“I’ll see what I can sort out,” he said.
Patience finished the muffin and then wiped the crumbs from her fingers. She went to the sink, put in the plug and looked around for the dish soap.
“Uh... I can do that,” Thomas said.
Patience looked up at him, a little embarrassed. “This is women’s work.”
“I know it’s not my place to tell you what needs to be done,” Thomas said, his voice low. “But Rue needs dresses, and if you’d be willing to start on that, I can clean up.”
“Oh...” She felt the heat hit her cheeks. Had she overstepped somehow?
“We’re a houseful of bachelors,” Thomas said. “We fend for ourselves a lot. We’ll be right proper once we’re married, I’m sure, but—” He shrugged.
“Yah, well, I can start sewing,” Patience said.
As she stepped away from the sink, Thomas pulled a bottle of dish soap from the cabinet and squirted it into the running water. He rolled his sleeves up past his elbows and looked around himself for a moment, then started gathering the dirty dishes. He looked...practiced. He’d spent time with the Englishers... Was this his time away shining through?
For the next few minutes, Patience cut out the paper pattern for a little dress, then laid out the cloth and began pinning the pattern in place. Mammi’s sewing basket was in the corner, so Patience made use of it. Girls’ dresses were simple enough to sew, and they left lots of room for a child to grow, too. She’d helped her sisters make all sorts of clothes for her nieces and nephews over the years, so her hands knew the work.
But as she worked, she caught herself looking up at the quiet man who continued to wash, dry and put away the stack of morning dishes.
“I know that you spent time with the Englishers,” she said after some silence. “I shouldn’t be trying to inform you of how they raise their kinner.”
“Yah. I went there to live with my mamm for my Rumspringa and stayed for three years. I’m twenty-four now, so I’ve been home for a while,” he replied. “But they’re different, the Englishers. They keep to themselves. You don’t see as much as you think you will about how their families work. The young people spend time together, and the older people have their friends... The different generations don’t come together very often.”
That seemed sad—and lonely. All the same, a woman like her who wouldn’t be raising children of her own might fit into an Englisher system a little easier than she would here with her own people. She wouldn’t ask about that, though. It wouldn’t be right to show curiosity about the Englishers. Still... He’d loved an Englisher girl, hadn’t he? Obviously they weren’t so strange and different to him.
Thomas seemed to feel her eyes on him, and he turned. She felt the heat hit her face and she dropped her attention to the pattern on the fabric. Was that jealousy she’d just felt?
“I had a choice,” he said quietly. “I could stay with my mamm and live an Englisher life, or I could come back. It wasn’t easy. Your home, your life... Your mother is supposed to be a part of that, isn’t she?” He waited, as if he expected her to answer, and when she didn’t, he went on, “But I’m Amish. And I came back. I’ll be Amish until I die.”
“I wasn’t questioning your dedication,” she said.
“I thought it should be said,” he replied.
“Do you miss your mamm?” she asked quietly.
Thomas pressed his lips together, then nodded. “Yah. Of course.”
But he was living away from her. An Amish family got together with all the grandparents, aunts and uncles and cousins regularly. Even coming out here to teach school, Patience knew she’d go back to visit her family at Christmas, and to help her mamm with all the Christmas baking. Would Thomas have his mamm’s cooking to look forward to come Christmas?
Thomas let the water out of the sink and wrung out the cloth. He hung it over the tap neatly.
“I’d best get some work done here at home,” he said. “I’ll be going back to the shop tomorrow, so...”
“Yah, of course,” she replied.
Thomas nodded, then headed past the table, his fingers skimming over the tabletop next to the spread-out fabric as he passed her. She watched him disappear into the mudroom, and a moment later the door shut behind him.
There was a rustle at the doorway to the sitting room and Patience looked up to see Mary standing there. Her eyes looked bleary from sleep, and she patted at her hair, checking for any loose strands.
“I must have dozed off,” Mary said. “I’d better get to the dishes.”
“Thomas did them,” Patience replied.
“Did he?” Mary’s face pinked. “That boy... They’re treating me like I’m old, you know. What is that you’re doing, dear?”
“I’m starting on a dress for Rue,” Patience replied.
“Well, let me help, then,” Mary said. “I can cut out the cloth still. I’m not as good with the stitching anymore, but—”
“That would be wonderful, Mary,” Patience replied with a smile. “Before the day is out, I want her to have at least one proper dress.”
Mary came to the table, and pulled out a chair. She reached for the shears, and Patience passed them over.
“She wasn’t a bad woman,” Mary said, setting to work. “Thomas’s mamm, I mean. She wasn’t a bad woman, just a sad one. She knew how to be Amish with her husband, but she hadn’t been raised in our ways, and she didn’t know how to do it without him. She couldn’t change who she was.”
Patience met the old woman’s gaze. Did Mary guess at how much Patience was judging the woman who’d left her sons behind? She didn’t answer, and Mary didn’t say anything further.
There was a dress to be made—an Englisher child to be made over into a plain one. Like her grandmother, Rue had started
