A Wells Landing Christmas Read online

  He shook his head at himself. Christmas was making him nostalgic. Weak-minded. Or maybe that was seeing Ivy again.

  “I’ll be in my room,” he muttered and headed for the stairs.

  * * *

  There was no way she could have said no. How could she turn down the opportunity to work a couple of extra hours? She couldn’t. They needed the money. Plain and simple. But now that she was on her way home, the worry had settled in. What if . . . ? haunted her. What if her grandfather had lost his way again? What if he were “deer hunting”? It really was hunting season. He could wander through the woods and get shot.

  She took a deep breath and said a quick prayer that he was safe. If only she had thought to go over and tell Daryl that she had started a new job. He was a frequent customer in the Super Saver. Most everyone in Wells Landing was. That was how he’d known she worked there. But she didn’t have a clue how many times, if any, he frequented Esther’s Bakery. He didn’t know she worked there and wouldn’t know to call her there if something happened.

  She sucked in another breath, but this one didn’t help either. Not even the prayer eased her mind and calmed her thoughts as she pulled her tractor to a stop. She tugged her coat a little tighter around her and rushed toward the house. She was being ridiculous. Paranoid, even. There was no reason she should believe that something had happened to her grandfather. So why did the thought burn through her like wildfire?

  “Dawdi?” she called. She did her best to make her voice sound normal, or at the very least not crazy urgent. She might be alarmed over nothing, but there was no reason to get him worked up over the same. “Dawdi?”

  No answer.

  Her alarm rose. Had the front door been locked? She had grabbed her key out of habit, her thoughts whirling. Now she couldn’t remember. Had there been an auction? Was he working? Was she being overly protective?

  “Dawdi!” The urgency in her voice lifted a notch.

  Then a small sound. From the kitchen. She raced toward it thinking she would find nothing, maybe her calico cat, Chester, wondering if she was half-crazy. She blamed Zeb. Everything had been okay until he had come home.

  She knew that wasn’t true. Everything had not been okay before then. Everything had been terrible. He’d just brought it all to the surface.

  “Dawdi?” She eased into the kitchen and screamed. Her dawdi lay on the kitchen floor in a puddle of blood.

  Chapter Four

  Dear Lord, please help me. Father God, I beg you. Please let him be okay.

  Ivy rushed to her grandfather’s side, not caring about the blood as she knelt beside him. Chester sat on his chest as if guarding him until Ivy got back. She meowed at Ivy, then sauntered away as if her work was indeed done.

  Ivy turned her full attention to her dawdi. There was a big gash on his head, his eyes were closed, and his breathing seemed low and labored. In an instant her mind went through the possibilities as she tried to formulate a plan. Heart attack, then fell and hit his head. Stroke and the same. Slipped on something and his head hit the counter. Thought he was fifteen again and jumping into Millers’ Pond, hit his head on the way down.

  Whatever happened, it seemed apparent that the blood came from his head. How he had fallen remained to be seen. She wasn’t sure what was worse: thinking he was fifteen, with his mind in another time and place, or a heart attack. Doctors knew what to do for the heart. Did they know what to do when the mind went?

  “Dawdi?” She cradled his head in her lap and lightly tapped his cheek. She sniffed, only then realizing that she was crying. Had been for a while, if the moisture on her cheeks was any indication. “Oh, Dawdi.” Why had she worked late? She should have been here. But another thought intruded, this one more important. How was she going to get him to the hospital? She couldn’t lift him herself. He might not be a big man, but he was larger than she was. She couldn’t load him onto the tractor and chug him on into town. Was it even safe to move him?

  Her only other option was to run next door to Daryl’s house and pray like everything that he was home and could help. But that meant leaving Dawdi alone, unconscious and bleeding. She bit her lip and did her best to come up with another option. But time was slipping away and she didn’t know how much of it she had. He seemed to have lost a lot of blood. How much was too much? What if it was a heart attack and he needed immediate care in order to save him?

  “Ivy?”

  She jerked around as Zeb came barreling through the kitchen door.

  “What happened?” He slid to his knees beside her.

  “He was like this when I got here.” She let go of his face long enough to wipe the back of her hand against her nose. She had thought herself a strong person, but now . . . now she knew the truth.

  “Is there a neighbor?” Zeb asked.

  “What?” Ivy looked at him, his words washing over her like a warm wave, not settling, just there and gone.

  “Ivy.” He took her by the shoulders and shook her like one shakes another to wake them from sleeping. “Is there someone who can help? A neighbor? Or . . . anyone?”

  Slowly she nodded. “Daryl,” she said, coming back to her senses. “He lives east. If he’s home, he’ll help.”

  * * *

  It took both him and the neighbor to lift Yonnie into the back of the Englischer’s car. Thankfully Daryl had been home when Zeb came knocking. Home and ready to help.

  Somehow they got Ivy into the back seat with her grandfather while Zeb rode next to the driver. They decided against the Wells Landing Medical Center. They dealt with small emergencies, simple broken arms, deep cuts, and cases of the flu. Since no one knew what had happened to Yonnie, they kept going on into Pryor to the emergency center there. If need be, they could helicopter him into Tulsa, though Zeb said a quick prayer that it wouldn’t be necessary. He wasn’t sure how Ivy would handle such a thing.

  “Here.” He handed her the steaming coffee and took a sip of his own. It was terrible, but wasn’t that part of the hospital waiting experience? Worry and bad coffee?

  “Danki.” She took the paper cup and blew over the top of it. But she didn’t drink it. Her eyes held that listless, dead look. He had only seen it one time before. He hadn’t liked it then, and he didn’t like it now. “What’s taking so long?” she asked.

  He wanted to take her hands into his own, tell her that it was going to be okay. But her hands weren’t his to hold. Not now. Nor had they ever truly been. And he didn’t know if things were going to be okay. He had never lied to her. He wasn’t about to start now. “It hasn’t been as long as it feels,” he replied.

  “It’s been forever.” She took a sip of the coffee, her face impassive. That she could drink it without a grimace proved how preoccupied her thoughts were.

  “It’s not even been an hour. These things take time.”

  “These things?” she asked.

  “Tests and all that.” He waved a hand in the air in front of him. He was doing a bad job in trying to make her feel better, but he hadn’t had much experience with that sort of thing.

  He needed to keep her mind off worry and onto something else. He glanced around the brightly lit waiting area. The chairs were covered in pastel fabric that he supposed was meant to be soothing. The walls were a gentle white. The overhead lights threw everything into too much relief. It was too bright, too harsh, too real.

  “How long do you suppose that Christmas tree has been up?” He nodded to the four-foot tree in the corner. “These Englisch. They start Christmas earlier and earlier every year.”

  “It is December,” she countered.

  “Jah. That’s true. And I imagine it would take a while to put up the tree and take it down. Even longer to get it out of storage.”

  “Or remember where you put it?”

  He laughed. “That too.”

  She smiled, and a little of the worry seeped from her eyes.

  “You know, there’s a big Christmas celebration in Pinecraft every year. A big parade with al
l sorts of vehicles. And clowns.”

  “At Christmas?”

  “And Santa.”

  “I don’t believe in Santa.” Her words held a ring of finality. Amish children were never taught about such things.

  “I’ve given it a lot of thought since I’ve been gone.”

  “Santa?” she asked. Then she took another sip of coffee, allowing herself a small wince as she waited for him to answer. This was good. The coffee was bad and her mind was occupied.

  “Of course.”

  “Why?”

  It was a simple enough question. “Why not? I mean, how can millions of parents pull such a hoax on their children each year and get away with it?”

  “And you’ve figured this out?”

  He nodded. “See, Santa is a lot like Jesus.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “It’s simple, really. He came and brought everyone on earth a gift.”

  “Jesus or Santa?”

  “Both. Jesus.” He shook his head. “Just let me finish.”

  She motioned for him to continue.

  “Jesus brought everyone on earth a gift, and all He asked in return was for people to believe in Him.”

  “What about works?” she asked. “Jesus is important. He’s everything, but a person’s deeds . . .”

  He knew what she was going to say. Amish didn’t believe in saved by grace, at least not the ones where they were raised. A person needed to believe in Jesus, follow His word, and work hard every day in order to hope they would get into heaven. Nothing was a sure thing.

  “The Beachy Amish I was with don’t believe in works. I mean, they believe in them, but—” He wasn’t able to finish that thought. A middle-aged doctor with graying blond hair and a pristine white lab coat came through the double doors toward them.

  “Ivy Weaver?” he asked.

  She nodded and stood, hands trembling.

  “The best we can figure, your grandfather slipped and fell, hitting his head on the way down.”

  “No heart attack?”

  The doctor gave her a grim smile. “We want to keep him overnight. With a head injury such as this you can’t be too careful.”

  “Overnight?”

  “Was he alone when he fell?”

  “Jah.” Ivy nodded. “I mean, yes.”

  “Has he fallen before?”

  Ivy answered all the doctor’s questions no matter how accusing they sounded. Zeb figured it was simply what the hospital did, but it didn’t make it sound any less condemning.

  “Can I take him home? Please,” Ivy pleaded.

  “With a head injury . . .”

  “Please,” she said again.

  The doctor seemed to take in her dress and prayer covering for the first time. “He’ll need to be awakened every hour or so. All night long.”

  If he thought that was going to dissuade her, he didn’t know Ivy Weaver very well. “I’ll wake him.”

  The doctor looked reluctant, but nodded. “I’ll get some instructions for you to take with you.”

  Ivy nearly wilted with relief. “Danki. I mean, thank you,” she said.

  The doctor shook her hand.

  “He’s going to be okay,” she gushed as she watched the doctor walk away.

  “Ivy . . .” Zeb hated to be the one to bring her down from her happy place. “Don’t you have to work tomorrow? How are you going to wake him up all night long, then go to work at the bakery?”

  “The Super Saver,” she corrected.

  “What?”

  “I work at the Super Saver tomorrow.”

  “You have two jobs?”

  She shrugged.

  How bad were things at the Weaver house? “Let him stay here tonight. If all is well, he can come home in the morning.”

  “I have to stay with him,” she said. Poor girl, she had lost so much. After everything, no wonder she was teary-eyed with exhaustion and relief.

  “Fine,” he agreed. “Stay with him. I’ll call Obie’s cell phone and have him go by and do your chores.”

  “The chores!” she exclaimed. “I’ve been so wrapped up in everything here.”

  “No worries,” he said. “I’ll be right back. You tell the doctor you changed your mind, okay?”

  She nodded and sat back down in her seat. “Can Obie feed Chester too? I didn’t have time to feed her before we left.”

  “I know he will,” Zeb said, then he turned and made his way down the hallway to the small kitchen/snack area where he had gotten the coffee earlier. It was getting late; it was already dark outside. Granted, the day ended a lot quicker in December, but it had been light when they arrived. They had sat through supper waiting on word. Now that it was over and news had come down, he was sure she would be hungry.

  He called Obie from the hospital phone and left a message on his voice mail. With any luck, his brother would get it before he went to bed and he could take care of everything first thing in the morning. It wasn’t the best-case scenario, but it would have to do.

  Then he fed a couple of dollars into the snack machine and got a bag of chips, a candy bar, and two sandwiches of questionable filling for his effort. Then he poured them both a fresh cup of coffee and started back toward the waiting area.

  Ivy smiled when she saw him approach. His knees nearly buckled beneath him. How many times had she looked at him that exact same way? More than he could count. But that had been so two years ago.

  “Here.” He held out one of the sandwiches to her.

  “A gift?” she asked.

  “Just call me Santa.”

  She smiled.

  “I called Obie and left a message. If anything, I can run by there in the morning.”

  “Could you . . . could you go now?”

  He shook his head. “No.”

  She blinked at him dumbly. “You can’t?”

  “No,” he repeated. “I’m staying right here. We all go home together.”

  * * *

  Once her grandfather was settled in a room, Ivy grew antsy. She had too many questions to ask Dawdi, but the doctor had warned them to let him rest well before asking too much. But even as she thought about it, what good would the answers to her questions be? How did you fall? What happened next? How long were you on the floor? Did any of it really matter? Or would the knowledge only serve to make her feel worse about his accident?

  She pushed out of the darkened room and left her grandfather lightly dozing and Zeb sitting in the room’s only chair gazing at the television as if it held all the secrets in the universe.

  There was no one up and about this time of night. She wasn’t even sure exactly what time it was, only that it was late. The soles of her walking shoes squeaked against the over-waxed floors as she trod along. She thought she would walk down to the kitchen and get a pop. She really didn’t want a drink, but it was something to do.

  She slowed as she rounded the corner and entered the square kitchen tucked back on the other side of the supply closet. There were drink machines, coffee machines, sandwich machines, an ice machine, and a microwave, along with a refrigerator and a small round table with three chairs. Two women sat at the table, sipping something that looked like hot cocoa. They shifted when they saw her and gave matching nods, almost unnoticeable.

  Ivy nodded in return. She was used to having such an effect on people. She always had. She called it the Prayer Kapp Complex. Secretly, that was. For when most people saw her prayer kapp they immediately changed. Their voices lowered; they ducked their heads and refused to look at her directly. She wasn’t sure if they thought she was so godly she would condemn them or they were worried they would catch something from her. Either way, the women shifted, ducked their heads, lowered their voices, and covertly continued on as if she weren’t there.

  “They’re going to put her in a nursing home,” the lady in the blue sweater said.

  The lady in the orange shirt shook her head and tsked as if it were a shame. “And after all this time.”

>   Ivy moved to the counter and opened one of the top cabinets. She wasn’t sure what she was looking for, but for some reason she wanted to hear what they were saying. Maybe she just wanted to be a part of a conversation. Who knew?

  “They’ve done all they can for her,” Blue Sweater said.

  “But she’s their mother.”

  “Grandmother,” Blue Sweater corrected.

  Ivy closed the cabinet, then took a cup off the stack and filled it with hot water. She dumped in a packet of cocoa mix and stirred it with one of the little sticks. A nursing home. Weren’t those places terrible? Why did she even care? It wasn’t like the Amish even used places like that to house their elderly.

  Orange Shirt nodded. “I suppose.”

  “It’s a nice place,” Blue Sweater continued. “More of a retirement center.”

  Ivy moved as slowly as she dared. She threw away the little red stir stick and inched toward the door. She knew the women were aware of her. They had been since the moment she had set foot in the door. Stupid Prayer Kapp Complex.

  “It’s still sort of sad, isn’t it?”

  “Well, yes and no. Her family simply can’t take care of her any longer. She’s fallen twice, caught the stove on fire, and lost the dog.”

  “Lost the dog?” Orange Shirt choked.

  “Let him out and they never saw him again.”

  “But—”

  “He wasn’t an outside dog. She was supposed to put him on a leash and walk him around the block, but she forgot.”

  “Oh,” Orange Shirt murmured.

  “I guess there are worse things.”

  “Is the home here in Pryor, or in Tulsa?”

  “That’s just the thing,” Blue Sweater exclaimed, then hushed her voice once again. “It’s over in Wells Landing. Well, between Wells Landing and Taylor Creek.”

  She could stall no more. She eased out the door and stood there, straining to hear what the women were saying.

  “I didn’t know there was a home out there.”

  Blue Sweater nodded. “It’s new.”

  “Nice?” Orange Shirt asked.

  “Very.”