Big Decisions (7 page)

It wasn’t that she didn’t miss her; there was just nothing else to do about it. Life went on as usual, the sun rose and set in the same sky, and Mandy lived under the same sky with the same sun and moon, except now she was 10 miles away. Emma was even farther away, and Lizzie had soon become accustomed to that, so she would survive.

Dat’s health seemed fairly stable in the spring. He loved the challenge of building. Mam said that his giving up farming was one of the best things that could have happened. He was always eager to go to work, he was happy while he was there, and he had only minor frustrations, like stumbling occasionally or bouts of blurry vision.

One warm Sunday evening, Stephen and Lizzie decided to sit under the old apple tree in the pasture instead of sitting as they normally did in the living room. The grass was soft and cushiony, so after their walk, they sat side by side in the soft, warm darkness.

Stephen was acting a bit strange, Lizzie thought, having less to say than usual, which really, on ordinary days, was never very much at all. Lizzie tried gamely to keep up a lively conversation, but she didn’t get a very positive response from Stephen.

Finally, she could stand it no longer, so she blurted out, “Why don’t you have anything to say this weekend? You’re much quieter than usual.”

Stephen didn’t answer until Lizzie became quite uncomfortable.

Then, all he said was, “I’d like to build a house someday.”

“A house!” Lizzie squeaked, her heart plummeting to her stomach.

“Yes.”

“You mean to sell? Or for yourself, or … I mean, where would you build it? Do you know how to build a house by yourself?”

“Of course. That’s what I do.”

“Oh, yes. I guess.”

There was a soft silence as dogs barked in the distance. Headlights created an arc of light as a car rounded the bend, the kitchen door slammed as someone went out to the front porch, and still Stephen said nothing.

Lizzie gnawed at the corner of her thumbnail, cleared her throat, sighed, glanced nervously in Stephen’s direction, and wondered what was going on. Surely he wasn’t contemplating marriage this weekend, as he had been having the time of his life with all of his friends, playing baseball, going on day trips, talking about walking that dreaded—in Lizzie’s opinion—Appalachian Trail again. Stephen’s first trip had just about ended their relationship, and Lizzie wasn’t sure she could handle it if Stephen went hiking for a month again.

And then, oh sickening thought, she wondered if he wanted to end the relationship, to have absolute freedom to go on long trips or just do as he wanted. He had acted like it lately, now that she thought about it.

She held her breath as he reached down and took away her hand.

“Don’t do that. You’ll chew a hole in your thumb.”

There was a space of a few heartbeats as his hand tightened on hers, and he leaned closer.

Then, very softly, he said, “Lizzie, do you think we could build a small house on an acre of your dad’s land?”

“W … We?”

“Yes, we.”

“I … I don’t know. I guess we could ask him sometime.”

“No, not sometime. Next week. We have to know if we want to live in our house this winter.”

Lizzie drew a deep breath. “You … you mean … ?”

“Would you live in a new little house with me, Lizzie?”

“We’d … I … we’d have to get married first?” she breathed.

“Of course. If I asked you tonight, would you marry me?”

“Well, are you asking?”

“Yes.”

Lizzie sighed happily, turned to him, and said, “Yes, I will. I will marry you and live in a little house with you.”

Stephen laughed happily. “All my hopes and dreams have come true, Lizzie!”

Lizzie, as usual, felt awkward and wasn’t sure how to answer. For one thing, she was so happy she had to fight back her tears, and for another thing, the lump in her throat threatened to choke her, so she just sat there and swallowed. She couldn’t speak at the moment, although a thousand questions rained in from every direction, wherever thoughts came from. For once in her life, she was absolutely speechless. She wanted to tell him it was a dream come true for her, too, which it was, but to be perfectly honest, she was a bit afraid. How did they know the dream come true would remain a good dream?

So she said, “We’ll be very happy, I’m sure.”

There was nothing wrong with that, was there? Of course not. Of course they would be very happy together. Maybe not 100 percent of the time. Like all the Amish preachers said, they would have their rainy days and their sunshiny days.

Stephen got to his feet quite suddenly, pulling her up with him. His hands closed firmly around hers, and she felt the difference in him as he placed her hands around his waist. Her own heart beat with his, and it was the most natural feeling she had ever experienced. This beating of two hearts together was as light as a moth and as powerful as a large magnet.

Lizzie raised questioning eyes to him. The lights from the back porch reflected the love in his blue, blue eyes. As naturally as their hearts beating, he slowly bent his head, and their lips met in an honest-to- goodness kiss of love.

It wasn’t that the world stood still, the way the books said. But the dark sky, the apple tree, the soft summer night’s breeze, disappeared for a very short time. In that moment, there was only Stephen and this all-consuming love she felt for him.

“Lizzie, I love you so much,” Stephen said, his voice shaking. “Thank you for promising to be my wife.”

“I do love you, too, Stephen,” she said.

And she did.

The spoken words, that mutual kiss empowered Lizzie, drowning any doubts or fears she had ever felt. They would stand together, in love, with God at the helm, and even if they stumbled and fell sometimes, he would pick them up.

After a moment, Stephen pulled back.

“You know, Lizzie, I don’t have a lot of money. I have very little saved up, but I think if we had a bit of land, we could borrow the money from the bank to build our house.”

“Do you really think we can borrow the money?” Lizzie asked. “I mean, how do you know we could even qualify?”

“We probably won’t unless we own an acre of land,” Stephen answered.

Then he laughed softly. “Here we are, planning our house as if our life depended on it and acting as if our relationship—actually getting married—is of no consequence. Do you think we can get along?”

“Oh, of course,” Lizzie said airily. “We don’t always agree on everything now, so I’m sure there will be times when we don’t agree in the future. And you know me. I can’t keep my thoughts and opinions to myself, and I might get a bit loud and judgmental, don’t you think?”

Stephen laughed. “Yes, definitely.”

“And,” Lizzie continued, “you’ll just stay quiet and never say what you think but do exactly as you please, no matter if I fuss and carry on like a wild person.”

“Not always. Not if I love you as I should,” he said soberly.

Lizzie was amazed at that statement. He must have read his Bible about that subject as well, which was very good. Stephen was not the type of person to be verbal about God or what certain passages in the Bible meant. He was taught to keep his faith to himself, as most Amish youth were. They were instructed to live their beliefs and let their lights shine, which was good.

Stephen did not think highly of himself or his opinions, especially when it came to spiritual matters. Lizzie had realized early in their relationship that he was not comfortable with speaking about God. Lizzie had mentioned this to Mam, and Mam said that it was nothing to worry about. That would come in time, as he matured spiritually, which was comforting to Lizzie.

Lizzie clasped her hands, sighing joyously. “Oh, I can hardly believe this! Really, Stephen, are we actually going to live in a new house? How did you know I always wanted a new one? You know I’m not like Emma. She always wanted an old house with old quilts and stuff. I’ll even have new kitchen cupboards, won’t I? And I’ll get to pick out the color of my linoleum, no, not
my
linoleum,
our
linoleum,” she said, laughing happily.

So they sat and planned, talking about many different subjects, until Stephen said it was past his usual time to leave.

“You ask your dad about the land, all right?” he concluded.

“No, you come over Wednesday evening, and we’ll ask him together,” she corrected him.

“You know, it’s funny about your dad. I don’t know how often I’ve heard him say he would gladly have all his married children live on the farm, and so far, they’ve all moved away to farms of their own. I always thought he’d probably be glad to offer us some land. Do you think I’m right?” Stephen asked.

Lizzie laughed. “Oh, you know how Dat is, Stephen. He talks almost as much as I do!”

She helped him hitch up his horse, and as he drove out through the darkness, his lights blinking as they always did, Lizzie thought they blinked a bit faster and brighter than before. She and Stephen were so happy that even the buggy lights felt it, she thought, then told herself to stop being so downright silly.

Wednesday evening Stephen was a bit late, which had Lizzie in an absolute dither. For one thing, she had tried so hard not to talk about the marriage proposal and the acre of land to anyone, but unable to help herself she had confided in Mam the very first thing on Monday morning.

Lizzie thought Mam seemed quite pleased, especially about their plans to build a house somewhere on the farm. So that made Lizzie feel good inside, thinking how happy Mam was to welcome Stephen warmly into the family as a new son-in-law. Of course, she reasoned, Mam and Dat had always approved of Stephen, she was sure of that.

When Stephen finally did turn into the drive, she breathed a sigh of relief. Dat had just finished the barn chores and was sitting on the porch for a minute’s rest. He looked questioningly at Lizzie as Stephen pulled up to the barn door.

“This isn’t Saturday evening,” he said bluntly.

Lizzie ran lightly down the steps, calling over her shoulder, “I know. He has something he wants to ask you.”

“Hello, Stephen,” Lizzie said, smiling up at him warmly as he walked toward her.

“Hello, yourself. Did you tell him?”

“No.”

She hadn’t told him, that was the truth, but she was almost certain Mam had said something to him about it.

“Hi, Stephen,” Dat called. “We didn’t expect to see you this evening.”

Stephen grinned at him.

“How are you feeling?” he asked Dat.

“Oh, I’m fine. I would hardly know I have MS, except my legs don’t always want to do what my brain tells them to do. My eyesight is largely improved by the new prescription from the specialist in Warm Springs. He knows what he’s doing. It took him two whole hours to thoroughly examine my eyes, and he found some things an ordinary doctor would never have found. I got a new pair of glasses. Almost fell over backward when he told me the price. Three hundred dollars! I almost told him to keep the glasses. That’s ridiculous.”

He stopped for breath, but before Stephen could get a word in edgewise, he started rambling on again.

That was Dat, Lizzie thought, smiling to herself as she walked to the porch with Stephen. As long as he had someone who listened without saying much, which Stephen was very good at, Dat would talk.

“You ought to start working with me and Jase. We need a good block layer right now. Are you familiar with masonry?”

Dat barely paused long enough to hear Stephen’s “Mm-hmm,” before launching into a lively description of a concrete job they were doing.

Stephen sat down next to Dat and listened, nodding his head, or shaking it in disbelief, and laughing at appropriate times. His eyes were crinkled at the sides, and he looked as if he was enjoying the whole conversation, although Dat was doing all the talking.

Jason came up on the porch, greeting Stephen with a quick smile.

“Are you mixed up, Stephen? It isn’t Saturday evening,” he asked, interrupting Dat.

“I know. I came to ask your dad a question,” Stephen said quietly.

“What? What?” Dat was fairly hopping up and down on his lawn chair, if it was possible to hop up and down while still sitting.

Stephen took a deep breath, and Lizzie could tell he was nervous. He wasn’t good with words, long speeches, or talking when he felt embarrassed, so she felt a bit sorry for him.

“I guess … Did Lizzie tell you we want to be married in the fall?” he started.

“No! Really? She didn’t tell me!” Dat leaned forward, slapping his knee. “But do you think a secret like that would survive 10 minutes in this house? Of course, I know. Annie told me.”

“Well, anyway,” Stephen said, grinning shyly, “we wondered whether you would be able to give us some land if we want to build a house.”

“Land? Would I give you land? How much?”

“Oh, just a small plot, enough for a house and barn. Maybe an acre.”

“An acre? Oh, of course. We could do that. I don’t know how much money you have, but you know if you have an acre of ground, that’s enough collateral to be able to acquire a loan to build your house. Did you know that? And if you don’t build a very big house, you know not a real big one—you don’t really need it the first five years that you’re married—you can always add on later, you know.”

Stephen nodded.

“And another thing. If you build your house close enough to ours, you won’t have to build your barn right away. You can always use our barn to keep your horse in. But then, maybe you wouldn’t want that either. Where do you want to build? Surely not down in the flats. If we get another flood like Hurricane Agnes, your whole house would be under water. No, that’s not going to work, building your house in the flats.”

Stephen nodded.

“You could build your house along the road, there where those three ranch houses were built recently. That would work. The only thing is, it’s on top of a hill. Do you mind building your house on a hill? Now me, I always liked a view. To be able to look around and see for miles. That’s a good feeling, a real good feeling. If you don’t mind living on a hill, I’ll give you an acre. Do you want to walk up there and see it?”