A Bee in Her Bonnet (14 page)

Dorothy and Joann flashed matching smiles. “Okay,” Dorothy said. “That would be wonderful-
gute
.”

Luke propped his elbow on his wagon. “Mamm is never going to let you keep four cats.”

Dorothy stuck out her bottom lip. “Yes, she will, once we tell her how we saved them. She'll want them to have a
gute
home.”

“Go along then,” he said, more eager to get rid of them than to argue about the kittens. They were Mamm's headache now.

“What about Poppy's head?” Joann asked.

Poppy dabbed at her forehead with her apron. “I'll be all right.”

“I'll see she gets home,” Luke said.

Joann handed her kittens to Dorothy and gave Poppy a hug. “
Denki
, Poppy. I hope I'm as brave as you someday.”

Not if Luke had anything to say about it.

His sisters walked away, chatting merrily about how they were going to take care of their cats. No one seeing them would have guessed that they'd been weeping and wailing half an hour ago.

Poppy grasped her limp arm with her other hand. “I should go home and take some ibuprofen,” she said, clearly in more pain than she would ever show.

Pressing his lips into a hard line, he pulled his damp handkerchief from his damp pocket and handed it to her. She dabbed at the blood on her forehead. The cut was just a small scratch, but he'd first seen it when the water mixed with the blood, and it had looked like a seven-stitch wound.

Luke pushed his fingers into his forehead, trying to rub away the anger that burned hot right behind his eyes. “Your feet are bleeding.”

She lifted one foot and had the audacity to grin. “Sharp rocks. But at least I didn't ruin a good pair of shoes.”

Something about the cavalier way she talked about her shoes made him snap like a willow switch. “Poppy Christner,” he said, making his voice soft and menacing so she knew he meant business—so she would wipe that aggravatingly stunning smile off her face and feel a little bit of remorse for what she'd put him through.

She peered at him as if waiting for him to tease her about her wet dress or how funny she looked with blood drizzling down her face.

He was so furious, he thought he might explode. He'd be hanged if he let her make light of this. He scrubbed his fingers through his hair. “That was reckless and foolish.”

She finally lost her smile. “Luke, it was a ditch as shallow as a kiddie pool.”

“And yet your head is bleeding and you can't move your arm,” he snarled. “You put yourself in danger. You put my sisters in danger.”

She lifted her chin, and a hot, raging forest fire flared to life behind her eyes. “I would never, ever do anything to harm your sisters.”

“What if they had followed your example and jumped in? What if Dorothy had hit her head on a rock? Did you think of that? It was foolish, Poppy. Stupid and foolish.”

Her jaw dropped. “I told them to stay on the bank.”

“So you didn't care if you drowned.”

“I wasn't going to drown.”

Luke growled until his throat felt raw. “You almost did. If I hadn't pulled you out . . .”

“If you hadn't pulled me out, I would have climbed out by myself. You're not so indispensable, Luke Bontrager, and I don't need you.”

“And I don't need this aggravation.” He jabbed a finger in her direction. “I'm done with you, Poppy. For good and forever.”

“Done with me?”

“I won't save you from yourself anymore.”

She scowled. “I never asked you to save me in the first place.”

He folded his arms across his chest. “I should have known you'd be ungrateful.”

“I should have known you'd be arrogant. What are you so angry about? Are you upset because a girl did what you should have done? What you were too chicken to do?”

He smacked his hand against the side of his wagon so hard, even Poppy jumped. “You don't know anything. You want to prove you're so tough, just like the boys.” His voice shook. “You're a girl, Poppy. You're weaker and softer, and you're never going to be as good as the boys at anything.”

She stepped back as if he had slapped her across the face. “I'll never be as good at being an idiot.”

“Then quit trying.”

She took a deep breath and glared at him with such contempt in her eyes, she might have made a weaker man fall over. “I hate you, Luke Bontrager.”

“I hate you right back.”

She turned on her heels, leaving her basket, her drill, and four loaves of bread sitting in his wagon. She wouldn't be able to carry all of it with one good hand anyway. “Don't follow me,” she said.

He leaned against his wagon and watched her limp down the road, not looking away until she stepped safely onto the footbridge that spanned the pond at the front of their property. He'd hate himself tomorrow if he didn't at least make sure she got home safe.

He knew how a girl should be treated, even if she didn't want the treatment. At least Dinah Eicher appreciated him. Besides, he preferred blue eyes over brilliant green any day.

Good riddance, Poppy Christner.

Chapter Eleven

Poppy was getting pretty good at doing things with one hand. She couldn't work the hives, but she could use the smoker. She couldn't knead bread dough, but she could stir the cake batter. She couldn't hoe, but she could pull weeds by hand from her garden. And her garden sorely needed some attention.

Ever since she'd caught her hand in a certain car window, the bindweed had been creeping toward the tomato plants, and oh,
sis yuscht
, they were stubborn weeds. Unless she pulled out the whole root, the pesky things reappeared after only a few days, and the roots were nearly impossible to kill. It tempted her to spray the whole garden with weed killer and start again next year. But Aunt B refused to allow anything poisonous near the bees. Better to be careful of the bees than be rid of the bindweed.

Despite being out on a bright, clear day in July, Poppy felt gray and drab, as if someone had extinguished the sun in her little patch of the world. It felt like she couldn't catch her breath, and her heart ached with something deep and raw that she didn't want to put a name to.

She scooted farther down the row, picked up her trowel, and started turning over small piles of dirt. She certainly wasn't sad about Luke or anything he might have said to her yesterday. She couldn't care less what that boy thought or how he behaved. A boy that stupid and hateful had absolutely no power to hurt her—except for the fact that in his panic to pull her from the three-foot-deep ditch, he'd dislocated her shoulder.

You're never going to be as good as the boys at anything.
She bit her bottom lip to keep from crying out. That's what Luke had told her. She didn't know why his words stabbed her in the heart. She'd heard them dozens of times from boys at school. In the few terrible months they'd lived with Dawdi and Mammi, Dawdi Sol had admonished her daily for trying to be better than the boys. Urius Beachy had been the worst of all. He had pulled her hair and kicked her in the shins just to prove that boys were better than girls.

You're just a stupid girl, Poppy
. Gotte
loves boys more.

It didn't matter what Luke had said. Nothing any boy said bothered her anymore. She only felt down because she had an annoying bandage on her forehead and a sling on her arm. The yawning hole in her chest was because her shoulder hurt something wonderful. To her relief, the doctor said that a dislocated shoulder was a minor injury. She just needed to wear the sling for two weeks and be careful for a few weeks after that, and she'd be as good as new.

At least her shoulder would be.

Just the thought of wearing a sling for a couple of weeks made her testy. How could she work around the farm or help with Lily's wedding or pick the cherries that would be ready to harvest next week? How could she gather eggs from their nice, new chicken coop with only one good hand?

Her heart slammed against her rib cage and made her wince.

Never mind. She'd let Rose gather the eggs.

The chicken coop reminded her of Luke Bontrager, and she'd rather not have that unpleasant experience every morning.

At least the chicken coop was still standing after last night. The troublemaker had come back and torn all their laundry from the line. That seemed to be his favorite thing to do. They'd have to start hanging their clothes to dry inside the house if they didn't want double laundry every week.

Laundry. Another thing she couldn't do with one hand.

A lump grew in the pit of her stomach. The harder she thought about it, the more sure she became that the vandalism was her fault. Whoever was making mischief on their farm did it because they hated her.

Unfortunately there were a lot of boys on that list, Luke Bontrager at the very top. He was the only boy who had ever been brave enough to tell her he hated her right to her face. Maybe he had been the vandal all along.

Poppy quickly squelched that thought. Luke had been the arrogant boy on the playground who wouldn't let her play football, but he wasn't vicious or vindictive. More recently, he'd saved her hand from a car window and pulled her out of a ditch. She'd spent two whole days building a chicken coop with him, and he'd eaten dinner at her house. He had even put his arm around her. Twice. Not on purpose, of course. Luke would never voluntarily touch someone he found so repulsive, but he'd done it because he thought he needed to save her, even if he hadn't.

He might be aggravatingly confident, but he would never harm Poppy or her family. She knew that from the bottom of her heart.

The ache in her chest grew with every breath she took. It felt even worse when she breathed out.

Oh,
sis yuscht
. Was she crying? She swiped the back of her hand across her eyes and bit back whatever tears wanted to escape. Poppy didn't cry. No matter what Luke or Dawdi or Urius Beachy thought, she was the tough one, the strong one, the one who watched out for her sisters when their parents had died. The one who would fight to defend her family, no matter what.

And she would never, ever, cry over a boy, especially a boy like Luke Bontrager, who yelled at her and told her she was weak and thought he was smarter than a doctor.

Crying over Luke was silly, and Poppy was not a silly girl.

She looked up as she heard the buggy come down the lane. Aunt B was back from the library. Poppy quickly dried any hint of tears from her eyes with the handkerchief from her apron pocket. Aunt B would not suspect a thing.

She paused and studied the handkerchief smeared with two or three spots of dried blood. Where had this come from? It wasn't one of Rose's embroidered ones.

Ach
.

Luke had given it to her yesterday right before he'd started yelling. Her eyes stung with tears that she absolutely refused to shed.

Silly, silly girl.

Aunt B waved to Poppy and parked the buggy next to the barn. After unhitching Queenie, she led her to the little pasture on the far side of the barn, which gave Poppy time to compose herself. Aunt B need never know that Poppy had made a fool of herself over a boy.

A stupid, mean, conceited boy.

Aunt B came around from the side of the barn, retrieved some books from the buggy, and strolled to Poppy's garden. “The tomatoes are coming along nice,” she said, being careful not to step on the dandelions or Poppy's lettuce.

“I planted some cherry tomatoes this year. We might even get enough to sell.”

“Wonderful-
gute
. Every little bit helps if we want special M&M's for the wedding.”

Poppy cracked a smile. “Special M&M's?”

“I went online at the library. You can order M&M's with the bride's and groom's names on them. With the M&M's and the fireworks, Lily will be thrilled.”

“Then I'll pray we get a
gute
tomato harvest. We've got to have M&M's.”

Aunt B smirked. “Paul Glick will be righteously indignant about our wedding M&M's. I can't wait to see his face get all red and splotchy.”

“Will Paul be invited to the wedding?”

“We can't very well leave him out. We're inviting the whole district.”

Poppy pointed to the four books Aunt B cradled in her arm. “What did you get?”

After studying Poppy's face for a minute, Aunt B plopped herself down in the dirt and rested the books in her lap. “I'm doing more research for my vampire book. I'm having real trouble getting it to flow. I don't think Edgar and Isabella love each other that much, but I can't make Isabella fall in love with the ogre because the ogre is in love with Isabella's daughter. It's a mess.”

Poppy smiled. “What books did you get?”

Aunt B held up the first one. “This is the best one of all. I found some money in it.”

“Money?”

Aunt B leafed through the book and pulled out three one-hundred dollar bills from between the pages. “I was the last person to check this out, and I accidentally stored some of my savings in here.”

Poppy laughed. “That's wonderful-
gute
.” Aunt B didn't trust her money in a bank, so she stored her excess cash all over the house. The Bible always had the most money in it. Aunt B thought her money was safer in the Good Book.

“I cast my bread upon the waters, and
Gotte
brought it back to me. But I'll need to be more careful about where I put my money. Who knows how much I've lost.” She tapped her finger to her lips. “I think I better go back and check out a few more books.” She looked up at the sky. “
Denki
, Lord, for leading me to this book today. I'm really eager to get those fireworks.”

With the books still cradled in her lap, Aunt B leaned over and pulled a few weeds from Poppy's neglected tomatoes. “We need to take a hoe to this.”

Poppy huffed out an exasperated breath. “I know. I can't get ahead of the weeds. The cherries will be ripe, the honey is almost ready, and I've got to make bread for the fellowship luncheon next week.”

Aunt B lightly pinched Poppy's earlobes with her fingers. “We'll manage, little sister. Dan will help with the cherries and the honey. Your sisters can do the bread.”

“I can't do hardly anything.”

Aunt B frowned. “Well, it's not your fault. You've been mashed and squeezed and stretched harder than a cockroach in a washing machine. And it's all Luke Bontrager's fault. Every time that boy comes over, disaster strikes.”

Something sharp like a shard of broken glass lodged next to Poppy's heart. She held her breath and tried to ignore it. Superior, ill-humored Luke had no power to upset her whatsoever. “Then we can all rejoice that he won't be over again.”

Aunt B tilted her head to get a better look at Poppy's face and propped her chin on her fist. She had a small tattoo of a pink flower on her wrist today. “What happened yesterday?”

Poppy drew her brows together. “I told you. I fished those four kittens out of the ditch and then Luke thought I needed to be fished out. I guess he pulled too hard.”

“Did he say something stupid?”

“He always says something stupid.”

“Something extra stupid?”

Poppy ran her finger along the strap of the sling. “He said I'm weak.”

“That boy wouldn't know sense if it kicked him in the head.”

Poppy swallowed hard as that shard of glass edged closer to her heart. “He said I'll never be as good as a boy.” She tried to sound as if she couldn't care less. Not even Aunt B would know how those words had sliced right through her heart. Poppy had never told her about Urius Beachy. She didn't need to know about Luke. “He said he hates me.”

Aunt B pursed her lips. “Luke's proud and hasty, but that's harsh, even for him.”

“I said it first.” Once she admitted it, she realized how ashamed she was. As a Christian, she was supposed to love everyone. But that wasn't the reason she felt so ashamed. She felt ashamed because it was a lie. She didn't hate Luke Bontrager. The only thing she wasn't sure about was to what extent she
didn't
hate him.

Aunt B nodded. “That makes more sense now.”

Poppy massaged her forehead and groaned. “I shouldn't have said that.”

“It sounds like he had it coming. Luke sticks his foot in his mouth so often, he should learn to hop.”

“I made him pretty mad.”

“It ain't your fault, little sister.” Aunt B squeezed her ear again. “Ever since his
dat
's cancer and his
mamm
's accident, he's been a little intense.”

When Luke was in seventh grade his
dat
had gotten a cancer that laid him low for almost two years. During that same time, Luke's
mamm
lost her foot in a farming accident. Being the oldest sibling, Luke probably had a lot of worries fall on his shoulders.

“I shouldn't have told him I hate him.”

Aunt Bitsy narrowed her eyes and leaned closer. “Do you?”

Poppy stared down at the freshly-turned dirt.
“Nae.”

“I see.”

“He gave me a drill. I thought maybe we could be friends.”

Aunt B's eyebrows were in danger of flying off her face. “A drill?”

“He said he wanted to teach me how to use it.”

“That's no casual gift, especially for Luke,” Aunt B said. “He doesn't like girls using drills.”

They turned and watched as Dan Kanagy, with a lovesick grin on his face, drove his open-air buggy down their lane.

Aunt B growled under her breath. “Doesn't that boy have something better to do than come over all the time?”

Poppy giggled. “Probably not.”

“He eats all our food.”

Not as much as Luke had.

Dan parked his buggy next to the sidewalk and jumped down with a spring in his step. He was a boy in love, after all. “Poppy, Bitsy,” he called. He reached into his buggy and pulled out a basket. Poppy's basket.

She'd left it in Luke's wagon.

Dan charged across the grass, and Aunt B stood so fast, she nearly jumped out of her skin. “Dan Kanagy, don't trample my dandelions. Have you no shame?”

Dan merely smiled, bent over, and gave Aunt B a peck on the cheek. “I've come to see Lily,” he announced.

“I never would have guessed,” Aunt B said.

He glanced doubtfully at Poppy. “Luke asked me to return this basket. He said you left it in his wagon.”

Poppy took the basket from Dan. The three uneaten loaves of bread were there as well as the loaf she had given Luke with the three pieces missing. He hadn't eaten another bite. The drill was also missing. He didn't like girls using drills. He didn't like girls at all.