a near perfect match to the image she’d created in her mind. Although it was a room with four walls, real furniture, and a stone hearth, it was, in many ways, simply an indoor version of Miss Lottie’s porch. Warm, welcoming, safe.

  She reveled in the warmth emanating from the fireplace and then wandered over to its mantel and the series of framed black and white photographs that covered it from one end to the other. The pictures, themselves, were of places—a building that reached the sky, a bridge over a rushing stream, the top of a mountain overlooking a valley, and the vast ocean. In each picture was a single person—a woman—whose back was to the camera, looking out at the scene. She didn’t need to look closer to know the woman was a younger Miss Lottie. The mere presence of the floppy straw hat atop the figure’s head was all the proof Emma needed. Still, it was clear the pictures were taken years earlier, before age necessitated the cane that was as much a part of the woman now as the very home in which Emma was standing.

  “It takes a while to get everything in here when one hand is occupied with walking, but I get it done.” Miss Lottie caned her way into the room with a stack of plates and set them down on the table Emma recognized as being Amish made. “I’ll be right—”

  “Miss Lottie, I’m sorry,” she said, snapping to. “I was so busy enjoying your pictures I did not add a log to the fire as you asked. I will do that now, and then I will get the pie and anything else you need.”

  “How about we switch? Everything is on a tray in the kitchen. If you can carry that in, I will add the log so we can get to our evening.”

  “Yah.” Emma went in the direction indicated by Miss Lottie’s finger, located the tray with its pie, forks, teacups, and teapot, and carried it back into the sitting room in time to see her host backing away from a newly roaring fire. She set the tray on the table and took a spot on the sofa, her gaze gravitating back to the picture-topped mantel. “You have been to many places.”

  Miss Lottie followed Emma’s gaze to the mantel as she settled into her own chair. “I have.”

  “What was that like?” She poured some tea into each of the two cups and handed one to Miss Lottie. “To go to such places and see such things?”

  “It is always an experience to see something for the first time.”

  Lifting her own cup to her lips, Emma stopped just shy of actually taking a sip. “Do you still go to places like that sometimes?”

  “No. I have seen many things. I have had many experiences in my life that have had me traveling to many places.” Miss Lottie took a sip of tea, pinning Emma with her eyes across the rim of her mug as she did. “But soon I came to see that where I feel most content, most at peace in my heart, is right here, in Amish country. So I returned.”

  She considered the woman’s words against snatches of conversation she’d heard at Katie Beiler’s marriage to Abram Zook in the fall. “You are Katie’s kin, yah?”

  “I am.”

  “Which means you were Amish . . .” Emma prodded, setting her cup back onto the tray.

  Miss Lottie leaned forward, cut two pieces of pie, and deposited one onto each of their plates. “I was raised by Amish. I did not join the church.”

  “But you came back here.”

  “I did.”

  Emma took the pie plate and a fork from the woman and rested it atop her lap. “Why?”

  “I was wandering in an outdoor market in San Francisco one day and I came across a sign. It said, ‘Home is not a place, it’s a feeling.’ ” Miss Lottie forked up a piece of pie and took a bite, her eyes disappearing briefly behind closed lashes. After what seemed like a minute, maybe two, the woman’s eyes popped open to meet Emma’s. “For days after I saw that sign, I couldn’t get those words out of my head. I thought about it when I woke up, I thought about it as I was drifting off to sleep. And then, a few days later, it just hit me. I’d always felt as if I was visiting places I went—even places I stayed for several years. Yet when I thought back to the one place where I never felt as if I was visiting, it was here. In Blue Ball. I have never regretted coming back here for even a moment.”

  “I did not know you were Katie’s kin until she married Abram.”

  “Katie and the rest of ’em didn’t know until shortly before that, either. But I knew.”

  “So, it was wanting to be near them that brought you back here?”

  “That was some of it, of course, but I feel as if everyone in this community is my family. It’s like the sign in that market said, home is not a place, it’s a feeling. The second I arrived back in Blue Ball . . . and bought this house . . . and looked out the window and saw a buggy driving by, I no longer felt as if I was visiting.”

  A log split, sending sparks up the chimney and Emma’s thoughts to the reason she’d come. “Do you think you would feel the same if you learned you were never meant to be here from the start?”

  “You mean here, in Blue Ball?” Miss Lottie asked, lowering her teacup to the armrest. “Among the Amish?”

  “Yah.”

  “That’s an interesting question, Emma—one I’m not sure how to answer. I think it would come down to choosing to listen to your head or your heart . . . anger or truth.”

  “Anger and truth,” Emma corrected. “They are together, for me.”

  Leaning forward, Miss Lottie set her cup on the tray, folded her hands atop her lap, and nodded ever so gently at Emma. “I’m listening, child.”

  Emma traveled her gaze back to the hearth and the flames licking at the base of the chimney. “Everything is different now. I am different.”

  “You look the same to me.”

  “Because I am still dressed as if I am Amish. But I am not.”

  “You were baptized, dear.”

  “But I should not have been.” At Miss Lottie’s not so quiet inhale, Emma abandoned her view of the flickering flames and stood, her feet taking her around the room with no clear destination in mind. “I did not know another world.”

  “That is what Rumspringa is for. To let you taste the English world and its ways. Did you not do that?”

  “No, I did. I wore some English clothes a few times . . . listened to English music with Mary . . . and”—she turned back as she reached the entrance to the hallway—“I even tried a cigarette outside the English grocery store, but I did not like it.”

  “Did you take a full year, or did you hur
ry back for baptism?” Miss Lottie asked, her eyes following Emma around the room.

  “My Rumspringa fell between baptisms for the bishop, so it was a little more than a year. But I knew after six months.”

  “Then what is different now? Have you met an English man?”

  She whirled around, her face hot. “No!”

  Miss Lottie’s shoulders sagged with relief. “That is good.”

  “Not in the way that you mean,” Emma clarified. At Miss Lottie’s pointed look, she rushed to explain. “I have met an English man, yah. But not in a courting way.”

  Wandering over to the window, she parted the pale yellow curtains with her hand and peered out at the road, a series of flashing orange lights in the distance letting her know the day of worship and visiting at the Schrocks had come to an end. Soon, the hymn sing, too, would end and Levi would be arriving to take her home....

  She rested her forehead against the cool glass for a few long moments and then turned back to the woman patiently waiting for Emma to explain the unexplainable.

  “The Englisher is my dat. My real dat.”

  Reaching up, Miss Lottie readjusted her glasses against her eyes as if the enhanced view might change what her ears had heard. But after a slow inspection of Emma’s face, the elderly woman squared her shoulders with a hearty breath. “I did not know that, child. I didn’t come back to Blue Ball until you were closer to four.”

  “I did not know until two weeks ago,” Emma said, her voice wooden even to her own ears.

  A peek at Miss Lottie pointed to surprise as the reason for the room’s sudden silence, save for the quick pops and slow crackles from the fireplace. Eventually, though, the woman spoke, her voice so hushed Emma was forced back to the sofa just to hear.

  “What made your mamm tell you now?” Miss Lottie asked. “After all this time?”

  “I saw the picture—the one of my real mamm. And that is when I knew.”

  “Your . . .” Miss Lottie stopped, cleared her throat, and tried again. “Your real mamm?”

  “Yah. Ruby. She is dead. I killed her.”