Amish Circle Letters II: The Second Circle of Letters (22 page)

He stared at her in disbelief.

“It’s true, Melvin,” she continued, her tone serious and firm. “Stealing is a sin and you need to make this right. The guilt will weigh heavy on you until you do.”

The fact that she was right made it even worse. The guilt, indeed, weighed very heavily on him. More than she realized, that was for sure and certain. The Bible verses were only the beginning of it. If he confessed to that, he
’d have to confess to the fire. He had no idea how his
daed
would react, or Mary Ruth, for that matter. All he knew was that Katie was finished with the conversation, her fork now picking up food and lifting it to her mouth. She seemed back to her old self, happy and onto another subject. When she saw that the pies were beginning to be passed around, she looked at Melvin and motioned that he needed to hurry up to get a piece before it was time to work in the afternoon.

Reluctantly, he followed her, amazed at how she had just flipped a switch and returned to enjoying the day. He realized that his fear that she would hold his sin against him was wrong. She had forgiven him long before he even knew that she was aware of his action. As he followed her into the main fellowship room to collect a piece of pie, he wondered if his
daed
would be as quick to forgive if he confessed what he had done.

“What kind of pie, Melvin?”

He looked up in surprise at Mimi who stood behind the table with the extra pies to bring to the men. He knew her from church and from the wedding. Technically, he guessed she was his
aendi
now, since she was married to Mary Ruth’s brother. And, while she looked friendly enough, he felt shy in her presence.

“He likes pumpkin pie, ain
’t so?” Katie answered for him. “Maybe with some ice cream, if we have it.”

Mimi frowned. “Ice cream? It
’s December!”

Katie shrugged her shoulders and looked over at Melvin. “Was worth a try,
ja
?”

The two friends stood side by side as Mimi dished two slices of pumpkin pie onto their plates and watched as they wandered away. Melvin felt h
er eyes lingering on them as they slipped through the kitchen and went outside to sit on the porch.

The men had finished their dinner and, without a warning, the room fell silent. No noise could be heard as all heads bowed down for the after-prayer. It remained silent for a few long minutes before Menno cleared his throat and, as if in unison, most of the men stood up and began to make their way outside. They still had a full four hours of work to complete in order to call it a day.

Steve walked by Mimi and paused, leaning over to whisper in her ear. “We have to leave in a spell,” he said. “Milking needs to be done soon.”

The word
milking
caused a shiver to run through her spine. She tried to hide her irritation that, yet again, this ten-hour milking schedule was ruining the time that she should be spending with Mary Ruth and her new family. Certainly the women would enjoy their meal then, after cleaning up the dishes and cups, they would sit in the sunroom, keeping Elijah company while they crocheted and knitted for the rest of the afternoon. However, once again, milking the cows took precedence over her ability to spend time with her friends and family.

Just the knowledge that they would have to leave soon cast a pallor on her face and a shadow on her afternoon. She ate her meal quietly, barely talking to the women seated next to her and found that everything seemed to taste like sawdust. With no appetite, she quickly excused herself before the after prayer and hurried to the downstairs bathroom where she shut the door and, leaning against it, closed her eyes as she tried to stop the swelling tears.

She had hoped that her
mamm
would show up at the barn raising. However, her
daed
had donated a lot of hardware to the Yoders and they simply could not shut down for the entire day. Yet, Mimi had kept saying a selfish silent prayer that her
mamm
would be there among the women. She needed to see her, needed to tell her about her conflicting feelings. In her entire life, she had never felt such emotional turmoil, an upheaval of sorts, and she needed to confide in someone whom she trusted.

Mimi couldn
’t deny it anymore. She had first noticed the change during the weeks before she had moved onto Steve’s farm. It began as feelings of anxiety and irritation when plans had gone awry. She had thought it was her disappointment of not feeling like a married woman right away. However, once she had moved into the
grossdaadihaus
, the feelings had not gotten better. Indeed, they had gotten worse.

When Steve was around, she managed to put on a happy face. But as soon as she was alone, she felt the feelings press down upon her, almost as though there was a heavy weight on her chest. It began to feel oppressive and harmful, causing her heart to palpitate and her blood to race through her veins.

During her first week at the farm, she had wondered if she was spending too much time alone, so she had sought out Anna, who lived across the street. However pleasant were those visits, they didn’t actually change her mood. She returned to Steve’s farm, dragging her feet the closer she got to the smaller dwelling in the back of the main house. By the time she would get to the door, she’d be close to tears. Still, she had tried to hold it together.

Now, the disappointment of not seeing her
mamm
, combined with having to return to the farm once again to milk those cows was too much. Downright so. The tears began to fill her eyes and she wiped at them, angry with herself that she was crying at all.

What is wrong with me?
She couldn’t help asking why she was crying. She had known right well from the onset that Steve was a dairy farmer when she married him. She had even known about his strange ten-hour milking schedule. But she had never imagined that life would be like this: Dictated by the confines of an animal!

Someone knocked at the door and Mimi quickly turned on the water faucet. She splashed cold water on her face and reached for the hand towel to dab at her eyes and cheeks. The last thing that she wanted was for anyone to know that she had been hiding in the bathroom crying over cows. That particular thought made her laugh for just a moment, a laugh that made her feel even more out of control than she had, moments earlier.

“Everything all right?”

Mimi smiled at the older woman standing outside the door, her hands tucked into the sleeves of her dark blue dress as she waited. “Oh
ja
, just a bit queasy is all,” she managed to answer. Ignoring the lifted eyebrow from the older woman, Mimi lowered her eyes and hurried into the kitchen to help the other women with cleaning up from the meal.

There were almost twenty women hustling about the kitchen and fellowship room, complete organized chaos as the worn wooden benches were folded and stacked by the side of the room while plates were washed and dried. Women began to collect their plates, dishes, utensils and cups, stacking them into baskets to return to their homes when it would be time to leave.

One of the women began to hum a song and, within minutes, others had joined in, singing the words to a Christmas song. The atmosphere of the room immediately changed from a working environment to one of faith and camaraderie as the words slipped from their lips and filled the air with joy:

When Christmas morn is dawning
In faith I would repair
Unto the lowly manger;
My Savior lieth there,
Unto the lowly manger,
My Savior lieth there.
How kind, O loving Savior,
To come from heaven above;
From sin and evil save us,
And keep us in thy love,
From sin and evil save us,
And keep us in thy love.
We need thee, blessed Jesus,
Our dearest friend thou art,
Forbid that we by sinning
Should grieve thy loving heart,
Forbid that we by sinning
Should grieve thy loving heart.

Mimi tried to sing along with the other women, but she found herself becoming emotional again. She wondered how much her sinning grieved Jesus? It was not proper to complain or to harbor ill thoughts. She knew that. Yet, she was unable to remain happy, or even just content, with her current situation. When she had Steve to herself, no interruptions or cows or chores, that was one thing. But she needed stability and routine in her life. This schedule was not helping her achieve that and, as a result, was taxing on her nerves.

Even worse was the fact that it did not seem to bother Steve at all. He could handle the inconsistent late nights and early mornings. Lack of sleep did not seem to affect him in the slightest. In fact, he had boundless energy for working the farm, milking the cows, attending auctions, and even visiting friends for short periods of times. He never complained and seemed genuinely happy.

It was almost two when Steve came to fetch her. The buggy was already hitched to the horse and he greeted her with a smile. “Ready, then?” he asked, tying the horse to the hitching post with a slipknot in the black lead rope.

She wanted to respond “
Nee
!” but knew better than to make a scene. If only she could quell the rising panic that was in her chest! Instead, she nodded her head and said her quick good-byes to everyone before collecting her pie pans that had been washed and stored in her basket by the door.

“
Danke, schwester
,” Mary Ruth said, shaking Mimi’s hand. “Your help yesterday and today was a true blessing.”

Mimi nodded and forced a smile before she nodded to the other women and followed Steve outside the side door. He took the basket from her and put it in the back of the buggy while she waited, patiently, by the buggy door. Her eyes lifted to the new barn that was rising on the old foundation. Almost half of it was already sided with fresh, unpainted boards. It was smaller than the original barn and had less room on the second floor. However, it was well made and would suit the needs of the Yoder family, that was for sure and certain.

As the men continued to work on it, Mimi wished that she, too, could feel the joy of the moment.

“Mimi?”

She glanced over her shoulder and saw that Steve was waiting by the buggy door. He held out his hand to help her climb onto the foot-step and she ducked her head before situating herself on the far side of the front seat. Then, with a quick jump, he was beside her. He shut the front window, making certain that the reins were properly threaded through the two notches beneath the glass pane, enabling him to control the horse without the cold air coming through the opening.

“What a
wunderbaar gut
day,
ja
?” he said as the horse began to pull the buggy out of the driveway, the rocking motion causing his shoulder to brush against Mimi’s arm. “A true testament of the community!” He glanced at Mimi and smiled. “Ain’t so?”

Meekly, she nodded her head. She felt a headache coming on and sighed as she sank back into the buggy seat and stared straight ahead. She watched the empty, brown fields pass by as the horse trotted its way down the road. In the distance, she could see the skeletons of trees, grouped in patches, naked without any leaves left hanging on their branches. Despite the clear sky, everything felt gray and miserable to Mimi.

“You’re awful quiet,” he stated, nudging her gently.

The gesture awakened her from her pensive thoughts as she watched the landscape passing by her. “Hmm?”

“You’re right quiet,
fraa
,” he said, his tone light and teasing. “Something awful deep on your mind,
ja
?”

She didn
’t want to tell him, didn’t want him to know about the overwhelming sense of sadness that she had felt earlier in the afternoon. She didn’t want to tell him that she had been fighting those feelings for a long time and now, something seemed to have shifted within her and she could no longer hold back her feelings of despair. It was as if the floodgates had finally opened to her emotions and she just wanted to crawl into her bed to sleep them away.
Mayhaps
if she slept, she told herself, she’d wake up to a brighter outlook on life.

“Just tired,” she mumbled, as an answer.

He raised an eyebrow at her in his familiar inquisitive way, but said nothing in response to her two words.

“Was speaking with James today,” he said, changing the subject and breaking the quiet. “Seems there
’s an issue between him and Lovina, now.”

“Oh?”

“
Ja
,” he affirmed. “Over that Englische woman he fancied so long ago.”

This was news to her and it piqued her interest, even if only for the moment. She had never heard about James and an Englische woman. It wasn’t very often that Amish courting outside of their faith, even during
rumschpringe
. Of course, gossip such as that would die a fast death on the Amish grapevine, especially after James took his baptism and settled down.