Chapter 10
“Whoops.”
The exclamation registered just before the sensation of something wet dripped down Jocelyn’s forehead. She touched her fingers
to the spot and examined them. Paint. Snowy white. She glanced up.
Theo Beiler stood on a catwalk set up on scaffolding not far from Jocelyn’s brother Uriah. Theo held up his paint roller.
“I tried to stop it, but I was too late.” His expression amused, he nodded toward the catwalk under his feet. “Just your luck
to pass by when a gust of wind whips up.”
“I didn’t feel any gust of wind.”
In fact, the chilly breeze had stilled for a few minutes, which was surely nice for the men who’d been standing out in the
cold painting her house most of the day. It was so like Virginia weather this time of year. Cool and springlike one day and
summery hot the next. Which was why she’d brought out two more thermoses filled with hot coffee, along with cookies.
“Huh.” Theo rested the roller on the paint pan, wiped his hands on a rag, and hopped down from the catwalk. “Is that fresh
kaffi?”
“It is.”
“Let me carry the thermos for you.”
“I can manage.”
“Don’t be such a grumpy old woman, Joci.” Uriah climbed down with more agility than a man five years her senior should have.
That was the second time in a week someone had called her a grumpy old woman. She wasn’t, was she? Uriah wiped his paint-speckled
hands with a faded blue bandanna. “Letting people help you is as much a blessing for them as it is for you. I keep thinking
you’ll learn that lesson anytime now.”
He was right. The district had rallied around Bonnie and her after Marlin’s death in a hundred small and big ways. “I do know
that. I appreciate everything you do for me.”
“I wasn’t fishing for appreciation.”
“I know that.”
“That lesson also applies to small things.” Theo tugged one of the thermoses from Jocelyn’s hand. He strode ahead toward the
picnic table that held the snacks and drinks she had laid out earlier. “I’m feeling a little peckish. I could use an eppy.”
“I do appreciate you and your fraa organizing this frolic.” Jocelyn stepped into Uriah’s path. They paused in the shade of
an enormous oak tree several yards from the picnic table. “I’m just surprised you sent a strange man to my door to tell me
about it.” Jocelyn kept her voice low. “Knowing I was probably here alone.”
“I reckon I didn’t think about him being a stranger to you. He’s not to me and Frannie, and the kinner like him. He’s quite the storyteller.” Uriah craned his head side to side. He buttoned the top button on his black wool jacket. He and their dad could be twins twenty-five years apart. Tall, broad-shouldered, wiry gray hair and beard, and skin marked by years of sun. “Theo’s been working for me since February. He’s handy, a hard worker, and smart. He fits right in.”
Why didn’t that sit well with Jocelyn? “Gut for him.”
“There you go, being a grumpy old woman again.”
“Am not.” Now they sounded like the teenagers who had bickered endlessly while doing their chores, annoying their mother so
much. Bless her soul for putting up with five children born in ten years’ time. “I mean, I’m glad you found an extra set of
hands, but don’t you think you should’ve told me about the frolic yourself?”
“You would’ve insisted it wasn’t needed. I figured it was better to just go ahead with it. You’d get on board in the end.”
So she had.
Was that a flicker of amusement in his walnut-colored eyes? “Plus I wanted you to meet Theo.”
“Why?”
“You have a lot in common. He’s a wittmann. He farmed in Berlin, but he has family in Lancaster County, same as us. He has
just the one kind too, but his is a boy. After his fraa died, he decided he needed a fresh start. Came here to Lee’s Gulch
to stay with his cousin.”
A few things in common, true, but what did that matter? Then it hit Jocelyn. Her brother was matchmaking. “Uriah Baumgartner.
You should be ashamed.”
“Of what?” He had the audacity to appear astonished and even hurt. “What did I do?”
“Time’s wasting. You should get back to painting.”
Uriah hitched up pants a little too big for his lean body. “It’s time, Joci, and you know it. The bishop even said as much
after church last Sunday.”
A bunch of men sitting around talking about something none of them knew squat about. Not a widower in the bunch. “You must’ve been hard up for conversation if you were talking about me.”
“Hey, we just want what’s best for you.”
As if they knew. Jocelyn ducked past her brother and strode to the picnic table where Theo had taken a seat. He had a cup
of steaming coffee in one hand and a cookie in the other. He held up the cookie. “This is a mighty fine eppy. Reminds me of
the ones my fraa used to make.”
His smile didn’t waver, but something in his voice gave him away. Jocelyn lowered the thermos. A person who’d lost a spouse
couldn’t simply walk away from someone with a shared experience of such excruciating pain. It would be uncompassionate. Inhumane.
“How long has she been gone?”
“One year, six months, and twenty-three days.” His Adam’s apple bobbed. His faint smile was wry. “But who’s counting?”
“My dochder made the eppies.” Her throat suddenly aching, Jocelyn had to clear it. She sat across from him and nudged the
plate in his direction. “She’s my only kind. Uri mentioned you have one kind as well, a bu .”
“Jah. Noah. Named for his daadi. He’s twenty-three.”
“I wonder if we’ll ever stop counting the years, the months, and the days. If I’ll ever stop wondering why I didn’t see that
my mann’s heart was bad. How I missed it.”
Theo laid his cookie on a napkin. His gaze bounced from her face to a spot over her shoulder. “Ellie had cancer. She waited
too long to go to the doctor. She was like that. Too busy taking care of others to take care of herself. I should’ve made
her go.”
“Maybe if I’d had served less fried food, less red meat, more vegetables and fish, maybe Marlin would still be here.”
Jocelyn had never shared that gnawing sense of guilt with anyone else. Her family would poo-poo the idea to make her feel better. Theo simply nodded. He nudged the snack plate in her direction. She selected an oatmeal raisin cookie but didn’t take a bite.
The conversation teetered, stopped, but it felt comfortable, as if there were no need for words. They both understood. Momma
Cat trotted up to the table. She stopped, one paw suspended in air, tail swishing, and peered at its occupants, then resumed
her journey. A mourning dove cooed in the red maple that shaded the table. It was the sound of summer coming, of long childhood
days spent playing outdoors, a sound of contentment hard to achieve as a grown-up. Jocelyn closed her eyes, listened, and
heaved a breath. The longing to get it back was so strong that the hurt in her heart spread and filled every crevice of her
being. Why, Gott?
God probably wondered why she still asked this infernal question after two years, two months, and twelve days. Let it go, Dochder.
God’s plan was God’s plan. Thy will be done.
Even when it was incomprehensible. Even when it hurt worse than any physical pain she’d ever experienced. Even when dragging
herself from the bed she’d shared with Marlin every day of their married life was a monumental—almost impossible—task.
“Are the elders pushing you to remarry?” Theo’s voice had gone soft, barely above a hoarse whisper.
“Not directly to me, but my brieder and schweschdre seem bent on doing some matchmaking.”
Uriah and her brothers wouldn’t approve of their sister having this conversation with a man she barely knew—or any man at
all. But Uriah had opened the door and shoved her through it.
Theo shook his head. He grinned. The change lit up his face. Lines disappeared. He shed years of pain and hurt. It would be miserly not to return the gift. Jocelyn summoned her best smile. It was rusty from lack of use.
“Fortunately for us, we’re adults used to making our own way in this world.” He finished his cookie, dusted crumbs from his
beard, and drained his coffee cup. “I better get back to painting before your bruder fires me.”
“He wouldn’t do that. He likes you.”
“I’m glad he does. I’m starting to really like living in Lee’s Gulch.”
His expression, an invitation to share something singularly theirs, sent a tingle up Jocelyn’s spine. A feeling she hadn’t
had in a very long time came along for the ride. A sense of aliveness. Of creating a connection with someone that wasn’t there
before.
No, no, no. That couldn’t be. None of that.
Marlin had been the only man for her. It didn’t matter what the elders thought or wanted or felt. It didn’t matter what her
brothers and sisters thought was best for her. She wasn’t a teenager on her rumspringa.
Guilt, like boiling water, scalded her skin. Jocelyn hopped up from the bench. In her haste she knocked against the table.
The open thermos toppled over. Hot coffee spread across the table and dripped on Theo’s pants. He sprang up. “Whoa!”
Jocelyn backpedaled. “I didn’t mean to do that.”
“I didn’t think you did.” Looking puzzled, Theo snatched up a napkin and dabbed at the coffee spots. “No harm done.”
Jocelyn whirled and fled.
“Don’t you want to take the thermoses?” Theo’s voice calling after her held a hint of laughter.
What was so funny?