A Wells Landing Christmas Read online

  “I would say that’s not the truth.”

  “It is.” Whatever had been between them had died long ago. They had agreed to go their separate ways. Was it her fault that Zeb had decided to break their agreement and come back to Wells Landing? Was it fair of her to think he could stay away from his home forever? “Listen, Dawdi—”

  He shook his head. “You don’t have to tell me,” he said. “But one day you’re going to have to acknowledge it to yourself.”

  * * *

  Long after her grandfather had kissed her cheek, told her good night, and hobbled off to his own bedroom, his words stayed with her.

  One day you’re going to have to acknowledge it to yourself.

  Was that what he thought she was doing? Hiding from the truth? Was it what she was doing? She had been telling herself lies for so long that she had come to believe them as the truth. That she didn’t need Zeb. She didn’t love him. She didn’t want him. That she didn’t miss him with each breath.

  But nothing had changed since he’d come back into town. She still didn’t want to need him, want him, miss him, love him.

  She got up the next morning and went through her normal Monday routine, headed for the bakery, then back home again. It was perhaps the first day that she hadn’t truly enjoyed her job. Her dawdi’s advice haunted her. And she found less satisfaction in making the good folks of Wells Landing talk to her. She burned her arm on the large oven and broke one fingernail down to the quick. Thankfully, neither bled, but she drove home with a throbbing arm and a bandage over the end of her thumb.

  “Of course,” she muttered as she pulled onto the short lane leading to the house. A tractor was parked off to one side. A machine that didn’t belong to her or her dawdi.

  Visitors. Just what she needed.

  She searched her memory for the owner of the tractor, but she couldn’t place the machine with anyone in their church district. Not that she knew every tractor that belonged to every family. She was more familiar with everyone’s horse and buggy than the many rusty tractors that chugged down the Mayes County roads daily.

  She continued to assess the tractor, but couldn’t remember who it belonged to. The bishop? Tassie Weber? One of the other Brennemans?

  Ivy parked her own tractor in its usual spot, then climbed down. There was no one hanging out in the cool December air, and she pulled her coat a little tighter around her and headed for the house. With any luck her dawdi was home and their visitor had been offered some of last night’s pie and a fresh cup of coffee.

  She took off her coat, bonnet, and gloves, then followed the delicious aroma of coffee straight into the kitchen, surprised to see Clara Rose Brenneman sitting across from Dawdi. She was perhaps the last person Ivy would have expected.

  “Clara Rose, so good of you to come by,” she greeted, wondering what had the woman visiting. Did she come to talk to Dawdi about hay, or was she there for Ivy?

  Ivy remembered the scathing looks that Clara Rose had sent her way last year during the fall hayride. Not that Ivy could blame her, given all the rumors that were circulating at the time, but she had hoped that at least one person would give her the benefit of the doubt. Well, one person other than Obie. But that was in the past.

  Now the rumors had grown. The censure had doubled. Yet Clara Rose sat at her table, her chin set at a determined angle.

  “I need to talk to you about something.” Clara Rose pushed herself to her feet, her half-eaten pie still on the table in front of her.

  “Jah. Sure.” Ivy nodded dumbly. She wasn’t sure she wanted to talk to Clara Rose, not with the fire burning in her sky-blue eyes, but she might as well get it over with.

  Dawdi’s chair scraped loudly against the floor as he pushed it out behind him. “Y’ all go ahead and sit here. I’ve got some things to tend to in the barn.”

  Ivy couldn’t imagine what, since she did all the outside chores, but she wasn’t about to call her grandfather out in front of company, such as it were.

  Clara Rose settled back into her seat as Ivy poured herself a cup of coffee. She took it over to the table and eased down into her grandfather’s vacated seat.

  “I’ll get right to the point. What are your intentions toward Zeb?”

  Ivy nearly choked on her mouthful of coffee. “My what?”

  “Your intentions. Zeb is back, and I know that the two of you had something a few years ago. Now he’s home but moping around the house. He’s over here more than he’s at home. Just what do you want from him?”

  “How do you know there was something between us?” She could have simply denied it, but she wanted to hear this answer.

  “Last year after the hayride. Obie told me.”

  “Told you what?” Just how much did Clara Rose know?

  “He told me that he used you to make me jealous.”

  And that worked? Maybe she wasn’t such a pariah after all. “He did?”

  “I jumped all over him for . . . contributing to your reputation.” She stopped, using her fork to pick at the edge of the pie still sitting on the saucer in front of her. “But he wasn’t really contributing, was he?”

  Ivy shook her head.

  “Zeb is a good man. I’ve known him almost my whole life. He knows what’s right and what’s wrong. He’s good and godly and has made his vows to the church.”

  “Jah.”

  “So how do you figure into all this?”

  How indeed? “I don’t.”

  “I don’t believe that. I’ve seen the way he looks at you. The way he watches you when he thinks no one will notice.”

  Oh, how she wanted to unburden herself, tell her entire story to Clara Rose, put it out on the table and examine it. Maybe if she did it would appear smaller, maybe even manageable. Or it could grow to out-of-control proportions.

  “Zeb wants something that’s gone, something that we can never get back.” She swallowed the lump that had formed in her throat. It had nearly choked out her last couple of words.

  “Have you tried?”

  “It’s not as easy as that.”

  Clara Rose nodded sagely. “Never is.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  They finished their pie and talked for a little more, sticking to safe topics like how the baby was doing and how happy the Brennemans were to have Zeb home.

  “I don’t think he’ll stay,” Clara Rose said, her voice full of lament.

  Ivy shook her head. “Probably not.” Like Chris Flaud, Zeb had a wandering soul. Unlike Chris, Zeb didn’t have a paralyzed brother who was bedridden and needed constant care. Zeb would stay as long as he could, then he would head out again. They’d all be lucky if he stayed past the New Year.

  Clara Rose nodded slowly. “If anyone could get him to stay, it would be you.”

  Two things occurred to Ivy in that moment. The first was that it was true what they said: when people were in love they tended to see love all around them whether it was there or not. Why else would Ivy be able to get Zeb to stay? And the other was that Clara Rose could be the friend she had needed all along. Ivy wanted to unburden herself, explain to Clara Rose why it looked as if she and Zeb were in love. Perhaps there had been a time when they really were in love, but the time had passed. They couldn’t go back. And she had to believe that their unfurled relationship was just proof that sometimes God’s will prevailed. Well, it did all the time, she supposed, but in cases like theirs when each had prayed for a different outcome, it was more obvious than others. She might not know where she was supposed to be in life, who she might marry, if at all, and where Zeb would finally end up. But she knew the answer was not with her.

  Clara Rose waited expectantly, as if she could sense Ivy’s inner turmoil. But she couldn’t do it. Ivy couldn’t tell Clara Rose everything that had happened between her and Zeb. Wells Landing was tiny. What would happen if she did tell? What kind of judgment would she face in their close-knit community? Would she lose her job? Would she be able to hold her head up and walk down the str
eet? Amish were forgiving, but that didn’t mean they would forget. And if everyone in town knew what had happened . . .

  “I guess I should get back home.” Clara Rose stood. “It’s going to be time to feed Paul Daniel soon.”

  “Of course.” Ivy pushed herself to her feet. “You’ll have to bring him next time.” Like there would be a next time. Surely not if Ivy told Clara Rose the truth.

  “Jah. I will. I wanted Daddy and baby to have a little alone time.” She winked. “Makes them appreciate the mamm all the more.”

  Clara Rose slipped back into her coat, tied her bonnet under her chin, and pulled on her gloves. With a flourish, she wrapped the scarf around her neck and started for the door.

  Ivy stood on the porch and waved as she backed out of her drive.

  Not so very long ago, Clara Rose was engaged to marry Thomas Lapp. Ivy wasn’t sure what had happened, but she’d heard that at the wedding, Thomas had announced that he and Clara Rose weren’t getting married after all.

  Ivy wished she had been there to see that. Things like that didn’t happen all the time in a small community like theirs. Clara Rose had started off that day believing she was marrying one man and ended up a few months later marrying another. Some things just didn’t work out the way a person suspected.

  They both figured that Zeb would return to Florida, or at least that he wouldn’t stay in Wells Landing. But anything was possible. If he did stay, he would eventually get married, maybe raise a family. The thought sent her heart plummeting to her toes. How would she be able to go to church, to the store, even to the bakery knowing that she might run into Zeb and the family they would never have? The thought was almost more than she could bear.

  If that time came, maybe she would move to Indiana, but she knew she wouldn’t. Watching Zeb be happy with another would be just another part of God’s punishment for actions past. She would have to learn to live with it.

  With one final wave at Clara Rose, Ivy pulled the ends of her sweater around her a bit tighter and made her way back into the house.

  * * *

  The rest of the week fell into a comfortable pattern. Ivy would drive home from work each day to find her grandfather playing some sort of game with Tassie Weber. Thankfully Karl had “other plans” this week and chose not to visit. That was just fine with Ivy. It was one thing to be forced to go places where she knew she would be shunned and another to have it in her very own house. Karl held censure against her, and it was best if the two of them stayed as far apart as possible. There was no need for them to be obliged to visit just because his grandmother wanted to come see her grandfather. But it wouldn’t do to try to tell Tassie that.

  Ivy sent up a small prayer of thanks for the “other plans” Karl had. She was grateful to them, whatever they were.

  When she got home each day, her grandfather and Tassie were in the kitchen and her chores in the barn were all taken care of—and it seemed that Tassie had taken over the cooking duties from her grandfather. She didn’t notice much change in the food, since Tassie was using her grandmother’s own recipe book to pick meals from. Tassie kept the ingredients the same and rarely deviated from the original. It occurred to Ivy that maybe her grandfather couldn’t tell that Tassie seemed to be after herself a new husband, but Ivy figured she shouldn’t interfere. Every time she came in, the pair was laughing and having a great time, eating pie, and sharing stories about when they were in school together. He seemed happy, and if he was happy, Ivy was happy for him.

  It was also a relief not to have to worry about him when she was at work. His memory had seemed to be holding these days, but it could be that he stayed in the here and now because he was grounded there by Tassie’s presence. Ivy didn’t know a lot about such things, but she decided she would go the following day and look it up on the computers at the library.

  Whatever had caused it, she was grateful. But today was Thursday and she had been waiting all week to visit with the residents at the Whispering Pines Senior Living Center.

  She was getting to be a common sight there, and no one paused as she came in and signed her name to the guest book. A few people greeted her—a couple of the residents, one nurse, and a couple of other employees that she had seen before. She smiled a little to herself as she made her way to Ethan’s room.

  “Tell me about forgiveness,” she asked after they had greeted one another and settled down into his small living area where she read to him.

  He looked at her, his eyes bright, if not a little droopy at the corners. He looked tired, and she worried that he wasn’t getting enough rest. She would have to talk to Angie about it on her way out. “What do you want to know?” he asked. “Forgiveness is forgiveness.”

  “You’ve said that before,” Ivy commented. “What does it mean?”

  “It means that there are a great many ways to ask for forgiveness, but God’s forgiveness is the same no matter what.”

  She nodded slowly, thoughtfully. “Then why are there different ways to ask?”

  Ethan gave an elegant shrug, and she couldn’t help but notice that his hands trembled. Had they always done that? Maybe she should talk to the nurse . . . “Just different beliefs, is all.”

  Different beliefs. But those beliefs were what separated them all. Yet not from God. The thought was like a whirlwind in her mind.

  “I thought that one day we would get married, you know?”

  He nodded, but didn’t comment.

  “We only have baptism classes once every two years. So when I waited too long, Zeb and I knew that we would have to wait even longer.”

  “But you didn’t want to.”

  “We just wanted to be together, you know? Spend time together like all our friends who had found boyfriends or girlfriends. But because I wasn’t a member of the church, we couldn’t officially date. So we snuck around.” She had already told him all this, but he didn’t bother to point that out to her. Ethan was kind that way, as if he knew she needed to say the words again, even if to the same person who had heard them before.

  “There’s a reason why spending so much time alone is frowned upon.” She shook her head. “That’s not entirely true. Amish parents trust their children. They have raised them up in the way and have faith that they will not deviate from their righteous path.”

  “But?” he quietly asked.

  Ivy centered her gaze on the paper chain of green and red they had made on her last visit there. It was a crude decoration, hardly worth the time they had spent making it. But they had laughed, and had talked other residents into helping them cut all the paper strips, and she had listened to all their stories about life in the 1950s and what it meant to be a part of a war that hardly anyone supported. She had listened enthralled. It was easy sometimes to forget that these sorts of things happened outside her beloved, quiet Wells Landing.

  “But it’s different when you are always alone. We never sat on my parents’ sofa in the middle of the night, knowing full well anyone could come down the stairs at any minute.”

  “So you were alone, but not alone.”

  She nodded. “Except we were alone. Always.”

  “And temptation got the better of you.”

  She nodded. “But there’s more.” She drew in a deep breath, not sure that she could continue, but if she was to have this forgiveness that Ethan talked about with such conviction, she would have to tell someone.

  “I found out I was going to have a baby.” The shame and joy of it almost choked her. She had been so happy, so remorseful, so many things that warred with each other inside her heart.

  She had found out early and on a fluke. She had barely been late with her period before she had the opportunity to buy a pregnancy test and give it a try. Maybe it was something of intuition, but somehow she knew before she even opened that slim pink-and-white box what it would reveal.

  But she didn’t know what the two of them would do, her and Zeb. Would he be happy? Sad? Regretful? What would they tell their families?
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  But they didn’t tell them anything. She miscarried before they got the chance.

  The pain of that time was still so sharp and real, nearly tangible. She knew in her heart it was for the best. God had given them a second chance, a chance to start again, to forget it ever happened. They didn’t have to confess. They didn’t have to let everyone know their transgressions. But along with that freedom came an acute sense of guilt. Had they cheated? Or been cheated?

  “What happened?” Ethan asked, bringing her out of her memories.

  “I lost the baby. Zeb went to Florida, and I started a wild rumspringa.” The kind they made movies out of on public television. Or so she had heard someone say.

  Ethan took a deep breath. “We are the same all around.”

  She nodded. It could have happened to anyone, but it had happened to her.

  “All you have to do is ask,” he said quietly.

  “No.” There had to be more than that. How could asking relieve the thud in her heartbeats, the pain in her stomach, the mourning in her soul?

  “Last time you came, I told you I was going to tell you about Mary.”

  “Jah.”

  “Mary was persecuted. Frowned upon by her neighbors and those she once called friend. She endured it all because she knew she was to give birth to the Savior.”

  How many times had she heard the Christmas story? She had read it straight from the Bible herself. She knew of Mary and Joseph and their trip to Bethlehem. She had heard it every year of her life.

  But persecuted?

  It wasn’t anything she had ever given much thought. Mary knew she was going to have the son of God. Wasn’t that comfort alone enough?

  “Mary endured months of doubts, but still she pressed on. She had to tell her intended that she was going to have a baby. A baby that was not his. And she swore that no man had ever touched her. Who would believe such a thing?”

  “No one,” Ivy whispered. And yet she had done the exact opposite as Mary. She had told everyone lies in hopes they would stay away, so she wouldn’t have to answer the hard questions. So she wouldn’t have to confess her sins. And yet those sins were eating away at her from the inside out. “What did she do?” Ivy asked.