Beneath the Summer Sun

by Kelly Irvin

  A run-of-the-mill buggy sat parked in the spot where buggies usually parked. So Melvin had driven over. What was so special about this one? Melvin, huffing and puffing as if he’d jogged the last few miles, seemed to be unhitching the horse that pulled the buggy.

  “Guder mariye.” She stepped onto the porch. “Is something wrong?”

  “Not a thing.” Melvin straightened. He stood as wide as he did tall. Every year added a few pounds to his squat frame. His round, sun-toughed face wrinkled in a smile above his brown beard. “I’m just delivering your buggy.”

  “My buggy?” Jennie wavered on the first step. “I don’t understand.”

  “Our buggy, our buggy!” Celia danced a little jig. “I’ll get the others.” She raced toward the barn.

  “Your friends pooled their funds and bought this buggy for you.” Melvin patted the bay’s rump. “I’m dropping it off as a favor to them.”

  “They bought me a buggy?” The words didn’t add up. Buggies were far too expensive to be given as gifts. Jennie had resigned herself to the borrowed buggy for as long as Peter could spare it. “That’s not possible. No one asked me about it.”

  “That’s what makes it a gift.” He mopped at his chubby, dimpled cheeks with his sleeve. “I have to get going. My fraa wants to look at the beds they’re selling at the auction. Ours broke down.”

  Could it be his husky frame? That was beside the point. Jennie circled the buggy. It had a well-worn look to it, but it was sturdy. The reflectors were in place, the battery-operated brake lights seemed fine. Rearview mirrors stuck out from both sides. The seats were amply padded. It was a thing of useful beauty. “Who did this? Who bought this for us?”

  Melvin’s nose wrinkled. He donned a mischievous grin that made him look twelve instead of closing in on forty. “That’s for me to know and you not to find out.”

  “Nee. I can’t accept it.”

  “Don’t be a naysayer. A gift’s a gift.” He busied himself pulling a saddle from the buggy and placing it on his horse. “The givers prefer to remain anonymous.” He drew the last word out in four long syllables as if he’d never said it before. Likely, he hadn’t.

  “I need to be able to thank someone and then pay him back.”

  “No sense it getting fancy about it. You needed a buggy. Now you have one.” He doffed his straw hat at her and hoisted himself into the saddle with ease for a man of his girth.

  “Melvin, wait!”

  “I’ll never tell.” He turned the horse around and then looked back with feigned seriousness belied by a distinct twinkle in his blue eyes. “Nothing you can do to make me spill the beans.”

  “Danki.”

  “I’m just the delivery man.” He waved as he started off toward the road. “Use it well.”

  The children tumbled from the barn, laughing, talking, running toward her and the house and their new buggy. Sometimes a person had to accept unexpected, undeserved gifts for the sake of others. She contemplated the buggy. She would find out who gave it to her. She would find a way to pay them back. But first she needed to thank whoever it had been for a gesture that began to sew up the wound where her heart had once been.

  THIRTY

  The line between one person’s junk and another’s treasure was never thinner than at these school auctions and fund-raisers. Still in a blissful state over the unexpected gift of the buggy, Jennie wandered through aisles of buggy parts, old dishes, farm implements, and furniture, bemused by the stuff people thought would sell. The July heat beat down on her. She lifted her face to the sun, glad it shone on her day of blessing. She paused to peer into a box of flowerpots and garden tools. Nee. She needed to save her money to pay back the generous friends who had bought her family that buggy. Somehow. Generosity would be repaid with a pleasing attitude of gratitude. The children ran on ahead, Elizabeth in Celia’s keeping and Francis in Cynthia’s. They loved to look, even if they couldn’t afford to buy. Jennie had enough change to get everyone an ice cream if the price hadn’t gone up since last year.

  Everyone but Matthew. She shoved away the thought. Matthew was too old to be placated with ice cream. His malaise went deeper, so deep she couldn’t fathom how she would cure it. The sight of Freeman’s fraa, Dorothy Borntrager, and her closest friend, Josephine Beachy, wife of Deacon Cyrus Beachy, made Jennie do an about-face and head the other directions. The thought that they might have heard of the deputy’s visit to her home during the night sent long chilly fingers up her spine despite the sun’s heat. She ducked her head and trudged toward the long line of wringer washing machines. She could use a new one, but that too would wait.

  “The pink one looks like it would suit you.”

  Leo. Just the person she needed to talk to about Matthew. Her heart began to pound as she turned to look up at him. His grin said he knew how silly the notion was. One pink washer in the midst of all those run-of-the-mill white washers. It would never do. The neighbors would frown at her choice to stand out in the Plain world. She swallowed her anxiety and managed a smile in return. “Just looking.”

  “Me too.” He held a bowl of ice cream in one hand and two white plastic spoons in the other. “It’s really hot today.” His tone was tentative, his expression uncertain. “Share with me?”

  He offered her a spoon. She hesitated as she looked at his face. Such a tender expression. Such sweetness. His eyes were the color of warm chocolate. His lips were full. Not like Atlee’s that thinned in anger until they became a line drawn in the sand with fury that said “Don’t step over me.”

  “I don’t have a cold or anything. No germs, I promise.”

  She took his offering. Their fingers brushed. A jolt of longing, a heat that had nothing to do with the sun, surged through her. She longed for the touch of his strong hand. His warm embrace. Something in his gaze said he offered both with no reservation. Her heart sought such an offering, but her head held on to fear. A soft touch could turn to stone in a mere second. She thrust aside her heart’s desire.

  “You can have the whole thing if you’d rather not share with me.”

  The disappointment in his words registered. Emotions warred in his face, then disappeared behind a careful neutral stare. But not before she saw a loneliness she recognized from her own constant and overwhelming supply.

  “Nee, we’ll share.” She offered a smile. His returned. He held out the bowl. She dipped her spoon in the ice cream. “Soft serve.”

  “I like it that way. It doesn’t give me brain freeze.” He stuck a heaping spoonful in his mouth, closed his eyes in mock adoration, and swallowed. “Meredith and Bess made it. They’re selling out as fast as they can finish a batch.”

  “It’s very gut.” She took another small bite, savoring the creamy texture. “I planned to buy some for my kinner.”

  “I already did.”

  “You shouldn’t have done that.”

  “I wanted to.” Emotion laced the words. His gaze met hers and, for once, didn’t back away. She found she couldn’t, either. Her heart began to pound. He opened his mouth, then closed it. Finally, his gaze strayed over her shoulder to the buggies parked on the other side of the road. He sighed. “I like them. Especially Francis.”

  “Francis likes you.”

  His head bobbed in acknowledgment, but his gaze remained fixed on the buggies.

  “So do I.” Where had that come from? Now her heart raced. Heat burned across her face. “I mean—”

  “I like you too.” Red spread under his tan. His gaze dropped to her face. “Always have.”

  She couldn’t breathe. This was dangerous, dangerous territory, not where she had intended to travel at all. “I can’t—”

  “It’s only ice cream.” His amber eyes told a different story. “Don’t worry. It’s sweet and it’s good, like you.”

  She opened her mouth but found no words came out. Her throat hurt. Tears formed but could not be allowed to fall. They could not. They could not. She would not cry. Instead she nodded. He smiled and nod
ded at the bowl.

  She took another bite, then another, glad for the cold creaminess that cooled a heat she couldn’t explain.

  They took turns bite for bite without speaking. The auction sounds flowed around them, three different callers bleating out numbers in a singsong. People talked, horses whinnied, and children screeched as they played hide-and-seek among the buggies. Life ran on around them.

  Leo scooped the last of the ice cream onto his spoon and held it out to her. “You should have the last bite.”

  “I had the first.”

  “I want you to have it.” His spoon wavered. “Among other things.”

  Her mind ran in a thousand directions, trying to imagine those other things. She’d come to an auction because that was what a person did. Now this man declared himself with a bowl of ice cream and a gaze that saw through her.

  She heaved a breath and allowed him to feed her that last bite. “I should find the kinner. They’ll get into trouble if left on their own too long.”

  “Wait. They’re gut kinner. They’ll be fine.” He tossed the bowl and spoons into a rusted trash barrel. “I wanted to give you something.”

  He ducked his head. He looked for a fleeting second like the boy she’d known in school, who never wanted to be the one to read aloud or answer the teacher’s question. The best softball player and the worst speller. She’d always liked that boy. “You already gave me ice cream.”

  “You looked disappointed that day in the basement. When I gave the animals to Elizabeth and Francis, you looked like you wanted one too. I felt bad.” He shifted from one foot to the other. “I never want to disappoint you again.”

  He knew she’d been disappointed long ago. “Nee, don’t be silly. I’m all grown up.”

  “Not too old for this, I hope.” His face red, neck to ears, he thrust a balled-up paper napkin at her.

  A lump in her throat, she unfolded the napkin. A small, wooden horse lay in her palm. Its back arched, front hooves high, as it reared. The wood, something dark and rich in grain, had been polished to a high sheen. Leo loved horses. He loved animals. That he’d chosen to share that love with her was not lost on Jennie. “It’s beautiful.”

  “It reminds me of you.”

  “Me? Why me?”

  “You want to loosen the reins of something in your past.”

  After a moment she remembered to close her mouth. She sought a response but found none. He touched the horse. “You’re beautiful too.”

  Plain men and women didn’t aspire to such a thing. But the words touched something broken inside her. The carpenter took the pieces and, with great care, put them together again in something new and different. Something complete. To Leo, she wasn’t a clumsy cow or a pig.

  Her throat ached with the supreme effort not to cry.

  “Danki.” She breathed, in and out, in and out.

  Ice cream. A carved animal. The rocking chair for Todd and Samantha Riker. Leo has a generous nature. She’d said those words last night to Matthew. “I received another gift today. A buggy.”

  Did his expression shift? She couldn’t tell. He cleared his throat. “That is gut news.”

  “A buggy is a very big gift, too big for a person to accept.” She studied his face. The corners of his mouth turned up. “I need to find out who gave it to me so I can pay them back.”

  “If it’s a gift, I reckon they’re not looking for payment.”

  He definitely looked uncomfortable. She crossed her arms. “Regardless, I need to pay for it.”

  “You can’t afford to pay for it, that’s why they gave you the gift.”

  “How do you know why they gave me the buggy?”

  “I’m just speculating.” He studied his dusty boots. “I know you were thinking you’d earn the money at the store to buy another one, and now the store will probably close.”

  He knew her burden and wanted to help. She could see it in his face, no matter what his words said. A person should accept such a gift with grace. “For now, I’ll say danki then.”

  He couldn’t deny it without lying. The struggle played out across his rugged face. “Is Matthew here?”

  So he changed the subject. “Nee.” Heat burned her face hotter than the July sun. He’d given her the opening she needed. “He stayed back to do chores. I want to talk to you about him.”

  “I know.” Leo took her arm, forcing her to halt with him at the end of the long row of washers. The desire to lean into him grew. The desire to feel his fingers against her skin. His grip wasn’t gentle. Nor her reaction. Not like the sweetness that overtook her when she thought of Nathan. She should tug away, but her heart, warming after a long, dark cold, held her there, close to him. “Word gets around.”

  “You heard already? How?”

  “Delbert Wilkins was at the coffeehouse this morning complaining to his buddy Louis Barton over pancakes and fried eggs. Isaac Plank was there with his fraa.”

  To tell Hazel was to tell everyone she knew who in turn would pass the word. A fund-raiser like this auction allowed the grapevine to twist and turn and grow in one fell swoop. “Freeman and Cyrus know?”

  “I reckon.”

  “He said he wasn’t drinking. He went to listen to music and talk to girls.”

  “Drinking or not, he had no business being out there at his age.”

  “He talked about your friend Todd and his wife, Samantha. He said you took them a chair. I’m not sure what that has to do with him sneaking out of the house to go to a kegger, but in his mind, they’re connected.”

  His expression somber, Leo studied the crowd around the auctioneer’s stand in the distance. He sighed. “It is connected. I saw what he saw at Todd’s house.”

  “What? What did you see?”

  His face suffused with red. He shuffled his feet. “Lieb.”

  “He’s a boy.”

  “Too young to understand what he feels, but not too young to feel it.”

  “It has to do with his daed . . . and me.” To have this conversation with Leo surprised—and embarrassed—her. But he seemed determined to have it. And to help her understand her son. His words would help her to show Matthew the grace he needed. “He’s old enough to remember how things were.”

  “Whatever happened with you and Atlee, you can still teach Matthew how things are supposed to be.”

  If only he was right. “I’m glad you think so, but you have no idea what this is about.”

  “Tell me then.”

  She looked over his shoulder, across the road, to the lot where all the buggies were parked. Too far to run. “It’s a long story.”

  “I’m a patient man.”

  The words sounded like a promise. She struggled against unfettered emotion. “Matthew needs time to heal.”

  “From what?”

  “This isn’t the time or the place.”

  “I’ve been down this road of looking for a way to put a bandage on a hurt that won’t heal. Others will not be as patient.”

  His tone warned her. She followed his gaze. Freeman and the deacon approached from across the fairgrounds. Even at a distance she could see their expressions were somber, their tread heavy. Leo swerved, putting more space between them. “Quick, before they get here, tell me you’ll take a ride with me. Later. One night this week. We’ll talk. About Matthew. About everything. About us.”

  With the sweet taste of his ice cream still on her lips and the weight of the Gmay bearing down on her, she didn’t have time to think about it. To worry it like a ragged thumbnail. To see the many destinations where such a decision would take her. To fear the known and the unknown. “Jah.”

  “Gut.” A gusty sigh followed that single syllable. He smiled, which seemed a gift in itself. “It’ll be fine.”

  She wasn’t sure what he meant. The ride or the conversation she was about to have with Freeman and Cyrus.

  It didn’t matter if the president of the United States himself approached now. Leo wanted to sing. Jennie would take a ride with
him. Bringing her a bowl of ice cream had taken every bit of courage he had. Getting her the buggy had been easier. Because Melvin Plank had been willing to deliver it. Walking up to her with a bowl of ice cream and starting a conversation—it had almost been too much. She was like a skittish horse to be handled with gentle care and patience.

  There were ways other than words to show a person you cared for them. The barn roof. Matthew’s apprenticeship. Francis and the snake. Francis and the candy sucker. The buggy. Between the orders for his furniture at the store and from Todd’s friends and family, and Mary Katherine’s help, he was able to swing a deal with Melvin to take his old back-up buggy off his hands. Leo had his work cut out for him, but he liked the work and liked her. At a certain point a man had to speak up. Say the words. Words were the hardest part for him. He would find them, starting with this conversation with Freeman and Cyrus. He turned, planted his feet, and faced the two men.

  They approached looking like twins with their paunches, their silver beards, and their thick-rimmed glasses. They had the same ponderous tread, the same way of swinging their arms as if clearing the way. The same solemn expressions. Men on a mission. No others stood in the area around the washing machines, but it wouldn’t have mattered. Their gazes said they’d found their targets in Jennie and Leo.

  Freeman nodded at Leo, acknowledging him before Jennie. Cyrus did the same. Leo returned the nod and crossed his arms over his chest. He had had many conversations with the bishop and the deacon. He would hold his own and then some. He always did. “Gut turn out.”

  “Indeed.” Freeman brushed the comment away with the flick of his tone. He turned to Jennie. “I’ve been told of a visit to your house by a sheriff’s deputy. Last night.”

  “Jah.” Her cheeks stained red, which only made her prettier. Her voice quivered. “I’m sorry to say.”

  Freeman shoved his spectacles up his long nose. Cyrus did the same. “You should’ve come to Cyrus immediately. This is a matter that affects the entire Gmay. Law enforcement coming to your home. It’s as if he came to all our homes. It reflects on all of us.”