Abby Finds Her Calling (17 page)

As Abby stepped out the front door of the Cedar Creek Mercantile, she noticed that a light burned inside the carriage shop across the road. It meant James was working on that glittery white carriage again, and for that she was thankful. Next door, at Treva’s Greenhouse, Mamm’s silhouette moved inside the fogged glass walls as she tended houseplants and the potted mums she’d brought inside when the weather had turned colder.

Before long, snow would be clinging to the hillsides. No matter what sorts of trouble people caused, it was comforting to know that the seasons would still come and go. Fall would be followed by Thanksgiving and Christmas, with all their extra baking and celebrations, and for that Abby was grateful, too. The upcoming holidays were a reminder that no matter how unsettling their daily life became—mostly because of the mistakes folks made, thinking they knew best—God was in charge. The trick was to accept this, to submit to His higher wisdom, and to patiently believe that all things were possible for Him, even when all hope seemed lost.

As Abby entered her house and walked through the kitchen, she felt a welling up of gladness. Zanna sat at the table by the window. She looked rested, and she was ripping out the hems and seams of the old clothing they’d collected at the store. “I figured you’d be starting a rug soon, and I’m in the mood for ripping strips,” she announced.

“That’s gut,” Abby replied with a wry smile, “on account of how I need to write up my piece for the
Budget
. But jah, I’ll be needing a rug soon, and yours are just the hands I want working on it, too.”

Zanna’s brows rose. “You realize it’s been a while since I made a rag rug, ain’t so? I hope it’s all right that I want to use your big crochet hook rather than braiding coils and then stitching them together.”

“I like that method best myself. The rug’s easier to handle as you work, and it’ll hold together better.” Abby went to the cabinet in her front room and came back with a large box. “I’ve got some fabric scraps left from the last quilting frolic, too. Adding in these new prints will brighten up those old clothes—because we want this to be a special rug, Zanna,” Abby added in a thoughtful tone. “A true work of your hands and heart.”

Her sister glanced up warily from a faded brown dress she’d cut some notches in. “And why are we saying this piece will be any different? Your rugs always turn out better than anyone else’s, Abby. Mine won’t be as flat and even and perfect as yours.”

Abby smiled, and then took her writing tablet from the kitchen drawer. She put on a kettle for tea. “It’s for Adah Ropp. She ordered a rug while you were away.”

Defiance clouded Zanna’s blue eyes. “If you think I want to—”

“I think you’ll see this as a way to mend some fences. To offer up a gift that says you can rise above Adah’s sharp remarks,” Abby replied. “Adah’s none too happy about what her boy’s done this time—on top of jumping the fence and not associating with his dat these past few years.”

Abby wasn’t surprised to see the resistance rising in her sister’s face, but the more she thought about it, the more perfect this idea seemed. “Consider it a peace offering, Zanna—a gut thing to work on while you’re under the ban, don’t you think?” she murmured. “When you do your best work for somebody who rubs you the wrong way, you show the kind of love Barbara was talking about last night.
And besides that,” Abby added with a grin, “when we deliver the rug, it’ll be you Adah’s paying.”

Zanna’s shoulders were rising like a cantankerous cat’s. “Maybe this isn’t such a gut idea, Abby. Adah’s sure to find all sorts of things wrong with a rug
I
make—”

“That’s why it has to be the prettiest, sturdiest rag rug anybody’s ever made for her.”

“Maybe I could work it up and we’ll say
you
did.” Zanna widened her eyes, pleading like a little girl.

“Then the money will be mine, sister. Think on it while you’re ripping those strips.”

Abby poured boiling water into two mugs, added tea bags, and then sat at the opposite end of the table from Zanna. Through the back window, the view of the brightly colored maple trees and sweet gums usually inspired her—except last night’s wind had stripped off most of their leaves. It was yet another reminder that winter would soon arrive… and watching Zanna rip strips gave her an idea for the piece she’d write.

It was a mysterious process, putting words on paper. Abby had found that composing her thoughts for a
Budget
article often clarified her feelings about the events she reported. And if ever she had needed more clarity, the time was now. So much had happened so quickly this week, she’d had no time to ponder what it all might mean in the grander scheme of things… in the way the Lord wanted her to live her life for others.

Here in Cedar Creek, life has been a lot like making a rag rug
, Abby began. She sipped her tea and then let her thoughts guide her pencil without interrupting their flow. The good ideas often got lost when she imposed judgment too soon.

You start by washing old, faded dresses and shirts, thinking how you can bring new life—new usefulness—to this castaway clothing. Rag rug making involves tearing garments apart, then working in strong, brighter fabric left from other projects so as not to waste the materials you’ve been
given. Sometimes you must rip out stitches that become too tight—or add in extra stitches to ease your way around tricky curves. This is never something you can plan ahead of time. Only working your way around by feel and instinct, adding in your love with each and every stitch, will make a rug that lies flat and holds together well. When you’ve finished, you’ve created something new and beautiful from materials that had been discarded.

Folks here in Cedar Creek are especially sorry for Marian and Carl Byler: their newborn, Elizabeth, is doing well in the medical center after an early arrival but her twin sister, Esther, lived only one day on account of severe trauma during the delivery. It’s another way life brings us strips that aren’t always bright and perfect and beautiful, while God provides ways to stitch in strength and fresh hope so our rug holds together anyway.

Abby paused. The Bylers’ story, while tragic, had been the easier one to report: who wouldn’t feel sympathy for Marian and Carl? But she couldn’t skip over Zanna’s canceled wedding—kin who’d come from Ohio, Indiana, and Pennsylvania would be wondering what had happened since then. Friends and family hereabouts would read her account with interest, as well, because of the rumors that had run rampant before Zanna’s confession on Sunday. Even now, folks speculated about what would happen to this misbegotten child: they all recalled how Jonny Ropp had left town on his sixteenth birthday only to return a few days later, showing off his fancy van and his cell phone. He’d openly belittled his parents’ dairy farming and their out-of-fashion faith.

Make believers of them.

Abby dimpled her cheek with the end of her pen. That still, small voice was reminding her that a higher good could be served with every word she wrote. As Cedar Creek’s scribe for the national Plain newspaper, she was to present local events so that all would be informed—and none would be misrepresented. The canceled wedding and Zanna’s confession were only part of the picture:
she had to consider James, too. His hopes and dreams had been ripped to shreds. His family had been humiliated, and the revelation of another man’s baby had only rubbed salt in their wounds.

Abby recalled James’s stunned silence, the pain on his handsome face when she’d told him Zanna had disappeared… and his anger when he’d heard that the woman he loved was carrying Jonny Ropp’s child. No good would be served by spelling out these details for the Amish across America—especially since many women in Cedar Creek would report their versions of this local scandal in letters to their kin back East anyway. Better to give this situation no more space than she had allotted the announcement of Marian Byler’s unfortunate birthing… best to write it the way Zanna would form the rows of her rug with the big crochet hook: loose and even, with love and care.

Once again Abby put her pen to the paper:

As many of you know, the marriage of Suzanna Lambright to James Graber was called off. As with that rug I mentioned earlier, sometimes you’re crocheting along on a fast, easy straightaway and then you come to a curve: if the stitches don’t fit right, no matter how much love and effort and patience you apply, there’s nothing to do but tear out that section so you can rework it. We must believe that when our plans—for rugs, or lives—don’t happen the way we’d hoped, it’s because God has a better idea, a different path and purpose for us.

My wish for you this week: never give up or give in to despair and stuff your unfinished rug in the trash. Keep thinking on it, praying over it—as we ask you to do for the Bylers, the Grabers, and the Lambrights. ~Abigail Lambright

Abby reread the piece, smiled, and wrote a neater copy of it to send in the mail. She kept her drafts in a loose-leaf notebook, a sort of diary of her life since she’d volunteered to be the town scribe a couple of years ago—right around the time she’d turned twenty-five and realized James Graber would never see her as a potential wife. Now
there
was a sorry state she’d been in! A time when the rag rug
of her life seemed ugly and puckered and beyond fixing. What young woman dreamed of living alone?

Yet once Abby had declared herself a maidel, she’d immediately become closer to Sam’s children at an important time in their young lives, and she’d created her Stitch in Time business. She also cherished the time she’d spent helping Dat plan her house so Owen Coblentz could build it… a cozy home that would be Zanna’s haven while she reconsidered her future, as well. Had Abby married, none of those things would have happened.

And whom had she considered for a husband? No one but James. He alone had made her heart sing.
So why waste another man’s life—or your own—settling for less of a marriage than you dream of?
This was the thought that had run consistently through her heart when she prayed on her unmarried state a few years ago, until she’d begun to trust the Lord’s truth for her life. This inner guidance had been a beacon ever since, and now Zanna’s situation again proved the wisdom of listening to it, and sharing it.

Abby went to the kitchen for an envelope and a stamp. It pleased her to see her sister sitting at the kitchen table with strips of fabric draped over the chairs according to color. Zanna was patiently removing the hem from a floral print dress—something she wouldn’t have spent her time doing when she was younger.

Zanna looked up, the seam ripper poised at the next stitch. “Gut thing Adah’s Mennonite friends donated their old clothes so we have different colors and more patterns. And you know,” she continued in a pensive tone, “I’m thinking the royal blue of my wedding dress would set off a lot of these quilting scraps—if you won’t be upset at me for using it that way.”

Abby hugged her sister’s slender shoulders. What a good sign, that Zanna was thinking beyond her earlier excuses for not making Adah’s rug. “Since you already snipped it into ribbons,” Abby teased, “this might be the perfect way to reclaim a dress that will never be worn. And with those shirts in the darker blue, you’ve got a nice
contrast to the faded browns and grays from the donation box. Adah will be tickled.”

Zanna’s smile curved wryly. “Jah, that’s why I want to make a really fine rug and then deliver it, like you said. To see the look on her face.”

Abby heard a bit of payback in that remark, which defeated the whole principle of having Zanna make these rugs. As she thought about her response, she watched her sister cut more strips, about two inches wide and the length of the broadfall trousers she held. “If Adah’s rug turns out gut, you might make one for James and Emma’s mamm,” Abby suggested quietly. “All the rugs in their house are looking worn, and if anyone could use a gift, it’s Eunice Graber. I don’t expect she gets many.”

The slight rise of Zanna’s eyebrows told Abby she’d gotten the hint about her attitude. Zanna yanked a long section of thread from another hem, smoothed the fabric flat with her hand, and then snipped it at two-inch intervals. As she ripped the long strips, a sigh escaped her, yet she didn’t seem as hopeless or helpless as she’d been these past few days. “I could make rugs until the day I die and not repay
you
, sister,” she murmured. “Denki for putting up with my moods, and for helping me out of this tight spot. I don’t
intend
to be thoughtless or rude or—and I never in a million years wanted to hurt Barbara or Sam or Mamm. Sometimes I just don’t pay attention. I run off at the mouth without thinking.”

Abby leaned over her sister’s chair to hug her shoulders. It might not be the way the Ordnung said she was to treat her shunned sister, but wasn’t affection the better alternative to emotional distance? Weren’t approval and encouragement the quicker ways to persuade this young woman to show that same kindness to others, now that Zanna could see where she’d fallen short?

“I’d rather hear you talking this way than have you making me rugs any day,” Abby whispered. “I’ll fetch that wedding dress. Then I can be stitching the ends of your strips together so you can get a gut start on your rug before dinner.”

Zanna blinked back tears. “You’re the best sister ever. You know that, Abby?”

And wasn’t that about the nicest thing anyone had ever said to her? Abby went to fetch the ruined wedding dress before this conversation turned into a crying match. The day might be blustery and bleak, but it was warm as toast in her little house. And wasn’t that something to celebrate?

A few days later, Zanna sat at Abby’s table stitching around the oval rug’s next curving edge. She carefully inserted her big crochet hook into the previous row, feeling more than counting how many extra stitches would keep the rug loose enough that it would lie flat. She’d had to rip out plenty of places and redo them to get the rug started right, yet it measured nearly three feet wide now. This project had been a better way to fill the long hours than she had anticipated: while Zanna had watched Abby make plenty of these sturdy floor mats, handwork had never been her cup of tea. She had always had someplace more fun to go, some buddy to giggle with.