A Plain Love Song (21 page)

“Nee, nee.” She stumbled away, walking faster. “You can’t do that. Don’t compare me to anything close to God.”

“I can’t help myself.”

Jackson caught up with her, snatched her arm a second time, and whirled her around. His kiss took her so utterly by surprise she nearly sank to the ground. He wrapped his arms around her waist and held her up, the kiss deepening until she was sure she would black out and he’d have to carry her to the buggy and drive her home. He tasted of tobacco and mint gum and the promise of more. He tasted like freedom. The thought only made the blood race faster from her heart to her head and back, blotting out any thought of what was right or
wrong, good or bad. Finally, finally, he backed away, but his hands tightened around her hips, his gaze locked on her face.

Gasping for breath, Adah stared up at him. Her heart slammed against her ribcage. She could feel the blood pumping through her body. Every nerve quivered like a cloud of hummingbirds, their wings beating in agitation against a net. She waited, thinking he would say something. Still, he didn’t speak. He simply looked at her, his expression daring her to respond. Anger burned through her, turning everything inside her to ashes. “You promised.” Two words. They were all she could muster. “You promised.”

“I know—”

“Goodbye, Jackson.”

She turned and fled.

“Adah, wait.”

“No, you spoiled it. You said you were a gentleman.”

“I am, but I’m only human.”

She untied the reins from the fence post with hands that seemed to be all thumbs. The reins dropped to the ground. She stooped, scooped them up, and scrambled into the buggy. Before she could get Dusty moving, Jackson hauled himself in on the other side and plopped down next to her.

“Get out.”

“Not until you accept my apology.”

“Get out.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You shouldn’t have done that.”

“I know, but you make a man crazy. The huffier you get, the more your eyes light up and the more your skin turns that pretty pink color.” Jackson stared straight ahead. He breathed so hard, he sounded as if he’d been running. “You have beautiful lips. Did you know that? You’re driving me nuts!”

“Why?”

“I don’t know why. I don’t know!”

He flung the words at her, the truth of them etched across his face.

Adah stared at the reins in her hands, unable to remember what to do with them. She’d been driving buggies since she was seven.

“I
am
sorry.”

“I know.” She didn’t look at him, didn’t dare, or she might do something horrible, like lean in to him for another kiss. “You have to get down.”

“Let’s go hang with the band.”

“No.”

“Go to Bert’s party, then.”

“No!”

“To the pond? We’ll write a song.”

“No.”

“Then just sit here with me for a minute.”

Considering the shaking of her body and the tears that clouded her vision, Adah figured she needed a minute to collect herself. It wasn’t so she could spend another sixty seconds in Jackson’s company. Not at all.

Neither of them spoke. Jackson tugged a cigarette from his pack and flicked open a silver lighter with a stallion etched on the cover. The acrid smell of butane and burning tobacco floated in the air, mingling with the earthy smells of hay and manure. She couldn’t have found words if she tried. Monster trucks rumbled by, stirring up dust and hurling diesel fumes at them. The overflow parking cleared and the traffic dwindled. Fresh air blew in on a night breeze, finally cooling the dark and banishing the smells.

“I
am
sorry, Amish girl.” His voice was so soft and hoarse she could barely hear him. “But if you could see yourself the way I see you, you’d understand.”

“No, I wouldn’t.”

“I thought you folks were all about forgiveness.”

“We are.”

“Then how about spreading a little of it my way? Give a guy a break. Especially one who’s falling in love with you.”

“You’re not helping your case.”

“It’s not a crime to love someone.”

“There can’t be anything between us.”

The silence stretched. He sighed, the softest, saddest sound Adah had ever heard. “Meet me at the pond Wednesday after you finish cleaning? For another lesson?”

“How will that help your…our…situation?”

“Just because I’m a jerk doesn’t mean you should give up your music.”

“You’re not a jerk.”

“I’m glad you can see that. Come to the pond.”

“We’ll see.”

He smacked his hand on the side of the buggy. Adah jumped. He sighed. “Sorry. That’s what my mom says when she means no.”

“I mean I’ll see. I have to think. I can’t think with you sitting next to me.”

“Then I’ll let you go.” He climbed down. She breathed for the first time all evening, it seemed. He looked back. “For now.”

She stopped breathing again. “You’re not helping.”

He flashed a grin, his teeth white against the growing darkness. “You kissed me back.”

“Did not.”

“You just keep telling yourself that.”

His laugh followed her all the way home. Her first kiss and it had been with a man she barely knew instead of the man who’d been courting her for two years. Matthew didn’t deserve this. Her heart ached with the shame of it and knowing she desperately wanted to kiss Jackson again.
Gott, what is wrong with me?
She pulled over long enough to fix her hair and pin her kapp to her head. Her apron was wrinkled from being stuffed in her bag, but it was better than nothing. At least she didn’t have to stop at the shed to change her clothes. At least she hadn’t gone that far.

The heady excitement of the music fled as she pulled back onto the road, chased away by the events in its aftermath. Dani Jo and her hostility. Bert and his eyes that seemed to peek under her dress. Clayton Star with his knowing smile and patronizing tone. The combination left her with a headache and the sure knowledge that she’d made
a terrible mistake. She’d tried to have it all. It couldn’t be done. One thing led to another. She’d raced toward the slippery slope full tilt, and found herself at the bottom on her behind, just as Daed had predicted.

She urged Dusty into a trot, anxious to get home and to bed. For a rumspringa night it was still early. She still had time to get a decent night’s sleep and be up early to do chores around the house. Time to study the Confession of Faith articles. Time to prepare for baptism class. Time to get right with Gott.

Relief flowed through her. She could get her bearings again among her own people. Find herself. From now on she would concentrate on baptism classes. Give her parents what they wanted. What she needed.

Feeling a little better, she pulled onto the dirt road that led to her house and let Dusty lead the way. The breeze cooled her face. Earthy night smells, country smells of dirt and grass, calmed her. She breathed, her heart settling into its normal pace. If she could only forget the feel of Jackson’s hand rubbing her back or his lips on hers.
Stop it. Gott, I’m sorry, so sorry. Forgive me.

In the moonlight, something moved in front of the house. The beat of her heart stumbled over itself in a painful hiccup. Who would be outside this time of night? Surely not Daed waiting up for her. Her heartbeat took off in a dead run. He would see her face and know. She pulled up on the reins, trying to slow Dusty down, but the horse slogged on, anxious, no doubt, for his stall and rest.

A horse’s head bobbed. It whinnied. A horse and buggy sat by the hitching post, battery operated lights luminous against the dark night.

A stream of light from a flashlight whooshed over her and then circled back. Adah squinted and slapped her palm to her forehead as if that would help her see who stood behind the flashlight’s brilliance. She pulled back on the reins again and came to a stop by the other buggy.

“So there you are.”

Matthew.

The headache came back full force.

“I was beginning to think you were ignoring my flashlight.” His
tone crackled, as brittle and dry as two-day old toast. “It never occurred to me you weren’t home.”

“Matthew, I was just…”

He turned the flashlight off, leaving his face in darkness. Without speaking, he climbed in the buggy, snapped the reins, and drove away.

Chapter 17

M
atthew ignored the
clip-clop
of another set of horse’s hooves. He pulled through the Knepps’ gate and turned on to the road that led to the highway. Heat burned his face and neck despite the warm night breeze. What had he been thinking? He’d been thinking he would take Adah for a drive and give her a good talking to. He’d make her see. He’d prove his daed and Molly and all the others wrong. Groossdaadi was right. A person had to fight for the person he loved. Matthew had set out to fight for her. Instead, he’d only embarrassed himself. Why hadn’t he seen it? Adah couldn’t commit to him because there was someone else. Her cheeks were bright red and her hair looked done up in a hurry under her crooked kapp. The sight of him had sent guilt rising on her face plain as day. Who? His mind raced over the possibilities. Not that many existed. The New Hope district was too new, too small.

Richard Bontrager. He’d make a good candidate. The way he looked at Adah the day of the canning frolic, before he realized Matthew approached. But if Richard came courting, he would come in his own buggy, take her for a ride, and bring her home. What was she doing out gallivanting on country roads at night by herself? Who had she been meeting?

“Matthew, stop! Come on, stop!”

Adah’s buggy pulled up next to his on the wrong side of the road.

“Are you crazy? You can’t drive on that side.” Matthew pulled toward the shoulder of the road. Much farther over and he’d be in the ditch. “What do you want?”

“Stop. At least give me a chance to explain.”

“You don’t owe me an explanation.”

“Jah, I do. Please.”

Matthew yanked the buggy over to the shoulder and came to a stop. Not because she asked him to do it, but because he knew better than to drive when he was so furious. He’d never felt this angry before in his life. Thanks to Adah Knepp.

Adah drew her buggy onto the shoulder a few yards ahead of him. She made no move to get down. Apparently she expected him to come to her, which of course he already had done once this evening.

He counted to ten. Then to twenty. Then to thirty. Finally, he jumped from his buggy and stalked toward hers. “If you have something to say, say it.”

“Could you please get up here and sit? Please.”

Words he would never say aloud bobbed in his head. He swatted them away. No point in standing here looking up at her like a little boy at the candy store, wanting something he couldn’t have. He’d come to talk. Might as well talk. He did as she asked.

For a few minutes, she didn’t speak and he saw no reason to be the one to initiate the conversation. Crickets sang. An owl hooted.

“I don’t know what I’m doing.” Her voice, laden with unshed tears, hurt his heart. His anger whooshed out, fizzled, and sank to the ground like a spent balloon. “I want to do the right thing, but if I do, I’m afraid I’ll never be happy.” She shook her head. Her prayer kapp slid some more. Her bun slipped. “Happy isn’t the right word. Content. I want to be content.”

She might as well have shot him through the heart with her daed’s hunting rifle. Matthew swallowed against the pain of the inference that she could never be happy or content with him. “What do you want? What would it take for you to be happy?”

“I want to play my music.” She peeked sideways at him. “But I also want my family and my friends and my community.”

She didn’t say it, but the way she looked at him gave Matthew a faint hope he might be included in this circle of people she wanted in her life. He stared at the carpet of sky thick with stars. He’d stared at them so many times with Adah at his side. Had she been content in his company or only feigning it? Why wasn’t he enough for her?

What an arrogant thought. Didn’t he want the woman he made his fraa to be happy and content with her lot? “Isn’t it enough to have the music we sing while we work and while we play? Isn’t it enough to sing praises to God? Even to sing praises during the prayer service?”

“If I weigh it all out when I’m alone or at the prayer service or doing the laundry at home, I think it’s enough. It’s when I get too close to all of it that I find myself drawn to the other music, the other life.” She said the words fast as if it were a release to let it out. “Isn’t that what the rumspringa is for? So we can see the other life and know that it’s not for us? What if we find out it
is
what we want?”

She didn’t have to specify what
it
was. He’d seen the shine in her eyes, the way her lips parted and her breathing quickened when they went to the concerts. She didn’t drink the pop he brought her or hear him when he spoke to her, so entranced was she by the music. She also didn’t look at him like that. “Do you really want to wear goop on your face and shiny shoes and strut across a stage and sing for strangers who ogle you and turn to you for pleasure instead of to God?”