An Amish Gift (21 page)

She went into the dining room, which had been converted into a shipping station, with cartons, packing tape, and scissors arranged to speed the process of getting packages ready to go. Shep, Tim, and Willa were all there, working as fast as they could to pack the bags and tins of peanut brittle and lollipops into appropriate-sized brown boxes. It was fortunate, she and Shep had agreed, that the bicycle business slowed down for the season as her business picked up, because he was able to help fulfill the orders. As Christmas drew closer, the four of them worked frantically not to fall behind.

As if they had time to make cards, she thought. What had she been thinking? They could barely keep up with all they had to do as it was.

“Check out this lovely card from the Fishers,” she said, holding it up. No one even glanced over. She went into the living room to prop it up on the mantel next to the few others they had received, then returned to the dining room to pitch in with the packing. “Shep, did you ever get out your customer holiday cards?”

“Yup. All done.” He didn’t look up from the carton he was taping shut.

“That’s great. I’m sorry I forgot to ask before.” She sat down at the open laptop to check if any new orders had come in over the past half hour.

“By the way,” he went on, “I just got in a bunch of new bike
accessories, so I hope somebody will help me get them on display at some point.”

“No problem,” Tim said.

Jennie looked over at her son. Even though he was working long hours for her and Shep, he’d been able to find time to spend with some new friends he had made at school. It had taken him almost a year and a half, but at last he was settling in with people he liked. That had seemed to be the final missing piece for him, and he was no longer at the mercy of his temper; he had let go of most of the anger he had been carrying around when they first moved here. On top of that, the more time he spent with his father, the better they got along. Tim had been willing to open the door to a new relationship with his father, and Shep had been only too glad to go through it.

Willa’s voice interrupted her reverie. “If we get a big rush in the last twenty-four hours before deadline, we’re going to be in trouble, Mom.”

“I have an idea. Do you think we could hire Evie and her mother for that week, let’s say the nineteenth to the morning of the twenty-fourth? I know it’s short notice …”

Evie was Willa’s friend from school, and Jennie had met the girl’s mother several times when they were picking up or dropping off their daughters at each other’s houses. The mother had mentioned to Jennie that she was looking for work.

“I’ll ask.”

“I like her mother,” Jennie reflected aloud. “Maybe I could invite them over for dinner one night.”

“Just make it after the holidays, okay?” Willa asked. “I’m ready to fall asleep with my head in my plate most nights.”

“It’ll be over soon,” Shep reassured her. “Let’s just be grateful we have such a problem—being too busy.”

“If all goes well, in the spring you’ll be just as busy at the shop,” Jennie said. “It looks great. People are going to be really surprised by everything that’s going on.”

Although they hadn’t followed up on some of the more expensive plans, all four of them had been involved in carrying out a lot of their brainstorming list for the store. The website was up, and Willa gave Tim information to add to it whenever she could find the time. She was also working on a green campaign to encourage biking. Tim had set up software so they could view the buying histories of their customers and inform them of new items that might be of interest, or point out what was old or perhaps missing in their gear. He liked combining his computer skills with business, and Jennie was amazed on several occasions to find him in his room reading industry newsletters about cycling. She wished she could help out more, but the three of them had handled the lion’s share of it and seemed to be doing an excellent job without her. The store wasn’t physically transformed yet, although they were working toward that goal, and the new sky-blue paint made it brighter and more inviting. They were cautiously hopeful about the upcoming spring season.

The next morning, she got up at five to make candy and deliver it to the Fishers for the market booth and packaging.
When she entered the kitchen, she saw Nan straightening Joshua’s shirt as he recited a poem.

“Good morning,” she said to Jennie. “My brother is practicing for the school Christmas program.”

The little boy nodded. “I say the poem for all our parents and guests. Everyone comes to the school, and we do skits and read stories. I will recite this poem.”

“It’s a big event for the children,” Nan added, smoothing down his hair.

“I can imagine,” Jennie said. “It sounds lovely, Joshua.”

“That’s enough,” he said to his sister, squirming away from her and running out of the room.

“Take your lunch,” she called after him.

He raced back in, making a wide circle as he grabbed a lunchbox and thermos before running out again without stopping.

Nan smiled. “He was worried I might try to fix his clothes some more.”

“You all take such good care of one another,” Jennie observed as she put the shopping bags on the kitchen table.

Nan shrugged. “The little ones need help. That’s all.”

Jennie thought of her own children’s incessant fighting, quelled now and hopefully for good. Suddenly, she recalled that she would have Michael’s children in her home again soon, and she wondered if they would be any different. After a year spent among the Amish and their children, she didn’t know if she would have the stomach to watch the two complain
about every little thing. Her next thought was that their mother wouldn’t be with them. She frowned, hoping that Lydia’s absence didn’t signify trouble; whether the children were spoiled or not, it would break her heart if anything serious had happened to their parents’ marriage.

By the time the twenty-third arrived, Jennie was too exhausted to worry any further about the state of Michael’s marriage. Got To Candy had promised its customers that all deliveries received by that date would be shipped in time for Christmas Day arrival, and it was a vow she realized she had been unprepared to keep. If things went as well next year, she would hire more people for the holiday season, but that was little comfort now as they struggled over the handmade labels and wrappings. She told Shep to warn his brother that they might get spaghetti for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, but there was all the peanut brittle the kids could eat.

When Michael and the children arrived late in the afternoon, Jennie glanced down at her old sweater, jeans, and sneakers and realized she hadn’t even put on any makeup that day. It was lucky they had managed to hang the Christmas decorations around the house; no time to decorate herself, she thought.

Scout, as usual, got to their guests first, followed by Shep, who was welcoming everyone over the barking when she joined them. No fancy overcoat and blazer for Michael this year, she noticed. He wore a parka over jeans and a flannel shirt. Evan and Kimberly were a little taller, and Jennie fussed over how much more grown-up they looked, which both of
them liked. Beyond that, she could tell their demeanors were more subdued, their expressions almost somber. Michael gave Jennie a shopping bag with two store-wrapped gifts for Tim and Willa, which told Jennie that Lydia hadn’t picked them out; she invariably did her own special gift wrapping.

Tim and Willa came out to greet their uncle, then ushered their little cousins back into the dining room, planning to put them to work taping boxes, at least until they got bored with it. The adults went into the living room.

“Nice tree,” Michael said, barely glancing at it.

“Willa and I used leftover paper to make the braids.” Jennie saw he wasn’t listening and stopped. “Sit down, Michael, and let me get you a soda or something.”

“Great.”

She and Shep exchanged glances, registering that Michael was nervous, completely out of character for him. They wouldn’t ask any questions, she decided, but let him relax and get to it all in his own good time.

They made small talk for a bit. Michael wanted to hear all about their candy business and walked around the dining room, examining the lollipops and tins of brittle. Dinner was pizza in the living room, the only place with space to seat them all.

“Please excuse the takeout, Michael,” Jennie said as she slid the pieces onto paper plates. “As you can see, it’s just too crazy to cook. You probably thought I was kidding when I said you wouldn’t get any good food this trip.”

He grinned. “Are you kidding? First of all, this is great. What’s better than relaxing with pizza? Second of all, I couldn’t
be happier for you guys. You’re building this business with no investment to speak of. It’s fantastic.”

“I have to get everything out of here by tomorrow so it can be delivered on Christmas Day. After that, we can all collapse,” she said.

“No, then you have to get ready for Valentine’s Day,” Shep put in. “You guys said you were going to bring in something new.”

Willa, seated next to him, gave an exaggerated groan and a wild-eyed look to her cousins. Evan and Kimberly laughed and began imitating her groan. “That’s right,” she encouraged, “let everybody know how put upon I am. Make ’em feel sorry for me.”

The children grew louder and, following Tim’s lead, got up to make piteous faces and fall to the floor. Jennie laughed, delighted to see Michael’s children acting like kids instead of small adults. The cell phones, she realized, were nowhere in evidence. As Kimberly sat back down next to her, Jennie put an arm around her niece, whose pleased expression gratified her. After a dessert of ice cream with chocolate sauce, Jennie suggested the children take a break upstairs, saying she would be working later on, and if they were up to it, they could come back.

“You sure we can go?” Tim asked.

“Please, you need some time to relax. Besides,” she said with a smile, “we’re doing well with our schedule but not that well. We’ll get tonight’s stuff done if Dad and I give it an extra push later.”

“You don’t have to say it twice.” He led the others upstairs.

“More coffee?” Shep asked his brother.

Michael shook his head. “I still have some. But I want to thank you two for letting me just be here without any explaining. That dinner was perfect, and the kids and I both needed it.”

“You needed pizza? I hear they have excellent pizza in Chicago,” Jennie said in a light tone.

He smiled. “No, we didn’t need pizza. We needed
normal
.” His expression grew serious again. “We haven’t had any normal in some time.”

“What’s going on, Michael?” Shep asked in a gentle voice.

“I don’t know where to start.” He leaned back on the sofa and stretched out his legs. “It started with me, really. A couple of years back. I was getting tired of the way we were living. I did nothing but work, except when we took these extravagant vacations, where I still did nothing but work, only it was on my phone or laptop. Mind you, I drove myself to get to that point, where I was a big important guy who always had a phone glued to his ear and a million people clamoring for advice or decisions.”

“You’re a successful lawyer. That’s got to come with the territory,” Jennie said.

“It wasn’t only that. I was making a lot of money, but I hated what we were doing with the money. The mindless spending—on clothes and gadgets and junk for the kids. Sometimes I felt like all our junk was going to rise up and suffocate me.”

“I never realized you felt that way,” Shep said.

“It was creeping up on me. And the kids were getting so spoiled. It must have been going on for a long time before I woke up enough to see it. It wasn’t just that they expected someone else to pick up after them, do their bidding. That was bad enough. But they weren’t
kind
. They didn’t care about anything or anyone. Once I saw that, it became obvious.” He took a sip of his cold coffee. “I was so embarrassed last Christmas by the way they behaved here, and that was nothing compared to other things I’d seen them do. Anyway, I tried to talk to Lydia about it. Got nowhere.”

“She didn’t agree with your assessment of things?”

“That’s one way to put it. She was furious that I would dare question how, as she put it, she was raising the children. When I suggested that some of our values might be a little out of whack, she really hit the roof. She worked so hard to give me this beautiful life and so on.”

“She did work hard at making things nice.” Jennie recalled the meticulous attention to detail in Lydia’s clothes, her makeup, whatever she did.

“When we were here last year, I realized what nonsense that all is. You guys have a family, not the trappings of a family, which was what I had.”

“Boy, you really didn’t understand what was—” Shep started.

“There was life happening here,” Michael burst out. “In our house, there was no life. Just schedules and appointments. Tutors and choosing the right everything. It was one big competition to stay a step ahead of whoever Lydia decided was important.”

Shep leaned forward. “Why are you talking in the past tense?”

Michael looked down. “She must have realized things were not going in the direction she wanted. She found somebody else.”

“Ohhhh …” Jennie breathed.

“Not just anybody else. An Italian guy she met at some charity function. With way more money than I have and no problem showing it off.”

“You’re getting a divorce?” Jennie asked.

He nodded. “And she’s moving to Italy. Without the children. She says she’ll come back in a few months and take them on a vacation.
Vacation
, for goodness’ sake!”

There was silence as Shep and Jennie took this in.

“Guess they’d be in the way,” Michael said with bitterness. “Hard to believe she could pick up and leave them like that, but that’s what she’s doing. One day they were the most important things in her life, according to her, and the next, they were of just about no concern at all.”

Jennie tried to hide the shock she was afraid showed on her face. “Do they know what’s going on?”