Promise to Cherish (24 page)

“Well, I—the thing is—” he stammered.

“And why can’t the women ever have their hair down? They even wear some type of sleep bonnet, don’t they?”

“You know—” He tripped and barely caught himself from falling.

Christine stopped walking and turned toward him. Her eyes squinted and her finger bounced up and down at him.

“And, tell me why you all are so religious but you don’t have church every week? My community church back home has services every week and a prayer meeting on Wednesdays.” She tilted her head and her hair fell down the side of her shoulder. The orange sun shone on her head, and her caramel hair appeared even more golden. Their eyes locked.
What had she asked him?

Eli wanted to kiss her. The frankness of his own thoughts and desires scared him and he stood straighter and cleared his throat. He started walking slowly again and she continued with him.

“Well?”

“I’ll answer your questions. The silent prayers are so that no one gets prideful over their personal prayers in front of others.”

“So, it’s like praying in your closet instead of on the street corners like the Pharisees?”

“Yes, exactly.” Why was he explaining this to her when she seemed to be doing just fine with it herself? “And the hair is an issue of modesty. I know it’s somewhere in the Bible. You’ll have
to ask Aunt Annie or my mother about that. I try not to get too involved with those lady issues.”

Christine stopped and with her free hand grabbed his forearm. Her delicate hand squeezed harder than he expected. She was standing close and looking up at him with those beautiful brown eyes. The fresh open air wrapped around them, energizing him.

“But you should know these standards, Eli. Someday you’ll have a wife and maybe some daughters, and aren’t you going to want to understand why they can’t wear their hair down?”

He nodded and tried not to laugh but couldn’t keep it in. He loved her chatter and how serious she was about her interrogation.

“You’re laughing at me?” She grinned back.

“No. But since you’re full of questions, I have a question for you, too.” He didn’t wait for a response. “Yesterday you were a frightened cat and today—what changed?”

Christine’s soft face looked far into the distance. She inhaled deeply and exhaled slowly.

“There is something about being out here, away from the rest of the world that comforts me. I know this feeling won’t last forever—I have a lot of decisions to make, but for now—for today—I want to enjoy all of this.”

“Because you won’t be here long?” Could she hear his heart pounding?

Her head jerked up for her eyes to meet his. Her countenance had shifted. “I don’t know. I don’t feel like I know anything yet.”

Eli was angry to have taken away her lightheartedness with his comments. He wanted her to be free here—to be at peace. But, how could he offer that to her when he didn’t have it for himself?

CHAPTER 19

I
t didn’t take long for Christine to learn that the only thing that she could do as well as the Amish women was make a bed. Her nursing career made that possible. Her bed was adorned with a beautiful star-patterned quilt in teals, reds, blues, and greens. The iron bed was common enough, but the quilt made her feel as if she were sleeping in the best bed in the house. Her bedroom at home had been simple, and while her mother was an amazing cook and sewed clothing, she didn’t quilt.

Christine ran another hand over the pattern before she decided it was perfect. She pulled out the mirror from her bag and propped it up against the oil lamp. It was so small she didn’t know how in the world she would do her hair. The first night she was there she peeked around every corner of the house when she thought Aunt Annie wasn’t looking and didn’t find a bathroom anywhere. The sweet old lady was laughing at her when she pointed to the outhouse outside.

Outhouse! Of course Christine knew this, but it hadn’t occurred to her when it was late and she was tired and ready to go to bed.

“Is there a mirror out there?”

“
Nay
,
mei
maedle
,” she smiled as she shook her head. “Don’t you have a hand mirror?”

Christine nodded her head.

“Just use that.” Then Aunt Annie had gone to tidy the kitchen before she retired to bed. The kitchen looked spotless to Christine, but somehow the woman still found something to clean.

Christine suddenly became aware of her own vanity and primness. And what was she saying when she called her
maedle
? She was too embarrassed to ask.

So here she was with her small mirror propped up as best as she could get it.

“Oh, Christine, your hair,” she talked to herself, trying to fix her pin curls. She pulled out the pins and put them between her lips. She finally did roll it on one side and let the rest of it fall down in waves. Surely that would do. In the small bit of reflection she noticed her earrings. Should she take them out? No one else was wearing jewelry. Her fingers spun one around in a circle as she thought, then she decided to keep them in.

Eli was going to come to see her sometime today, but she wasn’t sure when. The previous day he came in the morning and she had gone back to the farm with him for most of the day. He showed her just about every corner of the entire farm amidst the distraction of his siblings, who constantly stared at her. At least they smiled. Sarah and Sylvia both were very friendly, but naturally neither understood why she was there and probably wished she wasn’t. The very presence of Mark was what made things the most uncomfortable. This made mealtimes awkward. No one spoke and the tension was obvious. How would they feel if she stayed long enough for them to learn that she was expecting a baby?

Christine pulled out the paper from her clutch purse.

Your daughter will be given a new identity while at our home. Here she will receive instruction on how to live a clean and pure life. She will not be idle but will practice good Christian servitude while doing light farm work or cooking for her fellow housemates. This will provide her with skills she may not already have and a reformed heart when she returns home. The child she carries will be placed with an approved Christian family. You must not concern yourself with the documentation, as all of this will be sealed and filed away. No one will even know it exists. Your daughter will be returned to you in a condition that is proper and respectful.

She couldn’t read any more. She folded the paper crudely and stuffed it back into her clutch. The thought of it brought on nausea, and she rushed to the outhouse in just enough time to retch. By the time she returned and looked at her reflection in the small, round mirror her kohl was smeared and her face pasty, in spite of the rouge. She realized, however, there was no one who cared how made up she was. Aunt Annie certainly didn’t care.

She patted her face to encourage the blood flow and walked out into the kitchen.

“Now, don’t you look nice. What a pretty dress,” Aunt Annie said. “Just a shade darker and the girls in Ohio would wear that color.”

What Ohio girls? Christine looked down at her green dress. She’d picked it out because it was on the plainer side, though she’d never have thought that the grassy green color wasn’t allowed.

“They dress real nice in Ohio. That’s where I come from. The bishop lets them wear more colors, not just navy blue, black, and maroon. Their sewing is perfect, too. Not like here where hems aren’t straight and—” Annie interrupted herself. “Would you like to help me bake some bread?”

“I don’t know how. My mother said I’m hopeless.”

“What about pies?”

She shook her head.

“No.” She winced. She was useless to Aunt Annie.

“Nonsense. Anyone can learn. If Rudy’s Laura, who’s as simple as potato soup, can learn, anyone can learn. Trust me. Would you like to?”

“Learn to bake bread and pies?”

“What else are you going to do?”

Christine’s eyes surveyed the house. There were only four rooms: a small kitchen with a table, a slightly larger space for the living room, and two bedrooms. She had no patients to tend. Even if she wrote letters, the only people who wanted to hear from her were her mother and Jeanne. Even still, it wouldn’t take her all day to do that. She really should fill her time doing something useful.

“Why not,” she said, trying to hide her reluctance.

“Let’s get started on the
brote
—that’s bread. Next week we’ll start working on our garden.” Aunt Annie stood from the chair and began pulling her sleeves up to her elbows.

“
Our
garden?”

“We’ll have a large one so we can do a lot of canning. We’ll give most of it away, of course. Some people never did recover from the Depression—worse here than Ohio.” She paused for a moment looking at Christine up and down. “You have an apron?”

She thought of her nursing apron that hung in her home in Poughkeepsie. She shook her head.

“Well, use that one over there.” Aunt Annie pointed near the woodstove where an apron hung on a drying rack. “Oh, and pull those sleeves up, too. You don’t want to get your pretty green dress dirty.”

Christine did as she was told and kept listening as the older
woman told her about all the vegetables they’d plant. Apparently, Aunt Annie expected her to be around for a while, when Christine was wondering whether or not she should go to the maternity home. Did she really have a choice? It was clear to her that she was only causing problems for Eli and she’d only been there for a few days.

Over the next several hours Christine did her best to help Aunt Annie. After showing her the process of mixing, rolling, and laying out piecrust in the pan, Annie told her to try on her own. What she wouldn’t give to have her nursing notebook handy to take notes. Couldn’t she just sit and watch?

“What’s all this?” Eli walked into the house without knocking.

Christine’s chin dropped against her chest. At some point in the process Annie had wrapped a cloth that looked a lot like a handkerchief around her hair, but strands had come through and stuck to her sweaty face. How was it that she was sweating at all? It was only mid-April.

“Pie?” Christine said, wincing. Her hands were covered with dough and flour.

She caught Eli glancing over at Aunt Annie, who was smiling brightly as usual. He walked over and pushed the hair from Christine’s face. He tucked it carefully in her head wrap and pushed up her glasses too. A shiver went down her spine. She cleared her throat.

“Christine’s pie isn’t quite ready to take visiting yet, but it was only her first try.” She giggled.

Christine knew she was only teasing, though she completely agreed. Her crust looked like the crudely sewn face of Frankenstein from the picture she’d seen years earlier. The pieces appeared misshapen, malformed, as if they didn’t belong together.

“Ah, well, we’ll take a few of mine instead. I know Truman’s
Marianna is not well, again, and I know she loves peach pie. I think it’ll be lovely for Christine to get out and about.”

Christine shot Eli a look of panic. She couldn’t go visiting. What would people think of her?

“I’m sure she’ll make an impression.” Eli winked at her.

An impression?

“Can I steal Christine away for a short walk?”

“Surely, surely.” Aunt Annie patted Christine’s arm as she gently nudged her away from the dry, pieced together crust. “I’ll see what I can do with this. Go wash up outside. Eli can help you with the pump.”

Once they were outside, Eli pumped the water and she did her best to wash the flour and pastry dough from her hands and arms.

“I don’t know how your aunt bakes without making a mess. I’ll never manage.” She dried her hands and arms with the borrowed apron and with a sigh let it fall back down over her dress. It was a mess. How would she wash it? She didn’t have the laundry service at the hospital to depend on.

Eli leaned forward with a smirk. His hand rose to her face. His fingers brushed against her skin as delicately as a butterfly. He had never touched her quite like that before. A tingle raced down her spine. She didn’t want to have a rush from his touch. She wasn’t available to him or to any man.

“Flour.” His eyes twinkled and Christine couldn’t help but laugh. “And I like the head scarf. Royal blue is your color.”

“You.” She poked his chest. “You’ll never let me live down the disaster you just witnessed, will you?”

He shrugged.

“I will if you make me a tasty cherry pie. If it tastes half as good as my mother’s I’ll spread the news all around the district.”

“A harrowing task.” She sighed and began walking down the field toward his farm. “I’m not sure I’m up for it.” A breeze
picked up and she rubbed her hands together and then hugged herself. “Aunt Annie is darling, really, and I’m just a dunce in the kitchen. I’ll never be good at it.”

“How do you eat?”

“Well, as a girl my mother made everything and at the hospital I didn’t have to prepare anything.”

“You weren’t going to be there forever. What were you going to do after you got married someday?” He winked at her.

“Is everything a joke to you, Eli?” Christine didn’t realize her frustration until she heard her own voice.

“I was only picking a little, Christy. I didn’t mean—” He turned to face her. Even though she didn’t meet his gaze, she could see him smiling at her.

“Forget it.” But she couldn’t. “And besides, you know my situation. I’ll never be married. And don’t call me Christy.”

Eli cleared his throat and she could see him look at her out of the corner of his eye. They walked quietly for a few paces. A breeze picked up and her hair blew, exposing her neck, giving her a chill.

“It’s cold out here. I think I’m going to go back. Can we just talk later?”

She couldn’t meet Eli’s gaze; instead she looked over his shoulder. The field behind the farm stretched far before the tree line was visible. The other way, toward the country dirt road, stood his house. She watched the activity, people going in and out of the barn with wheelbarrows, and the laundry being taken down from the line. His little sisters teeter-tottered and the younger boys ran around them. They all chanted something she couldn’t quite hear and then the girls rushed off and ran around as the boys jumped on. Giggles abounded. Christine didn’t belong here.