A Home for Hannah (15 page)

“You couldn’t tell it by looking at her. She’s eyeing my cheese-covered pretzel as we speak.”

Miriam chuckled. “Call me later. There are things I need to say to you.”

“Can’t you tell me now?”

“No, not on the phone. When I see you in person.”

“Now you have me worried.”

“Don’t be. I have a feeling that you may already know what I have to say.”

* * *

Throughout the day, Miriam divided her time between caring for her mother and waiting to spend a few stolen minutes with Nick. His promise of dinner turned into a late-night burrito that he carried into her mother’s room in a greasy, brown paper bag long after visiting hours. It was the best burrito Miriam had ever eaten. Unfortunately, he couldn’t stay.

The next evening she had a short, to the point meeting with Hannah’s social worker. Mostly, the woman wanted to know about Hannah’s schedule, her feeding issues and any type of history Miriam could provide. It wasn’t much, but it felt good to be doing something that might help Hannah.

The woman was leaving when Nick showed up. They spoke briefly, but the woman again said she couldn’t share any information about Hannah.

Miriam turned to Nick after she was gone. “Come on. I need a lookout.”

He followed her into the hall. “What are we doing?”

“We are taking matters into our own hands. I want to know how Hannah is doing.”

Miriam entered the elevator and pushed the button for the maternity floor. They walked down the halls listening to the sound of infants crying. None of them were Hannah. Miriam was sure she’d recognize her cry. She stopped beside the viewing window that looked into the special care section of the nursery and tried to get a glimpse of Hannah.

There was only one baby in the nursery. It had to be Hannah. Nick would have been notified if she had been dismissed.

Miriam tapped on the window and then noticed a sign that said to go to the door and not to knock on the window. The young nurse inside looked over and smiled. She gestured toward the door.

Miriam looked at Nick. “Keep an eye out for anyone who might know me.”

“Is this illegal?”

“Can I take the Fifth on that?”

“No.” He scowled at her.

“Then it isn’t illegal.” She waited as the nurse opened the door.

The young nurse asked, “Are you a relative?”

Miriam smiled. “No, I’m a critical care nurse and I’d love to tour your unit. I’ve often thought about working in pediatrics.”

It was the truth. She had considered changing fields more than once.

“Actually, there is an opening on the night shift, but it’s only part-time. This really is a great place to work. You should consider taking the job. Our charge nurse has stepped out, but she’ll be back in about ten minutes. She knows more about what goes on here. I’ve only worked here a few months.”

Miriam smiled at Nick and walked inside. “You don’t have a very high census. I only see one baby, is that right?”

“Normally we run between three and five occupied beds, but right now all we have is a baby that is a police hold.”

“I thought only sick babies were admitted here.”

“The child was in to rule out MSUD but that came back negative. The baby has been spitting up a lot. She didn’t seem to care for our regular soy formula.”

“Have you tried holding her upright and rocking her for thirty minutes after her feedings instead of laying her down afterward? I once knew a baby with spit-up problems and that worked wonders.”

“Funny you should say that. The social worker on the case came in a few minutes ago with the same suggestion.”

Miriam stepped forward enough to see Hannah was sleeping quietly. Her color was pink and she looked perfect. “Can I sneak a peek at her?”

“I’m afraid not. Hospital policy and all that.”

Miriam took a step back. “Sure. Thanks for letting me look around your unit.”

Miriam turned to leave. The young nurse quickly asked, “Don’t you want to talk to the charge nurse?”

Miriam shook her head. “I need a full-time job, but I’m sure you’ll find someone who likes to work with babies.”

She went out the door, gestured to Nick to follow her. He said, “If you want to take up police work, I can get you a recommendation.”

“No, I’m happy being a nurse. We should get back to Mother.”

“I’m going to stop and check on Mary Smith. I want to find out if I can talk to her soon. I’ll catch you later.” To Miriam’s delight, he pressed a kiss on her lips. The thrill was over all too quickly when he pulled away. She longed for more.

She took the elevator back to her mother’s floor. When she walked into her mother’s room, she found Ada trying to get out of bed. Miriam rushed to help her.

“Mom, you should call for help before you get up.”

“I called and I called, but no one came.”

“I’m sorry, I went to see Hannah for a few minutes.”

Her mother gave her a puzzled look. “Who is Hannah?”

“The baby that was left on our doorstep.”

“Mark’s baby?”

Miriam’s heart sank to her feet. How had her mother learned about Mark’s child? “No, Mother, it wasn’t Mark’s child. His baby was never born. His
Englisch
mother didn’t want him.”

Ada sighed heavily. “Have you been to plant flowers on Mark’s grave? I wish you would. I can’t go home until that is done.”

Before Miriam could reply, her mother’s eyes rolled back in her head and she collapsed into Miriam’s arms.

Yelling for help, Miriam lowered her mother to the floor. A quick check of her pulse showed she was still alive. Relief flooded Miriam, but it was quickly thrust aside as the room filled with people. Miriam repeated what had happened to five different people including the nurses, a new resident and finally her mother’s doctor.

He reviewed Ada’s chart and listened to her heart for a long while before he turned to Miriam. “Her blood pressure is too low at the moment. I believe that’s what caused her to faint. We’re having so much trouble getting this medication regulated that I’m going to try her on something else. I know this is frustrating for you.”

“
Scary
is the word I would use.” Low blood pressure meant a sluggish flow of blood through the brain. That would account for her mother’s confusion. Still, her mother’s words haunted her. “I can’t go home until that is done.”

Had she meant home as in the farm, or home as in her heavenly home?

The thought chilled Miriam. It was time, long past time, for her to face her mistakes and admit them.

She left word with the nursing staff to call her if her mother’s condition changed. In the hospital parking lot, she got in her car and headed toward the other side of town. It wasn’t long before she was in the country she recognized from her childhood.

The highway wound through low hills and past pristine farms. Everywhere, signs of spring were turning the landscape green. In the pastures, tiny black-and-white calves frolicked together while their mothers grazed nearby.

After ten minutes, she reached the fork in the road that led to a small Amish cemetery.

She pulled her car to a stop beside the white-board fence that surrounded the property. For a long time she sat in the car not moving. It was the first time she had been back to visit Mark’s grave since his funeral.

Opening the car door, she stepped out into the bright sunshine. The smell of new grass brought back memories from her childhood. With barely a thought, she kicked off her sneakers and stepped barefoot into a thick, cool green carpet.

Like all Amish children, she had spent her childhood barefoot. Not until frost hardened the ground each fall had she and Mark put on shoes. It felt right to visit him barefoot.

She made her way between the rows of nearly identical white headstones to his gravesite. When she came upon his name, tears welled up without warning as emotion choked her throat. With a moan, she sank to her knees and covered her face with her hands.

“I’m so sorry,” she wailed as she rocked back and forth with grief. “I’d change it all if I could. I’m so sorry.”

She had no idea how long she knelt there, but finally her sobs subsided. Weak and spent, she put her hand on the face of his marker. Would he forgive her? As she gazed at the stone, she brushed aside a small bit of moss growing on the edge of the stone. The clump fell to the grass and exposed something glittery. Reaching down, she picked up a silver star made of foil.

Instantly she knew where she had seen one before. Nick made one every time he put a piece of gum in his mouth.

Chapter Fourteen

M
iriam spread the thick grass aside and saw more silver stars. Dozens of them lay around Mark’s tombstone. Some were bright and new, others were old and dull, still others were mere flakes, having disintegrated from their time out in the elements.

“I started leaving them when I made sheriff.”

Startled, she twisted around to see Nick standing behind her. She hadn’t heard him approach.

Stepping forward, he laid a new star on the headstone. The breeze quickly blew it into the grass. “I put one out every time I come to visit.”

Miriam rubbed at her tearstained face. “You’ve been here a lot.”

“I have.” He thrust his hands into the front pockets of his jeans. His shoulders were rolled forward as if he was expecting a blow across his back.

Was he waiting for her to say something? What words could convey the depth of what she was feeling? She looked up at his face. His hat cast a shadow across his eyes.

So much heartache. So much pain. Where is it all to end, Lord?

She knew the answer. It had to end with her. It was time for her confession. It was time to start healing. It might not happen today, or even tomorrow, but unless she spoke now, true healing would never happen for her.

“I’m glad you’ve come to his grave. I never could.” She placed the star she held in her hand on her brother’s
stone. The wind died away and the star remained in place.

Nick squatted on his heels beside her. “Why haven’t you come, Miriam? You were closer to him than anyone.”

Sighing, she gripped her hands together until they ached.

Now or never.
It was now or never.

“Because it was my foolish jealousy that led to his death and to the death of his child.”

Nick’s hand closed over her arm in a viselike grip. “What do you mean? What child?”

She looked into Nick’s eyes. “Did you know he was in love with an
Englisch
girl?”

“No.”

“All my life I thought I knew what I wanted, Nick. I wanted to grow old as a member of the Amish community. I thought Mark wanted the same thing. From the time we were little we talked about the day we would be baptized into the faith. That all changed the day
she
came into his life.”

“Who was she?” Nick asked. He eased his grip on her arm but didn’t take his hand away.

“A girl who lived in Millersburg. Her name was Natalie
Perry. I don’t know how they met—he never told me that. He stopped telling me almost everything after they began going out. What he did talk about was leaving the faith.”

“Miriam, it’s not unusual for young Amish men and women to have their doubts.”

She shook her head. “You don’t understand, Nick. I don’t think he had any doubts at all. I was so mad at them, both of them, for disrupting our lives.”

“That’s understandable.”

She shrugged off his hand and rose to her feet. “Maybe, but what happened that last day was inexcusable.”

Walking to the fence, she braced her hands on the white-painted boards, feeling the roughness of the planks against her skin. She couldn’t face Nick or her brother’s memory.

“I’ve already said I’m sorry a hundred times, Miriam. How many more ways can I say it?” The anguish in his broken voice made her turn around. He stared at her with regret and pain etched in every feature.

Closing her eyes, she blocked the vision of yet one more life she’d damaged. “I wasn’t talking about you, Nick. I was talking about what I did that forced Mark to steal a car and drive to his death.”

* * *

Nick wasn’t sure that he had heard Miriam correctly. “I don’t understand. Are you saying that it wasn’t a joy ride?”

She shook her head. “He was desperately trying to save his child’s life.”

“You keep talking about a child. What child?”

“Mark’s unborn child. I promise you that I wouldn’t have interfered if I had known about the baby.”

He wanted to grab her and shake the truth out of her. All these years, he’d wrestled with the reason for Mark’s behavior. It had never made sense. His death had been so meaningless. Nick forced himself to remain calm. “Tell me what happened.”

“I know now that he must’ve loved her deeply, but he loved our family, too. I argued with him over and over that it was a mistake to go out into the world with her. I threatened to tell our parents and the bishop about them if he continued seeing her. Mark knew our family would be shunned if he ran off. I made him see he would break our parents’ hearts—my heart, too. I convinced him it was God’s will that he stay away from her.”

Nick had been close to the Kauffman twins when they were all teenagers, but he had stayed away when he realized his feelings for Miriam went beyond friendship. Maybe, if he had hidden his own feelings better, Mark might have confided in him.

“Mark didn’t see her for several weeks. The day before he died, she came to the farm. Mark had gone to visit some family with our parents. I could see Natalie was distraught, but I didn’t have any sympathy for her. She had come close to destroying our family.”

Miriam folded her arms across her chest and shivered. “Natalie told me her family was leaving the next day. She scrawled a note for Mark and thrust it into my hands. She begged me to give it to him as soon as possible.”

“And did you?”

Tears ran unchecked down Miriam’s face. “If only I had.”

“Do you know what was in the note?”

“I gave it to him the next evening after supper. His face turned white when he read it. The look in his eyes frightened me to death. He dropped the note and ran out of the house. That was the last time I saw him alive.”

“You said he dropped the note. You read it, didn’t you, Miriam? Tell me what it said.”

“It said she had just found out that she was pregnant and she didn’t want the baby. I think her exact words were, ‘I can’t go through this alone. If you love me, come for me. I’ll be waiting at the train station until nine o’clock. If you don’t come, I will know you have made your decision, and I will have made mine. I’m not going to have this baby without you.’”

Miriam covered her face with her hands. “She was going to get rid of Mark’s baby. That’s why he stole our neighbor’s car and wouldn’t stop when you came after him. He was desperate to reach Natalie before she left town. The terrible accident was all because of me.”

Miriam pressed a hand to her mouth and moaned. Her legs folded and she sank toward the ground. Nick caught her and held her against his chest as she cried.

Nick led Miriam to a small bench beside the caretaker’s shed and sat beside her, holding her close as he’d always dreamed of doing. When her crying slowed, he lifted her tear-streaked face with a finger beneath her chin.

“Miriam, you can’t keep blaming yourself for a mistake, no matter how serious you believe it is. We are human. We all make mistakes. Some of those mistakes have terrible consequences, but you have to forgive yourself. I know you thought you were protecting your brother.”

She nodded. “I stopped seeing you because of my faith. I thought Mark should be able to do the same. I was jealous that his love for her was stronger than mine for you.”

Nick pulled her close again. “I believe that Mark forgave you. He had to know you’d never willingly harm him or anyone. He was your brother. He loved you.”

“I believe he has forgiven me, too. But can you forgive me? I let you carry the blame when I was the cause of it all. I’m so sorry for the harsh things I said and for the way I treated you.”

“Of course I forgive you. Now that I understand Mark’s motives for trying to outrun me it all makes sense. I respect what he was trying to do.”

She cupped his face with her hand. “I’m glad I have given you some peace.”

He turned his face to kiss the palm of her hand. “You have given me much more than peace. You’ve given me back one of the best friends I ever had. You.”

And now he was going to give back pain. Taking her hand, he held it between his palms. “Miriam, I have something I need to tell you. We got the DNA report back. I know who Hannah’s mother is.”

Her eyes widened. “Are you sure?”

“Yes, her mother is the young woman who tried to commit suicide. Her name is Mary Smith, but we think it’s not her real name. The father has skipped town, but we’re looking for him. There’s a good possibility that he never knew Mary gave the baby away.”

“But why would she do it?”

“The doctor feels she may be suffering from a case of postpartum psychosis. If so, she wasn’t responsible for what she did. She may not even be aware of what she did. With treatment, she can recover and be a good mother.”

Miriam’s eyes softened. “I know that you love Hannah, too. I can only imagine how hard this must be for you.”

“I appreciate that you understand. We can hope and pray for her, but little else.”

“Life is so unfair.”

“Amen to that.”

She drew back a little. “How did you know where to find me?”

“I stopped by the hospital and your mother told me you’d come here.”

“Mother told you? I never told her I was coming here.”

“Then she made a good guess. Or maybe she knows you better than you think.”

Worry creased Miriam’s brows. “I need to tell her about Mark and his baby.”

“It can wait until she is stronger.”

“I guess you’re right about that. Now that I’ve told you, it’s as if the weight of the world has been taken off my shoulders.” Her smile was bright and genuine.

“I’m glad.” He wanted to know where he stood in her life now, but he sensed it wasn’t the time for such questions. It was a time for healing. What Miriam needed was a supportive friend and he could be that.

He asked, “Are you okay to drive back to town?”

“I am. I don’t want mother to start worrying.”

“She seemed fine when I was there. She was eating a piece of peanut butter toast.”

“Are you kidding me? She passed out cold this morning and scared me out of three years of my life.”

“Like I said, she’s a strong woman. You are, too, by the way. I hope you know that.” He loved her strength and so much more about her. He prayed he’d have the chance to tell her exactly how he felt one day soon.

* * *

Miriam stared into Nick’s eyes. She read more than friendship in their blue depths, but was she fooling
herself?

He rose to his feet and offered her a hand up. She took it, cherishing the warmth that flowed from his hand to hers. He was a very special man, and she was going to do her level best to make up for the pain she’d caused.

He held her hand a moment longer than he needed to. “I’ll let you know if I find out anything else about Hannah’s father.”

“It’s an open case? I thought you couldn’t talk about those.”

“You’ve been involved from the beginning. I’ll make an exception for you.”

“Thanks. I guess I should get back.”

“I’ve got to leave. Why don’t you stay a little longer and visit with your brother? I think you need that.”

“I think you’re right. I’ll see you later.”

“Count on it.” He tipped his hat and walked away.

Miriam followed his suggestion and spent a little time sitting by Mark’s grave, talking about her life and about Hannah. In a way, she felt connected to him again—something that had been missing for far too long in her life.

When she returned to the hospital, she found her mother sitting up in a chair and professing to feel great. It was a relief to see the new medication was agreeing with her.

“
Mamm,
how did you know I went to visit Mark’s grave?”

“I couldn’t think of any place else you would go without telling me if you weren’t with Nick. And you’ve been talking a lot about your brother, lately.”

Miriam frowned. “You are the one who has been mentioning him.”

“Have I? I don’t recall. I think the medicine has made me
narrisch.
”

“You’re not crazy, Mother. You’ve had some bad side effects, that’s all.”

“I wish I could go home. I’ll get well much quicker there.”

“If you do well on this new blood pressure medicine, I think you’ll be home before you know it.”

“How is Hannah? Have you heard anything about her?”

Miriam hesitated. Her mother looked so much better, but would the news of Hannah’s situation cause a relapse? She chose to err on the side of caution. “Hannah is still here in the hospital and she is fine.”

“I do miss that child. Who knew a person could fall in love with a baby so fast? I reckon Nick will have to carry the baby bed back up to the attic. At least it got used for a little while. Perhaps I should sell it.”

“That’s something we can talk about later. For now, you need your rest.”

“You need some rest, too, child. You look all done in.”