Huckleberry Spring (5 page)

Anna opened the door and invited her in. Emma placed her bag on the table and let her gaze travel around the room. Ben was nowhere to be seen. It was already turning out to be a wonderful-gute day, probably because she had prayed extra hard this morning.

“Did you bring the seeds?” Anna asked.

“Jah,” Emma said. “Did you get the fertilizer?”

Anna nodded.

Emma pulled the seed packets and the potting soil from her bag. “I thought maybe we could make a few more newspaper pots and start some tomatoes and a cantaloupe in addition to the pumpkin. And we can plant peas outside in about two weeks.”

Anna carefully read the seed packets. “This is too good to be true. With all you’ve got planned, you’ll be spending hours here every week.”

Emma felt a little silly telling Anna otherwise. Certainly she wouldn’t be spending more than four or five hours on Huckleberry Hill weekly. She hoped not. There was a limit to her restraint. More time spent here would mean more interaction with Ben, and more interaction with Ben meant more crying.

How did Anna know Emma was thinking about her grandson at that moment? “Ben is pruning peach trees, but he’s been given strict instructions to help you with the hoeing.”

Emma thought it would be hard to hoe and bawl like a baby at the same time. “He can finish the peaches. I’ll hoe by myself.”

“Nonsense,” Anna said. “Hard work like that takes muscles. And don’t worry about the fertilizer. Ben can heft a hundred pounds of potatoes without working up a sweat. Unless it’s July. Everybody sweats in July. I work up a sweat in July when I knit. Felty is tending to the chickens, and he’s been given strict instructions not to help with the hoeing.”

Once she and Anna made a dozen little pots, filled them with dirt, and planted seeds in them, Emma set their pots on the windowsill to soak up some sun. “Water them every day, but not too much.”

“I’ll be careful.”

Emma knew about watering too much. She used to do it all the time last summer when Ben still loved her. She daydreamed about him and the pots often ended up saturated because she mooned over her boyfriend instead of concentrating on horticulture.

Anna went to her closet and pulled out twelve knitted . . . somethings, each a different neon color. They looked like little woven bags. She slipped one of the newspaper seedling pots into one of her knitted containers. It fit like a sock around a tin can. “This will keep them nice and warm, and they look cheery lined up on my windowsill.”

“Lovely,” Emma said, taken aback but delighted all the same. The shabby newspaper pots looked almost charming when encased in bright pink yarn. Maybe when she felt like crying, she could think of the knitted pot holders sitting on Anna’s windowsill. Anna didn’t hesitate to give hours to her knitting when she thought it would make someone happy.

Once outside, Emma practically sneaked to the toolshed for a hoe. If Ben didn’t know she was here, she could hoe in peace. He wouldn’t be the wiser, and she wouldn’t have to lay eyes on him all morning.

Donning her leather gardening gloves, she found the wheelbarrow in the shed next to a seriously large bag of Pumpkin Pro. She studied the label. Fifty pounds. She’d have to summon Ben to lift it for her. Anna said he wouldn’t even work up a sweat.

Emma took a deep breath and wondered how puffy her eyes would get if she cried two days in a row. On second thought, there was no need to bother Ben. She had a wheelbarrow and two strong arms. She was perfectly capable of moving the bag of Pumpkin Pro by herself.

After scooting some garden tools and terra-cotta pots out of the way, she maneuvered the wheelbarrow closer to the fertilizer bag and tipped the clumsy thing onto its side. The bag stood firmly against the wall as if propping it up. If she scooted it just right, the bag would tumble into the sideways wheelbarrow, and with very little effort, she would be able to right the wheelbarrow with the Pumpkin Pro inside. Probably.

She clutched the heavy brown bag at the corners and pulled with all her might. The bag creaked and groaned, as if complaining that it didn’t want to move. It fell over, but not in the direction she wanted it to. It ended up flat on the ground parallel to the wheelbarrow but not inside it.

Emma puffed the air from her lungs, bent over, and tried to scoot the lazy bag into the wheelbarrow. It proved even heavier flat on the ground like that. It felt as if she were trying to move a . . . well, a bag of fertilizer that wouldn’t lift a finger to help her.

She stepped back to gain some leverage, as if that were going to make any difference, and her foot found the handle of a rake. The rake must have sneaked up behind her at the bag’s request. Obviously the bag of Pumpkin Pro would stoop to anything to keep Emma from moving it.

She wasn’t quite sure how it happened, but she stepped on the rake and her feet slipped out from under her. She stumbled backward and tumbled into the sideways wheelbarrow, which by some inexplicable law of balance righted itself with Emma in it. With a squeak of alarm, she came to rest on her back, gazing at the ceiling of the shed with feet and arms pointing in every direction like an upside-down potato bug. She waved her hand in surrender. That was one clever bag of Pumpkin Pro. A worthy opponent indeed.

“Emma, are you okay?”

Upon hearing that low, beautiful, why-did-he-have-to-come-into-the-shed-at-this-very-moment voice, Emma winced and clamped her eyes shut as if playing a game of toddler hide-and-seek, pretending that if she couldn’t see him, then he couldn’t see her.

Wrong thing to do. Concern tinged his next words, and she could hear him move closer. “Emma, are you hurt?”

She opened her eyes to see Ben standing over her, looking handsome enough to charm the bees out of their hives. She’d seen that look he gave her a hundred times before when they were courting. Every time she had made a fool of herself or tripped over the neighbor’s cat or set fire to something, compassion would flood his expression as if he felt her pain. When he had made sure she was all right, the amusement would always twinkle in his eyes, and he would act as if he thought her mishaps adorable.

Well, she knew better now. He didn’t think her clumsiness was adorable. He had moved to Florida to get away from it.

For the second time, she squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her lips together. She would not cry.

She would not cry.

Ben’s voice grew deep and rough as he laid a hand on her arm. “Emma, can you hear me?”

Still attempting to gain control over the pesky tears, Emma didn’t trust her voice. Without opening her eyes, she nodded emphatically.

“Do you think you can stand up? Let’s get you into the house, and then I can run to the neighbors and call a doctor.”

All thoughts of crying fled. She immediately opened her eyes and with a jerk, tried to sit up. The wheelbarrow sucked her back into its depths. She growled in exasperation. “I’m fine. I thought I’d see if the wheelbarrow would be a gute place to take a nap later on.”

A grin played at his lips as he reached out his hand. With only a moment’s hesitation, she took it. The wheelbarrow suddenly felt as deep as a bathtub. With nowhere for her feet to gain purchase, she managed to sit up, but couldn’t touch the ground. Ben took her other hand and pulled.

She grimaced as she sort of scooted her hinter part to the edge and searched for the ground with her toes. There was no graceful way to exit a wheelbarrow. Ben gave a firm tug. Finally locating solid earth, she stumbled forward and ended up in his arms. The world seemed to stand still for a brief moment as she looked at him and he stared back at her as if a best-forgotten memory attacked both of them at the same time. Emma held her breath and wished for the thousandth time that she didn’t love him so much.

Regaining her balance and her wits, she jumped back as if he were on fire. He frowned and almost made her believe that her pulling away had hurt his feelings.

He cleared his throat and tried to smile. “Are you okay?”

She pointed to the supine Pumpkin Pro. “He tried to kill me.”

Ben smiled, a genuine smile this time, bent over, and hefted the bag over his shoulder, just like she knew he could. His shoulders were so broad, she could have parked a buggy on them. “Where do you want it?”

Emma turned her face to the great outdoors to keep from staring, but that didn’t stop her heart from jerking around her chest like a skater bug. She ground her teeth together.

She would not cry.

“Put it in this handy wheelbarrow,” she finally managed to say. “I can take it to the garden myself. Denki for your help.”

A hint of teasing flashed in his eyes, and he strolled out of the shed as if he were going to church. With a fifty-pound bag slung over his shoulder. “Seeing as how it tried to kill you, I’m not letting it out of my sight.”

He was always thoughtful like that, seeing a job through to the end. She loaded the rake and hoe and a few other supplies into the wheelbarrow and pushed it out to the garden plot. She tried to move deftly over the grass to show Ben that no wheelbarrow would ever get the better of her again. She only stumbled once.

Ben laid the bag of Pumpkin Pro at the edge of the dirt and gazed at the garden plot. Anna had been right. Not one drop of sweat appeared on his forehead.

He hadn’t even been looking to see how well she pushed the wheelbarrow. Perhaps she should push it in a circle around him just once. She decided against that idea. With her history, she’d trip on a clod of dirt and end up facedown in the wheelbarrow.

She tried not to notice how tall and straight he stood or how he seemed to command the very air he breathed.

She pursed her lips and cleared her throat. Ben had nice posture. Lots of boys had gute posture. Ben’s wasn’t anything remarkable, even if he did have broad shoulders.

“What are you going to plant?” Ben asked without looking at her.

“Peas first. Then tomatoes and beans. The pumpkin goes over here. I’ll need to build up a mound of dirt for good drainage.”

He glanced at her, and Emma could have sworn she detected uncertainty in his expression. What was he suddenly so worried about? “This is an acre of soil. Preparing it will take all day. Maybe I should hitch up Dawdi’s plow.”

Emma shook her head. “No need. Even with a plow, I’ll need to break down the clods of dirt. I’ll work for a few hours today and come back tomorrow and the next day if I need to.”

He grabbed the shovel from the wheelbarrow. “I’ll help. This dirt is as hard as a rock.”

“Don’t trouble yourself. I know you need to prune the peaches.”
And I’d really rather not bite my tongue off trying to hold back tears all day.

He showed that half smile again, as if he really wanted to help but really wanted to avoid her too. She couldn’t make heads or tails of it. He gestured to the bag of Pumpkin Pro lying innocently on the ground. “You’ll need help with that, and I think the other fertilizer Dawdi bought is even heavier. I’d hate to find you buried under a hundred pounds of bone meal at the end of the day.”

Emma ignored her heart, which did all sorts of acrobatic tricks inside her chest. She couldn’t very well refuse his help without being rude. And he was right. Without Ben, she might end up being the first person to be assassinated by a bag of fertilizer. “Okay,” she said, sounding like she had just agreed to a root canal.

“Okay.” He gave her a reassuring smile before plunging the shovel into the dirt and turning it over with a mere flick of his wrist. That dirt didn’t stand a chance against Ben’s muscles.

Emma sighed quietly so that not even she could hear herself. Then she followed with the hoe, breaking up the large clods of dirt he left behind. Once they’d loosened the soil, they’d go back over the ground with a rake and the fertilizer.

Breathing a little harder now, Ben looked back at her and smiled again. Three times already today. That was a surprise, for as adamantly as he disliked her. “How is your family? Is Mahlon still working at the sawmill?”

“Jah, he is still there, plus he helps Dat on the farm, of course. Percy is helping with the cows. When his turns sixteen this summer, he’s going to find work with an
Englischer
in town. He can’t work at the sawmill with Mahlon until he turns eighteen.”

“Percy is a gute worker.”

“Jah, he’s always searching for ways to earn money.”

“How are the little ones?”

“Not so little. This is Rose’s last year in school, and Andy and Lisa are in fourth grade and sixth grade.”

Ben shook his head. “I can’t believe they’re that old already.”

“Rose is learning how to make quilts. Dat bought her a fancy battery-operated sewing machine.”

“I’ll bet she can go fast with that.”

“Jah. She can.”

He didn’t look at her as he cut dirt with the shovel, but she could see his brows inching closer together. “Have you tried the new machine?”

“I don’t dare. It goes so fast, I’m afraid I might sew all my fingers together.”

He nodded as if she’d answered the question correctly, then turned from her as if he’d said something slightly rude and felt embarrassed about it. No doubt he was thinking about Emma’s treadle accident.

Emma winced. The week after they had gotten engaged, Emma had started on a quilt for the wedding. In her haste, she had sewed right through her finger with the old treadle machine. She’d never finished the quilt and had gotten a very swollen finger and a tetanus shot for her trouble.

Emma hoed with renewed vigor. Tears threatened, and she wasn’t about to invite them by reminiscing about Ben. The day she’d sewn through her finger had been one of the best of her life. Ben had taken her to the emergency room for a shot and a bandage, and after the hospital, they had spent a wonderful afternoon at Shawano Lake, dipping their toes into the water and talking about the day when they could marry and be together forever. Ben had told her that the only present he wanted for his wedding was Emma herself and that after they married, she never had to sew anything ever again.