A Simple Hope

by Rosalind Lauer

  After the accident, folks had come through for her in small and large ways. Mamm and Dat had rushed to the hospital to see her, even though she was unharmed. The main concern had been to take care of the injured folk, and after the first few days that had included all the young people in the van who had been spared physical injury but hurt inside—traumatized. Dr. Monroe offered to do group counseling, and it was a blessing that the bishop allowed it because talking about the worst parts of the crash had eased the terror in Rachel’s heart. It was still a sad thing, especially losing Tom Lapp and seeing James and old Jacob injured. But now Rachel could talk about the accident without quivering inside.

  Stepping back from the painting, her blue brush tipped in the air, she thought about James. How she wished he’d been able to join in the group therapy. Dr. Dylan had been going to see him, but that wasn’t the same as hearing that Elsie, Ruben, Zed, and Rachel were battling the same feelings, suffering the same dreams. Was James getting the support he needed from his Amish family—the folks in the church district, the Plain folk of Halfway?

  She hoped so. Now, more than ever, James needed his Amish family.

  Later that morning, James was still on Rachel’s mind as she drove the buggy toward town. Mamm had given her a list of items to buy at the bulk store, but first she was going to drop sisters Molly and Bethany off at the farm stand on the road by the other family dairy farm, run by cousin Adam King.

  “I can’t wait to see what’s come out of Mammi Nell’s greenhouse,” Molly said, clapping her hands together in delight.

  This was the first year that the younger girls had been put in charge of running the family farm stand, which was used to sell off extra vegetables from the garden as well as items their grandmother grew in the greenhouse. Last year at this time, Rachel had managed the stand with her cousin Sadie. Dear Sadie! She had gone off to the city during her rumspringa, and Rachel missed her so.

  “Look at that! Ruthie’s already there.” Bethany pointed ahead at the white roadside hut down the hill. Today the chalkboard sign said FLOWERS & PIE FILLING. Underneath was the painted sign that read NO SUNDAY SALES.

  “Do you think we’ll get many customers today?” Molly asked, holding a hand up to shield her eyes from the sun.

  “I reckon so,” Rachel said. “A lot of Englishers come out this way on weekends, especially in the good spring weather.”

  As Rachel drew back the reins to slow the horse, cousin Ruthie emerged from the cover of the hut with her hands on her hips, her face set in a scowl.

  “Ruthie King, I’ve never seen such a look from you,” Rachel said as her sisters hopped down from the buggy. “You need to turn that frown upside down.”

  “But I’m not happy.” Ruthie pointed to the stand. “Somebody came by and stole our hyacinths. Every last one.”

  “Don’t tell me that!” Bethany rushed into the little booth to see for herself. “We’ve been growing those hyacinths for weeks, checking them every day. And now they’re stolen?”

  “I don’t believe it. Who would steal flowers?” Molly picked up two pots of daffodils, as if the money might be hiding under them. “Maybe they’re coming back to pay us later.”

  “I thought of that,” Ruthie said, “but the cash box is empty. Whoever came by took the money we left here to make change.”

  “Oh, dear girls, I’m afraid Ruthie is right.” Rachel understood their disappointment. “Someone didn’t obey the honor system.”

  “The sign is very clear,” Bethany said, reading: “Honor system. Place money in box. Thank you.” She squinted up at the sign, shaking her head. “Why didn’t they follow directions?”

  Molly blinked. “Maybe they couldn’t read. That would be a shame.”

  “But it’s still wrong to take something that doesn’t belong to you,” Ruthie said firmly. “And there are two jars of pie filling gone. They might have been sold, but I can’t be sure. No one made a note in the book.”

  “What a terrible day,” Bethany said crossly.

  “Don’t be that way.” Rachel slipped an arm around her sister’s shoulder. “Nothing good will come of this if you let it ruin your day.”

  Bethany shook her head. “How could there be anything good in this?”

  “Maybe Gott means it as a lesson to us. We need to learn to forgive and forget.”

  “Especially if the thief doesn’t know how to read,” said Molly.

  “Either way, we must forgive.” Rachel was watching Bethany, whose steely eyes seemed set in anger. “Take your anger and roll it up.” She pretended to be working cookie dough. “Pack it into a ball, and toss it down the road. It’s too heavy to be carrying around.”

  Molly and Ruthie exchanged a smile, then did the same, scooping up the air and cupping it between their hands.

  “And then throw it away!” Ruthie called, pitching it toward the road.

  “Good throw, Ruthie. Next softball game, I want you on my team,” Rachel teased.

  “Kumm, Bethany,” Molly urged her sister. “Toss your anger away.”

  With a snort, Bethany went through the motions quickly. “I forgive, but I’m still upset.”

  Rachel nodded. “Gott heals the heart. Sometimes it takes time.”

  “Mmm.” Bethany crossed her arms.

  “Maybe they needed the money more than we do,” Molly said.

  “Then why did they take our flowers, too?”

  “Wasn’t Mammi Nell the one who gave you the bulbs in the first place?” Rachel pointed out. “So, really, they’re her stolen flowers.”

  Ruthie wiped a few dirt crumbles from the counter. “If you want to go back that far, you could say the flowers were stolen from Gott, since He is the creator of all things, large and small.”

  Bethany scowled. “So they stole the flowers from Gott?”

  “Nay …” Rachel said slowly. “Because the flowers still belong to Gott. So in a way, they weren’t stolen at all.”

  “Oh, this is such roundabout talk,” Molly said. “Were the flowers stolen or not?”

  The girls looked at one another and began to laugh.

  “I don’t think it matters anymore.” Ruthie hitched up the skirt of her dress and bent down to reach under the counter. “And look here. Mammi gave us a whole lot of parsnips to sell, along with some potted tulips.”

  “There you go. Parsnips are good in stews.” Rachel helped load the vegetables onto the counter. She had always thought of parsnips as a cross between carrots and sweet potatoes.

  “I hope we can sell them,” Ruthie said as she added another bunch to the stack, “because I’m getting kind of sick of eating them.”

  “Make room for the tulips, too.” Bethany pushed the parsnips to the side so that all the flowers could be together.

  No sooner had the girls reorganized the display than a car pulled up, and an older couple purchased some parsnips. The woman was still chatting with the girls when a little red sports car roared to a stop, and two women got out to look over the flowers.

  For a few minutes Rachel hung back near the horse and watched the younger girls handle the customers. Then she went on her way to the bulk store, thinking that she must remember to tell Dat about the theft, though there was nothing to be done about it. Plain folk didn’t report crimes to the police; Gott in heaven was the only judge of a man.

  As Banjo’s hooves clip-clopped on the road, she felt a twinge of sadness for the girls, so disappointed that someone would steal from them. Still, it was a lesson to learn, one that she had faced with the accident. Sometimes bad things happened, but Gott healed the heart and renewed the spirit. As Mamm liked to say, “Gott could save us from trauma, but instead he sends us a comforter.”

  Saturday afternoon, bright Englisher voices and scattered laughter filled the Lapp home. The Englisher medical folk were here for the weekly visit that had been the norm since James had checked out of the rehabilitation facility. After Dat’s order to distance himself from the Englishers, James felt an uncomfortable r
esistance from his father when he greeted the visitors. When you ran your palm over an unfinished piece of wood, splinters would get in the hand.

  Luckily, Jimmy stepped out the door when everyone settled into the kitchen. What did that mean? Would Dat back down on his decision to tell these medical folks to stay away? While Mamm and Verena served coffee and shoofly pie, James soaked up the familiar faces and friendly conversation.

  He was glad to have Doc Trueherz here. In his denim shirt and jeans, Henry Trueherz had a friendly manner and a streak of common sense that made him different from other doctors. Although Doc had an office in Paradise, for many years he had made house calls far and wide. Most Amish folk in Halfway liked and trusted Doc Trueherz. James wished his father felt that same solid trust.

  As Haley Donovan poured a cloud of cream into her coffee, Doc asked her when she would finish nursing school.

  “Graduation is the last week in May,” Haley said, pushing her gold hair back behind her ears, “if I make it that long. There’s a killer meds test coming up, and everyone is freaking out about it.” A nursing student at Lancaster County General Hospital—LanCo General—Haley had witnessed the van accident that had injured James. He didn’t remember much from that night, but Rachel told him many times how Haley had helped in countless ways, probably saving old Jacob Fisher’s life. Folks were grateful that Gott had brought her onto the road at that moment. Even after that night, Haley had helped. When she learned that the Lapps couldn’t afford a physical therapist, Haley had volunteered to make his therapy part of her studies. Since then, she’d been out here every week to supervise James’s exercises.

  “Ah, I remember those med school exams.” Doc sighed. “My advice? Try to study a little each week instead of leaving it to the last night.”

  “What did I tell you?” Dylan Monroe pointed to Haley.

  She laughed. “Dylan warned me about procrastination. He’s been quizzing me, twice a week.”

  “And it’s working. You’ve got most of the vocabulary down.”

  “I do, thanks to you,” Haley said, her eyes on Dylan.

  James had noticed the looks that passed between these two. Like two blue jays, chasing each other over fences and brambles, Haley and Dylan favored each other. Sometimes it reminded him of the way he and Rachel had talked and joked around and walked hand in hand.

  Dylan lifted his mug of coffee over his plate. “Edna? Do you mind?”

  Mamm looked over from the sink and grinned. “Go ahead. It’s what we do when Englishers aren’t around.”

  With the wink of an eye, Dylan poured his coffee over his shoofly pie, causing Haley to let out a little squeal. “Dylan! Have you gone bonkers?”

  “It’s delicious.” With a flourish, Dylan scooped up a bite of moist pie.

  “Some people like it that way,” Doc Trueherz agreed.

  “Without coffee or cream, shoofly pie can be like a mouthful of dry sand,” James said, holding back a grin. He’d been the one to tell Dr. Dylan about the custom of pouring coffee on pie.

  Mamm chuckled. “Soon we’ll have ripe plums and peaches. You don’t need to tip coffee or cream on fruit pies.”

  Everyone agreed. As the conversation went on, it dawned on James that these people had become good friends. After the bishop’s dismal advice the other day, James felt like these Englishers had brought water to a man in the desert. He looked forward to their visits, clinging to their advice and jokes. Still, Dat was wrong to worry. Nothing would turn James’s head from living Plain.

  While Edna talked with Doc Trueherz, James and Haley went out to the living room to review his physical therapy exercises. Dylan tagged along as usual. He had taken to talking with James during the sessions, and now after weeks of prodding, James answered.

  James had told Dylan what it had been like to grow up on a family orchard, following his grandfather around through the trees, climbing ladders even as a child to pick peaches and pears and apples. Dylan’s childhood had been very different, centered on riding his bicycle, playing basketball, and swimming in a friend’s pool. “The only time I ever climbed a tree, I got stuck up there,” Dylan had admitted, spurring laughter from James.

  “You’ve made a lot of progress,” Haley said as they completed the thirty-minute workout. “How’s the all-terrain chair working out for you in the orchard?”

  “Good. Though I’d like it better if it could climb the trees,” James answered.

  “I bet you would,” Haley agreed, tucking a lock of blond hair behind one ear. “We’ll have to get someone to design that feature.”

  “Nay. I want to climb on my own again. My arms are strong enough. Now it’s only my legs that need to follow.”

  “What’s the latest update on your prognosis?” Dylan asked.

  “The doctors say it’s possible I might walk again. I went through some testing a few weeks ago to qualify for a study. They want to use electricity to wake up the spinal cord.”

  “And it’s okay to do that?” Dylan’s arms swept through the living room. “I mean, considering that electricity isn’t allowed in your house?”

  “It would be all right to use electricity outside the home. Amish do it all the time—in Englisher shops, under streetlights, sending faxes.” James checked the kitchen to make sure Dat had not returned before he continued. Mamm was in the kitchen alone. Doc Trueherz had stepped outside to take a call on his cell phone. “The problem is my father, and now the bishop. They’re worried that I’ve become swept up with the Englishers. They don’t want me to lose sight of the things that matter. My family and community. And Gott.”

  “Ouch.” Dylan leaned forward in his chair. “Are you questioning your faith? Have we been a bad influence?”

  James lowered the small barbells to the floor and straightened in the chair. “There’s no muddy water for me. When I look inside, there’s only a clear spring. I know I’m Amish through and through, and I won’t be swayed by Englisher friends or doctors. But my dat, he doesn’t see it that way.”

  “And there lies the problem,” Dylan said. “Does that mean Haley and I are getting you in trouble? I mean, our visits here …”

  “Your visits have eased my mind and helped me keep my eye on the target. I’ve learned that healing is more than lying back in bed. But Dat and the bishop don’t agree.”

  “Are they going to make you stop therapy?” Haley asked, a glimmer of concern in her blue eyes.

  “It looks that way. After today, Dat wants no more Englishers in the house. I’m sorry, but today will have to be your last visit.”

  “Oh, no, that can’t be!” Haley frowned, hands on her hips. “How will you continue therapy?”

  “That I don’t know.” James tucked the weights under the chair. “But when the bishop comes out to the house because he thinks a person is drifting away …” He shrugged. “They’re going to watch me like a hawk now.”

  Dylan rubbed his jaw with the knuckles of one hand, taking it all in. “Sounds like you’re in a pickle. What can I do to help?”

  “There’s nothing to be done. I’ll respect my father’s wishes, and Dat and Bishop Samuel will come to see that I’m not falling away from Plain living.”

  “Okay, my friend.” Dylan sat back in the rocking chair, gripping the armrests. “So I guess this would not be the time to persuade you to try our group counseling session? Because the other members of the group keep asking when you’re going to join, and Samuel has given us the nod of approval.”

  James shook his head. Rachel had been asking him to go to those meetings, and he’d given it some thought until Dat had come down on him. “I can’t do that now.”

  “Understood.” Dylan held up his hands. “You just keep me in the loop. Tell me to back off or step it up, whatever you need.”

  The door opened and Doc returned, along with Jimmy.

  “James!” Doc held up his cell phone, a twinkle in his eyes. “I just checked in with Alec Finley, the doctor doing the experimental spinal cord treatment�
��epidural stimulation, it’s called. He’s gone over your X-rays and scans, and he says it’s a go. He wants to see you in his office Monday morning.”

  “That’s great news,” Haley said brightly.

  Dylan grinned, and even Mamm seemed happy, her hands pressed to her lips in a gesture of prayer, as if she were silently thanking Gott.

  “It’s good.” Warmed by hope, James nodded, trying to keep the excitement buried inside him. This study had helped previous patients learn to walk after similar injuries, and it didn’t require any medication or surgery. But he kept his hope hidden. He didn’t want to give Dat a reason to buck against yet another Englisher treatment.

  “Let me give you Finley’s number right now.” Doc Trueherz tapped his cell phone. “Edna, can I trouble you for a pencil and paper?”

  “Mmm.” Jimmy grumbled as the doctor wrote the information on a notepad Mamm produced. “We’ll take the number, but we must give this some thought before we rush into anything. James has already had two expensive surgeries. We can’t keep going back to the hospital, hoping for something that the Almighty has not willed.”

  “I can’t speak for God,” Dr. Trueherz said, “but I can tell you that Dr. Finley’s study will not cost you any money. You just need to get James to the rehab center in Paradise.”

  “That’s not too far,” Edna said, but her lips clamped tight when Dat turned stern eyes on her.

  Jimmy’s broad, friendly face was tight with disapproval. “We’ll see. It’s a busy time in the orchard. It would be hard to spare James and someone to drive him.”

  “How about if we hooked James up with some transportation?” Dylan suggested.

  A flame of hope sparked in James’s chest, but Dat’s scowl snuffed it out. “No. Don’t need any more help. From now on, the Amish community will give James the support he needs.” And quick as a lightning bug’s flash, Dat had dismissed the Englishers.

  James wanted to point out the good things about the study. The potential. The fact that they had accepted him. The fact that it was free. The hope of standing and walking on his own again. But he knew better than to argue with his father, especially in front of the Englishers.