Like any doting big sister, I trusted that he’d do well now that he, too, was one of the big kids.
Walking back toward the house, I looked over my shoulder at Chris once more before heading inside.
Today, Mamma had entrusted Emma and me with making sure the younger children were cleaned up and ready for school on time. She’d hated having to miss seeing Chris off herself, but early this morning she had gone to Middlebury, Indiana, to substitute teach at an Amish-Mennonite school not far from the RV factory where Dat worked as a supervisor in the cabinetry department. Naturally, I’d promised to tell her all about Chris’s morning once she and Dat arrived home this afternoon. Oh, I could hardly wait to share Chris’s joy with her . . . despite my own mixed feelings.
Mamma will understand. She’s been through this ten times now!
In the kitchen, seventeen-year-old Emma was making an attempt to hurry along our younger sisters, Liz, turning fourteen in October, and Verena, twelve, both dallying as they were known to do. “Yous don’t wanna be late on the first day, do ya?” Emma said as she motioned them toward the back door. “Time’s a-wastin’!”
“Pay close attention to the teacher,” I said as they poked along, jabbering in Deitsch as if in a world of their own. “If you’re late, you might have to wash all the chalkboards after school!”
At my warning, they scurried along.
“You sound like Mamma,” said Emma, who turned her attention back to the four apple pies she was making for tonight’s supper—two for the twelve of us, and two for our close neighbors, Elmer and Polly Neuenschwander. Although our amiable neighbors were Old Order Amish like we were, they gave all of us children gifts every year at Christmastime. And because of that, Mamma had made pies and fresh-baked bread to take over to them for all these many years.
I sat down at the table and sighed. “I was glad to see Chris head off for school. But honestly, I feel a twinge of sadness, too.”
“Aw . . . well, he’s been itchin’ to start.” Emma pushed one pie after another into the old black wood stove.
“Jah, and I’ll get more work done without my little shadow, ain’t?”
Emma was more interested in baking than in looking after a younger sibling. In fact, I’d often hinted that she would do well to run a bakery somewhere and skip marriage. She would just roll her brown eyes at me and laugh. Truth was, every courting-age young woman round these parts was keen on getting hitched up with a fine Amish boy, settling down, and having babies.
“Maybe it’s time to turn the pages of your own life, sister . . . with Hans.” Emma came over to sit beside me on the long wooden bench, flour on the tip of her nose.
I agreed, thinking how exciting it was to be his girl. “He said he’d see me at Ping-Pong Saturday night,” I said.
Emma eyed me for a moment. “He told ya . . . didn’t ask?”
I wasn’t sure how to take her seeming concern. “Puh! We have an understanding now.”
“Well, surely he’s polite and still invites you on dates.”
“Now and then, jah.” I was so new at all this courtship business, I really didn’t know what was considered acceptable. I was surprised Emma already had opinions on such things.
“I’ve seen him wink at ya during Singings.” Emma’s eyes locked with mine. “I s’pose Mamma has an idea you’re seein’ someone.”
“Not just yet, but I’ll tell her soon. Still . . . ain’t like I’ll be wed by this November.”
“Nee, yous need time to get well acquainted.” Emma put her arms around me. “I’m happy for ya, if you think he’s the one.”
“You’ll be the first to know when I’m engaged,” I assured her, filled with hope.
“And I’ll hold ya to it,” Emma said as she went to check on her pies.
CHAPTER
1
Centreville, Michigan, was situated on the Prairie River. It was a close-knit town, and Lena loved it for just that reason. Everyone knew each other by first name . . . and also minded everyone else’s business, which was either good or bad, depending on who you were or what you’d done. There were always amusing stories floating around on the grapevine: which sixteen-year-old fellow had raced a train in his new open carriage at the railroad crossing in nearby Wasepi, or which young woman had sewn the hem of her dress too short. Or even which Amish farmer had sneaked off to listen to his portable transistor radio when Hank Aaron beat Babe Ruth’s home run record.
Aside from ordinary gossip like that, there was no one more caring and generous than the People up and down those southern Michigan back roads. These were the folk Lena Rose had known all of her eighteen-and-a-half years, and her heart was tightly wound around her hometown and the family she loved so dearly.
That hot late-August afternoon seemed to drag on like never before as she helped Emma put up peaches. Lena caught herself looking at the day clock, wondering what new things six-year-old Chris was learning.
She remembered again her own school days, when she and other Amish children were required to attend public schools. How far we’ve come, Lena thought, glad Chris got the chance to do his learning amongst the People. She fastened the lid on the last jar of peaches and put it in the canner, thinking ahead to what she might prepare as an after-school snack for her younger siblings.
“Goat cheese and crackers, and sliced apples,” she murmured to herself.
Emma glanced at her. “Ach, delicious,” she said. “But it’s too soon after the noon meal for a snack, ain’t?” she teased.
The two of them discussed what they planned to make
