“Down, Chester,” Noah said as he struggled to coax his dat into the house.
The dog immediately backed away, rested his rump on the floor, and tilted his head to study the three people who had barged into the house.
Noah’s dat paused in the entryway to take a blurry-eyed look at Mandy. “You remind me of my Rosie,” he said. “She’s a pretty gal.”
Noah coaxed him down the hall to the left.
“Can I help?” Mandy said.
“Nae,” Noah said. “You can’t.”
Feeling more than a little awkward, Mandy laced her fingers together and waited in the hallway with the dog as Noah took his father into what must have been a bedroom. The dog stayed put, quietly standing sentinel, waiting for Noah to return.
Mandy cautiously reached out a hand to pet him. He’d let her do it before, and he seemed gentle enough. “Chester,” she said. “You are a very pretty dog.” She scratched behind his floppy caramel-brown ears, and he nudged her fingers with his nose. “I have a cousin named Chester. He looks nothing like you.”
After a few minutes of conversing with Noah’s dog, Mandy took a peek around the house. It looked even smaller on the inside than it did from the outside. In the shadows cast by the lamp, she could see three doors down the hall to her left that she guessed were bedrooms and a bathroom. The entry hall, which was about three feet square, opened into a small kitchen with a fridge and oven on one wall and a sink and window on the wall opposite her. A long gray counter came out from the wall behind the sink and divided the room in half. A square kitchen table, surrounded by three chairs, sat in the other half of the room next to a woodstove against the far wall. There was no sitting room to speak of, no sofa, no comfy chairs. Where did they wash their clothes? How could they hold gmay in such a small space?
Mandy took another step into the house. Chester twitched his nose, but otherwise didn’t show any sign of objecting. It wasn’t too hard to guess that this was one house where church was never held. Not only was it too small to fit a whole district, but Noah’s dat had been allured by the evils of alcohol. A man like that wouldn’t be in gute standing with the church.
Even though it was small, Noah’s house was tidy. His mamm must be a gute housekeeper. Unless . . . What had Noah’s dat said about his mamm? Mandy couldn’t remember, but she’d gotten the impression that his mamm wasn’t around anymore.
Was she dead? Oh, please no, dear Lord. Noah had already lost his sister to death and his fater to alcohol. Had Noah’s mamm been taken too? Mandy couldn’t bear the thought of more tragedy plaguing Noah’s life.
She gazed down the hall. Certainly no more than two people and a good-sized dog could live in such a cramped space. Still, she didn’t see how Noah and his dat would have been able to keep the house so clean all by themselves.
Finally feeling somewhat warm, Mandy began to unbutton Noah’s oversized coat.
“Leave it on,” she heard Noah say. She turned to look down the hall as he slipped out of his dat’s room and shut the door behind him. He persistently refused to look her in the eye as he ambled down the hall and opened the front door. “Cum. I’ll take you home.” Chester’s ears twitched, and he let out a soft whine. “Stay here, Chester.”
The dog immediately came to attention as if he wouldn’t dream of moving from his designated spot.
Mandy had the feeling that she was being dismissed. Didn’t Noah want to talk about what had just happened with his dat? Didn’t he want some comfort?
“What about your lip? We should put some ointment on it.”
He rubbed his hand down the side of his face as if the weight of his dat’s problems had fallen on his shoulders.
She rested her hand on his arm. He flinched. “It’s going to be okay, Noah.”
For the thousandth time tonight, he turned his face away from her. “What do you know about it?” His tone was mild but tinged with a bitterness that made her take a step back. “I asked you to go away. Why didn’t you leave?”
“I wanted to help.”
He ran his fingers through his hair. “Help? You can’t help.”
“He . . . he was so angry. I thought you might not be able to get him home by yourself.”
He grunted his displeasure. “For five years I’ve managed to get my dat home all by myself. I’ve never needed your help, and I didn’t need it tonight.”
She swallowed the lump clogging her throat before she suffocated. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”
“No doubt Kristina’s told you all about my dat, the drunk,” he said, spitting the words out of his mouth. “You wanted to see for yourself, didn’t you?”
Mandy tucked the collar of Noah’s coat around her neck. His accusations chilled her to the bone. “I . . . I didn’t.”
“Kristina will love hearing about this latest incident, then, won’t she?”
“I would never do that.”
Noah took a ragged breath. “My mamm’s gone, my dat’s sick. Haven’t you people made me suffer enough? Go. Please just go.”
Mandy squared her shoulders and shook her head. “I’m not going. I’m still wearing your coat and I don’t have a way home.”
Leaving the front door wide open, he strode to the table and plopped into a chair with his back to her. He buried his face in his hands and acted as if he couldn’t care less if she walked through that door and disappeared forever. Chester padded softly into the kitchen and stood next to Noah’s chair, watching him expectantly as if to be ready if Noah needed him to fetch some slippers.
Mandy had never felt more miserable in her life. Somewhere along the line, her best intentions had gone awry, and there sat Noah, without a friend in the world, bearing a trainload of burdens on his shoulders. They were wide shoulders, jah, but a man could only take so much before he collapsed under the weight of it all.
Quietly, she shut the front door and tiptoed into the kitchen. She hesitated for only a moment before laying a hand on his shoulder. Chester sat on his haunches and licked the back of her other hand as a show of support.
Noah sighed, lowered his head even farther, and shoved his fingers through his hair. “You want me to say it? I’ll say it. Seeing you there tonight, knowing what you know about my dat, I’m completely humiliated. I hope you’re happy. You and Kristina will have a wonderful-gute time gloating.”
Standing in Noah’s quiet, dim kitchen, Mandy’s heart broke for this wounded soul who thought that Mandy and Kristina and maybe his entire community wanted to hurt him. Trying to keep some sort of connection between them, she left her hand on his shoulder and sat in the chair next to him. “Noah. I would never deliberately hurt you.”
He lifted his eyes and studied her face. “I’m the boy who broke your best friend’s heart.”
“We’ve had our differences.”
“We argue whenever we lay eyes on each other.”
She shook her head. “I’m not afraid to tell you what I think, and I have certainly made some hasty accusations, but do you really think I would use your misfortunes for petty revenge?”
His eyes flashed, and his icy expression seemed to thaw momentarily, as if he believed her. “Kristina would love to shame me in front of everybody.”
Mandy bit her bottom lip. Her best friend could be unpredictable and, yes, vindictive. Why had Mandy never noticed it before? They were definitely traits that Mandy found unattractive. “You keep talking as if Kristina and I have some secret plan to destroy your life.”
He raised an eyebrow. “You spied on me. That sounds like a secret plan.”
“She pushed me into the river. If it was a plan, it wasn’t a very good one.”
He let one corner of his mouth twitch upward. “Unless you planned that too. Kristina finagled a hug out of it.”
Mandy frowned. “Jah. She did.”
A shadow traveled across his face. “She’s tricky that way.”
That lump was still lodged in Mandy’s throat. “You and Krissy were never boyfriend and girlfriend
, were you?”
With his gaze riveted to hers, he rubbed the stubble on his jaw and shook his head.
Her face got hot. “And I came over and unjustly bawled you out.”
“You believed Kristina’s version.”
“But why didn’t you tell me the truth?”
He looked sideways at her. “Would you have believed me?”
She lowered her eyes. “I suppose not.”
Noah leaned back in his chair and folded his arms. “She and her gaggle of friends followed me around all summer. There was the spying and the texting and the messages on my voice mail. She asked me to drive her home from a gathering. One gathering. She lives close. I was trying to be nice.”
“She believed what she wanted to believe.” Kristina had made a pest of herself for a boy who had no interest. She should have been unendurably embarrassed. Right now, Mandy felt embarrassed enough for the both of them.
“It’s partly my fault. I should have put a stop to it sooner,” he said.
“Nae. You are not responsible for Kristina’s infatuation.” Except he was to blame for his good looks. They were kind of hard to resist. Kristina’s fascination was understandable. Her behavior was not.
“One day she . . . well, she did something that finally ended my patience. I texted her and told her to stay away from me and not to contact me ever again. I might have been a little harsh, but I wanted to make sure she understood. She’s not one to take a hint.” He let out a long sigh and rested a hand on Chester’s head. “I suppose I should have had the conversation in person, but I didn’t want to embarrass her and I didn’t want her to blubber all over my boots.” He inclined his head toward Mandy and pulled his phone from his pocket. “I apologize for doing it over a text. Somebody told me it’s cruel to break up with a text message.”
Mandy wanted to crawl into a tiny little hole. “Under the circumstances, I don’t think it could be considered a breakup.”
He frowned, concentrating on the phone as he twirled it in his fingers. “The bishop consented to the phone. The bar calls me when I need to come get my dat.”
Oh.
Mandy wanted to crawl into an even tinier hole and cover her head with dirt. “Sorry,” she said, her voice cracking like a carton of smashed eggs.
He didn’t reply, just played with his phone and kept his eyes away from her face.
Mandy leaned toward him and rested her hand on the table. “I won’t say a word about your dat to anyone,” she whispered.
“Denki,” he said, still twirling his phone, still averting his gaze, but sounding as if he’d just released a breath he’d been holding for a very long time.
Her heart swelled in her chest. For some reason she couldn’t explain, Mandy wanted Noah to share his pain with her, to express his deepest emotions. She wanted to laugh with him, be with him, understand him. Would he ever consider the possibility of being her friend? Did she dare invite him to? “I know this is none of my business . . .”
He looked up, probably expecting something horrible to come out of her mouth.
She cleared her throat. “If you don’t like the question, you can kick me out of your house. But if you kick me out, I get to keep your coat.”
His lip twitched almost imperceptibly. “Okay?”
“I barely know you. I know you don’t like to talk about your family.”
The muscles of his jaw tightened. “What do you want to know?”
“How long has your mamm been gone?”
He lifted his chin and seemed resentful of the question. “It’s no secret. Your grandparents must have told you all about my family.”
Mandy jiggled her head slightly. “My grandparents don’t tell tales on anybody except their grandchildren. When Mammi’s scheming to make a match, all the grandchildren know about it except the grandchild she’s scheming against.”
He let down his guard. “Your mammi is scheming against you, in case you didn’t know.”
Mandy winced. “I know.” She thumped her head down on her arm, which rested on the table. She bobbed her head up and down, lightly tapping her arm with her forehead as if she were banging her head against a wall. “She wants to make at least six more pot holders. You’ve got to save me, Noah.”
He made a face. “I’ll stay out of it. Felty asked me to fix his roof. He’s not paying me to help you find a husband.”
“I don’t want to find a husband.”
Noah rubbed his chin. “Davy Burkholder has three stuffed elk heads hanging in his living room. There’s hardly room for furniture. And Melvin Lambright, he’s nice enough, but he can’t whistle a note. He’d make a gute husband if you don’t mind that little disability yet.”
“Ha, ha,” Mandy said.
“The girls love Adam Wengerd.”
Probably almost as much as Adam loved himself.
Noah’s eyes sparkled with amusement. “Kristina says Adam’s handsome. She spies on him too.”
Mandy groaned.
“She was trying to make me jealous,” Noah said. “But I wasn’t.”
The goofy look on his face made Mandy giggle.
He leaned closer. “I’ll tell you a little secret. Adam Wengerd used to have the crookedest teeth you’ve ever seen. It took five years of braces. With headgear. If you marry him, don’t be surprised if your children look like beavers.”
Mandy playfully shoved Noah’s arm off the table. “Stop it. I don’t want to marry a Bonduel boy.”
This news seemed to sober him a bit. “Why not?”
“Charm, Ohio, has a better selection.”
“But we’ve got quality up here. What about Freeman Kiem? He’s got that nice cleft in his chin.”
“And I’ve got a face full of freckles. He doesn’t want anything to do with me.”
“I like freckles,” Noah said. He cleared his throat and lowered his eyes.
Mandy rested her elbow on the table and propped her chin in her hand. “We’ve strayed wildly from the subject.”
“What were we talking about?”
Ach. She should have been smarter than that. In an attempt to steer him from the subject of prospective husbands, she’d brought them right back to the question she shouldn’t have asked. They had been getting along so well, and Noah had found his smile. Not an easy feat considering where they’d been an hour ago.
If Mandy had owned a third leg, she would have kicked herself under the table.
“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “Never mind.”
Noah wilted slightly. “I remember. You want to know how long my mamm’s been gone.”
“It’s late. We can talk another time. I should get home.”
He reached over and laid his hand on top of hers. She didn’t move a muscle. “It’s okay. You might as well know. Then you won’t be wondering, and I won’t be avoiding eye contact every time we see each other.”
She curled her lips and tried not to stare at his hand touching hers. “I guess that’s so.”
“My mamm’s been gone three years.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Me too,” he said. He seemed to remember that his hand still covered hers. He pulled it away.
“How did she die?”
“Die?” Lines of confusion appeared around his eyes. “Your grandparents really don’t gossip, do they?”
“What do you mean?”
“My mamm isn’t dead.” His voice grew raspy and soft, as if the pain were too great to talk louder. He reached out and petted Chester again. “She left us. Took my five brothers and sisters and moved back to Missouri to live with her parents.”
Whatever Mandy had expected to hear, that wasn’t it. She caught her breath. “She . . . she left?”
He wouldn’t look at her. “I don’t blame her. She did what she had to do.”
“Because of the drinking?”
He nodded. “My sister Edi died of a heart defect seven years ago. She wasn’t yet one year old.” He swiped a tear away and then tried to pretend he hadn
’t just swiped a tear away. “It was hard for all of us, but my dat especially. He didn’t know what to do with all his grief. My mom gave hers to God, but Dat just didn’t know how to do it. He had developed a taste for the alcohol during rumschpringe and went back to it to forget how sad he was to have lost Edi. The bishop used to come over every week, but he didn’t know how to help. He quit coming after a while. My mamm put up with Dat for four years, and then she just couldn’t do it anymore.”
“So she divorced him and left the church?” Mandy asked.
“Nae. She wanted to stay in the church. They’re still married.”
Mandy sat with her heart in her throat, staring at Noah as if seeing him for the first time.
He didn’t hide his distress now. Resting his forehead in his hands, he let his tears drip onto the table. “My mamm begged me to come with her, but Dat needed me. I had to stay here.”
“Of course you did.”
He glanced at her. “You think I did the right thing? My brother Yost says I should have come with them and left Dat to suffer the consequences of his drinking. But I just couldn’t. I had to be the man my mamm raised me to be.”
“She raised you to be gute.”
He shook his head. “I’m not gute. I feel like I’ve been cut into two jagged pieces.”
“Are you angry with your mater?”
“Nae.” Noah rubbed the tears from his face with the back of his hand. “She was miserable. She did what she needed to do, what was best for my little brothers and sisters.”
“And you did what you thought was best.”
“Yost can’t forgive me for it,” Noah said. He ran his hand down the side of his face and nearly lost his composure. He looked so forlorn that Mandy couldn’t just sit there and do nothing. Not caring if it was proper behavior, she scooted her chair close beside him, put her arm around his shoulders, and grasped his upper arm with her other hand.
He didn’t acknowledge her gesture, but he didn’t pull away either. They sat in silence until Noah regained the power to speak. “Yost hasn’t had anything to do with me for three years. Mamm writes and calls once a week, but Yost hates me.”
“I’m sorry.”
Huckleberry Harvest (The Matchmakers of Huckleberry Hill Book 5) Page 11
