“I’m really sorry,” Levi said. He stood and she grabbed his hand to stop his leaving. Then she dropped it, realizing the impropriety.
“We’re friends. Right?” she asked.
He nodded. “Jah. I guess friends is a good enough word.”
“And maybe I could come talk to you sometime?” she asked. “As friends, you know.”
“Or I could come see you,” he said. “And Emmy. Just as friends.”
She nodded, then sat back in her seat as Hannah approached. “Thank you, Levi.”
He gave her a tight smile, then walked away.
“What was that all about?” Hannah asked.
Tillie shook her head. “Nothing.”
* * *
Levi made his way into his house and through the living room. He stopped there, noting the wilted cedar boughs that Tillie and her mamm had placed there. And the fat white candles. They had brought Christmas pillows and an afghan. Though they had claimed that the afghan was a gift from Mammi Glick, he wasn’t sure about the rest. Maybe he could take it to Tillie tomorrow. As friends.
Not the cedar boughs, obviously. But the other things. He should return them just in case.
And he could visit Emmy and Tillie and see how they were.
But you saw her today.
At her fiancé’s funeral. Not the best time to talk about anything other than Melvin.
Levi sighed and grabbed the tree limbs from the mantel. He took them to the back door and threw them out into the yard. Maybe he would move them tomorrow when it was daylight once more. But it was getting dark now. Hopefully no one would come visiting. He wasn’t in the mood for company. He wanted to work out some things in his head.
Back in the living room, the fireplace looked bare without the limbs. Even after he started a fire to warm the place. He should have put the boughs in the fire. But he hadn’t thought about it at the time.
The kitchen was still warm from the potbellied stove, where Puddles and her pups had their bed. He should have checked on them when he went through to the back door.
It seemed he should have been doing a lot of things.
Like telling Tillie that she looked good and would make it through. It would seem impossible the first few days, maybe even weeks, but each day got a little easier to bear.
He knew it because she had been the one to help bring him home.
And he wouldn’t know what to do without her.
But those were things he shouldn’t say.
Not now.
Not yet.
Maybe not ever.
* * *
New Year’s Eve and she was in mourning. It was fitting. She mourned Melvin and all that he had been and all that he was yet to be. She mourned their love that had made such a sweet child and then faded away.
The world around her was preparing to have lock-ins and sleepovers and all sorts of fun events. A few years ago, Hannah would have arranged for them to have a sisters/cousin time, spending the night eating popcorn and waiting for the clock to turn over to midnight.
But those days were gone. Just one more thing for her to mourn.
Since it was a holiday, her sisters had called off their cousins’ day. That just meant more work come the next week. But there had been too much going on that day with the road being blocked off and all.
But she was in mourning for a man who wasn’t her husband and would never be. Would never have been even if not for the terrible accident that took his life.
The men had been trying to lift the large tree using a tractor and chains. But the chains broke and the tree fell, landing squarely on Melvin’s chest.
She had asked, then begged David to tell her about it. No, he didn’t suffer much or long and his last words were of her and Emmy.
“He said something strange though,” David recounted just after the funeral.
“What was that?” Tillie asked. She wanted to know everything about his last moments. She wasn’t sure why it was important, just that it was. She wanted to know for certain that he was happy, or at the very least not unhappy before he died.
“He told me to take care of you and Emmy,” David said.
“That’s not strange at all.” In fact, it seemed like a very Melvin thing to say.
“Then he told me not to let you go. Made me promise and everything.” His forehead wrinkled into a frown. “I don’t know what that means. Go where?”
Tillie knew. Melvin didn’t want her to go to the English world. He knew that she wanted to stay with the Amish, and he made her brother promise to keep her there. In his last breath, he was concerned for her.
But for now she would do what she had to do. She shook her head. “Me either,” she said at the time, but knew that she would cry herself to sleep that night. What little sleep she got.
New Year’s Eve, and she was worn out.
However she wasn’t in the mood for any parties. Wasn’t sure she would be in that mood again for a very long time.
Emmy was napping in her cradle, and Tillie had settled down on the bed with a book. It was good enough to keep her attention, but maybe not good enough to keep her awake. Especially if her baby stayed asleep. Then she might even be able to get some rest as well.
A knock sounded at her door. “Tillie?” Mamm called. “You have company.”
Emmy arched her back and let out a squall.
Tillie sighed, placed the leather bookmark Levi had given her between the pages of her book, and stood. He had given her the bookmark to have a reminder of Melvin. But every time she looked at it, she thought of Levi.
Which seemed very disrespectful of the dead.
“Coming,” she called. She grabbed the baby’s
