A Rose Revealed (11 page)

My heart skipped a beat at her quiet statement. I wished with all my heart that I could tell her she was wrong, but in truth I thought Trevor had survived this long due only to the extraordinary love of his mother.

Becky looked at me with a sad smile.
“Denki
for not lying to me.”

I squeezed her hand gently. “I wish I could tell you differently, honey.”

“And thanks for not telling me his illness is punishment for my sin.”

My heart contracted again, and I thought of the story in the Bible about the man born blind.

“Rabbi,” Jesus’ disciples asked him, “why was this man born blind? Was it because of his own sins or his parents’ sins?”

“It was not because of his sins or his parents’ sins,” Jesus answered. “This happened so the power of God could be seen in him.”

As I watched the mother and child, I thought that in a strange way, God’s power was seen right here in this rude room, in a mother’s care for her dying child, her total commitment to his well-being. It was just that same totality of love that had sent Jesus to the manger in Bethlehem and the cross at Golgotha.

Becky lifted Trevor to her shoulder and soon we heard a little burp. She lowered him to her other breast.

“Is your boyfriend waiting for you back home?” I asked.

“I think so. He said he would wait and I believe him. But when my parents found out about the baby, they sent me away so fast that I never had a chance to speak with him.”

“And he hasn’t tried to contact you?”

She shook her head.

“Oh, Becky!”

“No,” she said quickly. “It’s not like you think. He’s
meidung
.”

I shook my head. “I don’t know the word.”

“He’s shunned. No one will talk to him or tell him where I am.”

“Oh.” The enormous life-altering power of shunning struck me again. “Is he shunned because of Trevor?”

She shook her head. “He was under the ban before Trevor.” She smiled sadly. “I wasn’t supposed to see him or have anything to do with him, but—” She shrugged. “Obviously I did.”

“Are you being shunned too?” I was appalled at the idea, but maybe it explained the way her grandparents were treating her.

“No. I hadn’t joined the congregation yet.”

“But he had?”

“Samuel had. He’s twenty-two.”

“Why was he shunned?” I feared all sorts of terrible things.

“He bought a pickup truck for his construction work.”

“Oh, Becky.” I was overwhelmed that something so commonplace in my world should be so costly in hers.

She nodded with understanding at my expression. Then her face darkened. “When I go home,” she said fiercely, “I will be like you. I will be fancy. I will buy a sweat suit and wear it all day, even the pants. I will learn to drive Samuel’s truck, and we will marry and have many more babies, healthy babies, and we will live in a house with a washing machine and electric lights and an electric can opener. And I will wear lipstick.”

The last was like a battle cry. I couldn’t help grin at her and her plans for a wanton life. “You are a rebel, Rebecca Stoltzfus.”

“I am. And I talk to
Herr Gott
about it all the time. I could not leave my people if He would not come with me, not even for Samuel, I don’t think.”

“He’ll go anywhere with anyone who believes,” I said.

Becky nodded. “I think so too.”

“I’m a Christian, and I know He’s with me. I know lots of English people who are believers and will tell you the Lord is with them too.”

“I had a job cleaning for an English lady back home.” Becky said. “She was a Christian too. She talked to me about Jesus, and she gave me an English Bible that was easy to read.” She reached under her pillow and pulled out a much used paper cover Bible.

“When I learned I was going to have a baby, I went to her. I told her about Samuel and how much I loved him. I thought that because she was fancy, she would say what we did was okay. She didn’t. She agreed with Mama that I was wrong, that we were wrong. But not because of Mama or the
Ordnung
, she said. Because of the Bible.” Becky ran her hand across the cover of her obviously cherished Book.

“Then about grace she told me. About Jesus. I heard about Him all my life, but finally I understood. Now He’s my Savior.”

I thanked God for the English woman who had such a great heart.

Becky slipped off the bed and laid Trevor in his nest in his basket on the floor. She began covering him with blankets. “I brought Samuel to my lady too. I wanted him to know Jesus like me.” She stopped and blushed as she glanced at me. “He needed to understand why I wouldn’t get into bed with him anymore.”

She stood, suddenly concerned lest I misunderstand. “Samuel is not bad,” she said. “He isn’t, even though he’s
meidung
. He’s practical. That’s what he always tells me. That’s why he got the truck.
Because it’s practical, Becky
. That’s what he says.”

“Becky, if you love him, I’m sure he’s a fine man. You wouldn’t love him otherwise.”

Her smile was so bright that my breath caught. I realized that she rarely had the luxury of talking about Samuel. That was part of shunning.

“So has Samuel trusted Jesus too?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” she said, tears gathering in her eyes. “I haven’t seen him in so many months or been able to talk to him. He doesn’t know about Trevor, that he was born, that he’s sick. My heart breaks that he doesn’t know.”

My heart broke a bit too. “Have you never tried to call him at the phone shanty?”

“I tried when I first came, but they saw me. My grandfather said I would have to leave if I tried again. I was seven months pregnant. Where would I go?”

What would I have done, I wondered, under an ultimatum like that? Honored my dictatorial grandfather or followed my heart? It was a hard question to answer because I viewed the whole question from what I considered a normal perspective, while Becky had been immersed in another way of thinking her whole life. Certainly she was rebelling and planning to break free, but that was with Samuel by her side. Here, alone, knowing no one?

“I did try again,” she confided, glancing at the door as if afraid of being overheard. “But no one answered the first two times I tried. Then I got a message saying the phone was disconnected. Samuel had moved, I guess. I don’t know. I didn’t worry too much at first. I would only be here until the baby was born and then I would go home. Somehow I would go home.”

We looked at Trevor.

“And now you can’t leave,” I said.

“I can’t risk the travel, the cold. And I can’t leave his doctors.”

I reached out and hugged this young woman who was enduring such pain on so many levels. She clung to me like a limpet to a rock. I wondered when the last time was that she had been hugged.

“It’ll be all right, Becky,” I said. “It’ll be all right.”

Why, I wondered even as I spoke, do we say such inane things, such impossible-to-be-true things?

“It is all right,” she said softly as she loosened her death grip though she did not let go completely. “I have my baby. I have you. I will have Samuel. And I have
Herr Gott
.”

What a combination of deep wisdom and pure naiveté.

Footsteps sounded on the stairs, and Becky jumped away from me. She turned her back to the door, but not before I saw the tears wetting her cheeks.

One of Annie’s female visitors stopped in the doorway, looking around the small room with a frown.

“Yes?” I said.

“The coroner is here. The other man asked could I get you.”

“Thank you,” I said in my best professional voice and moved to the door. “You keep that baby covered and warm, Becky. I’m depending on you to take good care of him, just like you’ve been doing. Drafts would be very bad for him. And you need to make another doctor’s appointment as soon as possible. I don’t like his coloring.”

Without turning, she nodded and bent over the baby’s basket. “I will,” she promised, playing my nurse–patient game with me for the benefit of the woman. “I will.”

I got back to Zooks’ at four in the morning and was halfway up the stairs to my rooms when a deep voice stopped me.

“Are you okay?”

I turned and looked at Jake as he stared up the steps at me. The darkness at the foot of the stairwell hid his face, but his voice held a palpable concern.

“I’m fine,” I whispered, surprised and pleased that he had waited up to be certain I was all right. I also wondered just what this solicitude meant in the scheme of life. One thing for certain: for someone who presented himself as a curmudgeon, Jake Zook definitely had a tender heart.

“It was Old Nate,” I said. “He’s dead.”

A burst of air indicated his surprise. Then he nodded and was gone.

I continued to my rooms, tore off my clothes, and dropped them in a heap on the floor. I tossed my glasses in the general direction of the night table and fell into bed, totally exhausted. I was asleep almost before my head hit the pillow and I slept deeply, untroubled by nightmares or dreams.

Chapter 6

W
hen I awoke, a glance at my clock showed that I could just make church if I really moved. I washed, dressed, and generally made myself presentable as quickly as I could. When I came downstairs, the family was gone, off to worship or sit the Amish version of
shivah
with Annie. Of Jake there was no sign.

I slid into the back pew as the singing began, a definite change of pace for me. I liked to sit in the front because the congregation’s voices washed over me and made the music so alive. When I got to heaven, one of the things I looked forward to most was being able to sing like I wanted. In fact, I’d probably sing better than I hoped because right now I was too human to imagine what heavenly singing sounded like.

This morning I found that the music made me teary and the message moved me more than usual. I slipped out during the closing prayer. I was too emotional from the past two days to make small talk.

I drove back to the farm in silence. In a few hours I’d be back in my apartment, sitting on my lumpy couch, watching TV as I did some needlepoint. I’d flick the dust cloth over surfaces that didn’t get dusty because nothing happened in the rooms to cause dust. I’d climb into bed and fall asleep until my clock radio blasted me awake. I’d eat a quick breakfast of granola and yogurt while I read a magazine or a novel.

And I’d do it all alone.

I’d moved from my mother’s house shortly after I got my BSN. She never asked me to leave or indicated in any way that she expected me to go, but I knew I had to for my own sanity. I couldn’t face another day of her unspoken reproof, though I couldn’t blame her for it either. I just knew I’d wither under another of her noble sighs or sorrowful stares into space.

Sometimes I wanted to scream, “Mom, get a life!” But how could I when I was responsible for the life she no longer had?

So I moved to Bird-in-Hand because I got my job at the Home Health Group and became affiliated with the East Lancaster Ambulance and Rescue Squad. I found my church and got involved with a singles group and made some nice friends.

But I was still alone. Perhaps I was afraid to get close to anyone because I didn’t want the pain of losing them. Perhaps I would have been a loner even without the tragedy. I had no way of knowing.

I pulled into the Zooks’ drive and went into the house. I didn’t even have the door shut when Jake wheeled in from his rooms.

“Where’ve you been?” he asked, frowning.

“Church,” I said, thinking he really had to do something about his people skills. “It’s Sunday. I always go to church on Sunday.”

“You should have slept in. You were out late last night.”

I shook my head. “If I slept in following every night I ran, I’d have been fired long ago.”

He harrumphed and cleared his throat. He must have decided he wasn’t going to get anywhere in this discussion because he said, “Mom left some food for us in the refrigerator.”

Suddenly I missed the breakfast I hadn’t had time to eat. “Great! I’m famished. Let me change, and I’ll be right back down.”

We sat at the kitchen table with a round of ring bologna, a half dozen pickled eggs, a wedge of Muenster cheese, and a loaf of Mary’s honey oat bread. There were a couple of pieces of Esther’s apple pie for dessert. We had just cut ourselves slices of meat and cheese when the front door banged open and Elam exploded into the room.

“Well, hello,” Jake said. “I didn’t expect to see you for several hours. Have some lunch.” And he indicated the food on the table.

Elam gave us a lowering glance, his gray eyes hostile and unhappy. He hung his hat by the door. I thought it a wonder he didn’t tear the brim off, given the violence with which he impaled it on the peg. He unbuttoned his plain black jacket and pulled it off roughly as he started up the stairs. In a moment we heard him clomping down the hall, his boots striking the floor like a boxer’s fists thudding into a practice bag.

Jake and I looked at each other as a door slammed overhead.

“Mary Clare Epp,” Jake said with a sardonic nod.

“Who’s she?”

“The girl Elam fancies himself in love with. I bet they read the banns for her and Young Joe Lapp this morning.”

“You mean they announced their intent to marry?” I looked at the ceiling. “Poor Elam.”

“I tried to warn him once, but he wouldn’t listen. And if I knew Mary Clare was interested in Young Joe, so did everyone else, believe me.”

“Everyone but Elam.” Thoughtfully I chewed a piece of cheese. “When I was here this summer for your mom, I got the idea that Esther and he were an item.”

Jake grunted. “They would be if Esther had her way. She’s certainly in love with him. I think the only reason she’s still here is that she and Mom hope he’ll come to his senses. Personally I think he’s crazy to prefer Mary Clare to a wonderful girl like Esther.” He savored a piece of her pie, a look of bliss on his face. “Any woman who can cook like this is worth marrying.”

When we finished eating, I rose. “Why don’t you bring the dishes over and I’ll wash?” I suggested.