A Widow's Hope

by Vannetta Chapman

  And with the extra overtime hours, she might just be able to help save her parents’ farm.

  As for Jacob, it wasn’t as if they were friends, but it felt good to have an employer she could talk to. It helped to know that he’d forgiven her for her behavior the day before.

  Despite the silly schoolgirl feelings she sometimes had around Jacob, she also understood that she was a mother and her sole focus was her child. She wasn’t interested in dating or expanding her social circle. Still, they could learn to enjoy working with one another—as long as they kept things on a professional basis, she saw no harm in it.

  To be professional one needed to extend certain courtesies, so perhaps her mother was right. Maybe they both needed to work on their social skills.

  Chapter Eight

  Jacob had fallen into a comfortable routine by Thursday afternoon. On days that Hannah left early to take Matthew to therapy, he would putter around in his workshop until she arrived. Then they’d spend thirty minutes talking about what progress they’d made on the accounting reconstruction, whether she had any questions and if he’d thought of any other items she needed to know about his business.

  His excuses for being there were relatively lame—needing to put a final coat of sealant on a birdhouse, giving his gelding Bo time in the pasture, not wanting to get caught in early-morning traffic.

  On the days when she didn’t leave early, he was gone before she arrived. He did this so he could be at the job site early, finish his work well before four and come home in time to spend the last hour or so with Hannah. They didn’t work together. He was usually in the workshop, and she was in the tiny office. But just knowing someone else was there seemed to give the old barn new life.

  His schedule was set, and he was pretty happy with it.

  He left for work late on therapy days—Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday. He left for home early on Monday and Thursday. He always had an answer ready in case anyone asked, as if he needed to justify his irregular hours.

  He didn’t share his excuses with Hannah. Instead he recited them to himself over and over in his mind.

  He should be there in case she had questions.

  He needed to catch up on his small jobs.

  She might need something moved in the office.

  But with each day that passed, he understood that those were just excuses. You might be able to fool someone else part of the time, but you can rarely fool yourself. The memory of his father’s words brought a smile as he made his way home early Thursday afternoon.

  Deep inside, beneath all the layers of why it wouldn’t work and how foolish he was being, Jacob understood that he was falling for Hannah.

  It was hard to believe that she had been working in his office for less than a week. It seemed like she belonged there.

  Thursday he arrived home around two o’clock. His days on the job site were getting shorter and shorter, but the boss was happy with what he’d been able to accomplish, and that was what mattered.

  He’d opened the large doors of the barn to let in the fall air and was working on a front entry bench for one of his Englisch neighbors when Hannah plopped into a chair next to his workbench.

  “Problem with the receipts? Let me guess, you can’t tell my threes from my eights.”

  “Nein. It’s not about the numbers.”

  “What is it? Is Matthew okay?” He clutched the piece of sandpaper he’d been using in both hands. Surely she would have told him if Matthew wasn’t well.

  “He’s fine. It’s only that he’s turning five in a couple of weeks.”

  “When is his birthday?”

  “September 25.”

  “We should have a party.”

  Hannah crossed her arms, as if to ward off more unwelcome ideas. “Matthew prefers to have small, private celebrations.”

  Matthew did? Or Hannah? He was about to ask when common sense saved him and he closed his mouth. It wasn’t his business how she raised her child, or at least it shouldn’t be. Should it?

  “But that’s not what I came to tell you. I’m going to need to leave early today, even though it’s not a therapy day.”

  Jacob pushed away the disappointment that welled up inside him. “That’s not a problem.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Ya. I know you’re doing extra work at home. From the stack of pages on your desk it would seem the great taping project of the year is nearly done.”

  “Speaking of taping...how’s your bin coming along?”

  Instead of admitting that he hadn’t actually started, he asked, “Why do they have to be taped up anyway? A receipt is a receipt.”

  Hannah’s eyes widened and she looked at him as if he were wearing two pairs of suspenders. “Because the IRS doesn’t deal in scraps of paper, and when I enter them in the ledger, I do so by date.”

  “You have to sort them by date?”

  Hannah shook her head in mock despair, or maybe it was real despair. “Stick to your woodwork, Jacob Schrock. Leave the office work to me.”

  He liked the sound of that. He liked the idea that she planned to stick around longer than the next two weeks.

  * * *

  Hannah went back into the office, ignoring the way that Jacob was looking at her. Maybe she was imagining it, but he seemed happy when she was around, almost as happy as he had been when he was working on Matthew’s playhouse.

  She plopped down in front of the desk. She was helping him out of a jam. Of course he was happy. Why wouldn’t he be happy? Things weren’t that clear-cut, though. She understood all too well that he was helping her out of a jam at the same time.

  She’d taken the most recent year of receipts herself, and she’d stayed up well past her normal bedtime—sitting at the kitchen table, taping receipts and sorting them by month. Now, back in Jacob’s office, she opened the journal and began entering them under the proper category headings. She immersed herself in the work, and thirty minutes later was surprised to hear the clatter of buggy wheels outside.

  Looking up, she saw that it was her brother-in-law and began tidying up the desk. She’d brought a quilted bag from home, and she carefully placed the next two months of receipts in it, along with the ledger, a few extra pencils and the battery-operated sharpener she’d purchased at the store.

  By the time she’d made it out into the larger room, Jacob was wiping his hands off on a cloth and frowning at the buggy that had parked in front of the workshop.

  “Your ride?” he asked.

  “Ya.”

  He nodded once, curtly, and turned back toward his workbench.

  “I’m taking some work with me, to make up for the time I’m missing.” When he didn’t answer she added, “Thanks again, Jacob.”

  He bobbed his head but was suddenly completely focused on cleaning some of his tools. It all seemed like rather odd behavior. Usually Jacob was the friendly, outgoing sort.

  Shrugging, she said, “See you tomorrow, I guess.”

  Still no answer, so she gave up on making conversation and walked outside.

  Her brother-in-law had just pulled up to the hitching post and jumped out of the buggy.

  “Carl, danki for picking me up.”

  “No problem.”

  “When Dat dropped me off, he thought he’d be able to come back and get me.”

  “Ya, he told me as much, but his errands in town took longer than he thought. It’s really no problem, Hannah.”

  He put his arm around her shoulders and gave her a clumsy hug. Carl was the big brother she’d never had. He’d been in the family over a dozen years, and Hannah thought the world of him. It helped that he was so good with Matthew, who happened to be sitting in the back seat practically bouncing up and down, if a boy with a spinal cord injury could bounce.

  Hannah stuck her head inside. “What are you doing
here?”

  “Carl said I could come.”

  “And why would you want to do that?”

  “I told you, Mamm. I want to see where you work. Is Jacob here? Can I come inside?”

  “Oh, I don’t think we have time for that.”

  “Sure we do,” Carl said. “I even brought his chair.”

  Hannah resisted the urge to ask why in the world he would do that. Carl was just trying to help, and Matthew’s fascination with Jacob hadn’t lessened one bit in the last few days. She didn’t think this was a good idea, but Carl was already removing Matthew’s wheelchair from where it was strapped on the back of the buggy.

  “All right,” she said with a sigh. “Let’s get this over with.”

  * * *

  Jacob had immediately gone to the window when Hannah walked out of the room. He knew he shouldn’t be aggravated with her. He couldn’t expect her to work all of the time, and of course she had a social life. Why wouldn’t she? Hannah was a smart, beautiful, young woman. She’d been a widow for over a year now. Of course she was lonely and ready to step out again. He was surprised she didn’t have beaus dropping her off and picking her up every day.

  When the man jumped out of the buggy and gave her a hug, Jacob understood the full depth of his misery. Not only had he fallen for a woman who could never possibly care for an ogre like himself, but she was already being courted. He could have asked around. He could have saved himself the embarrassment.

  He thought to sneak out the back and over to his house or the garden or anywhere that he wouldn’t have to watch the two of them when the man walked around to the back of the buggy. He reappeared with Matthew’s wheelchair. She had trusted Matthew with this fellow? They must be even closer than he feared.

  Now he was torn, but that feeling didn’t last long because the man had plopped Matthew into the chair as if he weighed no more than a sack of potatoes. Matthew was grinning up at his mother, and Hannah was pointing at the workshop. There was no way he was going to sneak out of this. He wasn’t beneath slipping away and being borderline rude to an Amish man, but he couldn’t find it in his heart to ignore young Matthew.

  So he pulled in a deep breath, straightened his suspenders and walked out into the fall afternoon.

  Matthew let out a squeal the minute he saw him.

  “Jacob! Carl brought me over to see where you work.”

  Hannah reached forward and straightened Matthew’s shirt. “I thought he came to pick me up.”

  “That too.” Carl stepped forward and offered his hand to Jacob. “It’s been a while.”

  A while?

  “We were in the same church district, before we grew too big and had to split.”

  He did look familiar.

  The man laughed good-naturedly. “Carl Yoder. I’m married to Hannah’s sister, Beth.”

  The flood of relief that swept through Jacob confirmed what he had already figured out—he’d developed feelings for Hannah King, and he was in much too far to back out now.

  He spent the next twenty minutes walking Carl and Matthew through the workshop, showing them the types of things he made and answering Matthew’s endless supply of questions.

  “I want to see your playhouses, Jacob.”

  “You have one of my playhouses, buddy.”

  “But I want to see the other ones. The ones that you made for other people. Are they all for disabled kids like me?”

  “Yes, they are, but different kids have different special needs.”

  “I don’t know what that means.”

  “Some disabilities you can see on the outside, but others, they’re inside—so those playhouses might not have grab bars. Maybe the person can’t see well, so the playhouse is flat on the ground—no steps and no ramps.”

  “How’s that a playhouse, then?”

  Jacob laughed and ruffled the hair on the top of Matthew’s head.

  “Say, isn’t there one over by me?” Carl asked. “Built like a ship. That has to be your work.”

  “Ya. Made it last year for a young boy with cancer.”

  “Can I see it?” Matthew began tugging on his hand. “Can we go there? Would he let me play with him?”

  “I’m not sure how Jasper is doing now. We’d need to check with his parents.”

  “Will you? Will you call them?”

  “That’s enough, Matthew.” Hannah had moved behind Matthew’s chair and had pivoted it toward the barn door. “Jacob has lots to do. He can’t be ferrying you around to playgrounds because you’re curious.”

  “I could take you both on Saturday.”

  Matthew squealed in delight and raised his hand for a fist bump. Jacob obliged and then he noticed the frown on Hannah’s face.

  “Oh. Unless you had something else you needed to do on Saturday.”

  “I had planned on working on your receipts.”

  “We could go without you. I don’t mind taking him.”

  “You need to work on receipts too.”

  “Well, we could do that in the morning and go to see the playhouse in the afternoon.”

  “Come on, Mamm. Please...” Matthew drew the word out in a well-practiced whine, but he added a smile, which caused his mother to sigh heavily.

  “Okay, but only for an hour.”

  “Jacob could come for lunch and then we could—”

  “Let’s not strain your mamm’s patience. She has things planned for her Saturday.”

  Carl had been studying a row of birdhouses. He picked one up and asked, “How much?”

  “Ten.”

  “Costs you more than that to build it.”

  “Nein. I use old barn wood. Costs practically nothing to build it.”

  Carl grinned. “I’ll take two, then. Beth will love them.”

  Matthew offered to hold the birdhouses, and Carl once again shook Jacob’s hand. “This has been great, but I need to get back before Beth thinks I’ve taken off for the auction in Shipshe without her.”

  “I didn’t know you were going,” Hannah said.

  “She wants goats, if you can believe that. As if she doesn’t have enough to take care of, and the new baby on the way...” Carl shook his head as if he couldn’t fathom the ways of women and offered to wheel Matthew back to the buggy.

  Hannah hung back, and Jacob had the feeling that it wasn’t to say thank you.

  “I’m sorry he pressured you into that.”

  “It’s not a problem.”

  “A four-year-old can be quite persistent once they’ve made up their mind, and Matthew doubly so. He’s been pestering me about coming to see you since I started on Monday.”

  “I really don’t mind.”

  “The thing is...” Hannah hesitated and then pushed on. “Matthew gets attached to people and then they move on to other...phases of their lives. He doesn’t handle that very well.”

  “Where would I move on to?”

  “He gets too attached, if you know what I mean.”

  “I don’t.” He waited, wondering what she did mean and trying not to be stung by her suggestion that he was going to somehow let Matthew down.

  “It’s up to me to protect him.”

  “From what? Freinden?”

  “You’re not his freind, Jacob.”

  “Of course I am.”

  “Nein. You’re my boss.”

  He stared out the window for a moment, watched Carl lift Matthew out of his wheelchair and place him in the buggy. He wondered how hard it was for Hannah to depend on other people, especially after losing her husband. “Let me take you both out on Saturday, show him a couple of playhouses. We’ll keep it to an hour so it doesn’t disrupt your whole day.”

  “Okay, fine. I guess.”

  “I know the owners, and they wouldn’t mind Matthew playing on them. Most are f
or children his age.”

  “Playdates don’t always go well with Matthew.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Other children can’t possibly understand his limitations, why he needs to be careful...”

  “I’ve worked with several disabled kids. They seem pretty intuitive about such things.”

  “And I’ve seen children point and ask cruel questions, or, worse yet, ignore him completely.”

  “Is that what you’re worried about? Or is it that you’re afraid I’ll somehow let Matthew down? Because I can assure you right now that isn’t going to happen.”

  “He’s too taken with you.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “He doesn’t understand that you were simply hired to do a job, and that now I’m hired to do a job. He thinks...well, he thinks that there’s something more to it.”

  “Hannah, what you’re saying is true, or was true. I was hired for a job, and now I’ve hired you for a job.” He wondered if he should just shut up, but ignored that idea. “I think, though, that Matthew is also right. We’re part of a community. We belong to the same church.”

  “Different districts.”

  “We are neighbors and freinden.”

  She nodded once, curtly, and turned. He walked beside her as she made her way back outside. Carl had climbed into the buggy and was waiting.

  He’d noticed that when she was embarrassed or nervous, she liked to keep her hands busy. At the moment, she was twisting the strings to her prayer kapp round and round. He’d also learned that if he waited, she would eventually work through her emotions and pick up the conversation again.

  “Ya, of course you’re right. It’s only that I don’t want him to get the wrong idea.”

  “What wrong idea? That I like you? Because I do.”

  She cocked her had to the side, glancing up at him and allowing her gaze to linger there before flitting away. “We’ll see you Saturday, two o’clock.”

  And then, she scurried back off to the buggy. There was simply no other word for it. She reminded him of a squirrel running back toward its safe spot in the woods.