Love’s Journey Home (14 page)
Read Love’s Journey Home Online
Authors: Kelly Irvin
“We must all stick together.” Luke Shirack, Emma’s brother, spoke for the first time.
“We’ll not let one member of this community fall by the wayside, surely.”
“It might be necessary for you to take a job in town.” Deacon Pierce’s gaze traveled
to Gabriel. “Many others have done it. Our way of life is changing. We can no longer
support our families with farming. Gabriel is opening a new shop. I reckon he needs
a partner.”
“He has grown sons in need of jobs.” Thomas kept his voice even, but Gabriel could
hear the slightest resistance in his tone. Thomas farmed because he had a connection
to the land. Tearing him from it would kill him. Gabriel wanted no part in that, but
sometimes circumstances forced difficult, painful change. Thomas’s brown eyes darkened.
“Gabriel’s starting out. It’s too soon to burden him with another person he must pay.”
Not to mention another person who didn’t want to be there. Gabriel already had sons
who fell in that category.
“Gabriel, you’ve traveled a long way to become a part of this district.” Deacon Altman
nodded Gabriel’s direction. “What are your thoughts?”
Surprised to be called upon, Gabriel drew a breath, then stood. All gazes were on
him, expectant. If only he had greater wisdom for them. “I’ll do whatever I can to
help my cousin. To help this district. I would say, in the short time that I’ve been
here, I’ve found this to be a strong community. Well centered on the Ordnung, for
the most part.” His gaze connected with Tobias Daugherty, who frowned and leaned forward
a little. “For the most part. I left my district in Indiana because they had drifted
far from our core beliefs. I would hate to see that happen here.”
“So we should move?” Josiah Shirack asked. His hands were tight around his suspenders,
knuckles white. “Just pick up and go?”
“Nee.” Gabriel held up a hand to quiet the low murmurs of disagreement. “See the obstacles
that lie ahead and overcome them. Don’t give up. Commit to the Ordnung and make sure
your families do the same. Oil means nothing to us. Let it remain so.”
“But it’s not only the oil.” Luke Shirack spoke up. “We lost the wheat. Again. It’s
beginning to look like we might not be able to sustain our way of life here. Unless
we do something different. Or move.”
“Or sell the oil.” Apparently Josiah liked to stir the pot. “Enough to sustain us
this winter until we can get another crop in the ground and harvest it.”
“That will not happen.” Micah Kelp fairly thundered the statement. “It is likely,
Thomas, that you will have to sell and seek a new home for your family. Let us think
on this and pray about it. We’ll meet back here two weeks from today. Begin to look
at other properties for sale in the area. Take a look at what jobs are available in
town. Talk with your cousin. Then we’ll make a decision.”
Thomas’s stoic expression didn’t change. He nodded, but when he returned to his seat,
Gabriel caught a glimpse of his eyes. The deep pain that clouded them made his own
heart clinch. Thomas must’ve seen his expression. Shutters descended. The pain became
cloaked behind an opaque neutrality.
“It’s likely there’s oil on our farms as well,” Luke said. “We need to deal with that
possibility.”
“No one does any searching for water without consulting with the community first.”
Bishop Kelp’s shaggy eyebrows rose and fell. “Any more oil, and we will all relocate.”
“There are more and more influences battering us now. As I’ve said before in these
meetings, a move might be for the best.” Paul Yoder stood, hands on his hips. He glanced
sideways at Tobias. “There’s land to be had in Montana and Colorado. Districts in
Missouri and Arkansas are looking to increase their numbers. Our district has grown
larger with each year. Some of us could start a new district. It might help us to
move beyond some of the bad influences we’re seeing here.”
“If you’re talking about Edmond, he’s a boy. Pure and simple.” Tobias didn’t raise
his voice, but steel resonated in the words. Gabriel respected the man for defending
his nephew, but couldn’t say he didn’t agree with Paul. “It won’t happen again. I’ll
see to it.”
“I already have,” Bishop Kelp said. “We’ll hear no more about it until Edmond’s confession
at prayer service on Sunday. Then we’ll forgive and move on.”
With those words of grace promised, he stood, signaling the end of the meeting. The
conversation immediately swelled as the men streamed toward the open doors. Like a
massive ox, Bishop Kelp moved against the flow until he reached Thomas. He nodded
at Gabriel, then turned to the other man. “The sacrifice you and your family may be
asked to make does not go unnoticed.”
Thomas nodded in return, but did not speak. The pulse in his jaw jumped.
Bishop Kelp touched the crown of his straw hat, then moved away.
Gabriel followed his cousin from the barn. Neither of them spoke until they reached
the open field where the buggies were parked in neat rows. “I’m sorry,” Gabriel began.
“I recently left behind my farm. I understand how it feels.”
“Don’t apologize for something you didn’t cause. It’s only land. Only a house. Home
is wherever your family is.”
“You grew up in that house.”
“Jah.”
“Joanna lived in that house.” Thomas’s first wife had given birth to both their children
in that house. “You have memories there.”
Thomas hitched the horse to his buggy. “We will have new memories, many of them, with
the new baby on the way.”
It was the first reference Thomas had made to the impending birth of another child.
“How will Emma take it?”
“Fine.”
“She’s a good fraa.”
At that, the gloom on his cousin’s face lifted. He smiled for a brief second. “That
she is.”
Catherine’s journal
July 5
What I did to Josiah wasn’t fair. I hijacked him. Ambushed him. Whatever you want
to call it. I drove out to the little plot of land he farms—if you can call it that—knowing
he would make his rounds before going in for the night. Even after a full day at the
shop and the big powwow with Micah Kelp, he’d still make sure the horses and pigs
and goats and chickens were bedded down for the night, just like Daed used to do.
I imagine Luke, with his much bigger farm and plethora of livestock, does the same.
Not that I would try to ambush big brother. Instead I went forth, seeking the brother
who’d once been a kindred soul. I parked the car on the road and walked up to the
barn. Sure enough, he was in there, talking to one of the horses. That’s his way.
He’s always had a way with animals
.
He didn’t even flinch when I called his name, quietly so as not to scare him. He looked
up and grinned that Shirack grin. One rebel to another. Cat, he says, calling me a
name only he ever used. A name from my running-around days. He looks so mischievous,
like no time has passed, and we’re two teenagers, our heads together, plotting our
escape. For one night of fun, not for a lifetime. I take out my camera. He cocks his
head, bushy eyebrows raised below his straw hat, and shrugs. I snap a few shots of
the most handsome of the Shirack men, just a few as he clowns, then poses with the
horses. After a few minutes he raises his hand, its fingers thick and wiry with hair
above the knuckles. Enough, he’s saying. He can go so far, but only so far. He has
Miriam to think of, and the babies, he says. No one in Bliss Creek will see these
images, I say. That’s not the point, he says, knowing I know exactly what the point
is
.
How he manages to stay in line, I can only imagine. A combination of fervent faith
and the even more fervent love of a good woman. By sheer will, Miriam Shirack holds
on to him by her fingertips. My brother has been blessed. Knowing that, I don’t bother
to ask him the obvious. He doesn’t disrespect me, either. Despite the choices we’d
each made and the shunning I now endure, however earned, we met in that lantern-lit
barn on equal footing. Josiah knows that but for the grace of God, there goes he.
So I ask him to explain to me how he makes it work. His answer is simple. Each day,
he looks at his wife and his child and begins a litany of blessings in his head. As
he drives the buggy to the shop, as he shoes the horses, as he drives home, he recounts
them, over and over in his head. Like a reformed alcoholic who prays, over and over,
God, don’t let me drink today, I will not drink today, and let tomorrow take care
of itself
.
I wonder if that would work for me. Could I give up my laptop and my social media
and my smartphone and my ancient, on-its-last-leg mini-Cooper with its excellent gas
mileage? Could I give up gourmet coffee, shorts, and tank tops? Could I give up classic
movies and old TV shows—new to me, of course? Do I want to? The answer screams at
me, just as it always has. I suppose I could. But I don’t want to. I won’t. The line
in the sand has been drawn. I’m on one side and the Lukes of the Plain world are on
the other
.
Josiah tells me he sometimes still has dreams—nightmares—about the time he spent in
Wichita. He dreams of car accidents in which his girl, Sarah, lies broken and bloody
on the pavement. He dreams he’s been drinking alcohol and smoking cigarettes. The
whiny guitars of a country song blare on the car radio even as the tortured steel
belches black smoke in the frigid winter night. What does that mean, he asks me. What
does it mean after all this time that I still dream of her and our broken relationship?
Am I being unfaithful to Miriam when I dream these dreams? Do I somehow summon them
when I close my eyes? He looks at me with such guilt and concern in his eyes. I wish
I could tell him. I wish I knew. Is it a subconscious desire for what he cannot have?
On the surface, he’s so happy. Father and husband. Husband and father. But he’s not
the farmer he wants to be. He’s sick of the heat and flame and smell of the blacksmith
shop. Still, he refuses to admit it, even to himself
.
What does it mean? I’m the psychology major. Will an MS or a PhD tell me what common
sense cannot? Josiah is a good man. Plain or otherwise, by all standards, he is good.
He’s where his faith would have him be. He loves and he is loved. By his wife, by
his family, by his community, by God
.
I tell him he should go with Thomas to find this new community they are talking of
building in Missouri. His family could go where there might be enough land for him
to farm. Maybe that’s what those dreams are about. About being who he really is. A
farmer
.
He nods as if he’s thinking about it, but I know he’ll stay in Bliss Creek because
the blacksmith shop is needed and Miriam’s family is here and he will do what he thinks
is right. What he knows is right. Because that is what makes him happy
.
So why does it make me so sad?
H
elen forced herself to inhale. Her stuffy nose and congested throat didn’t help, but
the summer cold had nothing to do with the feeling that she might collapse from lack
of air. She couldn’t breathe. Not as long as Edmond was kneeling in front of the entire
community, men on one side, women and children on the other. No murmur, no titter,
no whisper. The only sounds came from a pair of blue jays chattering in the elm trees
outside the barn doors and the occasional whinny of a horse or a dog barking in the
distance. Her son had risen without hesitation when Bishop Kelp commanded that he
come forward. Now he knelt, hands folded in front of him, his pale blue eyes bright
with unshed tears. Red blotches smattered across the chalky white skin of his cheeks
and neck. He worried his lower lip with his teeth.
Come on, come on. You can do it
.
God, help him say what needs to be said
.
The thoughts whirled in Helen’s mind, the need for prayer tugging her one way, her
desire to take matters into her own hands and help her son tugging her the other.
The humid July heat lay like a stone on her shoulders and chest. Someone coughed.
Someone cleared his throat. A baby whimpered and was quickly hushed by a young mother.
Helen forced her gaze to move back to the front of the barn. Her gaze collided with
Bishop Kelp’s. His expression seemed kind, but he shook his head as if in warning.
She swallowed and focused on her hands, clasped in her lap, her knuckles white with
the force of her grip.
A hand touched her shoulder. She looked up. Annie smiled in encouragement. Helen tried
to smile back, but her lips were frozen. She nodded. Annie knew how this felt. Her
brother Josiah had done some pretty horrible things in his rumspringa. They’d survived.
Barely. But now he was married, a hard worker, a good father. They all learned. The
rumspringa insisted on it. She closed her eyes for a second and felt a smidgen of
relief in not being able to see her boy, her only son, kneeling, shoulders slumped,
head ducked, before his community.
No, looking away did him a disservice. If he could face this group, she could face
him. She raised her head and sought his gaze. When it connected with hers, she nodded.
His Adam’s apple bobbed. He swiped at his face with his sleeve and then his shoulders
went back and his head came up.
“What I did was wrong. I went to a party. I knew the boys. I knew what they were like.”
The red splotches spread until Edmond’s face looked as if it were on fire, but neither
his voice nor his gaze wavered. “I chose to drink the alcohol. I made it so the Englisch
people saw me in a bad light and that makes us all look bad. I made a bad mistake.
I’m sorry. It won’t happen again. I know we…I know I…must keep myself apart from the
world. I will do that. I will do it.”