A Love Undone (3 page)

“We don’t own it?” Ray asked.

She shook her head. Her parents actually owned very little, but Mama had always said it’s what owns your heart, not what you own, that matters. Mamm had given birth to all her children under this roof, but Jolene couldn’t see any way they could hold on to it. But couldn’t she and Van hold on to the children? It’d be a really tight fit, but they could make do in the carriage house apartment in Ohio with all her siblings, couldn’t they? Had Van really considered the possibility? All she could recall was his guidance on what he needed her to do. Perhaps they needed to talk about what
she
wanted.

“Josiah, would you take the children upstairs and read to them?” Had they finished
Charlotte’s Web
? She’d begun it with them the night her Daed didn’t return. When Viola Mae’s husband had called the phone shanty around eight thirty that night, Jolene had been on the phone with Van. So she’d switched over to see who was calling, thinking it might be Daed saying that he’d been held up talking with the dad-to-be and that he’d be home soon. He often stayed with Mamm and visited with the expectant Daed. But it hadn’t been her Daed on the line. That’s when she learned that her parents hadn’t yet made it to their destination. It should have taken them forty minutes at the most to arrive at Viola Mae’s, but they’d been gone more than three hours. When Viola Mae’s husband called back at midnight to say they’d never arrived, Jolene knew … but she kept snuggling with her younger siblings, who would fall asleep and wake, asking for Mamm and Daed.

Jolene should remember if they’d finished the book in the following days, shouldn’t she? As much as she loved that book, the words had been meaningless to her as she filled the hours reading aloud, giving the children some small reprieve from their new reality.

Josiah nodded and stood. She kissed Ray and Hope on their heads and sent them off. Josiah waited for the younger ones to go up the stairs. “I vote no to separating us”—his eyes filled with tears—“if it matters what a sixteen-year-old thinks. I’m willing to do all I can to keep the little ones together. Not for me or you, but for them.”

Van propped an elbow on the table and rubbed his forehead. “You’re a good man, Josiah, and I’ve wrestled with those same desires since the day we learned your parents died, but taking on that responsibility is no life for Jolene or you.”

Josiah dipped his hands into his pockets and stared at the floor, probably trying to gather his thoughts. Their dad often teased his oldest son that he was as scattered as hayseed shooting out of a spreader, but Daed promised him he would produce a bumper crop in due time. Would he? If he did, would Jolene see it come to fruition? Their uncle in Ohio wanted Josiah to go with him. Josiah lifted his head. “Maybe our response to this tragedy isn’t about
us
. Or how to piece it together so we can be as happy as we would’ve been if our parents had lived.” Josiah stood straighter, looking his sister in the eyes. “Maybe we were given life and are in this family for
their
sakes.”

Jolene’s heart felt as if it had stopped beating. How did a person of so few words say something that profound? As the eldest Keim
daughter, was she put in this place for such a time as this? She nodded at her brother. “Maybe so.”

He went upstairs.

Van turned to her. “Jolene, you’re not thinking straight. How could you be? You need to trust me when I say it’s too much to take on. Hope could easily need to live with us for maybe twenty years.” He stood and began to pace. “You’ve made great strides with Ray, but everyone has known since the day he was struck by lightning that he could end up needing to live with his parents for the rest of his life.” He paused. “What about us? We’ll start adding our children into the mix within a year or so of marrying. We can’t do what you’re considering, Jo. I’m telling you that spiritually, emotionally, physically, and financially we can’t.”

A hint of beautiful, warm light filtered through some of the fog, and she had a fleeting moment of clarity. Was his insistence on the decision she needed to make the cause of some of her confusion? “
We
can’t, or
you
can’t?”

“
We
. One hundred percent, Jo.” He closed the gap between them. “We are in this together. But there’s no time to prepare ourselves emotionally to take this on, not with the wedding next week.”

She couldn’t believe the words that came to her, but she let them flow from her unchecked. “Then we need to postpone the wedding.”

He nodded. “A few weeks or months might help. It would give us time to get everyone situated.”

“Can’t we talk about keeping them together?”

“Jo, that’s all we’ve been talking about.”

Was it? While she’d gone through her days in shock, he’d been
a constant support, showing his love for her and his grief over her loss, but he’d also assured her at every turn that she needed to follow the guidance of her bishop and her uncles.

A knock on the door interrupted them, and a moment later Uncle Calvin and Aunt Lydia walked in. They spoke a greeting, as did each of the men in the procession of uncles and church leaders who also entered. The last person to come in was an unfamiliar, middle-aged
Englisch
man.

After Lydia asked Jolene and Van if they needed anything, she went to the kitchen sink and began washing the dishes Jolene had left. Calvin moved to the empty seat next to Jolene. He rubbed her shoulder as he sat, but he didn’t say anything. What could he say? Make silly small talk or assure her that everything would be fine? Of all her uncles, he was the most like her dad, and during the meetings she found herself watching him for clues of what she should do. But for the most part, he’d been quiet and stoic.

The church leaders and her other uncles had definite opinions about what had to be done, and they seemed weary of walking softly around her now that their minds were made up. She tried not to take it personally. They had families and businesses to get back to. But she was grateful that Calvin had not let them bully her into agreeing before she was ready. Despite having eight children of their own, he and Lydia had asked to take the one child no one wanted—Ray.

The men filled the chairs, and some remained standing. There was no small talk, and Lydia didn’t offer to make coffee or bring them a slice of cake. The group was short on protocol and tradition these days.

“Jolene and Van,”—Calvin motioned to the Englisch man—
“this is Douglas Piedmont. He’s a guardianship lawyer who’s here to help us know what we can and can’t do. So any questions we have, we can ask him.”

The men began to talk softly, reaffirming which child would go where and what furniture went with each child and discussing how to get out of the long lease her dad had signed on this place.

As their voices mingled into an indistinct mumbling, Jolene prayed. What should she do? She looked at Van. Would he stay by her if she chose to keep her siblings with her? If she lost him, she’d lose the life she had been dreaming about for the past four years. And she’d probably have a nervous breakdown, whatever that was.

Rambling thoughts swirled inside her brain, but Josiah’s words returned to her:
maybe we were given life and are in this family for
their
sakes
.

She tapped Calvin on the forearm, and he motioned for the group to be quiet. “What do I need to do to keep my siblings with me?”

An uproar followed—some men saying that she was dead wrong and that the children would pay the price and some complaining that a young girl shouldn’t have this kind of say.

But the lawyer held her gaze for several long moments. “Actually”—he clicked his pen, staring at her until the men became quiet—“it’s a viable question. You’d have to go before a judge and prove you’re a suitable guardian. You’d need a steady income, an affordable place to live, and home visits by the court—all of which I’d help you set up without cost.”

Was this stranger on her side? Aunt Lydia grabbed a dishtowel and dried her hands as she crossed the room and stood beside her husband.

Calvin glanced at her before he leveled a look at Jolene. “No one expects this of you. Don’t let a false sense of responsibility cause you to take on more than you should. But if it’s what you want, I’ll back you in it.”

Lydia put her hands on her husband’s shoulders. “
We
will back you in it.”

Is this why Calvin had been so quiet? Was he unwilling to hint that she should keep the siblings together and unwilling to support her giving them up?

“You would need to stay in state with your siblings, at least until the courts are satisfied about your capabilities.”

She focused on the lawyer. “I don’t know a place where we could afford to live.”

Calvin nodded, frowning. “This house belongs to Old Man Fisher two districts over. He’s cantankerous, but maybe he’d give you a bit of leeway, at least until we can figure out something else.”

Lester Fisher scared her, reminding her of the irritable grandfather in the book
Heidi
. Try as she might, she’d never won the man over, not even a smile. Even his children and grandchildren avoided him. “It’s worth a try.”

“Keeping your siblings is a monumental task,” the lawyer said. “They’re traumatized and scarred. Grown adults struggle to help children cope with this kind of loss, and you’re only nineteen.” He tapped his pen on the yellow paper with its blue and red lines.

“Jo, please,” Van pleaded. “They need to be in a home with two adult parents, not a teen sister and her twenty-one-year-old husband.” His voice trembled.

Fresh pain seared her as she realized where this conversation was
leading. He hadn’t wanted a girlfriend because of the responsibility. She’d been surprised when he’d asked her to marry him, thinking he’d wait a good five years or more, but he’d said he loved her too much to wait.

Oh, how she didn’t want to lose him.

A door slammed, rattling the kerosene lanterns on the kitchen table. The sound had come from upstairs, and she sat perched, listening, ready to run or relax based on the next few seconds. A thud echoed. And another. And another, each harder than the previous one, and she raced up the steps. She glanced in her bedroom.
Charlotte’s Web
lay on the floor. Its spine faced the ceiling, looking as if it’d been dropped there. The rocker where she often sat while reading swayed back and forth. Her bed was crumpled where the younger ones should be sitting or lying on it while Josiah read to them. Muffled voices floated from somewhere, and she knew her destination. “Ray?” She hurried into the boys’ bedroom.

Michael, Naomi, and Hope stood in the middle of the room, eyes large and focused on the closet.

“Kumm on,” Josiah whispered at the closet door. He shifted the kerosene lantern in his hand. “Don’t do this, Ray. Not now.”

Ray sobbed—short, muted noises, probably crying into a blanket or pillow. Jolene’s heart broke. She knocked on the closet door and tugged. “Ray.” When she encountered resistance, she recognized the pull of Ray’s suspenders, a favorite trick of his for securing the closet door when he wanted to be alone. She leaned her head against the frame. Whether together or apart, how were any of them going to survive their loss? Choking back tears, she had an urge to sing their parents’ favorite song. The lyrics wobbled as she began. “What
a Friend we have in Jesus, all our sins and griefs to bear. What a privilege to carry everything to God in prayer.”

Her siblings joined her. “O what peace we often forfeit, O what needless pain we bear, all because we do not carry everything to God in prayer.”

How many evenings had they sung that song as a family before dispersing to go to bed?

The suspenders ricocheted against the door, and she knew he’d either lost his grip or released them. When she opened the door, Ray was sitting against the wall at the back of the closet. His flashlight sat upright on the floor, illuminating the small room. He looked tiny and overwhelmed as he held his favorite stuffed toy in one hand, probably what he’d been sobbing into, and a bat in the other. He’d knocked five or six holes in the wall with the bat before sinking to the floor in a heap. This image pretty much summed up her youngest brother when he was overwhelmed—a childlike gentleness mixed with the occasional destructive outburst. But he never lashed out at or near people. She sat next to him.

He curled against her. “I’m sorry. I know that was wrong. I didn’t—”

She ran her hand over his silky hair. “It’s going to be okay, Ray. It doesn’t feel like it to any of us right now, but it will be. Can you trust me on that?”

He held on to her tightly. “What will happen to us?”

She wished she knew. “We will stick together.” But she was a girl facing adult tasks, and it terrified her. Would her brothers and sisters be more scarred in the long run if her best efforts to do them justice were pitiful?

He gazed up at her, and she saw relief overtake his grief for a moment. “Together? Really?”

A knot formed in her stomach, but she put on her best parental face and smiled at him. “Together.”

His eyes filled with tears. “I’ll do my best to be good. I promise.”

“Me too.” Tightening her grip around him, she kissed the top of his head and began singing the song to him again. Josiah, Michael, Naomi, and Hope piled into the closet with her, snuggling into a huddle of Keim legs and arms as they held each other.

Van came to the door and peered inside.

Jolene swallowed hard. “I can’t let them be scattered to the wind.”

Hurt etched itself deep in his face as he nodded. Was that a look of compassion for her and her siblings or heartbreak for himself?

Maybe he already knew what she was just beginning to see. The life they’d wanted was already gone, whether they housed the children or not. They could never be the couple he’d been dreaming of because she was no longer the girl he’d fallen in love with. But she would be. Someday. And she longed to ask, Will you wait for me? Wait for me to raise my siblings? Wait for me to heal and become me again?

But that was too much to ask of anyone. All she could do was hope he’d remain her friend until he fell in love with the person she was becoming.