The Promise Box

by Tricia Goyer

  “Ja. I went to the store today, and I hung out with the other ladies. I can understand why Mem enjoyed living here. There is quite a feeling of diversity—unlike where we lived in Sugarcreek, where everyone was the same.” She picked up a strawberry and placed it in her mouth, chewing slowly.

  Dat stroked his long beard and eyed her curiously. “And…are you going to have me sit all day before you tell me what the celebration is about yet?”

  Her heart fluttered, and her finger followed the edge of the red plate. “I heard some news. The schoolteacher is leaving, heading back east.”

  “That’s a shame. I heard she’s done a fine job.”

  Nervous energy bubbled up in Lydia’s stomach. “Ja, well, I was thinking, Dat, that I’d like that teaching position.” She nearly bounced in her chair like when she was ten and asked her dat for one of the neighbor’s puppies. Rex had grown and aged, but the exhilaration that surged through Lydia made her feel young again.

  “Ne, that’s not possible.” He shook his head and took a bite of his sandwich. “An Englisch woman cannot teach Amish children.”

  She tilted her head and sighed. Mem would have put two and two together. One look at Lydia’s face aglow and she would have figured it out.

  “I understand, Dat. Do you not think I know that?” She brushed scattered sandwich crumbs from the plate onto her hand. “And that’s what this is all about. Being back here—reading Mem’s notes and thinking about life—well, things have changed.”

  Dat glanced up at her. His eyes widened slightly. He stopped chewing for a moment, then placed the sandwich down again. Thick, gray eyebrows lifted. “What are you saying?” His words escaped as a breath.

  “I’ve been thinking about it. Being back here has brought so many good memories. Even though I jest started reading Mem’s letters, I’m seeing myself—the Amish world—differently than I have for many years.”

  “Just say it.” Dat pushed back from the table. “Yer fluttering around the answer like a butterfly on Mem’s rose bush out back.”

  Lydia smiled, feeling her cheeks plump. “I’d like to rejoin the church,” she said in a rush of words and air.

  Her dat nodded, lowered his head, and then dabbed the corners of his mouth with a napkin. If it wasn’t for the slight trembling of the napkin in his fingers and the softest gasp of air, she never would have realized her father was crying.

  “Dat, are you okay?”

  He lifted his head slowly and met her gaze. His eyes glimmered with emotion. Seeing tears brought moisture to hers.

  “If only your mem…”

  “I know. If only Mem could have seen this day, she would have been so happy. It was all she wanted.” Pain jabbed Lydia’s gut like a pair of knitting needles. Heat traveled up her arms—guilt—but she pushed it away. She had to trust in God’s timing.

  “But I wasn’t ready then. I didn’t know I was ready until I came back. Something changed when I first spotted this house from the road. I felt a sense of returning…even when I hadn’t realized I’d been gone.”

  Dat pushed the plate away from him, and Lydia looked down at hers, no longer hungry either.

  “Mem…” The word swelled and filled her throat. She swallowed hard and forced herself to continue. “Mem wanted it more than anything, I know.”

  He folded his hands on his lap, then unfolded them as if trying to decide what to do. A longing came over her: Lydia wanted to run to him and climb into his lap like she had when she was five.

  “Daughter, are you sure you want this? It will change…everything.”

  She nodded. “I want…yes. I’m ready to do this.” As she said the words, a peace she wasn’t expecting fell on her. The truth was she wasn’t choosing to be Amish as much as she was choosing God. God’s plan. It was the right choice, she knew.

  “I know the days and weeks to come won’t be easy. There are things to take care of back in Seattle. It’ll be like trying to fit my foot into shoes I wore six years ago. But I trust I’ll get used to the old ways again.”

  Dat nodded, and tore off a piece of crust from his bread.

  “A teacher, then?”

  “Well, I would like to apply. There is a need, and I’ve—” She was about to mention the years of college she had, but she knew that would most likely be a detriment rather than a benefit. Growing up in the middle of an Amish community, teachers served as role models in Amish society. They taught not only with their knowledge, but with their lives.

  “It might take awhile, but I’d like to earn their trust. I really do think I could be a person who could reinforce what the people in this community teach at home.”

  Dat eyed her. His thick gray eyebrows twitched slightly, and she guessed what he was thinking. You’re still in Englisch dress, and you think you can be an example?

  He cleared his throat. “Ja, I’d focus on that. Before you talk to anyone about your desire to teach this fall, I’d focus on the returning.”

  She understood that his trust would be the one she’d have to gain first. Even though he loved her, she’d hurt him and Mem in so many ways—moving out, not writing often, visiting even less. It would take work to rebuild the relationship with him. To reclaim the close relationship they used to have. But at least she was being given a second chance to try.

  Lydia wasn’t going to turn her back on that.

  “Ja. I understand.” Lydia rested her chin on her balled fist as if truly letting it sink in that this was happening. “I was thinking the same. I’m going to have to trust that God can help me with that.”

  During her teen years, God was the last thing she’d wanted to think about. She was more focused on getting her driver’s license, working, saving money for a car, and trying to fit in with her Englisch friends.

  Being back this time, she was reminded of some of the things she had enjoyed about being Amish and about what she’d liked about God—before her heart was hardened and she became mad at Him. Mad that God would allow evil men to rape innocent women. Mad that God would put her birth mom in a position to force her to give up her only daughter. Mad that she had to be raised by strangers. Yes, they were good people, but life wasn’t supposed to work that way. Life was supposed to be fair. God was supposed to be good.

  Lydia reached over and patted Dat’s hand. “I won’t say anything to them yet. I’ll work to live the life—the life you and Mem had always dreamed for me. It’s a promise I’m going to keep.”

  Promise. The word filled her mind, and she knew it was the promise Mem had clung to. Lydia imagined her smiling in heaven even now, and she supposed some promises were worth writing down, praying about, keeping.

  CHAPTER

  13

  She’d been awake even before the crow of the rooster, excited for the day. The day of her return.

  Yesterday she’d made dinner for Dat and Gideon—and left it simmering on the stove—and then she’d traveled down to Eureka to get her car serviced. She needed to have it ready to sell, but more than that, she didn’t want to be around when Gideon came over to help with the chores. One look at him and she wouldn’t be able to keep the secret. She had asked Dat not to tell, and he agreed. Lydia had plans to do it herself at church.

  Lydia combed out her hair and pulled it back away from her face and behind her ears, fastening it on both sides of her head with barrettes. Then she pulled it all back with a simple hair band. The ponytail was thick and close to her head, and the rest of her curls trailed down her back like a waterfall. She then folded the ponytail twice and rolled it up into a bun to pin it up. She used three large pins and a gray hairnet. She’d found both the pins and the hairnet in her mother’s things. With determination, Lydia pushed the pins toward the center of the bun, while also grabbing some of the hairnet and some of the hair to make it stay. She used nine pins total. She could have done with eight, but she added an extra for good measure. She didn’t want to make any mistakes today.

  When her hair was all pinned up and tucked under the h
airnet, she placed a kapp over it all. It was the same kapp she’d worn in Sugarcreek. She hadn’t been surprised to find it. Mem had kept all her things. Mem was the one who’d taught her how to put up her hair proper like. And as she glanced at her final appearance with her outfit and kapp she smiled as she also remembered Mem’s words to Dat every Sunday morning.

  “Comb your hair, Jacob. You’re all stroubly!”

  Dat would always nod and groan as if he was put out, and then he’d head back to their indoor bathroom for a brush. Lydia hadn’t understood why he didn’t do it without prodding, but now she did. Mem’s reaction was part of the fun of it. It had been a special tradition—if you wanted to call it that—within their family, no matter how silly. It was part of what made their home home.

  After a quick breakfast of biscuits and jam, Dat headed out to hitch up the buggy. The church service was to be at the Peachy place today—too far for Dat to walk with his bruised leg.

  She took another quick glance at her dress, her neat hair, her face without makeup, and then covered the mirror with a scarf. That was one tradition she’d kept even when she’d moved to Seattle. Growing up Amish, she’d been unfamiliar with looking at her reflection any time night or day. Or was it more than that? Perhaps what she didn’t like was the underlying feeling of guilt every time she saw herself in Englisch clothes.

  She moved to the front porch but stopped short when she heard two men’s voices. Lydia hurried down the porch steps and around the side of the house toward the barn. Gideon was there, helping Dat hitch up the mare. Lydia paused and stared. Her throat knotted. Her face flushed.

  Gideon glanced at her, looked back to the mare, and then, as if not believing what he’d just seen, turned back and eyed her again. Rex trotted to her side, tail wagging as if equally surprised.

  “Miss Wyse…How…how nice you look today…in Amish dress.” He tried to hide his smile, but it was pointless.

  “Ja.” She placed a hand over her heart. “And that’s kind of you. To come all this way…”

  “I’m here to help with the chores, remember. I wouldn’t want to slack on my work.”

  Lydia paused before him, lifting her face and looking into his eyes. The emotion there pierced her. “That’s one thing I’d never call you: a slacker.”

  His Adam’s apple bobbed, and he took a step back. “I have the buggy ready, if yer set to go. I didn’t expect you to be going, but it appears that I was wrong.”

  “It wasn’t that you were wrong.” She smiled. “I wanted it to be a surprise.” She could tell from the look in his eyes that he understood.

  “It is a wonderful surprise. Welcome home. Can I help you up?”

  Lydia hadn’t needed help climbing into a buggy since she was a toddler, but she accepted his offered hand all the same. He gripped it and guided her up, his eyes lingering on her face, her kapp.

  She sat in the middle of the seat, and a moment later the two men sat on either side of her. Dat seemed to enjoy the nervous energy in the air. He enjoyed turning over the reins to Gideon. Enjoyed, too, the bits of small talk that mattered little.

  Dat grinned like she hadn’t seen in a while, seeming more like the man who’d come in every night from the fields when she was a child. If hope could be captured in a gaze, it was in her dat’s as they parked at the Peachy place, where he insisted on helping Lydia down from the buggy and walking by her side.

  His daughter was there, with him. And even as her dat wore black from her mother’s passing, on his face he wore a smile.

  They arrived at service just moments before it started and the surprise of the members of the congregation was evident as she patted Dat’s arm before hurrying to the kitchen side of the room to find a place on the bench beside the other women.

  The bishop was the same one who’d spoken at Mem’s funeral, and his messages were good. The songs were the same as the ones she’d sung as a child, and as she looked around the folks here weren’t much different from the families she’d grown up with.

  The biggest difference was within her. The difference of choosing her path toward God, instead of doing what she did because that’s what her parents had taught her. The difference was she listened to the bishop’s message, and when she felt a stirring within her heart, she understood the message was for her.

  Unlike when she was a child, and a young teen attending services, this time she paid attention to the words she sang—penned from their martyred ancestors—instead of just moving her mouth out of habit. They rose, and Lydia lifted her voice with the others. She’d sung the words many times, but this time she translated them from German to English in her mind.

  In the beginning, God created me to be his child.

  He created me clean.

  He gave me his image when I was still in my mother’s womb…

  The hymn continued but she couldn’t move past the words still caught in her throat. Had she translated that right? God created me clean. God created me clean.

  They knelt for silent prayer, and Lydia was sure her heart would stop from the emotion surging through her. Why had she not paid attention to the words of that hymn before? Why had she been so hard on herself?

  She remembered the heartache in Mem’s gaze when she’d told Lydia about her birth. Mem had ached with her. There had been no accusation. Did God’s heart ache the same?

  Lydia covered her mouth with her trembling hand.

  Trust the truth, Lydia. Truth will set you free.

  What was the truth?

  For so many years what she thought impure—her birth—God had seen as clean and pure. She lowered her head even farther, letting that realization sink in.

  She’d been an innocent child in her mother’s womb. The sin hadn’t been hers.

  She’d used her pain to set off without God. To prove she could depend on herself, provide for herself.

  Forgive me…

  It was a simple request but one that flowed down into the deepest parts of her, washing out her murky soul.

  After joining the congregation on their knees for a silent prayer, they sang again. Lydia lifted her voice, her soul soaring high with her words:

  When the law wounded my conscience I began to cry

  for God’s grace and mercy.

  I began to cry to him to help me out of my sin and to

  accept me once more as his child for his mercy’s sake.

  God in his grace, heard through Christ my cry.

  He brought me out of death, forgave my sins, took me again as his son, and through him I overcame sin when he made me new.

  Because I had fallen from God through sin and come under his wrath, he bore me again as his child.

  He bore me in his Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, who is

  the man in between, so that I would not be lost.

  No one comes to God unless God draws him.

  Therefore he shows us Christ so that none of us will

  run away from him when we see through the law

  the punishment we deserve.

  The words of the song overwhelmed her. She’d known about the sacrifice of Jesus, but now the head knowledge moved to her heart.

  Put Me first.

  The words filtered into her mind as a gentle message. She opened her eyes and looked across the room to where Dat sat.

  I am your heavenly Father.

  She looked to Gideon who sat a few rows in front of Dat.

  I am your first Love.

  Her soul swelled as if all the sunshine from outside the window were trapped inside her chest. The feeling—as if God were really there with her—both scared and thrilled her. What would He ask of her? What would He expect? That was the scariest part.

  And although no voice shouted from heaven, Lydia had an inner knowing of what she needed to do. She could care for Dat. She could be a friend to Gideon. But Jesus wanted her whole heart first.

  CHAPTER

  14

  Gideon watched Lydia walk from table to table, wiping down the woode
n planks of the table tops, and he was amazed by how comfortable she seemed in her Amish dress and kapp. He reminded himself that she’d been raised Amish, but the woman driving into town just one week ago had seemed far from Plain.

  He’d had a hard time getting her off his mind the last few days, and he’d been sorely disappointed when he showed up at her house last night and she wasn’t there. And that’s what bothered him. His mem had pestered him for years, asking him what young woman had caught his eye. One finally had—an Englisch woman. Or least she’d been Englisch when their gazes first met. Now…did it help or hurt matters that she’d returned to her Amish heritage? That there were rumors circulating over lunch that Lydia was going to be baptized into the church? It was worse, he decided. Gideon knew he could convince himself to stay far away from an Englisch woman, but now…

  Something inside told Gideon to wait and watch. Lydia had only been here a week. If she were putting on a show or trying to gain favor, the truth would be found out. Then again…He glanced over at Amos and Micah, who also watched Lydia with interest. If he waited, he had no doubt another bachelor or two would step forward and try to win her heart.

  “Gideon, I’ve seen you out in the pasture with Blue a time or two. How’s it going?” Mr. Peachy’s question interrupted Gideon’s thoughts. The older man had a round face and ruddy complexion, and his long beard was more gray than brown. He looked like a younger version of the Santa Claus that Gideon often saw decorating Englisch businesses at Christmas.

  “Gut, ja. I knew Blue was an intelligent horse. He warmed to the halter well.”

  “Do you have any secrets?” Mr. Peachy asked. “I’m amazed in the change already—Blue’s always been a wild horse.”

  Gideon shared some of the tricks he used with horse training, especially with horses as strong-headed as Blue. Mr. Peachy listened intently. Every few minutes Gideon’s eyes left Mr. Peachy’s face to scan the room in search of Lydia. She talked with Hope Peachy for a time, and then she chatted with Mrs. Sommer. After a few minutes he watched as she approached her dat, whispering something into his ear.