Romancing Nadine

by Amy Lillard

  * * *

  “But, Mamm!” Jenna banged a frustrated hand against the top of the kitchen table. If she hadn’t been hurt, Nadine suspected that Jenna would have been prowling around the house like the caged tiger she had seen once at the zoo. But Jenna was hurt, which was exactly why they’d found themselves in this conversation.

  Even in the bright light of day, the injury seemed bleak. Nadine had such trouble believing that while she was out painting, her granddaughter had hurt herself. Why, she could have broken her neck stepping in that hole like that. It was unthinkable. Nadine would never forgive herself. It was just something she would have to learn to live with. But starting now, starting that very minute, she vowed not to let that happen again. Jenna was too precious to be abandoned that way.

  “No, Jenna Gail,” Charlotte started. “I have been more than patient with you. Those babies are walking all over the place. How are you going to see after them with your foot in a cast?”

  Jenna stared at her injured left foot and shook her head. “It’s not a cast. It’s a brace, and I can take it off anytime I want. The doctor said so.”

  “That’s not what I heard. He said you could take it off to bathe, but it needed to go right back on so you didn’t hurt your ankle further. You don’t want to have to have surgery.”

  “Surgery?” The word burst from Nadine. “You almost had to have surgery?”

  Charlotte plopped her hands on her hips and pressed her thinned lips together. She had been hovering around the oven all morning, baking all sorts of treats. So far, there were apricot scones, strawberry biscuits, and poor man’s cinnamon rolls, which were made without yeast. At the rate she was going, they were going to have to freeze the stuff or take it over to the quilting circle for them to have as snacks. “If her injury had been any more severe, she would have.”

  “Jenna, sweetie. Can’t you see why you need to stay here with us?” Nadine asked.

  Jenna let out a heavy, exasperated sigh. “Not you too. What are y’all going to do when Buddy and I get married? I’m not living here then.”

  “Well,” Charlotte started. “That’s something we can talk about later.”

  “Mamm!” Jenna tried to stand, but her balance was off from the brace and the crutch she had been using.

  Nadine hopped to her feet. “Sit down, Jenna. We can talk about this like adults.”

  “Not if you won’t treat me as an adult.”

  Nadine leaned in close to Jenna as Charlotte turned away to pour them all a fresh cup of coffee. “Just give her a couple of days.”

  “A couple of days?”

  “I’m sure we’ll have everything straightened out by then.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You’ll just have to trust me.” Nadine hated lying to her, but when it was for her own good ... well, that had to count for something, didn’t it?

  She and Charlotte had to get a handle on the girl before it was too late, and if it started with a lie, then so be it. She had vowed last night when she had seen Jenna limping from the car that she would take care of her always, and that’s just what she planned to do.

  Chapter Nine

  Amos untied his apron and hung it up on a hook just inside the back room at Esther’s Bakery.

  “Danki, Amos. Good work today.” Esther smiled.

  “Good work for a man?” he teased.

  “Good work for anybody.”

  “Danki.” He nodded to her and retrieved his hat. It seemed as if Tuesday was going to be one of his regular days at the bakery. He didn’t mind. Today it had gotten him out of the house and his mind on something else besides Nadine Burkhart.

  Last night, she had been open to him, then closed off. He didn’t understand that at all. He wanted to go see her, but his gut was telling him to wait, give her some space.

  “See you Thursday?” Esther reminded him.

  Amos nodded. He was taking a shift from Jodie on Thursday so she could go visit her sister, who was about to have a baby. Though no one said that was the reason why. It was so strange to him how no one wanted to talk about babies, at least not in front of the men. But he supposed he had just worked with the Englisch too long and picked up a few of their customs. They talked about babies all the time. Who was having a baby, when it was supposed to be born, what the sex was. They even had big pink and blue parties to tell everyone the sex of the baby. “Gender reveal,” he believed he called them. Interesting how folks were so different.

  But thinking about working with the guys at the shed shop had him wanting to visit. Maybe see what they thought about how Nadine had behaved the night before.

  The best part of the night was that she’d seemed to like his painting. He had decided then that he would give it to her. But he wanted to find the right time. It was a special gift and couldn’t be tossed over to her like the stuffed elephant he’d given her last week.

  When the time was right, he would know.

  For now, he needed to go home, have some supper, and get some rest. Even when he had been working full-time, he hadn’t been on his feet as much as he was at the bakery. His back and knees reminded him at the end of every shift. He wasn’t getting any younger, either, whether he wanted to admit it or not.

  But when he hopped on his tractor and started toward the trailer, he found himself turning down the drive that led to Nadine’s house. He just wanted to see her for a bit. Just a minute or two, then he would go home and take care of the rest.

  She came out on the porch when he pulled up. He smiled at the sight of her. Maybe she was coming around after all. Last night had been fun. He could tell that she was having a great time. Maybe that was enough to get her to realize the good times they could have together. And from there, surely the jump to true love wouldn’t be that far.

  He swung down from his tractor, so glad he had made the decision to come here first. His smile widened and he shook his head at himself. The woman was making him a mess.

  But his smile froze and his footsteps stopped when he caught sight of her face.

  “Nadine, what’s wrong?” He started toward her once again, but she held up a hand to stay him in place.

  “Don’t,” she said. Her mouth pulled down at the corners, and her eyes had lost some of their normal sparkle. Whatever had happened, it was major. A wave of nausea started in the pit of his stomach. It radiated outward until it turned into a tingling in his fingers and toes. He wanted to shake himself like a dog to see if he could rid himself of the feeling.

  “Is . . . is everyone all right?”

  “Jah.” She gave a stern nod to add weight to her words, and Amos released the breath he had been holding. He didn’t know what he would’ve done if something had happened to Jenna or Charlotte. Jenna especially. She was such a remarkable person.

  “Good, good,” he breathed.

  “But you can’t come around here anymore.”

  The sick feeling came back with a vengeance. “Why?”

  “Jenna fell last night. Almost broke her neck.”

  “You said everyone was all right.” He started toward the porch once again.

  Nadine raised her hands. “Amos, I mean it. She could have died, and I was out running around with you instead of where I needed to be.” To his dismay, her eyes filled with tears.

  “Wasn’t she at Abbie and Titus’s last night?” Had something more happened that had driven Jenna home?

  “Jah.”

  “So she fell at the camel farm.”

  “That’s right.”

  “But if you weren’t out with me, then you would have been here. Not at their house.”

  “I don’t see what bearing this has on anything at all. I was gone. Jenna was hurt, and that’s all there is to it.”

  He wanted to push further but stopped himself. He might not know a lot about women, but he knew better than to press the questions about a woman’s logic. That could wait for another time.

  “I thought you had a good time last night,” Amos said. �
�I sure did.”

  “I had a wonderful time, but I know now that it was a mistake.”

  “Is she hurt very badly?”

  “Bad enough,” Nadine said. “I really can’t talk about it any longer.”

  She turned and headed back for the door.

  “Nadine,” he called.

  She stopped with her hand on the doorknob and turned to face him.

  “I still believe in true love,” he said.

  “I know you do.”

  “I’m not a man who gives up easily.”

  “I don’t reckon you are, but it won’t do any good. I’ve got to be there for my family.” And with that, she entered the house, leaving him standing in the yard wondering where it had all turned wrong.

  * * *

  “I’m pretty sure the Englisch call this kidnapping,” Jenna said the following morning over breakfast.

  “That’s what the Amish call it too, but I believe there has to be a demand for money.” Charlotte scraped the rest of the scrambled eggs onto her daughter’s plate and moved to set the skillet back on the stove.

  “So if I have Buddy offer you money to bring me back, then I can go home.”

  At that last word, Charlotte frowned. “We have to ask for the money and get it before we give you back. Which is not happening.”

  Jenna propped her head in one hand and sighed. She stirred her eggs with her fork but made no move to eat them. “I don’t like scrambled eggs,” she grumbled.

  Charlotte took her place at the head of the table. “Since when? You’ve always loved scrambled eggs.”

  “Since Priscilla showed me how to make dippy eggs. They are so much better.”

  “Your father didn’t like them.”

  Nadine blinked at the reference to Daniel. Charlotte didn’t talk about him much. Nadine thought perhaps she didn’t want to confuse Jenna or bring up too many painful memories. So why was she bringing him up now?

  “I want to go home,” Jenna whined.

  “I wish you would quit saying that. This is your home.”

  For once, Charlotte and Nadine were in agreement. After they had given Jenna one of the prescribed pain pills and put her to bed last night, they had stayed up talking. They had agreed then too. Yes, they knew that Jenna fancied herself in love with Buddy, but love or not, she was still too ... fragile, too precious, to allow her to move across the town and marry a boy she had just met last year. Sometimes Amish couples dated for three or four years before finally getting married. There shouldn’t be a rush. Maybe, by delaying, they would force the pair of them to grow up a bit more before taking such a huge step. Or maybe they would come to realize that it was puppy love, pure infatuation, instead of the real thing, and it would simply fade away after a year or two of being starved of togetherness.

  “I miss the twins.” Jenna continued to whine, continued to stir her eggs, continued to protest at every turn.

  “Now, sweetheart, you know why we want you to stay here with us.”

  “You said a couple of days,” she told them. “It’s been a couple of days and I want to go hom—” She caught herself on the last word. “Back to Titus and Abbie’s.”

  “All in good time,” Charlotte murmured. “But, for now, you’re not going anywhere until you eat those eggs.”

  * * *

  By noon, Nadine was sure that in some countries being shut up in a house with a grumpy, injured young woman barely out of her teens was considered cruel torture. At least it was for her.

  She and Charlotte had tried everything to get Jenna to calm down, forget about Buddy, and just enjoy spending the day with them. But Jenna was having none of it. She wanted to go home so badly that Nadine was half concerned that she would sneak out in the night and make her way over there. On foot or by tractor, it didn’t really matter; both could be equally dangerous after the sun went down.

  “Come color a picture with me,” Charlotte said. She had the coloring books out, and the crayons that Jenna had always loved.

  But the colors only made Nadine think about Monday night and being with Amos. Painting the barn with the sunflowers and realizing that the man at her side had a God-given talent for painting. What else would you call it when he could paint as well as, if not better than, the instructor and had never had a lesson in his life?

  Unless he wasn’t telling the truth about that.

  Why wouldn’t he?

  She pushed her warring thoughts aside. She was home with her family, and for the first time in months, all three of them were together. That was something worth celebrating.

  “I don’t want to color baby pictures.”

  “Baby pictures?” Charlotte looked down at the coloring book she had chosen from their extensive stash. “I thought you always loved Peanuts.” And she did. Jenna thought Snoopy was the greatest dog on the planet. For years, she had gone around telling everyone that she was going to get a dog “just like Snoopy.” But when she’d figured out that Snoopy was not a regular dog, that dream had vanished into thin air.

  Nadine looked up from her knitting as Jenna flounced by on her way to the kitchen.

  “Abbie’s got adult coloring books.” She seemed unhappy about having to color at all, but at least she was sitting at the table with her mother. Surely that was a step in the right direction and would lead them ... somewhere. Somewhere other than where they were right then.

  “What are adult coloring books?” Charlotte asked.

  “They have more detailed pictures. And the spaces are really small to color in so you can’t use crayons.” When she said the word, she scrunched up her face until it looked as if it had physically pained her to say the word.

  “And these are better?”

  “Uh, jah.”

  Nadine turned toward the pair just in time to see Jenna frown.

  “Well, I don’t have adult coloring books or colored pencils, but I can offer you the red crayon and a picture of Snoopy’s dog house.”

  “Is Woodstock around?” she asked.

  “Right in the nest next door.”

  Jenna sighed, the sound not as heavy as her previous sighs, but still in the camp of frustrated. “Fine,” she finally said. And that’s how the almost-peace began.

  * * *

  He had thought about it all day Wednesday as he worked around the house. He had to stay busy to keep from hopping on his tractor and heading over to Nadine’s house and demanding an explanation. He wasn’t giving up. He wasn’t sure how badly Jenna was hurt, but she could have cut off her arms and it wouldn’t change Amos’s feelings for Nadine.

  She was shutting herself off, hiding from the world. But why?

  She deserved better that that. They all did. But perhaps Nadine more than most. She’d had true love and had it snatched away. Then she’d had what had appeared to be the perfect marriage, even by Amish standards, but it hadn’t been filled with heart-pounding love. She deserved that, beautiful love that gave the person a fresh start every day, permission to get out there and make it right. The problem was she didn’t believe that she deserved it. Or rather, she didn’t believe that it was possible. He had tried practically everything to get her to see that true love could be theirs. And she resisted every time.

  He made his way into the kitchen and poured himself a cup of coffee from the pot he had warming on the stove. The warm mug in his hands, he sat down at the table, and stared into the dark depths of his drink. Then he closed his eyes.

  “Lord,” he prayed. “If this is what You really want from me, please give me a sign.”

  How many times had he asked for that very same thing since he had first laid eyes on Nadine? So many ... too many ...

  And every time he thought he had a sign, a clear line of sight to his direction, something changed. Every time he thought he had seen the path he should take, she smacked him down. Like last night.

  “Lord?” Amos asked, hoping without any real hope that God was going to answer him. Or if He did answer him, how long would it be before Nadine
shifted gears and set him out on his ear once again? “I know.”

  He pushed up from the chair and shook his head. He should have never asked. He knew what he had to do. He just wasn’t sure how he was supposed to do it. He would keep working on it, he reckoned, and in the meantime, he would get a little more done on the porch. He was fairly certain it was time for another coat of stain.

  * * *

  Nadine tugged on the end of her yarn and tried to pretend that she was doing exactly what she wanted to be doing and that there was not one other thing in the world she would rather be doing. Or was that the same thing? It didn’t matter. Her thoughts had been a mess of jumbles since she had first met Amos Fisher, but she had put him out of her life for good, barring the times she would run into him in town or at church. They did live in the same district, after all. And once Jenna was settled back into the house without her begging to return to Abbie and Titus’s, that would certainly help Nadine get her mind back in order.

  For now, Jenna was resting in her room with an ice pack on her ankle, and Charlotte had gone out onto the back porch to work on the darning. She claimed the light was better out there, but Nadine suspected that something else was up. Maybe the argument that she and Jenna’d had when Buddy showed up for a visit.

  Charlotte had made him leave, while Jenna had been trying to get herself out of bed and into the living room to visit. Of course, walking was next to impossible without the crutch and the crutch made walking awkward and slow since she hadn’t had enough practice with it. By the time Jenna had come out of her room, Buddy was gone.

  There had been an argument and lots of crying, and now Jenna was back in her room, vowing to never speak to either of them again. A small price to pay to keep her safe.

  Charlotte came back in with a sigh.

  “I thought you were mending socks,” Nadine said. She pulled out the last stitch she had made and tried again.

  “I can’t concentrate.”

  Nadine set her knitting aside and motioned Charlotte to sit down. “I can’t either, and you hovering over there isn’t helping.”