An Amish Family Christmas

by Murray Pura

  “So you don’t understand.” Micah stared into the dark coffee, wrapping his hands around the mug. “You don’t understand why it had to be Afghanistan. Neither of you do.”

  Rebecca mussed his hair. “As we like to say in this house, that’s God’s problem. He put the call in your heart. So if he wants to, he can explain the call to us. Or not.”

  Naomi sat down with her own coffee. “That goes for the bishop too. You could argue till you’re blue in the face and get nowhere. God has to show him.”

  “I could argue with Yoder.”

  “Yoder, well, with Yoder your face would be purple.”

  The three of them laughed. Rebecca brought matches from a pocket in her dress and lit the candle on the table. Then she walked around the room, lighting other candles and lanterns.

  “I must go check on Luke.” Naomi patted Micah’s hand. “He was sleeping soundly through all that business with the leadership.”

  “No. I’m already on my way up.” Rebecca was carrying a lantern in one hand and coffee in the other as she climbed the staircase. “You two need to talk. In a few hours you’ll be like Trappists as far as speaking with one another is concerned.”

  “Thank you, Becca.” Naomi put a hand over both of Micah’s as he held the hot cup of coffee. “Just because I don’t understand now doesn’t mean I won’t understand tomorrow.”

  “What will it take, I wonder?”

  “Being there. But that will never happen. Naomi Bachman shall never set foot in Kandahar or Kabul. Micah Bachman did, yes, for that was his call. It is not mine.”

  “If it takes being there to touch your heart, your heart will never be touched.”

  “Well, you know the saying—what’s impossible with us is a short day’s work with God.”

  The small smile she had missed for more than a year came over his lips. “I’ll miss your voice, Omi, once the bann goes into effect again.”

  “You will hear my voice every day.”

  “But not directed to me.”

  She squeezed his hands. “The bann will not last forever.”

  “You said it the other day—how do we know? One day is as a thousand years to God.”

  “The Lord will do something. I don’t know what. But our story isn’t going to end in silence with you under a bann because you saved dying men’s lives.”

  He brought her hand to his lips and kissed it. “I love your faith.”

  “My faith isn’t faith in myself or my abilities, Micah.”

  “I know that. But I love it just the same. Just as I love you.”

  Her warmest smile came to her face. “A woman doesn’t need words to tell her man she loves him. There’s no bann against looking at me. I think you like to look at me.”

  “Oh, ja.”

  “So look into my eyes every morning, every afternoon, every evening. Look as long as you like. You will hear everything you need to hear right there.”

  His small smile became a large smile. “I like the sound of that.”

  “I’ll stop whatever I’m doing, I don’t care what it is. Just stand before me, and I will face you and you may gaze as long as you wish.” She winked. “So long as the favor is returned and I may gaze at your handsome face whenever the notion strikes me.”

  “That shouldn’t be too hard a favor to grant. But suppose I never break off my gaze? Suppose I get lost in those dreamy eyes of yours and never walk away?”

  “Suppose, suppose. We do not live in the land of suppose, suppose, Micah Bachman.”

  “I do. All people of faith do.”

  “Ja.” She stood up, slender and dark, a burning in her eyes. “So do I.” Standing over him, she placed one strong hand at the back of his neck, tilted his face toward her own, and bent down to kiss him. Strands of her hair fell over his closed eyes and his cheeks. Then all her dark hair seemed to be covering him, and he took in its spicy perfume. He reached up and pulled her into his lap. Her prayer kapp was gone, and so were her pins. The avalanche of sweet blackness overwhelmed him.

  “I love you, Micah,” she murmured as they kissed. “I ached for you while you were gone. I was literally in pain. No one will take you from me again. No army, no bann, no bishop. Every day look at me. Every day gaze at me like you gaze on a field of red poppies or a herd of fine horses grazing in the tall grass. I will not disappoint you. Each morning my hair will be washed just for you. My face scrubbed and fresh. My dress smoothed of wrinkles. Did they say I couldn’t smile at you? I will smile as if you were the sun on my face and the blue sky of summer in my eyes. I will smile as if you were the moonlight and stars of August. No one will stop me from loving you. I don’t need German or English words. It’s as the Scriptures themselves say, my speech will fill your ears even if there is no sound.”

  He placed his head on her chest. She cradled him and whispered, “The heavens tell us of the glory of God. Day after day, night after night. They speak without the slightest sound, without the tiniest word. You can’t hear a voice. Yet what they say goes out into all the earth, the words carry to the ends of the world. So it is for you and me, Micah Bachman. My language will be the love I bear for you, a love I’ll bear until the day I die. I don’t need syllables and vowels. Only my smile, only my eyes, only my soul.”

  Five

  But things did not go as smoothly as Naomi had hoped.

  Every morning she dressed as neatly as if she were a new bride and homemaker. She washed her face and hands, brushed out her hair till it gleamed, twisted it back into a perfect bun, placed her prayer kapp on her head, and joined Rebecca in a kitchen lit by lanterns, where they prepared the breakfasts Micah enjoyed the most. If Micah’s gaze rested on her, she let it and did not walk away. If his eyes found hers, she did not look down or to the side, but looked right back with all the feeling for him she had locked inside her.

  “Your love for my brother is obvious,” Rebecca said quietly as she placed a pitcher of cream back in the icebox.

  “I’m glad,” replied Naomi. “He’s my husband. That’s how it should be.”

  “I wonder what Minister Yoder would have to say about the way you and Micah look at one another when you are under the bann?”

  “So now our eyes are under the Ordnung too? We can’t talk to each other, and now we can’t look at each other either?”

  “Words are spoken with the eyes,” said Rebecca.

  “Ja?” Naomi put away a loaf of bread. “And what do they say?”

  “I’ve already told you.”

  “So when love is banned from our Amish community, please be the first to tell me so that I may pack my bags.”

  “I didn’t mean to censure you. But others see how you look at him when they visit us. They could complain to the bishop and make matters worse for you. They could demand Micah leave the house or community.”

  Rebecca’s words bothered Naomi. But it wasn’t just the words that bothered her. She found that whenever she met Micah in the house or in the yard and their eyes found one another and the love for him lit every part of her body, not being able to hold him or kiss him or speak to him became harder and harder to bear. And making herself perfect for him, cooking his favorite food, and letting him hold his gaze on her just made matters worse. Day after day she grew more and more miserable and began to avoid Micah whenever she could.

  “So love has taken a strange twist,” remarked Rebecca as they sewed by the front window that looked out on the fields and the main road.

  Naomi’s eyes snapped with a sudden burst of light. “If it has taken a twist, it’s the Ordnung that has twisted it. I haven’t seen my husband for a year—he could have been killed!—and now we’re in the same house together and we can’t talk, we can’t touch. I sleep alone while he makes his bed among worn-out rockers and broken cuckoo clocks. I think I’m going to lose my mind.”

  “Pray. Seek God.”

  “Pray for what? For Micah to change his mind? Or the bishop and the ministers?”

  “Both.”
<
br />   “Ha. Both. Gut. That’s easy enough.”

  “For God it is.”

  “Ja, sure, for God. But I’m the one who’s a widow. There’s no difference between myself and Deborah Lantz. She lost her husband to a barn fire. I lost mine to the war and the Ordnung.”

  “He’s still alive. You see him every day.”

  Naomi dropped her sewing on the table. “He might as well be dead. What good does seeing him every day do? We’re like ghosts to each other. I thought the smiles and the warmth would be enough, but I was wrong. It’s torture. It was easier to bear when I couldn’t see him at all.”

  Rebecca also put her sewing aside. “Thank God for what you have.”

  “That’s easy for you to say.” Naomi put a hand over her eyes. She sighed. “I’m sorry, Rebecca. Of course, it isn’t. I’ve had many griefs, but so have you. You’ve also lost grandparents and others you loved in your lifetime.”

  “But not my God. Not my faith. And neither have you.”

  “I seem to be on the verge some days. He asks too much of me.”

  “He will give you the grace you need to handle it.”

  “Ja? When?”

  “I don’t know when. I don’t know how. But that’s his problem to deal with. Not yours or mine.”

  Naomi dropped her hand from red and puffy eyes. “And so what’s my problem to deal with then?”

  “To not lose hope.”

  “Hope. Ja, well, hope is good. But I see no way out of this. It’s the most snarled-up ball of yarn I’ve ever laid eyes on. I’m at a loss. I feel trapped.”

  Rebecca put a hand on her arm. “I don’t want to come across as though I’m judging you and Micah. Truly, I’m on your side. The Lord who knows my heart can tell you I wish you to be in each other’s arms again and Micah to be welcomed back into the Amish community. Perhaps I’m too forthright with my tongue. Pardon me for that. But I’m not against you. I would rather the Ordnung changed its position than my brother changed his. I don’t believe there’s a great chance of that. Yet as I say, it’s God’s problem. If it’s true he sent Micah to war to be a healer in the name of Christ, then yes, it’s completely and utterly his problem. Ours is to remain steadfast and anchored in him.”

  Naomi stared out the window as snow began to fall and wind began to swirl it in tight circles. “I wish my mother were here. I wish I could speak with her.”

  Rebecca squeezed her arm. “You can.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “She kept a book. You always told me about her book.”

  A small smile came to Naomi’s face. “Das Buch von Wunder.” Her book of wonders.

  “Didn’t she leave messages in it for you to read?”

  “Ja, ja. Not just me. Papa. Luke. Ruth. It was her way.”

  “She spoke to God in it, didn’t she?”

  “Ja. Sometimes she asked us to read those conversations, those prayers. Other times no, she sealed those pages from us if she put the book in our hands.”

  Rebecca interlaced her fingers with Naomi’s. “Do you know where this book is?”

  Naomi’s eyebrows came together. “Why, I haven’t thought about it. No. Somewhere in their room, I suppose. I can’t go in there. I can’t bear to. Not yet.”

  “Ja. I know. But I have been in there. When I cleaned your parents’ room I saw the book. It was impossible not to notice. It was lying open on the table by the window. Your mother—” Rebecca paused and took a breath, glancing out at the snowfall. “She had been writing in it that morning before she climbed into the buggy.”

  “What?”

  “I read very little of it. Only enough to make note of the date. Then I closed it and put it away.”

  “And you didn’t say anything?”

  Rebecca continued to watch the snow. “I felt you had enough pain to deal with. But now perhaps you should sit down and read what she wrote her final morning on earth.”

  “The way you put it, I’m almost afraid to.”

  “Don’t be afraid. She was your mother. She loved you.”

  “Was...was what she wrote addressed to me?”

  Rebecca nodded. “Ja.”

  Naomi slipped her fingers from Rebecca’s and slowly got to her feet. “Where will I...where will I find the book?”

  “Under her pillow.” Rebecca picked up her sewing again. “I will pray for you, Naomi.”

  “Danke.”

  “I’ll be here by the window when you’ve finished, Naomi. If you wish to talk.”

  Naomi crossed the house to the staircase. She stared up the flight of steps to the second floor.

  Lord, I don’t want to go into that room. I will just cry my eyes out once I open the door and see their bed and the clothes still hanging in their closet. I cannot do it. Every day you ask too much of me.

  She climbed the stairs as if it hurt her to move each leg. At the top she waited again. She was tempted to look in on Luke, but she had just taken a peek an hour before. Biting her lip, she walked along the hall to the door with the well-worn brass knob. Resting her hand on it, she closed her eyes, twisted it, and opened the door. The air was cool. Scents of the room rushed over her like a breeze from an open window.

  Mama’s hand cream she used to get rid of the dryness. Papa’s shaving soap to keep his upper lip clear. The dried flowers Mama kept in a jar.

  She opened her eyes. The snow was falling faster and thicker and coating the windows. She entered the room and closed the door behind her, leaning with her back against it a moment. She felt as if both her parents would be sitting on their sides of the bed that night and talking as they always had. Nothing looked out of place. Rebecca had kept the room tidy. It was as though her mother had just swept the floor and wiped down the furniture with a damp cloth.

  “Blessings on this place,” she whispered. “Blessings on your souls in the Lord Jesus Christ.”

  She went to the bed and gently turned her mother’s pillow over. The book was there as Rebecca had said. She lifted it up. It was bound in the dark brown leather her father had tanned himself. Sitting on the bed she pressed her lips to it and smelled the thick leather and the cream from her mother’s hands. She was careful as she opened it, for she remembered that several old flowers were pressed between its pages.

  Six

  The book fell open to the middle, and a dried red rose fell into her lap.

  Naomi glanced at the fine, almost spidery writing of her mother’s fountain pen. She had never been shown these pages. They were prayers for each of the children. She read the ones for her sister and for Luke. Putting the book down, she looked at the snowfall again, bracing herself. Then she read the prayers her mother had written for her.

  For Naomi, Lord, you must find a man stronger than her. She is sweet, and I’ve always thought of her as my little muffin. But somehow into my recipe fell all sorts of scraps of iron from my husband’s workshop. She is a blue sky one moment and a tempest the next. Calm her spirit, yes, but do not remove it. I love my spirited mare. No, for her, I ask you, far more so than I do for Ruth, that you gift her with a man whose spirit matches hers, or he will never do and she will quickly be bored with him.

  “Oh, Mama.” Naomi laughed as tears moved down from her eyes. “This is five years ago. Is that truly how you thought of me when I was so young?”

  So now the Bachman’s boy Micah brings her home in his buggy. I don’t know what to think. Something about him strikes me wrong. My muffin is taken with his looks, but only you know the look of his heart. Direct her steps. Give her father and me wisdom in this matter.

  “What?” Naomi held the book tightly in her hands, and the tears stopped. “What was wrong with Micah? Oh...you always liked the Fischer boys. Please, Mama.”

  I have no argument against their marriage. But I know why I’ve felt some concern. Micah has a mind of his own. His spirit is very free, much freer than my muffin’s. I don’t know what will come of this. I don’t sense any objection from you in my heart. And I don’t read a
ny objection from you in your Word. So we go ahead and put every day of Micah’s and Naomi’s in your good hands.

  “Mama, you were very happy on our wedding day. You loved the clock he gave me for a wedding present. The little man announcing the hour by bringing the workhorse out of the barn, ja? So but now it is broken.”

  I knew this. I knew this in my soul. What Amish man up and joins the army and says he must bind the wounds of the soldiers who fall in battle? Who has ever heard of such a thing among the Amish? He knows he will be shunned. He knows it will break my Naomi’s heart. I knew he had this spirit in him. What will you do now, my Lord? Where are you taking us?

  There were no more prayers for Naomi. She turned to the back of the book. A dozen blank pages. She ran her fingers over their smooth whiteness. Then she forced herself to look at the last writing her mother had done.

  Naomi,

  I will share this with you in the evening. Let me think on it a while during the trip to town. But I think it is good. I think it is from God.

  Micah will come back to you. I’m certain of it. He won’t die. He will not forget his vows to you. So you must not forget your vows to him. Ja, of course, he has forgotten his vows to his people, to his church, but not, I think, to his God or to his bride. So even if others don’t welcome his return, you must.

  The bishop may not let you embrace him with your arms. But you must embrace him with your prayers. That’s how you will show him your love.

  There is more to Micah than I thought. The more I pray, the more I’m convinced of it. I don’t say he hasn’t made mistakes or been rash. But even while he’s shunned, it will be up to you, up to all of us in this family he has married into, to surround him with the love of God. Without words, without touch. All around him we are to place the love of God.

  I will give this to you to read tonight if it still sits well with me. Then we shall talk about it. Then we shall pray.