by Jan Drexler
Manny glanced up at the ceiling of painted boards and mentally shook off the thought. The Lord was in his place, and Manny was in his. That was the way it should be.
Naomi had been painfully aware of her new neighbor sitting to her left and slightly behind her all through the morning. She hadn’t planned to look for him until the noon meal after the service, but when Davey had erupted with delight and she had looked to see what he wanted to show her, she had met his smiling gaze in spite of herself. For the rest of the morning, no matter how hard she tried to concentrate on the worship, his dark brown eyes were all she saw.
But now, with the service ended, she had tasks to do that would keep her mind off of Manny Gerber. While Davey ran off to play with the other children, Naomi threw herself into the final preparations for the noon meal. Annalise Yoder had prepared a huge kettle of bean soup the day before, and Naomi ladled the steaming, savory stew into bowls and handed them to others, who set them on the long tables for the first sitting.
The ministers and older men ate first, and as soon as they were done, the bowls were washed and filled again. Naomi ladled soup until the kettle was nearly empty, and then it was finally her turn to sit at the table with the other young, unmarried women. Susan Gingerich took a seat on the bench beside her.
“Have you met the new man from Ohio?” Susan broke pieces of cornbread into her soup. “Isn’t he the best-looking man you’ve ever seen?”
Naomi shifted slightly. “I met him yesterday. His farm joins ours on the north side.”
Susan’s brow lifted. “Is that right? He came by to visit with your daed?”
“I went to his clearing to fetch Davey.”
Susan’s brow lifted even higher. The Gingerich family had come to Indiana from Wayne County, Ohio, at the end of the winter, and Naomi hadn’t been able to get to know Susan very well yet. Her family had settled in the western part of the community, near Rock Creek, in Elkhart County. Naomi felt her cheeks heat as Susan prepared to ask the question that new folks always posed whenever Davey was mentioned.
“I’ve been wanting to ask you.” Susan’s voice dropped to a whisper. “What happened to Davey’s father?”
Naomi stifled a sigh and covered it with a spoonful of soup. As she ate that spoonful, and the next, she wondered what would happen if she told Susan something that would send gossiping tongues wagging. But she couldn’t lie. Davey’s story wasn’t anything she was ashamed of.
“Davey’s parents were killed in a storm when he was little. Our family took him in, and I became his mother.”
As she blew on her next spoonful of the thick bean soup, she glanced at Susan’s face. A frown passed quickly before the other girl recovered.
“That’s a terrible thing for him. It must be hard for you, though, to have to care for such an active boy. Were you and his real mother close friends?”
Naomi ignored the slight. As far as she was concerned, her adoption of Davey made her his real mother, even if she hadn’t given birth to him. “They were strangers to us. We found Davey hiding in his family’s cabin after it had been destroyed by a twister.” Naomi’s stomach wrenched as it always did when the memories of that day surfaced. How they had found Davey’s parents and baby sister in the wrecked cabin, and Davey hiding in the fireplace. From the moment she had taken him into her arms and her heart, Davey had been her son. It was a feeling she had never been able to explain.
“How long have you and your family lived in Indiana?” Susan smiled at her, friendly now that Davey’s background had passed inspection.
“We moved from Somerset County three years ago.”
“Somerset County? In Pennsylvania? Most of the folks who live in our part of the district are from Ohio.”
Naomi took a piece of cornbread from the plate that was being passed down the table. “And most of this part of the district was settled by families from Pennsylvania. Folks like to settle near their friends and family.”
“I suppose so.” Susan looked toward the barnyard where the men had gathered to talk. “I wonder why Manny Gerber chose to buy land in this part of the district. After all, he’s from Ohio too.”
“Did you know him when you lived there?”
Susan shook her head. “He must be from Holmes County. There are some pretty tradition-minded folks down by Walnut Creek, and we never had much to do with them.”
When Susan turned to say something to the woman sitting on the other side of her, Naomi stood, taking her empty soup bowl and Susan’s to be washed. This wasn’t the first time someone had spoken openly about the distance between the two parts of the Indiana church district, but she didn’t want to hear it. The folks in Holmes and Wayne Counties in Ohio were different districts, but they were still Amish. Susan wasn’t the first person she had heard who talked as if there was some kind of wall between the two counties. If they weren’t careful, the same kind of division could happen here.
After the dishes were clean, Naomi found her sister, Mattie Yoder, and their friend, Hannah Bender. Hannah scooted over on their bench so that Naomi could sit between them and threaded her arm through hers.
“We don’t get to see each other as much as we did in the winter, since we’ve been so busy planting the gardens and all.” Hannah squeezed Naomi’s arm. “What have you been doing lately?”
“The same things you have been, for sure. Getting the garden ready, cleaning out the potato hole—”
“Now you sound like Jenny Smith.” Mattie laughed as she said it. Jenny lived on the farm south of Mattie and Jacob. Her father had been one of the first pioneers in the area fifteen years before and was one of their few non-Amish neighbors. “She always calls their root cellar a potato hole.”
Naomi laughed with her. “Jenny’s way of talking is so funny, I find myself using her phrases instead of our own. Besides, when the only vegetables in the root cellar are potatoes, we may as well call it a potato hole.”
Hannah turned to Mattie. “Did Jacob give you the carrot seeds I sent over? They will be a fine addition to our gardens this spring.”
As Mattie and Hannah continued discussing their gardens, Naomi’s attention was drawn to her mamm, sitting on a bench across the room with Annalise Yoder, Hannah’s mother. Annalise was holding her granddaughter, Hannah’s new baby, born just a month earlier. The baby lay in her grandmother’s arms with her face turned slightly, fast asleep. Mamm held her four-month-old granddaughter, Isaac and Emma’s Dorcas, while she slept. The two grandmothers chatted quietly, content to let the babies sleep. Annalise kept one eye on the group of children playing in the yard, where her daughter, Margli, and some of the other girls were playing with the little children. Annalise’s three-year-old twins, Gideon and Rachael, were among them.
If Mattie felt left out when the young mothers of the community discussed diapers and feedings, she never showed it. She and Jacob had been married for more than two years now, but hadn’t been blessed with any little ones yet. But Naomi felt the pain of her own empty arms as she grew older and no man considered her a good companion for marriage, or even friendship. Even with Davey to care for, she still couldn’t resign herself to never giving him a father, or brothers and sisters. If she felt this way, how must Mattie feel as the months and years passed by?
Jan Drexler brings a unique understanding of Amish traditions and beliefs to her writing. Her ancestors were among the first Amish, Mennonite, and Brethren immigrants to Pennsylvania in the 1700s. Their experiences are the basis for her stories. Jan lives in South Dakota with her husband, their four adult children, two active dogs, and a cat. When she isn’t writing, she enjoys hiking the Black Hills and the Badlands. She is the author of Hannah’s Choice and the Love Inspired novels The Prodigal Son Returns, A Mother for His Children, and A Home for His Family.
Other books in the Journey to Pleasant Prairie series
Hannah’s Choice
www.jandrexler.com
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