When Strawberries Bloom Read online

  She caught her breath as she let out a low laugh. “Remember how desperately I tried to keep up with you at school?”

  “No. I forgot.”

  “Anyway, you can be so simple and dense and blind. Lizzie, think! Why wouldn’t Stephen want you to think this over? He has always adored you, no, actually, adored the ground you walked on, and you never, not once, worried about his feelings. First, there was Joe and John, then Amos, and through all that …” Emma stopped.

  “Neither Joe or John wanted me,” Lizzie burst out. “Amos didn’t either.”

  “Well, you know what I mean. Mam told you over and over to pray for God’s will, and did you ever? Huh? Did you?”

  “Sometimes. But, Emma, I know I’m older now, but sometimes God still seems way out of reach. Honest. Sometimes when I pray my prayers bounce against the ceiling and fall right back down. I feel silly on my knees.”

  Emma watched Lizzie seriously. “You should have joined the church earlier.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe you would be more comfortable with God if you gave your life over to him. You never really thought about that, did you?”

  “Well, not really. I didn’t want to join church too early. You have to be so plain and can’t do one fun thing. Besides, this joining the church thing is all about the ordnung and obeying the rules, and I can do that anytime.”

  “No, Lizzie, joining church is so much more. It’s learning how to live for Jesus Christ, your Savior, after you realize that you are a sinner and want to live a better life.”

  “Oh.”

  That was all Lizzie said. How could she confess to Emma the fear in her soul? How could she tell anyone that she was scared to death to actually come right out and admit to God that she was a sinner? She was afraid of God as it was, always trying to assure herself that she wasn’t all that much of a sinner.

  She still couldn’t quite figure this whole thing out. If you confessed that you were a real sinner who was going to go to hell, you had to depend on something to help you out of that. Lizzie still was not convinced that she wasn’t at least somewhat good enough to make her way to heaven. She helped Mam with the work at home, she wasn’t outright terribly disobedient, and she even helped with the milking. Now that was a chore she absolutely hated with a passion, but she did it without complaining too much.

  She threw the afghan off her lap, sat up, and smiled at Emma.

  “Why don’t you lay him down and we’ll each make ourselves a cup of peppermint tea and a toasted cheese sandwich? I’m hungry.”

  Emma smiled back, relieved to see the dark look on Lizzie’s face turn to a lighter one.

  Their cups of tea steaming between them, they sat down together. The rich, buttery smell of the sandwiches made the kitchen seem warm and homey, Lizzie thought. Even as she felt the dark cloud of doubt return.

  “What?” Emma asked, as only sisters can ask, that perfect opening when one perceives that something is troubling the other.

  Lizzie swirled a spoon in her tea.

  “This sinner thing, Emma. I know Jesus died on the cross for us, and I understand that. The new birth they preach about is all over my head. I don’t get that, really, and Mam said I don’t have to, that I will in time, that we can’t of ourselves become born again.

  “So that doesn’t bother me so much. It’s just that, how do we know for sure that if we do feel like a sinner, I mean, a bad one, then how can we be certain that Jesus’ blood is for us, too? I mean me, just for me?”

  Emma took a bite of her sandwich and chewed slowly. She wiped the crumbs from her mouth with a napkin.

  “We never are. We just have to have faith and believe it. It’s kind of like a gift that seems too good to be free, so it’s hard to humble ourselves to admit that we even need it in the first place. But you’ll understand more as you grow older. We don’t need to understand every little thing before we try to live for God.”

  “I guess.”

  Lizzie paused before telling Emma that Mandy and she would join church the following summer, and probably by then she would be ready to start that serious journey.

  “In the meantime, you’ll wait until Stephen asks for another date, right?” Emma teased.

  Lizzie snorted. Emma laughed as she told Lizzie about how insecure she felt when Joshua asked her out the first time.

  “But he asked you again that Sunday evening for the coming weekend, right?” Lizzie asked.

  “Oh, yes! I would have had a fit if he hadn’t.”

  That was no comfort at all, but Lizzie didn’t say so. She needed to get out, get some exercise, clear her head of all these troubling thoughts wrapping themselves around her.

  “Emma, do you mind if I start mowing the yard? I could do it all tomorrow, but I need the exercise.”

  “No, of course not. Why do you want to? Didn’t I help much with whatever is troubling you?”

  “Oh, of course,” Lizzie said, meaning every word. There was still no one like Emma to explain things to her in a clear, uncluttered fashion that made everything more hopeful. Emma was like that.

  Walking steadily behind the reel mower with the grass clippings dusting her feet and the hot August sun on her back, she did feel much better. Hearing the drone of a low airplane, she stopped to watch its course across the blue sky.

  Airplanes were amazing things, an engine keeping that heavy craft in the sky and moving it along at that speed. Why weren’t Amish people allowed to fly in airplanes? What would be wrong with one little ride? It would be the most wonderful feeling to be flying along above the earth and looking down on the little dots that were towns or houses and barns.

  She sighed, returning to her grass mowing, and thought about how much it would cost to ride in an airplane. She’d ask Joshua; he knew such things.

  “Lizzie!”

  Joshua was hurrying toward her, a white piece of paper fluttering from his hand. Lizzie stopped, swiping at her loose hair with the back of her hand, watching him questioningly.

  “I was in the phone shanty and the phone rang. Someone wants you to call him right away!” he said, a broad grin spreading across his face.

  “Who?” Lizzie asked, her mouth becoming dry as her heart started banging too fast.

  “Go find out!”

  Lizzie grabbed blindly at the piece of paper, trying to read the numbers while running. She stumbled down over the bank beside the road, her thoughts scattered into a jumble that made no sense. Stephen? Would he? Did he even know where she was? He would never call in the middle of the day. He was at work. It was probably Jason. Or … or the school board. Or Dat. Joshua had said he.

  She wiped her perspiring face, and then with shaking hands she spread out the piece of paper as she sank onto the stool in the shanty. She definitely did not recognize the number. Oh, this was so terribly unnerving. She was afraid to dial and afraid not to pick up the phone.

  Taking a deep breath, she dialed the number quickly, just sure she would have heart failure if it was Stephen. Or if it wasn’t.

  It rang twice before a voice said, “Hello!”

  Lizzie’s heart sank. Marvin! What did he want? Trying desperately to keep her voice from showing the disappointment she felt, she said, “Marvin! Why are you calling me?”

  “Stephen wants to talk to you.”

  Lizzie’s mouth flew open as if to protest, but there was nothing she could do as she heard him yell for Stephen.

  Then, “Hello.”

  “Hi … hi!” Lizzie breathed.

  “What are you doing?”

  “I was … was mowing grass, actually.”

  “Oh.”

  Typical Stephen. Just “oh.”

  “Why … why are you calling me?”

  There was silence for the space of a few heartbeats before Stephen told her that he was doing some concrete work with Marvin and that Marvin had told him about the new baby. Stephen paused.

  “How are you feeling about our date, Lizzie?” he asked fin
ally.

  He laughed before she could respond.

  “Marvin didn’t think I was very smart,” he said. “He thought I should have asked you out again.”

  Lizzie bit her lip, squeezed her eyes shut, and then opened them wide as she tilted her head back to look at the ceiling. Good old Marvin, coming to her rescue like this.

  “Well, I guess that’s up to you whether you want to see me again,” she replied.

  “You know how I feel, Lizzie,” was all Stephen said.

  “Does that mean you’re asking me out … or … or what?” Lizzie asked.

  When she hung the phone on the hook, she definitely did have a date the following weekend. Dashing into the house, Lizzie let out a most unladylike yell of excitement, causing Emma to sit up from her nap on the couch, struggling to orient herself after all of Lizzie’s hollering.

  Baby Mark snuffled in his bassinet as Lizzie shouted, “Stephen called. I have a date!”

  Laughing wearily, Emma sank back against the cushions.

  “Lizzie, you’re acting as if you’re the only person ever asked for a date,” she said, closing her eyes.

  “I don’t care!” Lizzie said, flopping into a chair and gazing happily at the opposite wall. “I have another date with Stephen!”

  Chapter 16

  SUMMER DAYS TURNED STICKY with August’s humidity, and the heat hovered like a warm, wet blanket. Even getting up in the morning was a chore, and brushing her teeth brought a small sheen of perspiration to Lizzie’s upper lip. The sun was already a hot, orange orb rising mercilessly across the east pasture when she headed outside with Mandy to do yard work after breakfast. It was going to be another uncomfortable day with the thermometer hovering between 90 and 100 degrees.

  English people had air-conditioned homes, that was the thing. They could escape into their shaded, cool houses where that wonderful invention purred endearingly at the window, bringing waves of refrigerated air into a miserable house. They could lounge about in perfect comfort as long as they didn’t go outside, Lizzie thought.

  But not Amish people. No electricity meant no air-conditioning. So summer was miserable, and you had to go about your day with a smile on your face and sweat dripping off your nose and down your back and into your eyes, especially when hoeing in the garden or mowing lawn.

  The weekends weren’t as much fun in the summertime, either, once the heat became this uncomfortable. For one thing, they had to wear Sunday dresses and capes and aprons, which were not designed for August heat at all. Long sleeves, a lined cape, and a black apron pinned around the waist amounted to layers and layers of heavy fabric.

  Lizzie brought this fact to Mam’s attention when she was getting ready one Sunday afternoon before Stephen picked her up. Her hands were moist with perspiration, and the pins would not go smoothly into the black belt of her apron. Her good humor had disappeared.

  “Mam, help me pin on my apron,” she said.

  Mam glanced up from the Family Life magazine she was reading.

  “It’s too HOT to dress up!” Lizzie yelled as she accidentally pricked her finger with a pin.

  “Now …” Mam began.

  “I mean it, Mam. Think about it. We have facing on our dresses—that’s two layers of dress material—and till the cape is pinned on, that’s two more. Then, there are another two in the belt of our aprons. That’s six layers. Six!”

  Lizzie was almost screeching in exasperation, and Mam roared, helplessly caught in waves of laughter.

  “Ach, now Lizzie. It’s not that bad. I guess as long as the world has stood, it’s been summer and winter, and we just take it as it comes.”

  Lizzie flounced off before Mam had a chance to help her pin her apron, deciding that if she was going to be in that kind of mood, she’d do it herself. As long as the world stood, thought Lizzie. What an ancient expression! The world didn’t stand, it hurled itself around the sun at unimaginable speeds, whirling so fast it made no sense that you didn’t feel one thing.

  Stephen had continued to ask Lizzie for a date each weekend, and their relationship had quickly become more serious. They talked easily now, a more comfortable, effortless conversation, and it didn’t really matter whether they kept small talk flowing or not. Silence between the two of them was content and easy, too.

  Dat kept his appointment at the large hospital in Maryland. The doctors put him through a battery of tests to determine why his eyesight was failing and what caused the numbness in his legs and feet. He was often very tired and discouraged after his appointments, worried because his feet and eyes no longer wanted to do what his brain told them to do.

  A few weeks after his examination, Mam went to the phone shanty to find out what the tests revealed. Lizzie watched her walk out the lane with a sinking feeling in her heart. Soon Mam came striding back in the driveway, her thumbs curled under her four fingers as she did when something upset her. She took up the corner of her apron and wiped her eyes before reaching the porch. Lizzie steeled herself for the absolute worst, watching anxiously as Mam approached the steps.

  Lizzie glanced nervously at Dat who sat at the kitchen table, drumming his fingers on the tabletop. As Mam came through the door he looked up anxiously, his eyes seeking reassurance.

  Mam shook her head, making a soft, clucking noise. “Ach, the doctor wants to see you in his office in Maryland. I guess they don’t realize how much it costs for us to go that far with a driver, but he didn’t give us much choice.”

  “How soon does he want to see me?” Dat asked.

  “Tomorrow forenoon.”

  Lizzie dreaded her return from school that day, knowing this was the actual day they would find out why Dat wasn’t well. As always, she predicted the worst, her thoughts swirling around in her mind until she was in quite a state. She wanted the day to end swiftly, and yet she did not want to go home at all.

  But there was no avoiding the cold, hard truth when Mam’s words hit her with all the impact of a sledge hammer.

  “He has MS,” Mam said, not softly or loudly, just in plain ordinary words without tears or any display of emotion at all. She just said the words, simply and matter-of-factly, like carefully laying Scrabble tiles in the proper blocks to complete a word.

  Lizzie threw down her book bag, folding into a kitchen chair with a sigh.

  “What does that mean, Mam?” she asked, her fingers plucking nervously at the rip in the plastic tablecloth.

  Mam turned from the sink where she was peeling potatoes for the evening meal. Taking up the corner of her apron, she dried her hands on it before sitting down at the table.

  Her eyes looked tired. The red veins running through the whites of her eyes were more noticeable when she took off her glasses and wiped them with the dry corner of her apron. Putting her glasses back on her face, she smiled at Lizzie, only to have one corner of her mouth drop immediately as her nostrils flared and tears came of their own accord, despite her best effort to hold them back.

  “I don’t know, Lizzie, really, I don’t,” Mam said softly. “We have plenty of literature the doctor gave us to read, so I’m sure till the evening is over we’ll know more. The way I understand, it starts with a virus which somehow gets into the spinal fluid, and, in time, that messes up the brain signals, which is why Dat doesn’t have the full ability to walk like he used to. Same thing with his eyes.”

  “But there has to be something doctors can do,” Lizzie said. “Isn’t there some type of medication they can give him to make it go away?”

  “No. Not the way the doctor described the disease. There are many types, some much worse than others, or with some the muscles deteriorate faster, I suppose. Ach, Lizzie, I really don’t know too much about it yet. I just know that we have this to live with now and we have to make the best of it.”

  Mam went back to peeling potatoes with a tired sigh, and Lizzie watched her, a feeling of overwhelming pity making it hard for her to speak normally. “Where is the literature the doctor gave you?” she asked.
/>
  “On Dat’s desk.”

  So Lizzie curled up on the sofa, devouring every word she could about the disease that evidently was living in Dat’s spine. Multiple sclerosis. Whoever came up with those words? she thought. Her whole being rebelled against this horrible intruder that had so rudely interrupted their lives.

  She opened one pamphlet and looked at a few drawings of spinal fluid and odd-looking bacteria.

  “This slowly progressive disease involves various parts of the central nervous system and presents numerous symptoms which tend to come and go, only to return again in greater severity,” Lizzie read.

  She found out that although a tremendous amount of research was being carried forward in the hope of discovering the basic cause, as yet there was no known cure.

  Another pamphlet described in more detail exactly what was occurring in Dat’s body. The lesions of multiple sclerosis which interrupt the nerve pathways are characterized by a loss of the usual insulating material called myelin, which covers the nerve fibers. In other words, Lizzie thought, little tiny scabs are messing up the nerve fibers, making everything more difficult for him to do.

  She flung the glossy little folders on the arm of the sofa and marched back out to the kitchen.

  “Does this mean that we have to stay home on weekends and everyone is going to be all serious and sad and I can’t go camping this weekend?” she burst out, leaning against the countertop as she searched Mam’s face.

  Mam smiled a very small smile. “No, of course not. Dat is still alive and well and will continue to be all right for quite some time. Actually, he shouldn’t be showing too many signs of the disease for up to a few years, other than his stumbling and blurry vision. So, no, Lizzie, you can go camping, of course. Our family life will just go on much the same as it always has.”

  “What about the farm?”

  “We’ll keep going as long as Dat is able. We’ll see. Now go change, and you can start getting the wash off the line.”