“She seems pretty special to me,” Melvin said.
Levi didn’t know if he was talking about Tillie or Emmy.
Tillie returned from the stove and sat down next to Levi.
The air around them seemed to thicken. One cup of coffee and he would go. She had been hospitable enough to offer it to him, and it would sure help warm up his insides for the trip back home. He took a sip and reached for his sack. “There are a couple of baby things in here that I thought you might could use,” he said. “And a Christmas gift for you both.”
He wasn’t sure if they would be taken in the same spirit he was giving them. He could only hope and pray that they would.
“Danki,” she said. She accepted the flat package he handed her and the smaller rectangle one, then she placed them in front of her.
“Go ahead,” he said. “Open them.”
She picked up the smaller one.
“That one’s Emmy’s,” he said.
She tore off the plain green wrapping paper to reveal a box that came off the bottle of cough syrup. His trepidation doubled.
“I didn’t get you medication,” he said.
She popped the tape on the box and smiled at him. “I didn’t think you had.”
That sizzle of connection seemed to be there for a moment when their eyes met, then she looked away and it was gone. Perhaps he had just imagined it.
She pulled the tissue paper out of the box, bringing the present with it. Then she unfolded the paper and stared at the gift.
“It’s a pacifier holder,” he explained. “You clip it to her gown so she doesn’t lose her pacifier.” It was something he had been thinking about making for a long time now, but this was the first one he had ever actually fashioned. He had tooled the leather strap with tiny little flowers and figured he could use baseballs or puppies to have embellishments more fitting for boys.
“I know what it is,” she said. “And it’s lovely, thank you.”
It was simple, really: a strap of leather with a snap and the clip attached at one end. But right now, there was not another one like it in the world.
Tillie wrapped it back up into the paper and set it in the middle of the table. “We’ll have to try it out when she wakes up.”
Levi nodded. He probably wouldn’t be here for that.
Tillie reached for the bigger package, the flat one. His heart sped up a bit. Suddenly he wanted to snatch it from her hands and tell her that he had made a mistake, but he managed not to. He tried to breathe normally as he sat and watched her open it.
At least he had found a normal box to put this one in. Some kind of shirt box that Mary must have squirreled away in the linen closet.
Tillie slid the lid off and gasped. “Is this what I think it is?”
He nodded, swallowed hard once again. “It’s a baby book.”
She pulled it from the box and laid it gently on the table in front of her. It looked so right there that he knew he hadn’t made a mistake.
He had hand-tooled the cover with the same flowers he had used on Emmy’s pacifier holder, but these were surrounding an ornate letter E. He was proud of the work. Not only for what he had done, but for the sentiment as well. He had wanted something extra special to give Tillie, and it seemed as if he had succeeded.
“It’s beautiful,” she said with a sniff. She delicately wiped at the tears threatening to fall.
“Tillie?” Melvin took that time to interrupt their conversation. He said no more than her name, but there was a wealth of meaning to it.
Levi cleared his throat. “I hope I haven’t overstepped.”
Tillie shook her head without saying a word. She placed the book back into the box very primly. She put the lid on and patted it as if the job was well done. Somehow he knew she was as uncomfortable as he.
“That’s very nice of you,” Melvin said.
Levi turned toward the other man. For just a moment he had forgotten Melvin was sitting there. But of course he was. “Danki.”
He wanted to ask her if she had made any plans for after the holiday, but he had no right. Melvin was back, and that changed everything for her. Or at least it had the potential to.
She had been planning to return to the English world, but now that Melvin was back, perhaps she was holding out hope that he would still come back Amish.
Levi didn’t have any doubts. Melvin’s intention was obvious in the way the man was dressed. He was English from his haircut to the tips of his motorcycle boots. At least that’s what Levi thought they were called. Tillie was dressed English as well. In the same clothes she’d worn the night before. He had a feeling that when she had left the apartment she shared with Melvin, she had the clothes on her back and nothing more.
Tillie turned to Levi. “Danki,” she said. “Thank you.” Saying it twice almost like she didn’t acknowledge the Pennsylvania Dutch. She was already slipping away. But she had never been his to start. Whether she left or stayed. But he would be forever grateful to her for helping him move past the crushing grief he’d had when he saw her that cold, icy night in the barn.
“I’m sorry,” Tillie continued. “I don’t have a gift for you. Except for maybe some more cranberry bread.”
“I didn’t give you a gift to get one in return.” He hadn’t, even though she had given him the best gift of all.
He stood. “I should be going.”
“Would you like a coffee to take with you?”
He shook his head. It was just one more thing to have to bring back when the time came.
“You could put it in your buggy and bring it back to church tomorrow.”
“Are you going
