Big Decisions Page 8

  “No,” Mam said wisely. “It was the stairs.”

  When Dat left to go to work, Mam’s eyes bored into Lizzie’s, and she said, “All right. Out with it. What was going on?”

  Lizzie burst into happy laughter, telling Mam everything. Mam’s eyes became soft and watery, and her nose turned red as it always did when she became emotional. “Ach my, Lizzie, I would say you’re off on the right foot.” It was like a large pat on the back, hearing Mam say that.

  Chapter 8

  LIZZIE UNHOOKED THE BUGGY window from the ceiling and lowered it into place with a decided click. Rubbing her hands across her sweater sleeves, she shivered and said, “Brrr.”

  Stephen smiled at her.

  “I wondered how long you’d keep that window open. This is real hunting-season weather.”

  Lizzie slapped his arm playfully. “That’s all you ever think about.”

  “Oh, no. Not this fall. I’m thinking about you, then the house, then hunting. See? Hunting is way down on the bottom of the list.”

  “Don’t you ever think about getting married? About the wedding?” Lizzie asked, smiling happily.

  Stephen’s face became quite sober, and he watched the horse’s ears intently. “Yeah, I do.”

  “You don’t sound very thrilled about it.”

  “Oh, I am, Lizzie. You know I am. It’s just that I’ll be glad when the actual wedding day is over. I don’t like crowds of people all packed together in one house, even if it’s our wedding. I mean, I don’t want to make it sound as if I don’t want to marry you. I just wish there wouldn’t have to be quite so many people there.”

  Lizzie patted his arm reassuringly. “I know, Stephen. I know very well how you dislike crowds of people. I’m just the opposite, aren’t I?”

  Stephen nodded quietly.

  “I’ll just love all the attention, the relatives, the gifts, the food! Actually, I can hardly wait for our wedding day.”

  The horse picked up speed without being urged when it spotted another buggy on the road ahead of them. Horses did that, Lizzie thought. They could be clopping along, a bit bored, and suddenly, their ears would prick up when they spied another team ahead of them. Instantly, their ears turned forward, and they surged ahead, no longer content to amble along by themselves. Stephen pulled back slightly as his horse lunged into his collar, racing toward the other team.

  They were on their way to Ben King’s house to a supper for the youth. It was one of the farthest places they had to travel in their district. Stephen had let his horse walk up a few of the steepest hills to save his strength for the miles ahead. At the rate the horse was traveling now, it certainly looked as if he had conserved more than enough energy.

  The gap between the two teams narrowed until Lizzie could see someone waving and a face in the mirror peering back at her. “Rebecca,” Lizzie laughed. “The only person who waves like that!”

  Stephen grinned.

  Rebecca was Stephen’s sister, as well as Lizzie’s closest friend now that Mandy and Emma were both married. She had a great sense of humor with an endearing manner that made her easy to talk to and so much fun to be with, Lizzie thought.

  Rebecca had been dating Reuben after they had gone on a camping trip together with Lizzie, Stephen, and other friends. Now they were making their own plans for their wedding. Lizzie’s Uncle Marvin and Sara Ruth, as well as her friends, Amos and Sally, were also planning their weddings in November or December. This would be one of the last youth gatherings that Stephen and Lizzie would attend since most of the group was getting married.

  They reached a steep hill that wound through a wooded ridge, so both horses slowed to a walk. Lizzie gasped as Rebecca hopped lightly out of Reuben’s buggy while it was still moving and stood in the middle of the road, grinning at Lizzie.

  Lizzie slid back the door of Stephen’s buggy.

  “What are you doing, jumping out of the buggy like that?” she asked.

  “I’m tired of sitting. Jump down. Let’s walk the rest of the way.”

  Glancing questioningly at Stephen, who was busy keeping his horse from balking on the hill, she hopped out of the buggy, almost stumbling before she stood beside Rebecca.

  “Hi!”

  “Hi!”

  They both burst out laughing for no reason at all.

  “Rebecca, you know what? We shouldn’t be quite so silly anymore. We’re both getting married soon. Can you imagine? We’ll be old married ladies, sitting at our quilts, sighing about our arthritis way too soon!” Lizzie laughed.

  “Just because we’re getting married doesn’t mean we can’t laugh,” Rebecca cried.

  Lizzie caught her breath, grabbing her side. “Don’t walk so fast. I have side stitches.”

  “What are they?”

  “Not so fast!”

  Quite suddenly, Rebecca headed straight for the leafy bank and sat down so fast that little puffs of dust rolled from under her skirt and leaves whirled away with the dust. “Okay then, we’ll sit.”

  Lizzie plopped down beside Rebecca, gasping. “I don’t know how you can walk up a hill that fast and keep talking at the same time,” Lizzie said wryly.

  “That’s because I’m skinny,” Rebecca announced.

  “Do you think I’m fat, Rebecca? Seriously, tell me honestly, am I too fat to be getting married? Would you go on a diet if you were me? Huh? Tell me.”

  “Well … let me see. Hmmm.” Rebecca leaned back, eyeing Lizzie carefully. “Yes, you’re fat.”

  Lizzie pinched her hard on her upper arm. “Stop it.”

  “Well, you are.”

  “What?”

  “Fat.”

  “I’m not! Do you think so, for real?”

  “Yes, you’re fat.”

  They both doubled over with laughter before Rebecca wiped her eyes and said, “You’re not skinny. You’re a bit heavy, but Stephen likes you like that, so I would never, not even once, worry about it.”

  “Did he ever tell you he likes me a … a … bit heavy?”

  “No, but I know he does. He likes you.”

  “I would hope so. We’re getting married, Rebecca.”

  “We are, too.”

  “Do you want to?”

  “What?”

  “Get married?”

  “Why do you ask such a silly question? Of course.”

  Lizzie smiled, but the smile kind of slid downward into a soft sigh, like an ice cream cone that was melting in the hot sun.

  “Don’t you ever wonder if you’re doing the right thing? I mean, what if … after a couple gets married they suddenly decide they really don’t like each other all that well, and they’re Amish and can’t get a divorce and are miserably unhappy all the rest of their lives.”

  “O … o-oh, Lizzie. You think of the dumbest things.”

  “Do you know of one couple, just one Amish couple that that happened to?” Lizzie asked, peering anxiously into Rebecca’s face.

  Their conversation was brought to an abrupt end by the appearance of two teams coming up over the hill. The first one was Marvin and Sara Ruth, followed by Amos and Sally.

  “Jump out!” Rebecca shouted, gesturing to the approaching women to join them. Both women leaped nimbly out of their buggies as Marvin and Amos waved and said hello before moving on up the hill to follow Stephen and Reuben.

  Sara Ruth and Sally were both small and blond. They were each only a bit over five feet tall, weighing slightly more than a hundred pounds. Lizzie always envied their slim figures, looking so little and girlish, so light-haired and dainty. But she guessed not everyone could be so perfect.

  After saying hello, Sara Ruth felt the sleeve of Rebecca’s dress. “Is it new?” she asked.

  “Yes, I made a few new dresses for the weddings this fall. We’ll all be going in with the ‘young married ones,’ so we have to look nice and neat and a bit plainer, you know. Comb our hair flat.”

  They all laughed at Rebecca, but each one knew what she meant. The “young marrieds
” were the couples who were engaged. They got special treatment at each wedding. They were seated first among the youth, which was always an honor. Even if you weren’t married yet, only engaged, you were still seated first. These girls combed their hair more demurely, like the married women, and looked very mature and ladylike, Lizzie always thought.

  She tried to savor every moment here on the leaf-strewn, wooded hillside, chattering as only young women can. This was almost their last time together at the youth’s supper, and it all took on a surreal quality as Lizzie listened to Sally and Rebecca, smiling to herself as she tore a brittle leaf into many pieces.

  It was a bit sad to think that there would be no more weekends of running around with her friends. Not really sad, just nostalgic maybe, kind of wishing you could go back and be 16 all over again. Would there ever be another time in her life quite as exciting as going to Allen County with Emma that very first weekend just after Lizzie turned 16? Probably from here on until she died, nothing would even come close to it. She would just grow old and fat—fatter, according to Rebecca—and have a whole houseful of children with runny noses and bottles dripping milk all over the floor. In a brown house with white bricks, instead of a brown house with brown bricks.

  Suddenly she wanted to never, ever get married. Like a dark cloud hiding the sunlight, all of her happy anticipation disappeared. She pulled up her knees, stretching the blue fabric of her dress tightly around them, resting her chin on her folded legs.

  Rebecca stopped talking and looked at Lizzie. “You’re being very quiet.”

  “Don’t worry about it.”

  “Grouch!”

  Lizzie smiled.

  The other girls chattered on, Sara Ruth giving them a vivid account of sewing her own wedding dress. They talked about how nervous they were about their actual weddings when they would stand facing the minister in front of hundreds of pairs of eyes.

  “Mary Ann is lucky!” Lizzie said finally.

  “Why?” Sally asked.

  “Because she’s been married for almost a year, living in her cozy new home in Lamton, and all this nerve-racking stuff is behind her.”

  “You think getting married is nerve-racking?”

  “Well, kind of. In a way.”

  The truth was that while Lizzie looked forward to all of the food and attention on her wedding day, she also got very nervous whenever she thought about it. Would Stephen know how to do everything right? She remembered Joshua and Emma, and also John and Mandy, practicing the day before their wedding, each turning the proper way so that the groom never turned his back to his bride. Things like that. She knew Stephen was completely ill at ease in a crowd, so the whole wedding day was something that gave her a severe case of butterflies in her stomach.

  “Oh, it won’t be so bad when the time comes,” Rebecca comforted her.

  “Come on, let’s go. It’s almost time to eat,” Sara Ruth said.

  So they walked the remainder of the way up the wooded hillside, the four of them in their bright dresses making a colorful scene against the backdrop of green leaves. As they neared Ben and Lydia King’s home, they all remarked over Lydia’s perfect flower beds and garden.

  “She even has cabbage and lettuce that looks absolutely healthy!” Rebecca said excitedly.

  “What’s so thrilling about that?” Lizzie wanted to know.

  “Oh, a lot. We’re moving onto a produce farm, you know, so I’ll be busy helping Reuben with all kinds of vegetables and things. Imagine! We’ll have about a hundred times the amount of this garden.”

  Lizzie looked at Rebecca closely. Sure enough, the enthusiasm shining from her pretty blue eyes was genuine. Unbelievably, she did look forward to all that work.

  Lizzie shook her head incredulously. “Rebecca, I can’t believe you. How can you look forward to toiling in a huge garden every day?”

  Rebecca stopped and stared at Lizzie. Then she spread her hands wide and laughed. “See, Lizzie, you just don’t get it. Not everyone is alike. Look at Mandy, way down the 842 on her dairy farm. Is she happy? Huh? Is she?”

  Lizzie burst out laughing. “Stop it, smarty.”

  “Well, just because you don’t like cows and get depressed thinking about growing produce doesn’t mean Mandy and I do, too. We’re just not all alike.”

  All the girls burst out laughing. It was just Rebecca’s way, turning an ordinary sentence into a statement.

  Lizzie slipped her arm through Rebecca’s and squeezed her hand. “All right, I understand. Stop acting like Mandy.”

  Rebecca grinned at her, and Lizzie’s heart swelled with love for her true friend, because that’s what she was. Stephen’s sister or not, she would always be a special friend, one whom she hoped to remain friends with all the days of their lives.

  That evening on the way home from the hymn-singing, Lizzie felt so much love and gratitude for having Stephen in her life. He was not a dairyman or a produce farmer, and he was building a new house for her, albeit with the white bricks he had chosen. She sighed happily, thinking how perfect he was for her.

  “Tired?” Stephen asked.

  “No, just happy. Stephen, I’m so glad you’re not a dairy farmer or a produce farmer, I mean, a person who grows vegetables on one huge acre after another. I don’t think I would marry you if you were. Can you imagine Reuben and Rebecca?” she asked.

  “Sure, I can imagine Rebecca. She loves to garden.”

  Lizzie slipped her arm into his and said softly, “But, oh, Stephen, I’m so glad you’re a carpenter.”

  They rode together in silence for a short time before he asked her if that was the only reason she had agreed to marry him.

  “Of course not, Stephen. There are many other reasons. But you know as well as I do that I could never look forward to slaving in a produce field or milking cows. I would give up to it if I had to, but I probably wouldn’t be very happy, at least sometimes.”

  Stephen laughed wryly. “Likely not. Giving in is not one of your strong points.”

  “Ouch!” Lizzie said, smiling.

  “That’s all right. I will probably like a wife with a little spunk.”

  Lizzie smiled to herself. Stephen was so right for her. She wondered what had taken her so long to see it. Life was amazing, or rather, God was amazing, the way he worked things out. Even if you resisted his will at first, he just did what was best for you until you were ready.

  Like knowing Stephen was the one for her. How could she have known if he hadn’t gone away for a while? And how did he know she had to have that time without him? Probably God, same as always. He put in people’s heads things that were right until his perfect will was made manifest, like the Bible said.

  “Stephen, you know what, though? Sometimes we so barely manage to find the Lord’s will. You know? Kind of like a needle in a haystack? If you keep searching and want to find it with all your heart, you will. Right?”

  “Sometimes you know where it is, you feel deep down that you found it, and then, you can’t have it,” Stephen said very quietly.

  A slow smile spread across Lizzie’s face. “You mean me, don’t you?”

  “Yes, I mean you. Although you’re a lot bigger than a needle in a haystack.”

  Lizzie laughed.

  Chapter 9

  A FEW WEEKS LATER, all the building permits had passed through the network of township ordinances, the bank had obligingly loaned Stephen and Lizzie the amount they needed for Stephen to get started on the house, and the bulldozer was scheduled to arrive.

  Dat was fairly dancing with excitement. Mam said she declared he was getting better, MS or not. His mind was fully occupied with Stephen and Lizzie building a new house on the acre of ground Dat and Mam had given them. It was still a one-way street when Dat and Stephen were together, Dat doing all the talking, or rather, the greater portion by far, and Stephen quietly deciding things his way without much ado.

  Mam said she was afraid Dat was a bit pushy, shoving all his own ideas on Stephen, but Lizzie
assured her that Stephen could take care of himself. He just didn’t say much, then went ahead and did exactly what he wanted to do in the first place.

  When Lizzie stood on the hillside and watched the huge bulldozer backing down off the trailer that had transported it, she put both hands to her mouth to hide her excitement. KatieAnn and Susan were with her, their eyes big with awe around this noisy, rattling monster.

  Stephen and Dat walked over to them and grinned.

  “Think he can dig your basement?” Dat asked.

  “He’s certainly big and noisy enough!” Lizzie yelled above the clanking and chugging of the big machine.

  The driver waved down at them, pulling levers and working pedals as he turned the bulldozer toward the four wooden stakes with plastic orange streamers tied to them, outlining where the house would be built. And then, just like a gigantic spoon over a dish of hard, frozen ice cream, he scooped up a layer of sod and set it aside.

  Lizzie felt a bit sad for the poor warped little alfalfa plants which were taken from all the rest of the alfalfa plants on the hillside and cast aside by the bulldozer to die. It didn’t seem right. The little plants had to sacrifice their lives so she could live in her house on the hill. Sorry, little alfalfa, but you’d have to withstand the winter winds anyway, and then only to be cut and dried and eaten by a cow, she thought.

  The huge yellow machine kept chewing and scraping at the alfalfa-covered hillside until a decided hole appeared, which swallowed up parts of the bulldozer as the driver dug away, or so it seemed.

  Stephen stood and watched, his blue eyes alight, as Dat kept walking here and there, swinging his shovel and talking fast and loud whenever he passed by Stephen. Stephen smiled at Lizzie over Dat’s head, and she burst into laughter of pure joy. That was Dat! That was just how he was.

  “I’m cold!” KatieAnn said, grasping Lizzie’s hand tightly as she burrowed her head into her sweater.

  “Are you?” Lizzie asked, glancing at the twins, surprised to find their noses red with the brisk wind.

  “Okay, come on. We’ll go down to Mam. This is long enough now. We know what he’ll be doing the rest of the day, right?”