Amish Promises (2 page)

 2 

S
hani Beck peered through the rain-splattered windshield, searching for the road sign. It was an hour until nightfall but the autumn rain had darkened the day.

She slowed and then, seeing the sign, turned sharply onto Juneberry Lane. The narrow road tunneled through a thick grove of trees. Shani swerved to miss a fallen branch.

Her husband, Joel, stirred in the passenger seat. He'd slept since Philadelphia. So had Zane. Their son was twelve—no longer a boy, yet far from being a man. He was definitely starting to act like a teenager, but it was hard to determine if his new moodiness was because of his age or Joel's injuries. Probably a dose of each.

She maneuvered around a pothole. The moving van was a few minutes behind them. Thankfully the movers would unload everything, and then Charlie, Joel's Army buddy, would arrive the next morning to help with arranging the furniture and moving boxes. Zane would help too. She wouldn't be much help, except to unpack boxes and clean, and Joel wouldn't be any help at all.

Then she'd only have two days to get everything and everyone settled before she started her job at Lancaster General.

She'd scanned the listings for weeks for an opening in pediatrics there, and after she found one and they offered her a job after a phone interview, she was convinced they were supposed to move to Lancaster County.

Joel sat up straight, wrinkling his nose as he did. “You didn't tell me there was a dairy nearby.” Shani had noticed the stench but hadn't realized it was a dairy. Joel grew up in Wisconsin—he'd know.

“There wasn't one here before.” It had been over five years since she and Zane had visited while Joel was on a training exercise. Her grandfather had been much crankier than what she remembered as a child, or perhaps her grandmother had tempered him more than she'd realized. She'd intended to come once she and Zane moved to Philly last spring, but then Joel had been injured in Iraq and she'd gone to Germany instead.

Zane kicked against the back of her seat. “Who are
they
?” he asked.

“What are you talking about?” Shani turned the windshield wipers up higher, her gaze focused on the narrow road.

He tapped on the window. “Those people.”

Off to the side stood a woman wearing a bonnet and a cape, with a baby in her arms. A girl with blond hair stood near her. Another child, a boy who was also a towhead, hung upside down from a branch halfway up the tree. The woman and girl's dresses and the boy's shirt were all sky blue, as if they'd all been cut from the same bolt of cloth.

“Why are they dressed that way?” Zane asked.

Joel groaned. “You didn't tell me we have Amish neighbors.”

“I don't think we do.” Shani realized she'd nearly stopped the van. The woman turned toward her, freed one hand from the baby, and waved. The boy tumbled from the limb and then twisted, making Shani gasp. He landed on his bare feet next to a plastic bucket.

“How come the kid doesn't have shoes?” Zane asked.

“I don't know.” It was much too cold for such nonsense. The boy and girl both looked close to Zane's age.

“What's with his hair?” Zane asked.

“It's called a bowl cut,” Joel answered. “Want one?”

Shani shot her husband a warning look.

Zane didn't answer his father, but asked, “Can I say hi?” Being an only child seemed to make him extra outgoing—he craved the companionship of other children. The fact that Shani was having a baby—a boy—in less than four months wouldn't change that, though. She was afraid twelve years between Zane and a little brother would make it difficult for them to have much of a relationship.

“No, you can't go introduce yourself.” Joel stared at the Amish. “They keep to themselves—at least the ones back home did.”

Shani inched the van forward again. The girl turned toward them, a slight smile on her face. Then Shani accelerated around the bend and toward her grandparents' two-century-old house at the end of the lane. The home was made of brick, except for the white clapboard kitchen addition.

“I don't know about this.” Joel slumped in his seat. “How can another move be good for us?”

Shani kept her eyes on the lane. “Let's give it a year, like we decided.”

“Like you decided.”

She didn't respond. They'd been over it a hundred times. After Joel recovered enough to return to the US, they'd gone to Texas for his rehab and then back to the Philadelphia apartment she and Zane had moved into while he was deployed.

He grew more and more on edge with each passing day. At first Shani thought he was simply transitioning, but they lived just off a busy street, and she soon suspected the constant noise of traffic—especially the blare of horns—made him hyper alert. She didn't realize how out of sorts he'd become until she came home one night from work to find him at the window, sitting in his wheelchair with his .45 in his hand.

Joel's left tibia had been shattered in the attack, among other injuries, but the docs said more healing would come with time. He'd
stopped taking his sleep aids, making up for it with his pain meds, and any little noise made him jump. Even a car door slamming.

Her grandparents' farm had been a place of healing for Shani the summer she turned ten, after her mother left. As her parents wrangled out the divorce, her father sent her to be cared for by his own parents. Shani found out that the country—her grandparents' farm, in particular—could be a refuge. She returned home ready to face a new life, one without her mother.

She was sure the farm would be a place of healing for Joel too.

Zane kept quiet in the backseat. He'd certainly picked up on the tension between his parents over the last few months, and it seemed he was careful not to set off his father.

Shani pulled the van into the driveway and stopped under the red and orange canopy of another maple tree. The grass was trimmed and tidy. The curtains in the front window were pulled back, as if someone were home.

The land was leased to a local farmer, and after her grandfather passed away her father had intended to rent the house out as well. Thankfully he hadn't gotten around to finding a tenant. Her father said they could stay as long as they needed, at least until Joel was well enough to find a job.

“We're home.” Shani turned off the ignition, aware of how false her words sounded.

Zane opened his door.

Shani turned toward her husband. “Shall we take a look?”

He didn't answer but opened his door, swinging his good leg out and then moving his bum leg with his hands. He grabbed his cane.

“Wait,” Shani said. “I'll help.” She hurried around to the passenger side. Joel was putting his weight on his good leg, pushing down with his cane to stand.

The rain fell harder. “I think I'll look around outside,” Zane said.

“Don't you want to see the house first?” Shani asked, taking Joel's free arm.

“I'm just going to check out the field,” Zane said. “I want to get my bearings.”

She thought that was a funny thing for him to say, but if he explored the field first, he'd miss Joel's complaining about the house. “Come back if it starts to pour.”

Zane nodded and then, whistling a tune Shani didn't recognize—probably one he'd learned from Charlie—started toward the field.

Joel faltered on the stone driveway, and she reached for his arm. He shook off her hand and snapped, “I'm not one of your patients.”

She held her arm in midair for a moment. He was acting like one.

She eyed the steps, wondering how difficult they would be for him to maneuver, annoyed with herself that she hadn't thought through that detail. There were more than she'd remembered.

Joel's arm stiffened, and Shani patted it. He stopped at the bottom of the steps and scowled, his forehead wrinkling under his short hair, still cropped in an Army cut. As Joel struggled up the steps one at a time, grasping the rickety railing that squeaked with each pull, Shani kept close in case he stumbled.

He took a raggedy breath and snarled, “You know I don't like it when you hover.”

She winced at his harsh tone.

“I need to sit and rest a minute.” His voice was still raw. “You go ahead.”

“But it's raining.”

His flipped the hood of his jacket onto his head. “I'll be fine.” Her heart constricted, and the baby inside fluttered. Joel wasn't fine—not at all.

As he turned and sat, she steadied him until he leaned against the next step. Another benefit of having Charlie around was that Joel behaved better. He'd never lost his temper with his friend—probably because the man had saved his life when he pulled Joel from the burning Humvee.

She continued on up the steps. She'd need to hire a carpenter to put in a ramp. Joel had only been out of his wheelchair for a week—he still used it when he was tired. She wished Charlie had followed them, as they'd originally planned. She could have used his help at the moment.

Shani unlocked the door with the key her father had sent and entered the house, surprised by the fresh, lemony scent. In the dim light she found the switch and turned on the overhead bulb. The room was completely bare except for the wood stove. She remembered huddling around it as a child on cold mornings.

She peeked into the kitchen at the familiar worn yellow linoleum and Formica counter tops. Turning down the hallway, she pushed open her grandfather's bedroom door. Once cluttered, the room had been totally transformed. The stacks of books and papers were gone, along with the dark drapes. The last light of the rainy day revealed an Amish quilt covering the bed. The jewel-colored diamond shapes—burgundy, emerald, and sapphire blue—danced against the black background, as if casting a shadow. She stepped forward and rested her hand on the soft cotton.

Where had the quilt come from? Who had cleaned the house?

She felt hopeful, for the first time in months. “Please let us be happy here,” she whispered. That was all she wanted—all she'd ever wanted. She'd married Joel when she was nineteen and had Zane a year later. Her father had been horrified by both events, sure she'd thrown her life away. But she'd graduated from nursing school as planned, and for the most part, she and Joel had built a good life together.

Until his injury.

Zane and this new baby needed both parents. She'd seen too many families fall apart in the midst of a crisis. And not just military families. Her mother had left when she could no longer handle the monotony of suburban living, or so she'd said. Shani's dad had coped as best he could—and had been both mother and father to her. But she didn't want a one-parent family for her boys. She'd make things work with Joel, no matter how deep his wounds.

She rubbed her hand over the quilt squares as the hum of a truck vibrated through the room, and then the scrape of a branch against metal. She hurried out of the room, down the hall, and to the porch. Joel stood now and took a step down. Shani rushed to his side, taking his elbow, as the moving truck came to a stop.

Joel jerked his arm away.

“Wait here,” she said to him, waving to the mover on the passenger side of the truck. He opened his door and climbed down. “That's quite the narrow lane,” he said.

She nodded. It had grown over since she had last visited.

The driver hopped down from the other side, headed toward the back, and pulled down a ramp, dropping it just a few feet from where Shani stood. She hesitated for a moment and then started toward her van. The living room furniture was deep inside the truck, and so was the dining room set. She needed to get Joel's chair so he could sit—and soon, before the movers started up the stairs.

As she pulled the wheelchair from the back, Joel called out, “What are you doing?”

“Helping,” she called back. She carried the chair toward the porch, the metal back bumping against her belly.

Joel shook his head as she passed him on the steps. “You're going to hurt the baby.”