A Plain Love Song (37 page)

“No, no thank you.” Adah patted her denim bag, aware that it held exactly five dollars and six cents. She’d given her nest egg to Charlene to cover room and board. “I changed my mind.”

The waitress shrugged, making the beads in her multitude of tiny braids bounce on her head. “Better hurry or that man of yours will leave you standing on the curb.”

“He’s not my man…”

“That’s a shame. He’s cute as can be, honey. You’d be crazy to let him get away.”

“He’s a friend…”

The waitress had already moved on.

Would Jackson still be her friend if he thought she couldn’t help him reach his dream or rush into being what he would call a girlfriend? If she couldn’t sing and perform in public or let him get closer to her, would he have any use for her?

Jackson might leave her stranded, but she could still do what she needed to survive in this strange new world. She would get a job.

Chapter 34

W
iping his face and neck with a bandana, Matthew stomped his feet outside the door to the kitchen, trying to shake the worst of the dirt from his boots, and then opened the screen door. The heat billowed inside just as it did outside. From the smell of it, supper involved fried pork chops and fried potatoes and onions. His stomach growled at the thought. It had been a long time since the noonday meal of navy beans, ham, and cornbread. He hoped his nose was right. It rarely failed him. Ella looked up from her spot next to the prep table where she dropped rolls into a basket big enough to hold a load of laundry.

“Ouch, yikes, hot, hot!” she yelped as she tossed in another one. “Wow, those are hot.”

“As is to be expected when you take them out of the oven, little sister.” Matthew ruffled the top of her head, shoving her kapp a little to one side. “Ever hear of oven mitts?”

Grinning, she ducked away from his touch. “Didn’t have time. Daed’s chomping at the bit to eat. You’re late.”

“I wanted to get the last of the alfalfa cut so it has time to dry. We may get some rain later in the week.”

“They keep saying that, but it never comes.” At eight years old, Ella sounded like an old hand at this farming business. “We’re more likely to get a dust storm than a rainstorm.”

Matthew stuck his hands in a tub of water in the sink and washed them. “Mostly they’re just guessing, I reckon.”

“You got a letter.”

He turned to look at Ella, a young miniature of his mudder, all bony and angular, who grinned at him, obviously delighting in being the bearer of such surprising news. “I got a letter?”

He didn’t ever remember getting his own letter. Not even after they moved to New Hope from Bliss Creek. All his closest friends came with him. Family sent letters to Mudder and Daed who passed them around after they finished reading them.

“So did Molly. She ran off to her room to read it.”

“Molly got a letter? From the same person?”

“I don’t know. She didn’t say. She just got all excited like she does and hightailed it out of here.”

Smart girl. She wanted to savor the moment before everyone clamored for her to share her news. Letters were big. “Where’s mine?”

“Mudder put it on Daed’s desk in the front room. Better get in there or all the pork chops and taters will be gone before you get a bite.”

Ella was right about that, but he was more worried about keeping Daed waiting than the food. “I’ll read it afterward.”

He followed her out to the dining room, where Molly was pouring water into the glasses set at each plate. She seemed intent on the task, her face placid. They hadn’t spoken of the other night when he’d found her visiting with Richard in the kitchen. It wasn’t his business, but he was glad for her. Richard seemed like a decent man. If God’s plan was for her to be his fraa, then they would both be blessed. He tried to ignore the thought that he would never have such a chance himself. Whatever God’s plan, he couldn’t see it. Maybe he wore blinders. Maybe God had set an opportunity in front of him and he’d missed it somehow. He gritted his teeth and strode across the room. Molly looked up. Her cheeks turned a deep pink.

“Did you hear? Did Ella tell you I got a letter?” She poured water so fast it sloshed from her glass in her hand and dripped on the floor. “Whoops! Did you get yours?”

“She did and not yet.” He handed her the nearest napkin. “I’ll do it after supper. Where’s Daed?”

“He said something about getting a Band-Aid and went upstairs. He’ll be right back.”

“The letter will wait until after we eat.”

“You have to read it.” Molly’s face turned from pink to red and she leaned in close. She smelled like bleach and fresh soap. He could always tell when it was laundry day—aside from the rows of wet clothes drying on the lines outside. “Mine’s from Adah.”

Matthew’s lungs forgot what to do. He let his hands fall to the back of a chair in front of him, his fingers gripping the familiar knotted pine. The room spun until it became a white blur.

“Go get the letter!” Molly dropped her voice to a whisper as if someone lurked nearby. “Hurry before Daed gets back.”

Matthew’s body obeyed even as his thoughts cartwheeled back and forth through his mind. Did Adah want to come home? Did she want him to come get her? Was she sorry? Was she saying goodbye forever?

The questions whirled around him. Supper or no supper, he needed answers. He’d waited long enough.

He headed toward the front room. Daed, who smoothed a Band-Aid over his thumb, met him halfway. “We’re about to sit down to eat.” Daed’s raised eyebrows said it all. “Your groossmammi and groossdaadi are waiting.”

“Let the boy take care of business.” Groossdaadi rose from the rocking chair parked in front of an empty fireplace. “Didn’t you hear? He got a letter from his special friend.”

Groossdaadi’s hearing was mighty good for an old man. Daed’s gaze darkened. “We’re about to eat. You want to read a letter, do it. But we’re not waiting. Food’s getting cold.”

Matthew glanced back at Molly. She gave him the
go-you-won’t-regret-it
look.

“I’ll make it quick.”

“See that you do.”

It wasn’t about the letter. Daed didn’t want him thinking about
Adah. Or worse, trying to convince her to come back. Daed had forgotten what this felt like. Matthew made a beeline for the old, scarred pine desk and the mail Mudder had stacked on top of it. The
Budget.
A seed catalogue. A letter from Aenti Hazel. A flier about a horse auction. There it was. Small, rectangular, and blue. Adah’s familiar loopy cursive on the front. A stamp of the U.S. flag in one corner. The inked postmark and return address read
Branson, MO
.

His legs went weak. He inhaled and sank into Daed’s straight-back chair. At first he intended to open the envelope slowly, to preserve it. His fingers shook.
Get a grip.
It was just a letter from a girl who walked away from her family and her faith and her future with him. Better to rip it off fast, like a bandage stuck to his wounded skin. He unfolded the blue and purple stationery. Monarch butterflies fluttered in one corner. The handwriting wavered before his eyes.

He breathed and began to read.

Dear Matthew,

I can only start with I’m sorry. That’s the first thing. There are so many things I want to tell you. I’m okay. I wouldn’t say fine, but okay. I hope you weren’t worried. I know I don’t have a right to expect you to worry about me. But I know you. You wouldn’t be able to help yourself because you are a kind, decent man.

Matthew gritted his teeth against the desire to say something uncharitable. Heaping compliments on him did nothing to help her case. He was like every Plain man he knew. He worked hard and tried to conform to God’s will. She need not ply him with sweet words intended to soothe, like a mother with a child.

I am sorry if I hurt you, but I suspect your heart is already headed in another direction. I came to talk to you that night before I left. I thought if I could talk to you, I might feel differently about staying in New Hope. I might be able to see my way clear to a future that didn’t include music. You were on the front porch courting Elizabeth and I realized I waited too
long. I’d dabbled in things you couldn’t understand. I let things happen that should never happen to a Plain girl like me—not if I wanted you for my special friend. So I did what I thought was best for us both. I came here to start a new life.

I don’t know what will happen, but I can only move forward with my dream of making music. My dream of being your fraa is gone. I look back at the past few months and I can’t figure out how I got to this place in my life. I feel like a cat chasing her own tail. I can never quite catch up. I can’t catch my breath because it hurts so much. My throat aches with it, like a permanent cold. I’ve only been here a small time and I figure I’ll get used to it. There’s no going back now. I know you won’t have me. So I’ll try to make the best of it and sleep in the bed I made for myself, as my daed would say. I just wanted to say how sorry I am. I hope you are happy with Elizabeth. She will make a good fraa and mudder. Much better than me. Of that I am sure. God bless you.

Adah

Matthew stared at the words, reading them over and over again. He could still feel the heat of the sun on his face that night on the porch and taste the ice cream and the apple pie. He remembered the smell of the honeysuckle on the lattice. He remembered the look on her face. She never gave him a chance to explain. Typical Adah. Running full tilt, never taking the time to get all the information before making a decision. That was his Adah. Was.

Now she made a new life in Branson.

He trudged along here in New Hope, trying to figure out how to do the same. They both wondered how they’d managed to get to this place. She felt like a cat chasing her own tail. He felt like a caged mountain lion, prowling in circles, banging against the walls, wanting out, wanting to find the only woman who mattered to him.

“What did she say?”

He looked up to find Molly standing in the doorway. “She’s fine.”

“She doesn’t sound fine in my letter.”

“What did she say?”

Molly held it out. “Read it.”

“It’s not private?” He hesitated, wanting to read it, but not wanting to feel more blows raining down on his head. “Are you sure?”

“She says she’s sorry she didn’t finish what she started.”

“What she started?” He stared at the envelope as if it were a rabid dog about to lunge at him. It sounded like a familiar theme. She hadn’t finished her business with him either. “What did she start with you?”

“Richard, silly. She doesn’t know that we’re…” Molly’s cheeks grew an even brighter pink. She ducked her head. “You know.”

“I’d rather not know.”

“Well, that’s water under the bridge, isn’t it?” Molly sounded so much like Mudder in that moment, Matthew could imagine her with a baby on one hip and a plate of cookies in her hand, herding her flock to Sunday prayer service. “What I’m saying is she doesn’t realize what she did for me. How she helped make my life so much sweeter.”

“At least she did one good thing before she left.”

“Adah is a kind, sweet girl who’s lost. She needs us to help bring her back into the fold.” Molly shook the letter at Matthew. “This proves it. She thinks she’s done nothing but bad, but it’s not true. She’s done good things. Good things for me. I want her to know that. I want to help her.”

“Molly…” Matthew pushed the letter back at her. “She made her choices. She has to recognize the error of her way and return here of her own accord. That’s what Luke and Thomas think. And Silas. And Daed.”

Molly took a step closer. “They’re old men. They’ve forgotten what it’s like to be our age.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “They’re wrong. I know that sounds prideful coming from a girl like me, but Luke went after Josiah when he went to Wichita and got mixed up with that Mennonite girl.”

“This is different.”

“How?”

“Josiah needed to come home because his parents had died. Emma and Luke and the rest of the kinner needed him home.”

“I’m talking about the second time.”

“He almost died. They had to bring him home to take care of him.”

“Adah might not be dying physically, but she’s dying spiritually. Her spirit is dying.”

“You’re a fanciful girl. It must be all that book reading.”

“Don’t you feel like you’re dying inside? If Richard left, I don’t know what—”

“Don’t.” He held up a hand. “I don’t want to talk about my own sister’s courting.”

“Fine. Let’s talk about your courting then.”

“Nee—”

“You need Adah home.” Molly was like the wind that whipped the bushes around and turned them into tumbleweed. She couldn’t be stopped. “And she needs to come home before she loses faith. She probably thinks it’s too late. But it’s never too late to come back to God.”

She was right. Adah needed to come home—if not for him, then for her community of faith. “Thomas says we have to wait until she’s ready to come home. She has to decide for herself. She has to want this life.”

“Maybe she needs a nudge.” Molly stuck her hands on her hips, looking just like Mudder when she had a bone to pick with Daed. “What are you waiting for?”