Chapter 18 #2
Her heart felt as though it had stopped in her chest. The letter was just like her father’s speech—brief and to the point.
“Phoebe, what’s wrong?” Karen asked.
Tears formed in her eyes. Her mother had to be extremely ill for her father to write and ask for help. She said a quick, silent prayer for her mother, then went to Malachi. Without hesitation she said, “We have to geh .” Her voice sounded sharper than she intended.
“Where?”
“Home.”
“But we are home.”
His simple statement gave her pause. She’d been thinking of this place as home too. But now cold reality had hit. She had to set her fear of Bishop Weaver aside. She would face whatever she had to if it meant helping her family. “Don’t argue, Malachi.”
“Phoebe,” Leanna said. “Tell us what’s going on.”
But she didn’t answer. Hot tears ran down her face.
“Let me call the taxi,” Karen said softly.
Phoebe nodded her thanks, turned away from Karen, and rushed upstairs to pack.
“Think we made a good buy?” Jalon asked Adam as they neared the house.
“An excellent buy. Those are two of the finest drafts I’ve ever seen. We got them for a gut price too.”
Jalon leaned back in the front seat of the van, relieved.
It wasn’t that he didn’t know horses. He did.
He’d gone to the auctions with his father, who always ended up getting the cheapest horse, not the best. As he and Adam had made plans for the farm, he realized how many times his father had sabotaged himself, whether by being miserly when purchasing animals and seed or by planting too late or harvesting too early.
Adam had gleaned a lot of good knowledge about farming—and other topics—through reading and observing.
“Sometimes that’s all you can do from the chair,” he’d said one night when they’d been talking about how to divide the land and what crops to plant. “It made me feel a part of things, though. And who knew all this would come in handy one day?”
God knew. If Jalon hadn’t been convinced before that God’s hand was guiding him, then he had the proof now.
His father giving up the land, Jalon having just enough savings to make the back payments and take over the mortgage, Adam arriving here after Jalon had lost his job with enough money to get things started, and now Adam having as much of an interest in the farm as Jalon did, even though neither of them had ever considered becoming farmers.
Then there were Phoebe and Malachi. He wished he’d been able to spend more time with Phoebe lately, but so much had to be done.
She seemed to understand, and he did try to carve out time with Malachi, who wasn’t starving for companionship anymore.
Between Adam teaching him how to whittle a bar of soap and Leanna telling him wild tales and promising to take him fishing as soon as it was warm enough, Malachi was happy.
He was also Blue’s preferred companion, which Leanna didn’t seem to mind.
Jalon continued to teach him yo-yo tricks when he could, which delighted them both.
Once things settled down, he and Phoebe would be able to spend time together. She wasn’t going anywhere.
“Jalon?” Adam said from the backseat. “We’re home.”
He blinked. Home. It wasn’t the home he’d expected to have—a farm, a sister who drove him crazy more often than not, his cousin and best friend back, and the woman he loved and her son.
Their son, which was how he thought of Malachi sometimes, especially when Malachi wanted both him and Phoebe to tuck him in bed at night and read The Very Hungry Caterpillar .
Jalon could recite the book in his sleep now, but Malachi couldn’t get enough of it.
Yes, this was his home. His family. And when the time was right, he planned to make it official.
The van pulled into the driveway. Jalon got out and went to the back, then pulled out Adam’s wheelchair. He unfolded it and pushed it over the gravel to the side of the van where Adam was already at the edge of the seat. He hurled himself into the chair seamlessly.
“I already paid the driver,” Adam said, wheeling himself away from the van.
Jalon nodded and slid the door shut. This taxi driver wasn’t as friendly as Max, but he had a large van that could accommodate Adam’s chair. He waved to the driver, then started for the house just as Phoebe and Malachi came rushing out the front door. Phoebe was carrying a suitcase.
“I don’t wanna geh !” Malachi cried, skidding to a stop on the porch. He plopped down on it, crossed his arms, and wailed.
“Malachi, stop it!”
Jalon flinched, not just at Malachi’s distress but at Phoebe’s tone. Even in her most exasperated moments he’d never heard her snap at Malachi like that.
“What’s going on?” Adam asked.
“I don’t know.” Jalon rushed to the porch. “Phoebe?”
Malachi got up and ran to him, arms outstretched. He scooped up the boy and held him tight. “Malachi, what’s wrong?”
“ Mamm says we have to leave.” His grip tightened around Jalon’s neck. “I don’t wanna geh .”
Pain stabbed through him. “Leave?” He looked at Phoebe. There was a haunted look to her eyes, and he could tell she’d been crying too. What on earth had happened while he was gone?
“Malachi, please.” Her voice choked as she set down the heavy suitcase.
Jalon, still holding Malachi, went to her.
He put his arm around her, glad that at least she wasn’t shrugging him off.
Just the opposite. She turned and buried her face in his chest. They stayed like that for a brief moment, and Jalon decided no matter what had happened he wasn’t going to let her go.
Then she pulled away from him. Looked up into his eyes ... and he realized the choice wasn’t his to make.
“ Mamm ’s sick,” she said. She explained what her father said in his letter. “I have to help take care of mei familye .”
“I ...” The lump in his throat felt like the size of a boulder.
“I understand.” What else could he say? He couldn’t beg her to stay, although he wasn’t above doing that if the circumstances were different.
This was her family. If his mother were sick, he would do the same thing.
It didn’t make the twist of the knife in his heart any less painful.
“I don’t wanna geh .”
Jalon leaned down and whispered in Phoebe’s ear, not wanting Malachi to hear. “You could leave him here with me while you’re gone. You know we’ll take gut care of him.”
Phoebe looked at him. Touched his cheek with her hand, then let it fall. “I don’t know how long I’ll be gone.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Jalon whispered. “He can stay with us as long as you need him to.”
“But he belongs with me. He’s mei responsibility.”
The words dug deep into him, because he knew they were true. Malachi wasn’t his son. It didn’t matter if Jalon wanted him to be. Phoebe was his mother, and she would make the final decision.
“ Danki ,” she said, tears dripping down her cheeks. “For being willing to.”
“I’d do anything for both of you.”
“I know.” She reached up and took Malachi from Jalon.
But Malachi wasn’t going without a fight.
He clung to Jalon as Phoebe tried to pull his arms from around Jalon’s neck.
He cried, his wails directly in Jalon’s ear and going straight to his heart.
Finally, Jalon couldn’t let it go on. He walked away from Phoebe, took Malachi’s arm from around his neck, then sat the boy on the porch railing.
“You have to geh with yer mamm ,” he said, strengthening his resolve.
“I don’t wanna.”
“I don’t want you to geh either. But it will only be for a short time.
” Jalon shouldn’t have said it, but he hoped hearing the words out loud would make it true.
He glanced at Phoebe, who was standing there with her arms wrapped around her waist. Then he turned back to Malachi. “Do you have yer yo-yo?”
Malachi nodded and pulled it out of his pants pocket.
“Then here’s what I want you to do.” He covered the yo-yo and Malachi’s hand with his.
“Anytime you get lonely or upset, look at this yo-yo. Remember that you’ve got a part of me with you all the time .
.. until you and yer mamm come back to me.
” He could feel Malachi’s hand tightening around the toy.
“Make sure you practice all the tricks I showed you. When you come back, I’ll show you even more. ”
Malachi nodded. Then he threw his arms around Jalon, and after a tight hug, he let go.
Jalon set him down on the porch. The taxi pulled into the driveway. Jalon carried the suitcase to the car, then after the driver put it into the trunk, he stepped back and didn’t move. He watched Malachi and Phoebe get into the car and drive away. They will come back.
“They have to.”