Balm of Gilead

by Adina Senft

  “Well, that’s the thing,” Ginny said thoughtfully. “With people, you can’t experiment. You can’t stay half on one side and half on the other. You have to go all in. Because if you don’t, you haven’t given the relationship a chance.”

  “Is that what you’re doing?” Priscilla ventured. “With Englisch Henry Byler?”

  “Is that what you folks call him?” Ginny’s smile didn’t hold the brightness it usually did.

  “There are two other Henry Bylers in the district, but both of them are older.”

  “What happens if he decides to join church? What will you call him then?”

  Now it was Pris’s turn to smile. “I don’t know. I suppose Amish Henry Byler wouldn’t be very helpful, would it?” Ginny’s face seemed to go still. Almost bleak. “Ginny? It was supposed to be a joke. Did I say something wrong?”

  “No, honey.” Ginny reached across the table to squeeze her hand. “I was just thinking, that’s all. Look, here’s my advice. You go find that boy of yours, sit him down, and give it to him straight. Tell him you’re all in, if he is, and all this stuff about being worthy or not is all backward. God’s love makes us all worthy, and our love for each other is all we’ve got in the end.” Her lips trembled, and Priscilla held her breath. “But you gotta be all in. You tell him that.”

  Ginny pushed away from the table and walked into her private sitting room. The door closed quietly behind her.

  After a minute, Pris finally thought to close her mouth, which was hanging open in astonishment. Then she got up, put the next batch of tarts in the oven, and set the timer for twelve minutes.

  They both might be having man trouble, but that was no reason not to bake the tarts. Sometimes you needed more than philosophy to make something good out of a rainy day.

  She tracked Joe down in, of all places, Englisch Henry’s house, where he was sitting on the side of Jesse’s bed trying to get him to drink some bitterly aromatic tea. Jesse looked relieved when Joe’s surprise made him take the mug away. “What are you doing here?”

  “Your mother said you were here. Hallo, Jesse.”

  Jesse croaked something that sounded like hallo.

  “He’s giving me trouble,” Joe said. “Sarah says he’s supposed to drink a cup in the daytime and a cup at night until the rash clears up.”

  “It’s clearing up,” Jesse managed to say, pushing himself up to a sitting position with a groan. “Between the salve and the tea and who knows what else she sent over, I’m either going to be dead from the accident or dead from the cure.”

  “You’re not going to die,” Joe said patiently.

  “He sure isn’t.” Pris mustered up some cheer. “Crankiness is a sign that you’re on the mend. If you were just lying there moaning, I’d be worried. Now, drink your tea before Joe holds your jaws open and I pour it in.”

  He must have seen something businesslike in her face, because he took the mug and gulped it down fast, so he wouldn’t have to taste it.

  “That’s better.”

  “You take time off work to come over and see this guy?” Joe asked, taking the mug and getting off the bed.

  “No, Ginny gave me the rest of the week off so I could make pot holders for the Amish Market. And I came to find you.”

  “Good,” Jesse mumbled. “Take him away, please.”

  “How is he doing, really?” Pris asked once they were out on the porch. It was still raining. Ginny had come out of her sitting room when the timer had buzzed and taken the tarts out, and had given her a ride home so she wouldn’t have to walk the two miles in the wet. But Mamm wouldn’t hitch up the buggy just to take her down the road to the Byler place, so she had put on her gums and been thankful for whoever had invented umbrellas.

  Joe sat on the railing, and after a minute, Pris perched there, too. The old-fashioned eave was deep enough that it kept them both dry, and the whisper of the rain masked their voices if there had been anyone around to hear them.

  “He’s better,” Joe said. “The rash is going away and the bruises are doing what they do—turning color. The salve seems to be moving the process along faster, though. I wonder how it does that.”

  But Pris had not slogged all the way across three farms to talk about rashes and salve. “I came to find you for a reason,” she said.

  “Everything okay?” His brown eyes lit with concern, and his gaze ran over her as though he was checking whether she needed some salve, too.

  “Ja…everything but you and me.”

  Joe being Joe, he only looked at his hands, tapping restlessly as though they were looking for something to do.

  Maybe it wasn’t her place to be so forward. Maybe she should just step back and wait for God’s will to be revealed to her. Or maybe this was God’s will, and she should listen to the urge in her chest that was telling her she needed to make this right.

  “I was wrong to let Simon kiss me,” she said. “I know you say you’ve forgiven me, but it’s still not right between us.”

  “I got nothing against you, Pris,” he said after a moment. He knotted his fingers together, as if to still them. “I got nothing holding you back, either.”

  “That’s just it.” Oh Lord, please give me the words. “I don’t want to go forward or back. I want to be with you. By your side.” When he didn’t reply, a cold chill settled in her stomach. “Unless…you don’t want to be my special friend at all. That Simon’s kissing me was just a good reason to break up.”

  “No.”

  “No, what? Talk to me, Joe,” she begged. And then the words came to her, like a flock of butterflies landing all at once. “Because you know what? Not being ourselves together is no good for me. I want to be able to tell you things. I want to know that when we say our prayers at night, we’re praying for each other. And most of all, I want to save my kisses for you…because to be quite honest, Simon isn’t very good at it. And as for Benny Peachey, I’d sooner kiss a horse.”

  This made a smile flicker on his lips. “You’re not supposed to kiss and tell, I hear.”

  “I’m not supposed to be this forward, either. I’m supposed to pay the price of my own foolishness and let you walk away.”

  “Seems like a heavy price for one kiss.”

  She hardly dared to hope that he might be hearing her—or at least, the words that seemed to be pouring out of her without let or hindrance. “I came all the way here to say that I’m all in, Joe. I know we’re young and maybe God will take our lives in a different direction tomorrow or next month or next year, but for now, I choose you. And I hope that you’ll choose me, too.”

  She slid off the rail. There was nothing else she could say, and maybe it was best to leave him to think it over before her mouth got going again and she spoiled it all.

  “You going to go before I do what you asked?”

  “What’s that?”

  “Talk to you.”

  “Oh. Well. Neh, not if you don’t want me to.” She seated herself again on the rail, facing him and swinging one foot in its ugly gumboot.

  “I ain’t very good with words,” he said, his gaze dropping once more to his hands. “Not like you, in real life and in your letters. But I got feelings. And Pris, I can’t tell you what it felt like to see you kissing him, whether you liked it or you didn’t.”

  Miserably, she nodded, accepting responsibility once again for the wrong she’d done him.

  “But me and Jesse, we were talking just before you came in. I was sort of trying to keep him distracted so I could get the Mormon tea down his throat. So I broke your confidence and told him a few things.”

  “All in the name of medicine,” she said. “Ischt okay.”

  “He doesn’t know why Amanda came with him on Sunday. He doesn’t even know if she likes him. But I think he likes her, and he doesn’t have the first idea how to make all this up to her.”

  “Telling her the truth would be a good start.”

  “Ja, that’s what I said. No girl wants to date a man who’s g
ot no family and even owns a car, never mind lives in it. And best I know, she doesn’t know he’s homeless yet.”

  “No family? But there are dozens of Riehls around here.”

  “I shouldn’t be telling tales out of school, but his dad kicked him out when he took the driving test. The car came after, when he was working. He only gave the last address he knew of his aunt and uncle because you had to have that for the license.”

  “You mean he hasn’t even seen them? Or knows where they live?”

  He shrugged. “He’s mixed up.”

  “I’ll say.”

  “So I’m talking to him, and the more he tells me, the more I think that maybe one little kiss that you’re sorry for isn’t such a bad thing. I know how Simon is. How pride is. I ain’t saying I’ve got none of that, because I probably have too much, but compared to the row Jesse’s got to hoe, maybe I ought not to discount the blessings I have just because my feelings got hurt.”

  Relief trickled into her heart, then became a flood as he finally looked up into her face.

  “Besides which, I don’t want Benny Peachey or his horse swooping in when I’m not looking and taking you away.”

  She laughed, and it ended on a hitch of her breath. “I’m really sorry, Joe. For putting you through that. For causing you even a second of hurt feelings.”

  “That’s all in the past now.” And at last, he reached over and took her hand, pulling her closer to him. “From now on, it’s you and me until the gut Gott tells us different.”

  And right there on Englisch Henry’s front porch, he pulled her in close and kissed her…and it was like running up the steps and bursting in the kitchen door after a long, long time away.

  Chapter 23

  By Friday, Jesse was too restless to stay in bed, and Henry was too worried over his own concerns to keep him there. So he made breakfast for the two of them, and made sure he was out in the barn when Sarah came for her morning visit.

  When Jesse limped through the open doors, Henry looked up from his glaze recipe book. “Everything all right?”

  “Yeah, I guess. She didn’t bring me any more of that tea, so I must be getting better. The rash is almost gone.”

  “Don’t be tempted to take any more ibuprofen, though, even if you’re in some pain. I don’t think it’s worth it.”

  Jesse huffed a laugh. “Sure isn’t. I’m just going to have a look at my car, okay?”

  “It’s your car,” Henry pointed out. “I don’t have much in the way of tools, or much more in the way of knowledge about what goes on under the hood, but the toolbox is in the tack room if you need it. There’s a hammer to pound out that fender, if nothing else.”

  “Thanks, Henry. For everything,” Jesse said a little awkwardly. “I’ll try and be out of here as fast as possible.”

  “Why? You don’t take up a lot of room.”

  “I know, but it’s an imposition. Your lady…Sarah…”

  Henry looked up in alarm. “What?”

  “Sarah. She and you—you’re a thing, right?”

  Where did an Amish boy get these expressions? “My fiancée’s name is Ginny Hochstetler. Sarah is just my neighbor who happens to be a Dokterfraa and kind enough to look after you.”

  “Oh. Sorry. I thought—”

  “Never mind.” Time to change the subject. “Jesse, before you go outside…here’s a weird question. Have you ever heard of a TV show called Shunning Amish?”

  It took the boy a second or two to get the train of his thoughts onto this new and unexpected track. “Sure. I watched it a couple of times at this place.”

  A homeless shelter? A bar? Henry decided he probably didn’t want to know. “What did you think of it?”

  “I think that some of those people weren’t even Amish. Some of them might have been, I guess. There were these girls that were quilting—I’m pretty sure they were. Why? Are you getting a TV so you can watch it?”

  Henry snorted. “Not likely. No, they want me to be on it.”

  If he hadn’t been leaning on the tack room door, the boy would probably have fallen right over. “On the show? Are you kidding me?”

  “Sadly, no. I’m supposed to let them know today whether I’m going to do it or not, and I just can’t seem to walk over there and pick up the phone.”

  “Why not? I’d be on it. Do they pay?”

  “Sure they do. Fifty grand.”

  Jesse gaped at him and his knees actually buckled before he remembered himself and straightened up. “Fifty thousand dollars? Are you serious?”

  “It might as well be fifty pieces of silver. I’m having a hard time balancing what Ginny and I could do with that money with the intrusion it would be into everyone’s lives here. The hard feelings. To say nothing of how my family in Ohio would feel if word ever got back to them.”

  “They’re in Ohio,” Jesse pointed out a little more bluntly than he had to. “And the fifty grand is here.”

  “Yes, but is it worth it to alienate all my neighbors and lose their trust? Because after that money’s spent, I still have to live here.”

  “I wouldn’t. I’d go as far away as I could get. Maybe even Australia.”

  Henry looked at him for a moment. “Jesse, no matter how bad it was for you at home, no matter why you left, family is important. You can’t outrun who you are.”

  “I can outrun who they want me to be.”

  “And where would that leave you as far as Amanda is concerned? She’s joined church—if you want her, you have to want everything she stands for.”

  “I could say the same to you.”

  Maybe he should have tied the kid down to the bed. “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “I haven’t seen this lady you’re supposed to be engaged to, but I have seen you with Sarah Yoder. And I don’t think you have any business preaching to me about girls in church.”

  “Okay, that’s enough.” Henry abandoned the recipes. “If you want to hang around here, that’s fine by me. But you won’t say that again or you’ll be on your way even if you have to walk. Understand?”

  Jesse’s brief moment of bravado faded. “Ja. Sorry. None of my business.”

  “You’re right. It isn’t. And now, since you’ve brought up her name, I’m going to go see my fiancée and talk this over with her.”

  His temper didn’t get riled up very often, but when it did, it took him a little time to get it calmed down again. He couldn’t see Ginny when he was angry about something else, so he’d just walk along the creek instead of driving over there. The weather had improved marginally, so he might not even get rained on.

  He found Ginny in her office off the sitting room, going over the accounts. “Sorry—am I interrupting?”

  She rolled her chair away from the computer and rubbed her eyes, as though she’d been at it for some time already. “You’re here awfully early. It’s not even ten o’clock. And no, you’re not interrupting. Any excuse not to look at the bills and my bank statement is a good one.” Over her shoulder, he could see the columns of numbers on the spreadsheet, many of which were red. “Come and I’ll make another pot of coffee.”

  He followed her into the kitchen, where she waved him into a seat at the worktable. “I thought I might see you yesterday,” he said.

  “Likewise.” She ground fresh beans, and the rough fragrance of coffee filled the kitchen. “I had a lot of things to catch up on after being gone four days. Even without guests, the place has to be run.”

  “Is it running all right?”

  She shrugged, leaning one hip on the counter, her arms folded. “It’s running. All right is up for debate. I’ve got a big balloon payment coming up in April and with fewer guests this past summer, the place hasn’t brought in as much. I was hoping I wouldn’t have to go all out with the Christmas promotions, but I might. An innkeepers’ association has been bugging me about joining, so I may do that just to get the extra exposure from group advertising.”

  When the coffee was ready, she po
ured him a cup, added cream, and filled a plate with pecan tarts. “Not exactly breakfast, but they’re hard to resist.”

  He smiled and covered her hand with his as she sat opposite him. “Like some people I know.”

  The dimples dented her cheeks briefly, and smoothed out.

  “Ginny, what is it? You look down. Is it the mortgage? What can I do to help?”

  With a squeeze, she released his hand and shook her head, the spirals of her curls moving gently on her shoulders. “It’s everything. Doing the accounts always depresses me.”

  He was pretty sure there was more to it than that. If he knew nothing else about this woman, it was that it took a lot to make that smile fade. Maybe putting her business mind to work on his dilemma would make a good distraction until she was willing to talk about what was really bothering her.

  “Remember I said I talked to Dave Petersen about doing the episode of Shunning Amish?”

  She nodded. “You were going to call him back today with a decision.”

  “I told him I had to talk to you first, but with all that’s been going on, we haven’t had a chance.”

  “So here you are.”

  “So here I am, no further ahead than I was on Tuesday, despite talking about it with everyone else.”

  She took a careful sip of hot coffee. “With your…neighbors?”

  “Sarah says I shouldn’t dwell on the past and present a rebellious nineteen-year-old’s view of Amish life. Jesse says there’s nothing about said Amish life that couldn’t be fixed with fifty grand, and what am I waiting for?”

  Ginny made a sound in her throat that might have been a chuckle. “There probably isn’t anything in English life that couldn’t be fixed with it, either.”

  “Hence my problem,” he confessed. “On one hand, I see those red numbers on your spreadsheet, and the risk of Frith canceling my Christmas pieces, and the wedding coming up, and it seems like a no-brainer.”

  “And on the other?”

  “On the other is the way Paul and Barbara and my sisters and everyone else would feel if I spoke publicly about them.”