Love Finds You in Sugarcreek, Ohio (16 page)

The carefully lettered homemade sign was staked on the edge of the Troyer sisters’ front lawn.

F
UND-RAISER
B
AKE
S
ALE
T
ODAY
8-2
H
AITIAN
O
RPHANAGE

The sign had required much discussion on the part of the ladies, as had every loaf of bread and every cake, pie, and cookie displayed on the new shelves Joe had created.

Even though the sign was now wet from an early afternoon rain shower and the words written in black Magic Marker had begun to blur, buggies and cars had arrived in a steady stream all day.

“How can such a small sign bring in so many people?” Joe asked Rachel when she arrived.

“Word spreads fast among the Amish,” Rachel explained. “Especially for such a good cause. And Lydia’s baking is legendary.”

“I’m a little worried about your aunts. They worked all day yesterday and were up long before dawn this morning.”

“I know. And here I had hoped they would slow down a little if they closed the inn. That was the whole point.” Rachel sighed. “Do you suppose there’s anything left in there to buy?”

“Last I checked, there wasn’t much.”

They entered the kitchen, which was still redolent of serious baking. The shelves were completely bare…and the sisters were ecstatic.

“Look at this!” Bertha dumped money out of a shoebox crammed full of crumpled bills. She gathered them into a stack, licked her thumb, and began to separate the bills into stacks. “Even if we take out the cost of supplies, I think we made enough.”

“Just imagine,” Lydia said, “all the things the girls will be able to make!”

“What about material?” Anna asked.

Lydia’s and Bertha’s mouths made perfect Os. “They will need
material!”
they said in unison.

“We could have another bake sale next week!” Lydia said.

Rachel started to object, but Bertha interrupted.

“Think of how much fun it would be for the girls to open up a big box of beautiful fabric.”

“Can it have flowers?” Anna asked wistfully.

Once again, Lydia and Bertha looked at one another—this time with narrowed eyes, as they considered. Only the Mennonites and Englisch people wore patterned clothing.

“Probably not,” Bertha said. “Flowered material is not Plain.”

Anna’s brow wrinkled. “The children are Amish?”

“No,” Bertha said. “They are just themselves.”

“They could have flowers,” Anna pointed out.

“Maybe a small, conservative print.” Lydia held her fingers close together.

“Maybe. When we have enough from our bake sales,” Bertha said, “I will call a driver and we will go shopping. Maybe my cast will be off by then.”

“Oh…” Anna clapped her hands in glee. “A Yoder Toter!”

“A Yoder Toter?” Joe asked.

“It’s what the Amish call the fifteen-passenger vans that local drivers use to transport Amish. They use them when they need to go farther than the ten or so miles a horse can take them,” Rachel explained. “Since so many Amish around here are named Yoder, calling those vans ‘Yoder Toters’ is kind of a local Amish joke.”

Joe was relieved that he wouldn’t have to drive Nellie for their shopping trip, but he was curious. “Isn’t a fifteen-passenger van sort of overkill for three people?”

“You don’t know the Amish,” Rachel said. “Bertha will make a few phone calls and tomorrow there will be another dozen Amish women going along. They’ll share the cost, everyone will bring snacks, and they’ll have a picnic in the van and catch up on family news while they drive around. It’s quite a party.”

“Sounds like fun.”

“It is!” Lydia exclaimed.

Rachel smiled. “Want to hear another Amish joke, Joe?”

“Sure.”

“How many Amish can you pack into a Yoder Toter?”

“Beats me.”

“One more.” She held up a finger.

“I don’t get it.”

“You will when you see. The drivers charge by the mile. The Amish are frugal. They really pack those vans.”

Bertha folded the money and put it into her purse. “You are not angry with us for doing this, Rachel?”

“Of course I’m not angry, but I’m worried. You three worked yourself to a frazzle yesterday and today.”

“We enjoyed every minute.”

“I know you did, but—”

“You cannot wrap us up in cotton and put us on a shelf,” Bertha said. “I know you are trying to take care of us, but we have lived our lives by trying to be useful. When that possibility is gone, we will no longer have a reason to rise in the morning.”

“But I still worry about you.”

“You do not understand. Being trained as a seamstress can make the difference between life and death to a girl in Haiti. She can support herself with that skill. If one of us were to die while mixing enough pie dough to make that happen—what does it matter?”

“It matters to me,” Rachel said.

“This is not about you,” Lydia said softly.

What is it,
Joe wondered,
that creates such a strong work ethic in the Amish?
He saw it even in old Eli, who was still trying to care for all those dairy cows when his strapping-strong sons and grandsons would have happily allowed him to rock on the porch all day long.

His heart went out to Rachel as she absorbed Lydia’s words. He watched as she bowed her head a moment. When she looked at her aunts again, there was a look of resignation on her face.

“You’re right, Lydia. It’s not about me. How can I help you make this happen?”

After helping her aunts tidy the kitchen and prepare for the next baking marathon, Rachel strode out to the barn and climbed the ladder to the hayloft. Since childhood, the hayloft had been her spot to contemplate, pray, or have a good cry. The huge, high window beckoned with a view of the valley that always inspired her. She sat down and scooted to the edge of the window, allowing her legs to dangle. Her heart was heavy, and she needed to unburden herself to Someone who would understand.

“Father,” she said aloud, “my aunts are driving me crazy. They act like I’m punishing them by trying to get them to slow down.” She stopped and contemplated her life. “My back still aches from the beating in Cleveland. Bertha allowed Joe to become a permanent resident—over my strong objections.”

She hesitated. “And while we’re talking, Father, what is it with Joe, anyway? I don’t even know who he really is, and yet I feel myself drawn to him. There is something about the way he talks and moves and cares for his child that keeps me awake at night, replaying it in my mind.”

She kicked her foot against the barn with her face lifted toward the sky in prayer. “I’m a mess, Father. And I’m really, really tired of being the responsible one around here.”

It had been too long since she’d prayed like this. It felt as though a weight rolled off her shoulders as she finished. She scooted backward and lay on the scattered hay of the loft, watching a wisp of a cloud drift over the brilliantly colored fall trees. It was so quiet up in the hayloft that she was startled when she heard voices below.

“Can we play now, Daddy?” Bobby asked, holding up a plastic baseball set. He had chosen it for himself with the small “salary” Joe had given him for being such a good helper.

The rest of Joe’s first pay from the sisters had gone into groceries and getting his truck fixed. He had given the mechanic a little extra to drive it to his house. With Rachel knowing he didn’t have a driver’s license, he wasn’t about to risk being caught behind the wheel.

Still, it felt good having the truck parked out front in case of an emergency. The horror of the night that Bobby had gone into a febrile convulsion lingered. He had never felt so helpless in his life.

He hadn’t yet figured out what to do about that missing driver’s license. How could he replace it without revealing his identity to the local DMV people?

“Come on, Daddy, pleeease?”

Bobby was acting like any other impatient four-year-old these days. He hadn’t sucked his thumb for over a week now. He was sleeping in his own room. There had been no potty accidents.

“Pretty, pretty, pretty please?”

Joe was delighted to see the healthy changes in his son. With Bertha’s permission, he had even allowed the white kitten a one-night sleepover in the daadi haus. So far, so good. In another week he would probably allow the kitten to move in with them. With the next paycheck, he could afford cat food.

“You got it, buddy.” He scooped up the little boy in his arms and ran into the pasture behind the barn, Bobby giggling all the way.

“Okay.” He set his son down with the barn as the backstop and placed the plastic bat in the boy’s hands. “Hold it like this.”

“Like this?” Bobby let the bat sag.

“Close.” He positioned the bat for Bobby again. “Here. Like this. Now stand right there, and I’ll throw the ball to you. When it comes, you hit it. Okay?”

“’kay.”

Joe threw, and Bobby swatted at the ball and missed. He threw again; Bobby missed again. Joe watched his son’s lower lip start to quiver.

“It’s hard the first few times, buddy.” He tossed it as slow and as straight as he could. Bobby missed again. “You have to keep trying. Nobody gets it the first time.”

“Not even you?”

“Not even me. It took me a long, long time to hit the ball the first time.” That wasn’t entirely the truth, but he didn’t want his little boy to get discouraged.

“’kay, then.” Bobby took another stance, swung, and missed again. He threw the bat down, dropped to the ground, and folded his arms across his chest. “I quit!”

“You don’t want to do that, son. Here, let me—”

“Hi.”

It was Rachel, perched above them in the upper window of the barn. His heart leaped at the sight of her.

“You look like a kid playing hooky.” He deliberately kept his eyes focused on Bobby. “Don’t you have to work?”

“Not this afternoon, but I should be leaving soon. There’s a baseball game I’m supposed to be at in a couple of hours.”

“Baseball? In the fall?”

“It’s something Ed cooked up. He’s talked some of us over at the police station, as well as some of the guys at the fire department, into playing against Sugarcreek’s Garaway High School baseball team. It’s kind of a community-relations thing. He thinks it’ll maybe create some bonds with the kids, make them realize we’re regular people and not just here to arrest them when they drive too fast.”

“My daddy’s the best baseball player in the
world,”
Bobby said. He had been distracted from his impending tantrum by the spectacle of Rachel appearing above his head.

“You don’t say.” She chuckled at the little boy’s boast. “Do you play, Joe?”

“A little.” He shrugged. “It’s been awhile.”

“I found out this morning that we’re short a player. It would help if you could step in.”

“I promised to play with Bobby.”

Bobby kicked his bat. “I don’t want to play ball. I don’t like it.” A thought seemed to strike him. “Will there be hot dogs at the ball game?”

“Absolutely,” she said. “If you can talk your daddy into playing, I’ll buy you all the hot dogs you want.”

“Yay!” Bobby danced in place. “Hot dogs, hot dogs, hot dogs,” he sang as he galloped off across the field.