Davey's Daughter

by Linda Byler

  Sarah stood against the counter, her arms crossed, caught Dat’s eye, and give him a wink. They both knew Levi was one of a kind.

  “Davey, die maid sinn net chide (these girls are crazy),” he chortled to his father.

  “You enjoy it, and you know it, Levi. But how long do you think we’ll have to bug Mam before she’ll let us eat pie?”

  Levi shrugged his massive shoulders, his bright, brown eyes eagerly scanning Mam’s face.

  “You’ll ruin your supper.”

  “Come on, Malinda!” Levi begged, so completely in earnest they all burst out laughing.

  As it was, they ate more than one pie, sitting around the pumpkin-strewn kitchen, enjoying the perfect creaminess with just the right combination of spices. The tall shivery, custardy sweetness melted in their mouths, completely ruining the appetite that should have been reserved for healthier fare.

  Priscilla said pumpkin was a vegetable so they were having a healthy supper. Levi said pie crust was a vegetable, too. Mam laughed so hard that she had to gasp for breath and wipe her eyes.

  Dat said after chores Mam could just make bean soup with applesauce. Bean soup consisted of a can of great northern beans dumped into a saucepan of browned butter with some salt, milk, and bits of torn, stale bread. It was best eaten with dried apple pie, but if there was none, applesauce worked just fine.

  Spicy red beets made a great side dish.

  “Rote reeva (Red beets)!” yelled Levi.

  There was a new calf in the barn, its white and black colors so much crisper than it mother’s. It was so fresh and brand new and wobbly on its thin legs.

  Sarah crossed her arms along the top of the pen, watching it struggle to stay on its feet, the mother cow pleasantly licking and nurturing it, establishing a bond between them.

  Dat came up beside her to watch. “Cute little one, isn’t she?”

  Sarah nodded.

  “Who was the man at the door earlier?” he asked.

  Sarah told her father, giving all the details, and he frowned, his brow furrowed with lines of concern.

  “It just doesn’t sound good. I don’t think we have any reason to relax or feel that the barn fires are a thing of the past. Something is definitely not right among us.”

  He paused. “How sure are you that it was Ashley that you were chasing?”

  Sarah shook her head, her mouth in a straight line of concentration.

  “Just about a hundred percent. That poor girl—I don’t know, Dat. Something is not right with her.”

  Dat shook his head again, worry drawing vertical grooves between his graying eyebrows.

  That next Sunday as David Beiler stood to preach, he cautioned the congregation about feeling smug, satisfied, full, quoting the verse in the Bible about the man who said to himself, his barns were full to overflowing, he’d build more, and have plenty for years to come.

  In a spiritual sense, he cautioned against the satisfaction of feeling full as well as thinking that worldly goods were a blessing, that nothing could touch the harvest, so plentiful, so packed down and running over as it was.

  Sarah sat on the girls’ bench, her head bowed, perplexed. Dat made it sound so complicated. Sometimes, she still felt confused, thinking of Matthew, but the minute she remembered his sudden marriage, the confusion left.

  She wished Dat would just chill. If someone was going to burn more barns, they would. She had her own idea of exactly how Ashley Walters played into this string of fires. And she was sure it was only a matter of time until the next one was lit.

  Her thoughts flitted to the night before. Saturday evenings were always hard, the emptiness, the barren land without Matthew stretching before her, year after year.

  She’d just be a single, leftover blessing, as old maids were called in polite circles. She’d start her own bakery. She’d told Melvin about it. He said she was too optimistic. The last thing Lancaster County needed was another bakery. There was already one at every fence post.

  She and Melvin had walked up to visit with the Widow Lydia, who was already ready to go to bed for the night, her eyes large and self-conscious, her hands constantly going to the belt of her soft blue bathrobe.

  Sarah could not understand her discomfiture, until she saw Melvin watching her, standing stiffly inside the front door, tugging at his gray sleeves as if to lengthen them.

  Lydia had made coffee, but the evening was stilted, stiff, and uncomfortable, the way her brothers used to describe a new pair of denims.

  Finally, when conversation lagged, they’d walked home together. Melvin was strangely quiet, contemplative, a reserved manner creating an aura of distance, keeping Sarah from seeing his true feelings.

  He went home early, leaving her alone on the porch in the chilly evening, the crickets still gamely chirping their songs, in spite of falling leaves and lower night temperatures.

  She guessed she was like those tired crickets, knowing the end had already arrived, yet chirping anyway.

  She laughed to herself, a self-mocking, unattractive snort, sitting alone, wrapped in her old sweater, her feet uncomfortably cold inside her sneakers.

  She wondered if the weather changed in Haiti. Was it always tropical? Warm? She rocked forward in misery, thinking of Matthew, so tanned and fit, working hard to build homes for the natives, his wife ministering to the sick, the perfect couple working for the Lord.

  Well, I’m just too Amish. Home canned pumpkin, bean soup, white cape and apron pinned to her dress, the uniform of the unmarried woman.

  She had still not fully recovered from the wonder of the possibility of leaving, the excitement of actually being able go and do something out of the ordinary.

  Ha, she thought again. You know better than even think about it. No, she would not want to leave, truly. It was a lust that had never been fully conceived. A thought, a desire, gone as swiftly as Matthew.

  On her knees that Saturday night, she had prayed for direction, for peace, for acceptance of her lot in life, and went to bed with a strong spirit, bolstered by her time spent in prayer.

  Just keep on showing me the way, O God. Didn’t King David repeat that same prayer many times in Psalms?

  How then, could she ever suppose God had heard her pathetic prayer? The hymn singing on Sunday evening was abuzz with the news. Rose Zook was glowing in a dress the color of bittersweet made in the latest fashion, her skin radiant from the joy within. Lee Glick had asked Rose for a date, the beginning of what promised to be a steady relationship.

  Sarah sat carved in stone, unable to understand the dead weight somewhere in the region of her heart. Why?

  Who could figure out why a person felt the way they did? She’d never been attracted to Lee, had she? Could she help if it he had assumed he loved her?

  The songs were announced, the beautiful hymns rose and fell around her, and she sat, hearing nothing, staring at nothing, wishing with all her being she could get off the bench and go home. Home to her bed, where the pillow was soft and yielding, cradling her tired head that churned with all sorts of questions and exclamations, but always ending in commas, without a beginning and without an end.

  At the close of the evening, before the snack was served, they all sang the customary congratulations to the new dating couple. Rose dipped her head, blushing and giggling. Sarah was completely taken off guard by the assault of the green monster that had many names but whose only truthful one was jealousy, pure and simple. She felt as if she hated Rose. Almost.

  Sarah’s cheeks flamed with embarrassment, tears sprang to her eyes, and she kept them lowered, cautiously folding her hands tightly, keeping her eyes trained on the whitening of the knuckles. Best to stay that way. If she kept her eyes on her hands, no one would know the roiling unrest inside of her.

  It was only the passing of the trays of cookies, huge bowls of potato chips, and platters of cheese and pretzels that made her lift her head, smile, acknowledge comments from friends.

  Oh good, no one had noticed.


  Daring a look across the room, her eyes made solid contact with the devastating blueness of Lee Glick’s. Instantly, her eyes left his, slid away to safety, before returning, her heart rate increasing rapidly as their gazes held, melded, touched, and understood.

  I didn’t know, Sarah.

  I didn’t know you didn’t know, Lee.

  In a daze, a dizzying, dangerous edge of uncertainty, with a thread of hope woven though the insurmountable, she walked to Melvin’s buggy, helped him hitch up his restless horse, and then collapsed against the seat back. She restrained the urge to cry and sniff and blubber her way into Melvin’s pity, sharing the whole array of misery that was her life.

  “Now that’s a cute couple,” he observed, as they drove past Lee and Rose attaching his horse to the shafts.

  “Yeah.”

  “She must have known what she was doing, breaking up with Matthew.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Smarter than you, maybe?”

  His elbow jabbed her side good-naturedly, and she stifled the urge to slap him. She nodded her agreement and watched the stop sign flapping back and forth in the stiff breeze.

  “Say something.”

  “Be quiet, Melvin. Just shut your mouth for one second.”

  “Oops. Now you’re mad.”

  “No. Just tired and…”

  “You wish Lee Glick would not be dating Rose.”

  “I don’t care about Lee Glick. I don’t care about Rose. Let them date and get married and live happily ever after. Who cares?” she spat out.

  “You love him,” Melvin said quietly, and flicked the reins.

  “Mam, I have to get away.”

  Sarah flung the statement across the table as they relaxed together with their second cups of coffee before starting the serious scrubbing and polishing, dusting and moving furniture.

  Shocked, Mam choked on her hot drink, wiped her mouth, and opened her eyes wide to look at Sarah.

  “You mean, away? Leave the church? Or…or what?”

  “I just want to get out of Lancaster County.”

  “Sarah, stop talking like that. You can’t. You have your job, and your place is right here with your family.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Why would you question it?”

  Miserably, she confided in Mam, always her refuge when things got really serious.

  Her mother listened carefully, lent a patient ear, sipped her coffee, cut a cinnamon roll in half, and resolutely set one half on Sarah’s plate. She shook her head when Sarah wailed about getting old and fat on cinnamon rolls on top of everything else, then watched as her daughter took a great bite, shook her head, and promptly took another.

  “If all else fails, try pastries,” Mam remarked drily. She observed the change in Sarah, the tension in her shoulders, the down turn of her usually wide and smiling mouth, the clouded eyes darkened by her own unhappiness.

  “Sarah, you need to find joy in doing for others. You’re so anxious about the future, and there is absolutely no hurry. Enjoy your time being single. Why panic?

  “Matthew so obviously was not for you, and I’m so glad God has been gracious, sparing you the heartache of living with a man who marries for reasons other than true love.”

  “He loved me.”

  “No, Sarah, he didn’t. I remain firm in that belief.”

  “Then evidently Lee doesn’t, didn’t either. He asked Rose.”

  “Your stubborn….”

  “My stubborn what?”

  “Nothing.”

  Mam got up, whisked the dishes off the table, barking instructions to Priscilla. She told Sarah to get up off that chair and find the ceiling mop. The attachment was in the top drawer, and she could use Palmolive dish soap since stronger cleaning solutions made streaks on the kitchen ceiling.

  Priscilla sang catchy tunes, washed walls, whistled, teased Levi, organized drawers, found old post cards and letters in Mam’s cedar chest, chortled to herself about her sister Ruthie’s sloppy handwriting. Sarah was left to her thoughts as she plied the mop steadily across the gleaming ceiling, the tiny bits of fly dirt steadily disappearing beneath it.

  Mam worked alongside Sarah, wringing a cloth from a plastic bucket of sudsy water, washing down walls, rigorously attacking any stain on the doors or woodwork.

  The cleaning of the old house was a twice-yearly occurrence, usually in April and again in October, or the last of September, depending on the weather, which was the inspiration for Mam’s rush to get the house cleaned now.

  Dat told her he believed all Amish women were born with the instinct to clean house, like monarch butterflies or homing pigeons, drawn to the attic with a sense of purpose, an uncanny direction that sent them straight to the scrub bucket and up the stairs.

  Mam chortled and beamed, said nah, no one cleaned the way her grandmother used to. She never lugged bucket after bucket of hot, soapy water up two flights of stairs to the attic and scrubbed that splintery “garret” floor, the way grandmother had. Mam swept, cleaned under the eaves with a brush and dustpan, straightened up, organized, washed windows, but she never once washed her attic floor, no sir.

  That was where Mam headed next though, armed with a broom, garbage bags, window cleaner, and bug spray. She had that certain bright-eyed anticipation about her, her nostrils flared just enough to convey the bubbling of energy, and away she went, barking orders, her broom keeping time.

  Later Sarah found Mam sitting on her backside beside a plastic tote, her legs stretched in front of her as she pressed a tiny blue sleeper to her breast, her head bent over it, her grief unbearable for only a moment before she got ahold of herself, as she’d say.

  They lifted blankets, small white onesies, stained only a bit around the neckline, but even the stains were precious, knowing little baby Mervin had drooled there when his baby teeth were pushing through his soft, pink gums.

  “Mam, seriously, do you remember this? The first time you took him to church?”

  Mam nodded, her lips wobbling, a moment of vulnerability she couldn’t control.

  “Remember how hard it was on my pride, the fact that he wore a dress and white pinafore?” Sarah asked.

  “Oh Sarah! I would have forgotten.”

  “You said you had to lead by example and wear a dress on poor Mervin, but I was so embarrassed!”

  “Sarah, your grandmother wore a dress on Dat until he was potty-trained. That was the old way. Now young mothers are horrified to think of putting a dress on their little boys to take them to church just that one first time.”

  “Some mothers still do.”

  “Yes, a few. But you know how times change. What was considered Plain years ago, conservative, you know, is hardly practiced anymore, it seems.”

  They read Mervin’s baby book together, remembered the first time he sat alone, crawled, his first tooth, a lock of his hair Scotch-taped into place, but there was not one photograph.

  They were oblivious to the lack of photographs. They were not a necessary or customary item for the Amish, so their absence went unnoticed.

  The attic was cleaned, Mam’s emotions were dusted and swept along with the floors and walls, and all was well once again.

  Mam decided Priscilla’s room needed a coat of paint, but Priscilla refused, saying she’d be sixteen years old soon, and then she’d decide what color she wanted. So Mam shrugged her shoulders and said alright, and that was that. They worked their way through the upstairs, wiping down the walls, and down the stairway, washing curtains and bedding and rugs. Anything washable in Mam’s path was laundered in the wringer washer and hung on the wheel line to dry.

  By evening, there were usually two red spots, one on either cheek of Mam’s cheeks, her eyes drooping with weariness, but she was still ironing curtains, her fatigue only apparent when she snapped at Levi or answered Dat curtly.

  The kitchen was the sticker, she always said. Sarah knew it, too, thinking of moving the gas stove out from its station between the cupboards
, egg yolk and grease and dirt staining the sides of it, rolls of dust and dirt beneath it, the oven blackened and speckled with six months of hard and constant use.

  Every half year, Mam sprayed the oven cleaner liberally, then stood up, gasping and saying, “That stuff is wicked. It can’t be good for you.”

  But a clean oven won out, always. A few fumes wouldn’t hurt, as long as that oven was sparkling, at least till the next apple pie bubbled over, or the next tray of bacon sizzled and splattered grease over the racks.

  Doing the bacon in the oven was the lesser of two evils, according to Mam’s way of thinking. Bacon splattered everything, but at least it didn’t have to be turned in the oven. It came out nice and crispy without anyone having to touch it.

  They put Levi to work that day, assigning him to polish the leaves on the fig tree growing in its big ceramic pot in the corner. He stayed at his job for hours, content to be part of the housecleaning, his face pink with the praise Mam showered on him.

  Dat ate a bowl of corn flakes and chocolate cake for lunch, saying he’d been hungry for that for a while now. He didn’t eat the cereal separately, but plunked a sizable square of chocolate cake right in the middle of a large bowl of corn flakes that had been liberally sugared. The bowl had also been filled with plenty of creamy milk, and it soaked into the heavy chocolate cake.

  Levi said that was slop and wanted no part of it, muttering to himself as he buttered two slices of bread and plunked them on the griddle. He eyed Mam hopefully before bending to find the cheese in the refrigerator himself.

  He made his grilled cheese sandwich and poured a glass of milk, then got up to make another one, resigning himself to his fate. No use begging Mam when she was cleaning house, that much he’d learned when he was young.

  That was why Sarah was glad to go to market the following day. She was thoroughly tired of the intensity of housecleaning with Mam.

  She felt energized and took a new interest in her work, doing her best to produce a quality product, whistling softly as she plied the dough with a spoon or the mixer or turned out flaky pie crusts.