An Amish Gift (22 page)

“They know that we’re splitting up and she’s going to Italy with this man. I don’t think they understand she’s going away pretty much for good. That they’ll be lucky if she drops in for a visit once in a while.”

No one spoke.

Finally, Michael stood up. “I did quite a job picking a wife, didn’t I?”

“Don’t say that,” Shep said. “You couldn’t have foreseen all this.”

“Yes, yes, I could have. The way she is—it was right in front of me, but I didn’t want to see it.” He looked at his brother. “You saw it. I must have realized that, and I didn’t want to hear you say it.”

“Be fair to yourself,” Jennie protested. “You were married a long time, and that was an accomplishment.”

“It was a long time because I was never there. Always working, traveling. I let everything important fall by the wayside. Like you guys.”

“We’ve always been here,” Jennie said. “And we know you cared a—”

“Come on, J, don’t humor me,” he said. “I haven’t forgotten the way things used to be, how close we three were. That was all lost.”

Shep came over to put a hand on his shoulder. “So what are you going to do now?”

“No idea. Now it’s going to be about my kids, getting them through this shock. Then we’ll have to figure out what kind of life the three of us will want to live. All I can tell you is that it’s not going to be the one we were living.”

“Tell us how we can help.”

“Letting us come here for the holiday was a big one. I don’t know what would have happened if the three of us had been alone at home. It would have been awful.”

“We’ll get through tomorrow, and then we’ll spend all our time with the children.” Jennie turned to Shep. “In fact, let’s
ask if Evie and her mom will take a double shift, so we can stop working about midday tomorrow.”

“Good idea.”

“No,” Michael said, “I don’t want you paying out extra money because of us. But hey, why can’t we three help? I’ve been known to move pretty quickly when I have to. Maybe if we find something my kids can do, we can speed things along.”

“Okay, then,” Jennie agreed. “Welcome to the staff of Got To Candy.”

She went upstairs to check on the children, her mind racing with what she could do to provide some comfort to her niece and nephew. Shep and Michael sat back down to talk some more. Out of so much sadness, she thought, at least there was this one good piece: The brothers had each other again.

When Jennie heard the doorbell ring, she hoped with all her heart that it wasn’t one of her deliveries being returned. It hadn’t been easy, but with everyone—including Michael and his children—working at a furious pace, they had kept Got To Candy’s guarantee.

She pushed her chair back from the table, gesturing for everyone else to stay put. Shep, Michael, and all the children were eating roast chicken, string beans, and baked potatoes, the best impromptu meal she could throw together after they got the last box out. She was fascinated to see that Evan and Kimberly ate without complaint, free of cell phones or other distractions.

At the moment, they were engaged in a discussion of the best desserts they had ever eaten, and they barely noticed her leave the room. She was still considering possible shipping errors
as she went down the hall. Scout was already barking at the door, frantic to learn the identity of their visitor.

“Come on, Scout, please stop the racket!” The dog barked louder. “You know, sometimes—” she said in a threatening tone as she turned the doorknob.

A woman stood outside in the freezing darkness, several feet away from the door as if hesitant to get too close, bundled up in a long coat against the snowy night. The thick woolen scarf wrapped around her neck and lower portion of her face obscured almost everything but her eyes.

“Yes?” Jennie peered out in the dimness of the porch light.

“Jennie?” The woman took a small step forward and loosened the scarf to reveal more of her face.

Jennie stared at her. How many times over the years had she imagined this very thing? she asked herself. Early on, she had wished with all her heart that it would happen, that Hope would reappear out of the blue the same way she had disappeared. Later, though, she grew angry and hurt. When she pictured her sister coming back, she envisioned herself lashing out, wanting to punish her the way her absence had punished Jennie. It had taken so many years to harden her heart to her sister, getting to the point where she accepted—where she genuinely believed—that she would never see Hope again. The mixture of feelings had been buried along with her memories, and for the most part, she had been successful at keeping them buried.

Yet here Hope was, and all those feelings came rushing back.

“Hope,” Jennie whispered.

The other woman nodded. “Yes. It’s me.”

Her face was drawn, and the wrinkles etched in it made her look older than Jennie knew she was. Whatever she had been doing with her life, it must not have been easy.

“Why?” Jennie was stumbling over the words. “Why are you here?”

As if she hadn’t heard the question, Hope dropped her gaze to Scout, sitting at attention next to Jennie. He seemed to understand that now was not the time for him to create any further commotion. “Nice dog.” Hope knelt and extended her hand for him to sniff. He got up to move toward her.

Jennie grabbed him by the collar. “Sit!” she commanded, and he obeyed at once. “I asked why you’re here. And why now?”

Hope straightened up. “I guess I didn’t expect you to be glad to see me, but I wasn’t expecting quite this level—”

“Of what?” Jennie snapped. “Anger? No, make that fury. You expected the person you abandoned to welcome you with open arms?”

The wind was picking up.

“Do you think I might come in?” Hope asked. “It’s pretty windy. Believe it or not, I’ve been standing out here for a long time, trying to get up the courage to ring the bell.”

“With good reason.” Jennie herself was freezing just standing in the doorway, and she could guess that Hope must be extremely cold by this point. Exasperated, she stepped back to make room for her sister to enter. Hope stepped over the
threshold but made no effort to go any farther. As she unwrapped the scarf fully, Jennie saw that her sister’s brown hair, once thick and shining like her own, was dull and prematurely shot through with gray.

“Jen, who is it?” Shep called out from the dining room.

“That’s my husband,” she informed Hope.

“I know.”

“You
know
?” Jennie held up a finger as she raised her voice to answer him. “It’s okay, Shep, I got it.” She turned back to her sister. “How do you know?”

“I’ve kept track of you all these years. You must realize that. Remember, I sent mail to you.”

“Oh, now we’re getting to it. The money! Is that what you’re here about? You want it back, right?”

Hope shook her head. “Nope. Not at all. I just came to see you.”

Jennie saw the old scar on Hope’s jaw, an inch-long indentation that was faded but visible, where she had cut herself when she fell out of a tree they were climbing. That must have been thirty years ago. The scar was as familiar to Jennie as if it had been on her own face. In an instant, she was back there, watching the blood gush from the gash, a terrified five-year-old crying as she ran to get help.

Her emotions in turmoil, Jennie felt immobilized. She didn’t know how she was supposed to treat her sister. Worse, she didn’t know how she was supposed to feel about her. She was angry, but she was also aware that
her sister had come back
. On her own, the way Jennie always dreamed she would.

“Are Tim and Willa here, too?” Hope asked.

“You know their names?”

“Of course. Computers, you know …”

“Well, you’re quite the devoted aunt.”

Hope sighed. “I deserve that.”

“So you also know when Mom died? That’s when the money stopped coming.”

A nod.

“Jennie, is everything all right?” Shep’s voice was concerned. “We’re waiting to hear if you would pick the cheesecake from that place just outside Lawrence over the pecan pie we had on our tenth anniversary in Boston. Remember that?”

“Be right there,” she called back.

“It was wrong for me to come tonight. Maybe I should come back another time,” Hope said. “I’m staying at a motel nearby, so I could wait until after you celebrate Christmas tomorrow. The next day, maybe.”

“You’d wait around?”

Hope gave a wan smile. “This is what’s important, so I’ll wait as long as it takes.”

“I don’t get it!” Jennie exploded. “Why have you materialized on my doorstep?”

Her sister looked directly into her eyes. “I’ve wanted to see you for years. But I didn’t think you’d ever forgive me. I was living in Phoenix, and I sold my house. The day I left, I got to thinking it was time to see you, not because I wanted to—which I did—but because I needed to make it right. Or try to.”

“So you decided to come here all the way from Arizona on a whim.”

“It wasn’t a whim at all. But I’ve always lived like that. From the day I left home, I never wanted to get stuck in one place, like I felt stuck in our house. Makes me feel as if I’m suffocating. Anyway, the point is, I’ve never stopped feeling bad about leaving you behind. Leaving you alone with her.”

“Then why did you?”
Jennie wanted to shake Hope. “I was too young to be in charge like that. I had to take care of her, me, the house, everything. I was a kid!”

“I couldn’t stay there. And I knew she wouldn’t hurt you.”

“No,
you
hurt me! Everything she did hurt me. You abandoned me—but she did, too. Just in a different way.”

Hope’s voice got quiet. “I meant hurt you physically. Like she did to me.”

Jennie stared at her. “What are you saying?” It came out as a whisper.

“She used to hit me when she got drunk, a lot and pretty hard. With one of Dad’s belts. She blamed me for him leaving us. Soon as I could, I got out. You were the only one she really loved, and I was dead certain she would never do that to you.”

“She never did.” Jennie was thinking back, horrified at the knowledge of what must have been going on in the house. “But I didn’t know. How could that be happening and I didn’t know?”

“She never did it when you were awake. At least some part of her brain realized it was wrong and knew enough to hide it from you.”

Jennie was at a loss for words.

“So I left, and I never stopped leaving. Every place and everyone. I wished all the time that I had taken you with me, but I couldn’t have had you on the road with me. Your life would have been much worse.” Hope sighed. “And I knew you’d get through school if you stayed. The day you got married was one of the happiest of my life. Mom was gone and you had a real chance at having a normal life.” She glanced around. “Which, it seems, you do.”

Jennie was dumbfounded. “You tracked me all these years.”

“I never stopped loving you, Jen. You’re my baby sister. But I had to leave. If she didn’t kill me, I was afraid I would kill her. But I never would have let anyone harm you.”

“Where did you get all that money you sent?”

Hope shrugged. “Waitressing, mostly. I saw lots of places, had a lot of adventures. Mostly good, some not so good. I worked all over. Racetracks, funeral homes, you name it.”

“Those don’t sound like places that paid enough for you to send me money all the time.”

“I didn’t spend much. You needed money, and I got my freedom. It seemed like a fair deal.”

Jennie was trying to absorb what she was hearing. It was too much to take in, she realized. Everything she’d believed about her childhood would have to be reexamined. “You’ve been moving around your whole life?”

Hope grimaced. “Most of it, but not the whole time. There was one person I didn’t leave. My husband, Tom. We got married
fifteen years ago. We were living in Michigan. I must have been there about seven years, which was a record for me. We had a son.” She paused. “My husband and he were killed when he was two. Tom was pushing him in the stroller, crossing the street. Hit-and-run driver. Truck.”

Jennie gasped.

“I left Michigan right after that.”

Before Jennie could say anything, Shep appeared in the hallway, napkin in hand. “Honey, what’s going on?” He stopped as he saw they had a guest. “Oh, excuse me, I didn’t realize.”

Jennie took a deep breath. “Shep, I want you to meet someone.”

He came forward, smiling, extending a hand in preparation to shake.

“This is my sister, Hope.”

The smile disappeared, and his hand fell to his side. “You’re Hope.” Said in a flat voice, it wasn’t a question.

“Yes. Jennie didn’t know I was coming here tonight, but here I am.”

“Here you are, indeed.” Anger on his wife’s behalf was evident in his tone. He had met Jennie after Hope left town, but he knew the entire story and all the pain her disappearance had caused Jennie.

Hope didn’t try to deflect his anger, only stood there returning his gaze.

Jennie couldn’t handle the silence any longer. “This is all a little much to resolve in the hallway tonight.” She turned to
Hope. “I guess it’s going to happen one way or another, so you might as well come meet everybody else.”