For Sure and Certain

by Anya Monroe

  Still, she couldn’t help but think how lucky Bekah and Ruthie were to grow up hanging laundry with their mother. To pull fresh bread from the oven or carrots from the dirt. Everything they needed was at their fingertips: food, family, friends. Which is why she found it increasingly difficult to wrap her mind around Abel. He had everything right here, yet he chose to walk away.

  “After we finish this, I’ll have Mr. Miller hitch the buggy up and we can head to the Lapp’s house, okay girls? I just have to change, Ruthie smeared her jam covered fingers all over my apron.”

  “Why don’t you let us finish while you freshen up? We’ll clean up the little ones, too,” Marigold offered.

  “Thanks, dears, I could use a few minutes alone,” Mrs. Miller said, patting Marigold and Bekah’s shoulders as she walked back to the farmhouse.

  “You ready for the quilting circle?” Bekah asked Marigold.

  “I suppose so.” Marigold looked down at her knee-length sundress. “You sure it’s okay for me to wear my regular clothes over?”

  “Ja, you look right good. The ladies there won’t expect you to be dressed plain.”

  Marigold nodded, relieved. As comfortable as it had been to dress the part at church on Sunday, she didn’t want to field the questions that had come with the choice. Once a week was enough.

  After pinning up the final pair of pants to dry, she took Jakey in her arms and walked back to the house with Bekah and Ruthie to wash their faces before heading to Katie and Joshua’s home. With the chore behind them, they could enjoy the day. Marigold itched to get her eyes on the quilt pattern the women here used.

  The Lapp house was much smaller than the Miller’s. It was modest and decorated in the same sparse fashion, but it was not even half the size. She’d only been in one other Amish home, the one where the church service had been held. She’d learned that instead of having a church building or synagogue, the Amish held their services in homes, rotating each week, and they only held services three weeks of the month.

  Standing in the entryway, Mrs. Lapp greeted them with smiles and handshakes as she introduced herself to Marigold. In the living room a large quilting loom had been set up and over a half dozen women already had needles in hand over the outstretched quilt. They raised their voices to greet them, and Marigold couldn’t resist walking toward the women to get a closer look of the quilt.

  “Do you quilt?” Mrs. Lapp asked Marigold while Mrs. Miller and Bekah situated Ruthie outside with the other children, and laid Jakey down for an afternoon nap in a spare bedroom.

  “Not much,” Marigold admitted. “I’ve always knit, I taught myself.” Marigold remembered replaying YouTube videos as she clumsily held two needles in her perched hands. She’d been desperate to learn after seeing a woman in a coffee shop form a blanket from a ball of yarn. The idea of creating something useful, tangible … real … felt like magic. She’d always been in the shadows of her more talented siblings, but somehow Marigold knew she could do this. She could knit.

  But quilting was something else.

  “Have you tried?” Mrs. Lapp asked gently. Marigold looked up at the woman whose home she stood in. Mrs. Lapp wasn’t pretty. She had the sort of face that even if covered in foundation and blush, her cheeks would always sag a bit, her nose a bit too bulbous for traditional beauty. But her eyes welcomed Marigold and put her at ease.

  Being around women who didn’t emphasize appearance was a welcome relief. She had never gone somewhere with her mother without the constant prodding and pecking about how she looked wrong, with a dress too short or too long or hair too wild or makeup too obvious. Marigold couldn’t do anything right. But here? Here she was free.

  “I’ve sewn a lot of my clothes, but never from a pattern. I kind of teach myself as I go. This seems so precise, I’m scared I’d mess it up.” Marigold rubbed her hands together as she looked longingly at the queen-sized quilt spread tightly against the square wooden frame.

  The background was a solid navy blue with a large eight-pointed star in the center and diamonds of fabric in shades of greens, red, blues, and purples. The border was olive green, and the colors complemented one another in a way Marigold wouldn’t have anticipated. A bright, jewel-colored star against the dark night.

  “This pattern is the Lone Star. It’s pretty traditional, and as you can see, we’ve already pieced it together, now everyone can find a spot and do a running quilt stitch, simply following the pattern of the quilt top.”

  “I see,” Marigold said looking closer. “The stitches are used to add emphasis of the pieced shapes?”

  “Exactly. Can you do a running stitch?”

  “I’m sure I can, I just don’t want to ruin what you’ve worked so hard on.”

  “Honestly this was a spring project for Katie. It was a way for her to work a bit more diligently on her … domestic pursuits. But she can’t seem to focus long, so that’s why we called in the troops today, to get the project finished.”

  Marigold followed Mrs. Lapp’s eyes which landed on Katie, who stood at the sideboard pouring herself a cup of coffee while everyone else worked. “It would be a bit embarrassing to still have the project incomplete before the fall arrived and everyone began their new quilts.”

  “I see,” Marigold said awkwardly. “Maybe I could just sit with a scrap of fabric for a few minutes and make sure the stitch is right?”

  “Good idea, Marigold. Let me help you get set up.”

  A few hours later, Jakey awoke from his nap and Marigold’s fingers were stiff from the repetitive motion of making stitch after stitch. She’d noticed that Mrs. Lapp had been right, Katie flitted back and forth from the kitchen to the living room, carrying plates, chatting incessantly, and never quite sitting long enough to complete more than three or four stitches at a time. At one point, she asked Bekah if she had planted any celery because rumor was she had. Bekah shook her head slightly and kept her eyes down, not giving Katie any more attention.

  “Celery?” Marigold whispered to Bekah sitting at her side.

  “It’s a wedding custom. Planting a bed of celery means that the family knows about a wedding on the horizon.”

  Marigold couldn’t believe Katie. It was obvious the custom here was to keep dating hush-hush. The Millers never even mentioned the Singing the next morning at breakfast, which surprised Marigold somewhat. Bekah explained it is private, and that parents and children don’t discuss these matters. Apparently, though, at least in the Lapp’s case, siblings take it upon themselves to have these sorts of conversations.

  “Mom, look at what Marigold’s doing,” Bekah said, pointing.

  “Did I do something wrong?” Marigold grimaced. She’d struggled to get the spacing just right and didn’t want to mess up a project so many people had worked together on.

  Mrs. Miller peered over, counting with her pointer finger. “My word, Marigold. Eight stitches in a single inch!”

  “Is that good?” Marigold asked, genuinely clueless on these matters.

  “It’s very good.” Mrs. Miller looked proudly at her, squeezing her hand. A surge of emotion rose in Marigold’s chest; it was amazing what a simple well done meant to her. It meant too much.

  “If you’ll excuse me, I need some fresh air,” Marigold said to the group, finding her way outside to the front porch.

  She walked down the steps and pressed her hand to her chest, breathing deep, in and out. She reminded herself to breathe like she’d been taught at yoga class back at her fancy high school, deep from her belly. Closing her eyes, she inhaled the sweet smell of hay growing across the rolling hills. Centered, she opened her eyes and let out a shriek, surprised to see Joshua standing directly in front of her.

  “You seriously didn’t hear me coming?” he asked, cocking his head at her.

  “No, I didn’t,” she answered, taking a step back from this All-American Amish boy. With the sleeves of his shirt rolled up, she saw veins lining his forearm. He needed a football tucked in his arm to complete the picture
.

  “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

  “It’s okay, I just didn’t expect to see you.”

  “Bekah’s still here then, right?”

  “She is.”

  Marigold hadn’t asked Bekah any questions about the buggy ride home, figuring if she didn’t want to offer an explanation it wasn’t really her place to press for one. But now she sort of wished she had. She wanted to understand their relationship, the one between the reserved, collected girl and this strong, assertive boy. Opposites attract, she supposed.

  “Does she … do you think … ack.” He ran his hand through his hair.

  “I don’t know anything about the two of you, if that’s what you mean. Why don’t you just talk to her yourself?”

  “I don’t want to push her. I tried that before. I wanted my sister to find out if she was seeing anyone, but obviously Katie is about as helpful as a nail.”

  “A nail is actually really helpful,” Marigold pointed out.

  “Right. Well, not when you’re trying to date a girl. I don’t need a nail. Maybe a hammer, to knock some sense into her, or me. Or I don’t know. What do you think?”

  “I think you have me pegged for something I’m not. I have no idea about you and Bekah. I swear.” Marigold waved her hands in front of her to emphasize the point. She had no interest in meddling with the affairs of the heart between two Amish teenagers.

  “Of course,” Joshua said, blowing air out of his cheeks as if he was really maxed out. “It isn’t my place to bring you into it, I should have learned my lesson with Katie.”

  “Why didn’t you ask Abel, before he left?”

  Joshua laughed, shaking his head slightly. “Nah, Abel had a lot of opinions about Bekah and me. It wasn’t on the table for discussion.”

  “Really? That doesn’t seem very … friendly.” Marigold said, struggling for a word.

  “Ja, well Abel isn’t known for his friendly disposition. He’s intense, you know that.”

  “Oh, right,” Marigold said, now the one cocking her head.

  “He didn’t want me to date Bekah, he forbade me really. Plain and simple, except it isn’t, nothing is that easy.”

  “Why didn’t he want you to see his sister?” Marigold wondered if there was a good reason for Abel to forbid his best friend. She couldn’t imagine doing that to Tabby.

  “I have a history of less than fortunate encounters.”

  “With girls?”

  Joshua crossed his arms, not in a defensive way, more like embarrassed, like the reason wasn’t something he was proud of. He looked at Marigold, assessing her, his mouth twitching. Marigold met his eyes and prompted him to speak with a small nod of her chin. She wasn’t an intimidating person, she knew that, but she was an English girl, and maybe not someone to trust his secrets with.

  “Actually, it isn’t my place to ask, you don’t have to answer,” she said softly.

  “I’ve got nothing to hide, believe me, my past is common knowledge. My reputation is screwy because of my own doing.” He gave her a smirk, the kind that would have sent Tabby to the moon. His charm came from his ability to speak without pretense. “But it wasn’t just about the girls, it was also about the beer and cigarettes and pot. I went a little wild on my Rumspringa. I wasn’t like Abel.”

  “But now?”

  “Now I’ve changed, but Abel has reason to question that, to judge me. There’s a lot to judge.”

  “But you’ve gone out with Bekah before, it’s obvious,” Marigold said remembering the effortless way they held onto one another’s hands the other night. “Did Abel know?”

  “Ja, he knew. There was night a few months back, where things got out of hand. Bekah was there, and she and I had … we … well, let’s just say Abel got rightfully angry. So Bekah and I stopped seeing one another, Abel didn’t want her to get hurt.”

  “But now he’s gone. And you’ve changed.”

  “I have, I swear it to you.”

  “You don’t have to swear anything to me, Joshua. I’m not a part of this picture.”

  “But you are, if you’re Abel’s girl, he’ll listen to you.”

  “I don’t know if I’m Abel’s anything.”

  “Then why are you here?”

  “I’m here for me, not for him. And if you believe you need Abel’s permission to see a girl you care for, you have somethings to work out on your own. It isn’t Abel’s place any more than it’s mine.”

  Joshua clucked his tongue, taking her in. Marigold knew it wasn’t very Amish to speak like this with a guy, but Marigold wasn’t Amish. And she had plenty of experience with trying to be different than the person she’d always been.

  “It’s your life,” she said. “What do you want from it?”

  Before he could answer, the screen door on the front porch opened and closed, revealing Bekah in her blue dress, her white kapp framing her bright face. Seeing Joshua caused a smile to form on her lips, it wasn’t a secret smile either; it was a smile that said everything. A smile that said she knew exactly what she wanted from her life.

  Marigold couldn’t help but look at her and wish she was as certain.

  Abel

  The next week the study group gathered at Lily’s house for the second time. Being in the Asher’s living room felt strange, at least being here without Marigold. The first time they’d come, they sat in the yard under a covered gazebo, the very one he’d sat in with Marigold a few weeks back. She’d been so sad, looked so alone. It was the day he suggested she come to Lancaster with him. The day that changed everything.

  Today they sat around a large dining room table, and with a test coming up in a few days, they had all spread copious notes and reference books as they went over the review. After the disastrous pop quiz, everyone had decided to dial up their investment in winning Trape’s recommendation. Abel was grateful they’d come to this conclusion on their own.

  During a study break, Abel walked back from the bathroom, but stopped to look at a display of family photos covering the wall.

  There were silver framed photos of Marigold in clothing that looked like different sorts of costumes, posed with her parents and siblings. The rest of the family looked put together in collared shirts and khakis, it was Marigold who was set apart. In one picture she had the dreadlocks she’d once mentioned, in ripped jeans and a tank top with a giant peace sign in the tie-dyed middle.

  In another, she looked like a punk rocker, pink hair with a hoop ring through her nose. Abel hadn’t seen her with any piercing, and it surprised him to see her like that, so different than the flowers and lace girl he knew.

  Lily caught him looking at a picture and together they walked back to the empty dining room. Jenna and Lacey were getting food the cook had set out for them. Lily handed him a can of cola before saying, “She’s such a drama queen, right?”

  “Sorry?” he said, not really thinking drama queen was a great description of Marigold. Sensitive, honest, genuine? Yes. Drama queen? That had never entered his mind when he thought of her.

  “I mean, it’s always something. I know you’re into her and everything, or whatever, but really, going Amish? It’s like she’s begging for attention, once again.” Lily shrugged as if this was basic Marigold-knowledge. “"Story of my freaking life."”

  “You think that’s Marigold’s game? That she’s at my parents’ to get attention?” In all the conversations they’d had about her family, it had always been about the pressure of not fitting in, about not being understood by the people who should know her best.

  “Well, yeah,” Lily said, sitting down at the table where they were reviewing the difference between perfect competition and monopolistic competition. “I mean before this she was a hippy-dippy flower child in grandma’s clothes, and before that, it was that punk girl thing. I mean, that was the worst. Pink hair did nothing for her complexion.”

  Jenna and Lacey walked back in the room hearing the tail end of Lily’s take on her sister.

  “So
your sister is Abel’s girlfriend, but you don’t get along? Hmmm, kinda awkward.” Jenna shrugged, looking at them for more of an explanation.

  “Yeah, I mean, you’ve probably heard of her as more than Abel’s girlfriend,” Lily said, adding to everyone’s confusion. “Look, I’ve told you before that I try to keep my family’s reputation separate from me. I don’t talk about it because I don’t want to carry the baggage of Goldie’s choices.”

  “What are you talking about, Lily?” Lacey asked.

  “Okay, well, she was kind of a thing before she went off the grid. She had a stage name, ever heard of Goldie Glam Girl? She did a bunch of YouTube videos that went viral last year.”

  At that comment Abel’s head whipped to face Lily, ignorance written on his face.

  “Shit, you really didn’t know that?”

  “That’s your sister?” Jenna gawked.

  “Yes, she’s my amazing, gorgeous, drop-out-of-high-school sister.”

  “Wait. Dropped out?” Abel asked, now really confused.

  “Well, she got her GED, but basically yeah. I mean she said she needed to get off the grid. So she literally did. Things got kinda nuts after she threw a fit at a coffee shop and got this guy fired. A guy with like, three kids and a wife. The cops were there, thankfully our dad got the owners to drop charges, but it was really intense. That’s why she went into hiding. She seriously never told you about this?”

  Abel didn’t answer, his head spinning.

  “Crazy,” Jenna said, impressed.

  Lacey whistled his interest. “Wait, so your girlfriend is the girl who every guy in my high school jacked off too?” he asked Abel.

  “What?” Abel and Lily both yelped, totally shocked at Lacey’s admission.

  “Okay, maybe a slight exaggeration,” Lacey said laughing. “But not much.”