Seeds of Hope

by Barbara Cameron

  She tucked the journal under her pillow and reached for the book on her nightstand. Ever since she was a little girl, she’d loved to read for a while before she slept. Usually the day was long and she only made it through a few pages before she drifted off and her book fell onto her chest. Tonight, though, she was wide awake two dozen pages into the book.

  And it wasn’t because the book was all that interesting.

  There was a knock on the door.

  “Kumm.”

  “I saw the light under your door. Reading like usual, hmm?”

  Miriam nodded, sat up, and patted the bed, inviting her mudder to sit.

  Her gaze went to the rose in the bud vase. “Pretty.”

  “They were on the table at the restaurant Mark took me to. He asked if I could take it home.”

  “Very thoughtful.”

  “He’s just a friend,” she said quickly.

  Her mudder’s brows lifted. “Ya?”

  “Always has been.” Her fingers plucked at the edge of her sheet. “It can’t be anything else, right?”

  “What’s in your heart, kind? Do you want to be more than friends?”

  Miriam closed her eyes, searched for calm. “Mamm, how can I want more? I can’t have it.”

  Her mudder gathered her into her arms. “Oh, Miriam, I don’t know what to say. I want you to be happy, to be loved. But you’re Amish and he’s Englisch.” She sighed as she patted Miriam’s back. “I always wondered if he was more than a friend to you.”

  Miriam sat back. ”He doesn’t know I have feelings for him. And he won’t. He’s going through enough right now.” She sighed. “Mamm, he’s here because he’s had some trouble at work.”

  She told her the story and her mudder listened sympathetically.

  “Well, that is troubling for schur,” she said when Miriam finished. “What is he going to do?”

  “He has a friend who’s a private investigator looking into the case.”

  “That’s gut. Mark has always been the type of man to think of others. But what is he going to do about his job?”

  “He’s staying with John and helping him out until he hears from his boss at the firm.”

  She nodded. “Well, it’s sad that this happened to Mark. But John schur needed his help right now. And he can help other farmers in the community as well since they help John.” She patted Miriam’s hand. “God has a plan for everyone.”

  “But Mark is so upset. I worry about him.”

  “God knows what’s best for every one of his kinner.”

  “I know.” Miriam hugged her mudder then sat back. “It’s just hard to watch while things are working out. But I know they will.”

  Sarah kissed her forehead and rose. “My smart dochder.”

  She laughed. “Do mudders always think their kinner are smart?”

  “I don’t know. I only know that mine are. Not that I would brag,” she said quickly, her eyes twinkling. “That would be hochmut.”

  “You’ve never been prideful.”

  “And I don’t intend to start.” She walked to the door, stopped in the doorway, and smiled. “Sweet dreams.”

  “You, too. Say gut nacht to Daed.”

  Miriam lay back against her pillow. Her mudder was right. God had a plan for Mark, and even though she was sad that he was unhappy, it really was gut to have him back this summer.

  Maybe she could think of some way to cheer him up . . . She closed her eyes and felt herself drifting off.

  When she slept, she dreamed the dreams of a maedel in love.

  Mark was helping his grandfather feed the horses the next evening when he remembered something Miriam had said the night before.

  “Say, would you mind if I took Whitey out for a buggy ride?”

  His grandfather stopped what he was doing and stared at him. “Did I hear you right? You want to go for a buggy ride?”

  “Miriam reminded me how we used to go for buggy rides before I got a driver’s license and my first car.”

  “I remember that. You liked Whitey because he was the fastest.”

  Mark walked over to Whitey’s stall and ran a hand over his flank. “I thought it was the coolest thing ever that the Amish often buy retired race horses. I thought we’d go faster than a car. I was a little disappointed to say the least.”

  He chuckled. “Well, Whitey’s slowed down a bit since your teenaged years.”

  “That’s fine. It’s not like I have any urgent appointments.”

  “Still no word from your office?”

  “None.” He led Whitey from the stall outside to the buggy and began harnessing him. “Anything you need from town?”

  “Not a thing. I think I’ll have a rest while you’re gone.”

  Mark paused and frowned at his grandfather. “Are you feeling all right?”

  “Schur. Can’t a man take a little rest after all the work we’ve done this week?”

  “Sure.” But Mark couldn’t help worrying. Maybe he needed to have a talk with his grandfather’s doctor.

  “Have a gut time.”

  “You’re not afraid I’ll do something wrong?” he asked as he fumbled with the harness. “What if I can’t control Whitey and he takes off and is never seen again? What if I make a fool of myself?”

  “Whitey won’t bolt, and if you let go of the reins he’ll just come back home,” his grandfather said calmly. “And you couldn’t be a fool if you tried.”

  Mark doubted that. He frowned. Did Whitey just roll his eyes at him? “Thought this was like riding a bicycle. You supposedly don’t forget how to do it . . .”

  John walked over and showed him how to fasten the harness. He clapped him on the shoulder. “Lighten up.”

  “Lighten up?”

  “That’s what the Englisch say, right?”

  “Yeah. Just wasn’t expecting you to say it.”

  John shrugged. “Strikes me you’ve been too serious for too long. Maybe God’s giving you a break, a chance to relax, smell the roses.” He strolled off toward the house.

  Roses. That made him think of Miriam and how thrilled she’d looked with the gift of a simple table decoration last night.

  Maybe he’d stop by her house and see if she’d like to go for a buggy ride. He got in the buggy and picked up the reins. They brought back the memory of the first time he’d held them. He remembered feeling a mixture of terror and thrill when his grandfather actually suggested that he should drive them into town.

  He’d only been fourteen.

  No one was allowed to drive a car until they were sixteen, he’d told his grandfather as he tried to hold the reins in hands so sweaty the reins felt slippery. But he’d said the rules were different with buggies. So they went to town and not only survived the trip, but Mark had actually enjoyed it. The pace was slow, but the freedom was huge. Soon he was asking to take the buggy out for errands and whatever excuse he could come up with. And then he’d just taken it out for evening rides with Miriam to talk.

  That was the headiest freedom. No one could overhear them talk about their hopes and dreams. Few could see them together and speculate on their relationship. He’d caught some of her fellow Amish watching him when he attended church and speculating when they talked. But unless they passed someone in another buggy or a car and the passengers glanced in, there was a privacy to this quaint vehicle that made it very appealing to him during those long summers he’d spent here.

  Miriam didn’t know anything about the law or college, but she’d listened avidly to his talk about becoming an attorney and fighting for justice—concepts totally alien to her. God meted justice in her world, not man. But she told him he should study and get good grades and apply for that college called Yale. And when his father thought it was all a crazy pipe dream, Miriam had been the one to urge him to persuade his father he should go.

  After all, she said, wasn’t persuasion an attorney’s best tool?

  He chuckled as he remembered her impassioned defense of his dream. She�
��d done some persuading of her own, convincing her parents to let her attend his graduation ceremony with his grandfather. If she noticed that she got some curious glances in her modest Amish dress, she hadn’t shown it. No, he still could remember that brilliant smile of hers beaming at him when they met after the ceremony.

  She’d asked so many questions as he took her on a tour of the campus. Thinking about it now as he headed to her house, he wondered if she’d ever wanted to pursue higher education. It wouldn’t have been possible for her as an Amish woman—formal schooling ended after the eighth grade and students went on to do apprenticeships for the occupations they wanted to pursue. She’d have had to leave her community for good.

  And as much as Miriam loved learning, she’d never leave her family and friends. So she’d done her own studying, reading everything she could put her hands on from the local public library.

  Mark pulled into the drive, got out to go to her front door, and wondered if Whitey would still be there when he returned. “Stay,” he said, and could have sworn Whitey rolled his eyes again.

  Miriam’s mother, Sarah, answered the door. “Mark, how nice to see you!”

  “Is Miriam home?”

  “Ya, come in. She’s in the kitchen.”

  He followed her and found Miriam using a washcloth to clean the face of a baby.

  She smiled at him. “Gut-n-owed. I wasn’t expecting you.”

  “I thought I’d see if you wanted to go for a drive, maybe get an ice cream cone.”

  “Ice cream!” one of the kids shouted and began racing around the room. “Mamm, can we go get ice cream?”

  “You weren’t invited,” Sarah told him gently.

  Mark watched the little boy’s face fall. His lower lip quivered. When Mark glanced over at Miriam, he saw her biting her lip.

  “Can we take the children?” he found himself asking.

  “Are you schur?” she asked doubtfully. “Do you remember how many kinner there are in this family?”

  “Nine counting Miriam,” he said dryly.

  “Very funny.” Miriam stuck her tongue out at Mark behind her mother’s back.

  “Get your brothers and sisters,” he told the youngest boy. What was his name? He searched his memory but the kid was already racing for the stairs leading to the bedrooms, shouting at the top of his lungs.

  “We’re going for ice cream!”

  “What is all the racket?” Miriam’s father, Daniel, asked as he came into the room. “Hi, Mark.”

  “Mark invited the kinner to go for ice cream,” Sarah explained.

  “Well, that’s very generous.”

  “The poor man doesn’t know what he’s getting into,” Miriam said, wincing as her bruders and schweschders came barreling down the stairs. She clapped her hands. “We are not going if you behave like that!”

  They came to a halt and composed themselves.

  “That’s better.” She winked at Mark. Then she bit her lip. “The buggy’s not going to be big enough.”

  “Oh no!” the kinner cried in disappointment.

  “We can take the spring wagon,” Miriam suggested.

  Mark had never driven one, but he didn’t suppose it was much different than driving a buggy. The two of them unhitched Whitey and hitched him and one of the family’s horses to the wagon used to transport supplies.

  “Ready?” Miriam asked brightly.

  He wanted to say as ready as he’d ever be, but he wasn’t going to give her that satisfaction. “Sure. Sounds like fun. Let’s go, guys.”

  Miriam’s stern warning and her schoolmarm expression had them filing out to the wagon and climbing inside. Mark noticed the stream of passengers didn’t seem to affect Whitey in the least.

  “Everyone in?” Mark asked as he climbed into the driver’s seat.

  “All accounted for,” Miriam told him.

  Giggles came from the back.

  “Then on with the adventure,” he said.

  What would his associates at the firm think if they could see him now?

  Twelve

  Miriam watched Mark drive the wagon. “So, was it like riding a bicycle? Did it come back to you?”

  He grinned at her. “Yeah, believe it or not.”

  A car passed them and he frowned. “Lack of courtesy to buggy and wagon drivers hasn’t changed.”

  “Nee.”

  “Seems slower going than I remember.”

  She smiled. “Well, you’re used to that fast car of yours.”

  “Hey, it’s not a sports car,” he protested. “And I drive the speed limit.”

  “Always?”

  She watched him glance briefly at the back where her bruders and schweschders were hanging on his every word.

  “Always.”

  She fought to hide her smile, but when he looked her way and grinned, she suspected she wasn’t successful.

  “Some things never change,” he said as he pulled up in front of the ice-cream stand. “I remember when we used to come here.”

  “It’s been here forever,” Isaac said.

  “He makes it sound like we were around when civilization began,” Mark complained as he got out of the wagon. “Hmm. When did they replace the Grecian columns?”

  “Mark, help me out!” one of the twins cried as she held out her arms.

  He picked her up, set her on the ground beside the wagon, and when he turned to help the other twin, he watched her jump down on her own and scamper off. So, they weren’t alike in personality, he mused as he followed the children to the ordering window.

  Isaac looked at him. “Can I have a banana split?”

  “May I?” Miriam corrected. “And no, you may not. That’s way too much for a little boy. You may have a kiddie cone in whatever flavor you want. All of you.”

  “And sprinkles?”

  Miriam watched her schweschder stare up at Mark with wide blue eyes and—did she just bat her eyelashes?

  “We absolutely have to have sprinkles.” Mark got out his wallet.

  “I have money, if you need it.”

  “I think I can afford ice cream for a bunch of kids,” he said. “You can even have that root beer float you used to order.”

  “Big spender,” she responded pertly and batted her own eyelashes at him.

  They all got their cones and she and Mark their root beer floats, then they headed for one of the wooden picnic tables under the shade of a big oak tree.

  “Did you get enough sprinkles?” he asked Sadie.

  She nodded and grinned, revealing several missing teeth. “I asked the man for extra and he gave them to me,” she told him with satisfaction.

  Miriam had watched the man catch Mark’s eye as Sadie ordered and Mark had nodded for him to do that.

  “You’re gut with kids,” she murmured as she used a napkin to wipe Katie’s chin.

  “Buying them ice cream doesn’t make me good with them. I never know what to say to kids. I always feel awkward when I’m around the children of the people I work with.” He frowned. “I suppose some of that came from me being an only child. I got the impression my parents wanted more children, but they didn’t have them.”

  “My parents grew up with your dat,” she said quietly. “They weren’t surprised when he wanted to leave the community.” She glanced around at her bruders and schweschders. They were looking too interested in their ice cream to be paying attention, but it wasn’t a gut idea to talk about this now.

  An Englisch woman stopped at their table and smiled. “What a lovely family. Your children are beautiful.”

  Miriam saw Mark react with surprise. He shot a glance at her and she smiled. “Thank you.”

  The woman nodded and walked on.

  “Can we play on the swings?” Isaac asked.

  “May we?”

  He sighed and looked at Mark. “She’s always a teacher, even when we’re not in schul.”

  “I know.”

  Miriam swatted his arm. “We should always speak correct English.�
�

  “But we’re Amish.”

  “We’ve had this discussion. Do you want to talk about it some more or do you want to go on the swings?”

  “May we go on the swings?” he said with exaggerated politeness.

  “For a few minutes. I’m schur Mark has better things to do with his evening than sit around watching you swing.”

  Isaac ran off and his siblings joined him, all except for Katie.

  “It must be such a trial having your sister be your teacher.”

  Her mouth turned down as she gathered the crumpled napkins from the table. “Danki.”

  “I’m only teasing.” He took the napkins from her and tossed them in the trash can. “Why haven’t you married yet?”

  She stared at him. “Well, that’s a strange question.”

  Mark gestured at the children. “You obviously love children.”

  “And I take care of them every day and teach them as well.”

  “But don’t you want some of your own?”

  “Amish women don’t marry as young as they used to,” she told him defensively. “And I’m hardly an old maedel.”

  “I didn’t mean to imply that. I’m just curious, that’s all.”

  “What about you?” she asked. “You’re three years older than I am, and you haven’t married.” She watched a flush creep up his neck.

  “At least I’m engaged.”

  She nodded. “Well, yes, of course.”

  His cell phone rang.

  “Maybe that’s her now.”

  He took it out, checked the display. “No, but I need to take the call.”

  “Go ahead,” she said. “I’m going to go push the kinner on the swings.”

  She left him and busied herself with the kinner. But she had to admit she was grateful his call didn’t take long. They needed to get home so she could give the kinner their baths. She made sure there were no sticky faces or fingers before she led them to the wagon and watched as they climbed inside.