“It’s Monday. She only arrived last Friday, but already she is smiling occasionally.”
“Maybe at mamm when she quotes the Psalms, especially the times they make no sense.”
“Which is something.”
Julia sighed as she rested her head on her husband’s chest, her face turned toward the window. Sharon had loaded the laundry into the basket and was carrying it toward the house. “She’s a gut girl, Caleb. I wish I understood what is bothering her. The letter from your mamm didn’t explain very much about what happened in Indiana.”
“It explained enough. She had a bad experience with a boy, was struggling through her rumspringa, and her parents thought time away would be best.”
Julia looked up at him. “A bad experience with a boy. What does that mean?”
“We don’t know. Maybe we don’t need to know. If Sharon wants to tell us more, she will. Until then, we’ll be family to her.” He bent his head to kiss her.
The clatter of a buggy out in front of their home broke into their tender moment.
“That should be Gabe,” he said. “He offered to pick up the new menus and bring them to us.”
Julia’s excitement won out over her worry. They were opening the café the next day. She couldn’t control if anyone would show up, but she could check off the final items on her list. Number one was inspecting the menus to be sure they had been printed correctly before storing them in the cubbyhole in the front hallway.
“I’ll let him in,” Caleb murmured, planting a final kiss on the top of her head before releasing her.
Sharon had made it to the back door, so Julia hurried to help her inside with the large load of laundry. They arrived at their family table at the same time as Gabe, Miriam, and little Rachel.
“Miriam, I didn’t realize you were coming today!”
“I saw Grace off to school and finished my laundry early. I wanted to see the menus and the changes you have made to the house. Julia, this is amazing! I love the dining rooms.”
“Danki. The men did most of the work, and the tables are all from your bruder.”
“David was excited to sell them to you. Now he’s busy making more for tourists who may like what they’re sitting at and want to take a new table and chairs home.”
Gabe set a large cardboard box on the table.
Sharon stared back and forth as if she wasn’t sure what to do—stop at the table or walk upstairs to fold the laundry. Julia noticed her eyes linger on Rachel. Miriam’s daughter was younger than Sharon’s little sister, Ruthie, but perhaps the child still reminded her of home and better days. The letter from Caleb’s mother had said Sharon would likely miss her sister the most.
“Sharon, stay with us and look.” Julia patted the chair next to her.
“Ya, this is a big event in the Zook family!” Caleb laughed. “Tomorrow my fraa begins cooking all day.”
Sharon glanced around as if she was looking for a way to escape. “But I was—”
Rachel ran over to Sharon and held up a small wooden horse she’d brought inside with her. Sharon had met everyone at church the day before, though Julia had not seen the girl intermingle with any of the other teens. Sharon kept to herself and didn’t speak unless someone spoke to her directly.
Julia had noticed her helping with the younger children at one point, and apparently Rachel had spent some time with her then.
“The laundry will keep,” Julia assured her.
Caleb cut open the tape on the top of the box and removed the packaging stuffed around their order. Everyone stared down at the menus, but Miriam was the first to speak.
“Beautiful! These are absolutely beautiful.”
Julia reached in and pulled out a handful, taking one and passing the rest around. The menu listed Julia’s dishes and was surrounded by Grace’s artwork. The words “Plain Café” were written across the top in a simple script that looked remarkably similar to the board Wess had painted by the road. The entire page was bordered in a wavy scroll, which in the top left corner turned into a creek. Reeds grew up in front of it, and the words Pebble Creek were etched lightly below that. The creek symbol was repeated in the bottom right corner.
The menu was a single page, with printing on the front and back. The front had breakfast items and hours of operation. The back had lunch specials and take-out dinner items because they planned to close by six each day. This had been one of Julia’s biggest worries. She wanted to offer an evening meal, but she didn’t want to extend their hours into what should be family time. The idea of a take-out dinner was Caleb’s and seemed like a good compromise.
Turning the menu over, Julia set it down and clapped her hands.
“It’s gut. Don’t you think?” Gabe sounded like a proud father, and he should.
Sharon stepped closer to peer over her shoulder.
“Grace drew all of these,” Julia explained. She pointed to the small pictures of animals bordering the back of the menu—beaver, deer, and fox. Though the drawings were as small as a postage stamp, Grace had managed to pencil in an amazing amount of detail.
“Ya, and she only included animals she was certain visit Pebble Creek.” Miriam ran her finger over the mouse, muskrat, and opossum. “She double-checked each animal with her father and then with her teacher, Miss Bena.”
“Is that a big rat?” Sharon asked.
“Woodchuck.” Caleb laughed. “Some folks call it a groundhog or a whistle-pig. Your bruders would know what it is.”
“And they live near the creek?” Sharon’s eyes widened.
“No worries.” Gabe pulled out a chair and sat down. “They’re more afraid of you than…”
“Actually, they’re not,” Miriam interrupted, “but they hibernate in the winter. Chances are you won’t see one here unless you’re around in the spring.”
“I love being married to a former schoolmarm. She keeps me thinking.”
“And reading. Did you finish that book we borrowed from the library? The one on how to modify a donkey’s behavior?”
“They have a problem donkey,” Caleb explained.
“I was reading it last night while I was holding Rachel.”
“You both were sleeping.”
“Ya, later. But at first I was reading to her.”
Miriam shook her head and turned her attention back to the menu in her hand. “These are nicely done, Julia. They’re easy to read with a nice large font.”
“Jeanette helped. She googled menus—”
“She what?” Gabe pulled on his beard.
“Googled. I don’t know what that is, but it’s something on a computer. Anyway, she said the three biggest complaints about menus were they were often dirty—”
“Which is why we chose to laminate them.” Caleb rubbed the plastic between his fingers. “Easier to clean.”
“The second complaint is that it’s too difficult to locate information—”
“You’ve certainly kept it simple,” Miriam said. “No one should have problems ordering.”
“And the third is that they are too hard to read because the print is often too small.”
“Some restaurants want that,” Caleb said. “They don’t want you to find the special or know the prices.”
“Not here.” Julia tapped the menu. “We’re customer friendly.”
Rachel had been playing on the floor, but now she walked to the table and peered over the top. “Freinds?”
“Yes, honey. We’re freinden.” Miriam kissed her daughter, and then she turned her attention back to the menu. “Whose idea was it to add the information about the tables and quilts?”
“Lydia’s,” Julia said.
“Julia’s,” Caleb said.
“Both?” Miriam asked, smiling.
“Ya, I suppose so.” Julia ran her finger along the short paragraph on the bottom of the back side. “We didn’t want to be obnoxious, like Amish Anthem, and we certainly didn’t want to hang prices around everything on the bottom floor of our home.�
� Julia peeked into the next room. The tables were beautiful in the afternoon sunshine pouring through the windows. They had also added a few handmade quilts from women in their district, tastefully draped over quilt stands.
“So instead we thought to add two short lines. Jeanette helped us with the wording.” Caleb ran a hand over his jaw where his beard was coming in. “She’s gut at this sort of thing.”
They all studied the menu and read the lines Caleb referred to: Dining sets and quilts may be purchased from local artisans. Please ask if you’d like more information.
“It’s a gut thing to do,” Gabe said. “It could help other families bring in a little extra income.”
“All we need now is a roomful of customers.” Julia slid her menu back into the box.
“Are you worried about it?” Miriam handed her menu to Julia as Rachel attempted to climb into her lap.
“Nein. As mamm says, Gotte will send who we are to serve. We’ve done all we can, including advertising every way we can think of.”
“Jeanette even posted an article about the opening on her computer. She has a blog, whatever that is.” Caleb beamed at Julia as he explained, “She says it’s like a newspaper, but not actually written on paper.”
They stared at each other a moment, considering that. Finally Miriam asked, “Is there anything left to do?”
“A little baking.”
As Julia pulled out her list, Caleb stepped closer to Gabe. “Speaking of things left to do, I could use your hand with a stall in the barn if you have a few minutes.”
Caleb raised his eyebrows in a way Julia was learning to read. No doubt they would stop by and repair something in the barn, but the trip would end at Pebble Creek with a fishing pole in someone’s hand.
Not that she minded.
Looking at her list, she saw that everything had been marked off except for making tomorrow’s desserts and putting in tonight’s dinner.
“I should take care of these clothes.” Sharon picked up the laundry basket and headed upstairs. Before she left the room, though, she walked into the kitchen, fetched the cookie jar, and brought it back to Rachel.
“Is it okay?” she asked Julia.
“If Miriam doesn’t mind. I should have thought of offering her something myself.”
Miriam knelt down in front of her daughter and whispered the question to her. “Rachel says she would love a cookie. Danki.”
Sharon set the little girl up with cookies and a glass of milk, and then she made her way upstairs to the sitting room. It occurred to Julia that she had a servant’s heart, but as she turned to go upstairs her shoulders slumped and it seemed she had hardly any energy at all. No wonder, between the lack of sleep and lack of food. If she could coax the girl into eating, and if the nightmares would stop, then perhaps they could help Sharon turn things around.
But in the meantime, they had a café to open.
Chapter 21
In the last several months, Caleb’s life had changed radically. Stepping into the barn and doing his nightly walk-through to check on Red and Missy, it wasn’t lost on him that he had been sleeping in a barn before he had married Julia. Of course, he could have found a nicer place to rent at the time, but why?
Staying in Aaron’s barn had suited him fine—then. Now he couldn’t imagine going back.
Aaron’s barn and Aaron’s cabins had been within sight of the creek. The creek had pulled him, called to him, and satisfied him in a way that few things could.
Until he’d met Julia.
Correction. He’d been acquainted with Julia for quite some time, but he’d never taken the time and effort to get to know her. Facing that shortcoming in himself honestly kept him awake some nights. If not for Ada’s decree, he might still be a single man, sleeping in Aaron’s barn and spending all his free time fishing on the banks of Pebble Creek. Not that he minded a free hour or two with a line in the water.
He’d found a few times to fish since the day in the garden with Julia. Like now—more often than not—he’d spent the hours thinking of his new wife. He would remember something she had done, the way the light caught her hair as she brushed it, or the sound of her voice.
When the barn door opened and she walked inside, he wondered if maybe his thoughts had pulled her from the house and straight across the yard to his side.
“Done baking?”
“Ya.”
“Everything ready for tomorrow?”
“I think so.”
She wore a knitted shawl over her dress—something done up in a soft blue. He could just make out the color and pattern in the light of the gas lantern. Julia walked to Missy and rubbed the bay between her ears.
“The opening will be fine,” he assured her. “Aaron and Lydia told me today that all of their cabins are leased the rest of the week. They promised to point hungry guests this way.”
Julia nodded, pulled a strip of apple peeling from her pocket, and handed it to Missy. Caleb waited and watched as she stepped over to Red and did the same.
“You’re spoiling my horse.”
“Ya?”
“You are.”
“We’ve talked about this before, and you admitted to feeding him treats yourself long before we were married.”
Caleb thought of how to answer that without agreeing she was right.
“I think they like each other.” Julia moved to the opposite wall and stood across from the horses, watching with her head cocked.
Though they were in separate stalls, they managed to talk to each other, or so it seemed to Caleb.
“Maybe they do.”
“Maybe Missy was lonely before you and Red came to live here.”
Julia turned and smiled at him, and something in Caleb’s heart flipped, like a fish in a stream. “Do you have any of those apple peels for me?”
“Nein, but I saved you some warm apple nut bars.”
“You did?”
“I’d give you a slice of apple pie, but I don’t think I should cut it.”
“The bars will be fine.” He linked his fingers with hers and they walked out of the barn. He turned out the gas lantern when they stepped outside. The stars and moon provided enough light for them to see their way across the yard and up the porch steps.
Caleb held the door for her as they entered the mudroom.
While he stored the lantern, Julia moved into the kitchen, which smelled like heaven—or like heaven should in Caleb’s opinion.
“Sharon and Ada in bed?”
“Probably not, but they’re upstairs already.” She poured two glasses of milk, and he carried the plate of apple bars over to their table.
“How did I manage to land such a wunderbaar woman, Julia Zook?” He bit into his dessert and had to close his eyes as apple, sugar, and nutmeg melted on his tongue. His life had definitely improved since his days of living in a barn.
“Land a wife? You sound as if you’ve caught a fish.”
“Nein. I said it wrong, but the question was a serious one. How is it no man asked you to marry him before? You’re even tempered, beautiful, and a first-rate cook.”
Julia blushed, but she didn’t respond right away.
He took another bite and waited.
Glancing at him, she pulled in her bottom lip. He had noticed it was something she did when she was concentrating on a thing. Finally she said, “I’m trying to decide if I should answer your question. Do you seriously want to know?”
“I suppose I do, if you want to share about that time. If you don’t, I can finish off these bars and thank Gotte for my blessings even if I don’t understand them.”
She drank from her glass of milk, and glanced up at him as she set it carefully back on the table. “I was pledged to be married—once.”
“He must have been a fool to lose you.”
“His name was Thomas.” She fiddled with her napkin as she spoke, but he could tell by her voice that no real emotion lingered in the remembering. It was more as if she were reciting a sto
ry about someone else. “I was young—nineteen. The week before we were to wed, I learned his family was planning on moving to Kentucky.”
“He hadn’t told you?”
“He had assumed I would go, and maybe I would have. But…”
“But he didn’t ask.”
She looked directly at him then. “He just took my answer for granted.”
Taking another drink of her milk, she stared out the window. “I tried to explain to him my feelings about my parents and our situation. I was an only child and they needed me. Thomas, he became angry and began quoting Scripture about a how a woman’s place is with her husband—”
“Scripture isn’t to be used for winning fights.”
“I suppose you’re right.”
“You know I am.”
Julia picked up her napkin and folded it into a triangle. “My parents did need me. I was all they had. Both my mamm and dat were older when I was born—mamm was forty-one, which isn’t young to bear a last child but is unusual for a first. By the time I was to be wed, she was sixty, and already there were signs that their health, especially my father’s, was deteriorating.”
“And her arthritis—”
“Ya. She could hardly cook or clean, though she tried.” Julia met his gaze. “I broke off the wedding plans.”
They sat there in the kitchen, Julia’s revelation interrupted only by the small sounds of Sharon and Ada moving around in the room above them.
Finally Caleb sat back and said, “He was foolish.”
Julia shrugged. “My mamm said it was Gotte’s wille.”
“Did she quote a Psalm?”
“The forty-sixth. God is our refuge—”
“And strength.” They finished it together, smiling.
“It’s a favorite of hers, I gather.”
“You gather correctly.”
Picking up the empty glasses, he rinsed them and placed them in the drainer while Julia wrapped up the remaining two apple bars and placed them in a container for his lunch the next day.
“And there was no one else?” He placed his hand at her back as they started up the stairs.
A Wedding for Julia Page 15
