“Let it out, dear,” Hannah said softly. “I’m going to whip you some cream to go on top of your pie. I think you could use a little treat...”
Patience felt the tears rise again, and this time she didn’t stop them. She lowered her head onto her arms and cried.
Tuesday morning, school was set to open and Samuel waited patiently by the door, the buggy hitched and ready. When Patience brought her last bag of school supplies to the door, Samuel took it from her and put it up on his shoulder.
“All ready, Mamm!” Samuel called. “I’ll be back in a short while.”
“Drive safe, Daet. And you have a good day with those kinner, Patience,” Hannah said.
Samuel carried her bag out to the buggy and Patience got settled in her seat while Samuel put the bag in the back and came around to hoist himself up.
“It’s a beautiful morning,” Samuel said, flicking the reins.
And it was—warm, bright and a cloudless sky. But it was hard to feel cheery this morning. A good cry last night, and another one upstairs in her bed, had drained her of tears, but her heart still felt heavy in her chest.
“How many kinner do you have, Samuel?” Patience asked, more by way of making conversation than by any real interest.
“Oh...” Samuel’s cheeks pinked. “None, I’m afraid.”
Patience looked over at him, surprised. “But you called her Mamm.”
“And she called me Daet. I know...” He sighed. “You see, we wanted kinner—a whole house filled with them—but Gott never gave us any. We were heartbroken about it for years, and then we remembered that Gott doesn’t make mistakes. He brought us together, gave us a love like no other and didn’t choose to give us kinner to love. So we decided to look at it differently.”
A love like no other, and an inability to bring children into the marriage. She could identify with that a little too keenly.
“How?” Patience asked.
“We decided to be the mamm and daet that young people needed when their own parents were far from them,” Samuel replied. “We’ve had traveling students stay with us. A few Englisher college students came to see how we Amish live and we gave them room and board. We also opened our home to the teachers.” Samuel cast her a shy smile. “In hopes that we could be a little piece of home when you are far from yours.”
“That’s...beautiful,” she said.
A life of meaning, even without kinner of their own. She’d been wanting to create something like that for her own life—a loving teacher to help guide these kinner toward Gott, even if she never did have any babies of her own.
“Can I ask you something, Samuel?” she asked hesitantly.
“Yah, you can ask,” Samuel replied.
“Did you ever...lose your faith in Gott’s leading? Gott led you to Hannah—and I believe that—but did you ever, in a moment of weakness, regret your marriage? Did you ever think that if you’d married someone else, you might have had that houseful of kinner after all?”
Samuel looked over at her, his eyebrows raised, and she felt a flood of shame at even asking him such a thing.
“I know it’s a terrible question,” she said quickly. “I don’t mean to disrespect your marriage, or your wife.”
“Not once,” he said quietly. “And that is not just the answer of a loyal husband. That is the honest truth. My wife is a wonderful woman, as you probably already know. And being her husband—that was Gott moving. I have never questioned that. And what Gott has joined—”
“—let no man put asunder,” she finished for him.
“Yah, that, too,” he said. “But I was going to say, what Gott has joined, He joins for good reason. No one can love me just like my Hannah. And no one can love her just like me. And I’m grateful every day for the woman Gott gave me. Yah, I missed out on being a daet to my own little ones, but we remind each other that we’re still able to love the ones Gott puts in our paths. When we were younger, we focused on the kinner. And as we aged, so did the ones we reached out to. It happened naturally, I suppose. So she calls me Daet and I call her Mamm. Because we still have a job to do—it’s just a little harder.”
The horses clopped along, early morning dew shining like diamonds on the tall grasses in the ditches on either side of the road. Samuel hummed a little song to himself, and Patience’s heart pounded in her chest.
Here was a couple that had never had kinner, had never resented each other for the loss, and had made life so meaningful and rich that she’d never have guessed their childless state if he hadn’t told her himself.
She’d been so certain that Thomas would regret giving up that houseful of kinner of his own... But was it possible that he might not? Could this love that had blossomed between them be something wonderful enough that he’d never regret the day he chose her?
But as soon as the hope started to rise up inside her, she remembered that this wasn’t just about Thomas and a desire for children. This was about the daughter he already had—the little girl who needed her roots, her stability and a family that could anchor her to an Amish life.
Even if Patience could take the leap for a love like theirs, she knew what Rue needed, and she still couldn’t provide it.
Samuel pulled the buggy to a stop in front of the schoolhouse, and Patience took out the key. She was here, ready to teach her very first day of school—and she’d have to find a way to fill that aching hole in her heart alone.
“Let me get that bag for you,” Samuel said.
“Oh, I can
