Letters to Katie (11 page)

All her determination to move on from Johnny had vanished. She was as excited as she
had been all those years ago when he had pushed her on the swing, giving her that
smile that never failed to capture her heart.

God had given her this chance. Whatever Johnny Mullet needed her to do, she would
gladly do it.

She took a deep breath.
Don’t act stupid. Calm. For once, be
normal
around him
.

A memory from sixth grade swam unbidden to the surface of her mind. Johnny had been
playing baseball at recess with his friends. While he waited his turn to bat, she
had brought him a bouquet of wildflowers she had spent most of her recess time picking
just for him. When she finally got the nerve to hand it to him, he laughed.

“
Buwe
don’t get flowers.” He looked at the bouquet with childish derision. “They give flowers.
I don’t want those
dumm
things.”

Fighting tears, she’d taken the flowers and thrown them away before going back inside
the school
haus
. The rest of the afternoon she tried to hide her humiliation, from him and everyone
else. She wasn’t super smart, like Mary Beth and some of the other children in class.
Sometimes she said dumb things, and sometimes she wasn’t as quick to catch on to a
joke or sarcasm as other people were.

Yet despite that horrible day, she forgave Johnny. It wasn’t his fault she didn’t
know better.

She shook her head, releasing the memory. Now wasn’t the time to dwell in the past.

As she stepped out of the buggy, the back screen door banged against the door frame.
When she reached the front of the horse and grabbed his reins, she saw Johnny across
the yard, dressed in dirty work pants and shirt. Had he been outside working all morning?
His boots were caked with mud, dirt, and straw. From the smell as he came closer,
she knew for sure he’d been in the barn.

“Here, I’ll take him for you.” Johnny reached and took the reins. He looped them over
the wooden tie.

“Danki,”
she croaked. She cleared her throat and spoke louder. “Thank you.”

“No problem.” He turned toward her, pushing his hat back from his head. He stared
for a moment before averting his gaze. Silence stretched out between them, making
her ill at ease. She shifted on her feet until he finally spoke.

“I don’t know how else to say this. And I don’t want to ask, but I don’t have a choice.”
Worry clouded his eyes. “I need your help.”

She stepped toward him, concerned. “What’s wrong?”

He took a step back, widening the space between them. “I’m having company over tomorrow.
A couple from Akron. For a business meeting.”

“Okay.” She frowned. “I don’t know much about running a business.”

“I don’t need help with the business. Well, not in the way you think.”

“What kind of business?”

“Mullet’s Horse Farm.”

“You and your
daed
bought a farm?”

“Nee.”
He wiped his forehead with the back of his hand. “I bought a farm.”

She turned and glanced at the empty land surrounding a sad-looking barn. “Where?”

He spread out his arms. “You’re looking at it.” He gave her a halfhearted grin.

She surveyed the place more closely, taking in the sagging barn, broken, splintering
fence, and weedy yard. When she looked at the house, she saw it wasn’t in much better
shape. This was a horse farm?

“I know it’s not much, but it will be once I get it going.” He started pacing. “And
this
mann
—Wagner”—Johnny pronounced the
W
with a
V
sound—“he’s thinking about investing. But first he wants an authentic Amish meal.
Don’t ask me why, but he does.” He stopped and looked at Katherine, holding his palms
up in defeat. “I can’t cook.”

“So you want me to make the meal?” Her confidence started to grow. Cooking she could
handle.

“That . . . and something else.” He motioned for her to follow him toward the house.
He opened the door and she stepped in.

“Ach.”
Katherine looked around the grimy kitchen. No curtains on the windows. Motes danced
in the air as sunlight streamed through filmy windows. She sneezed, sniffed, then
turned to him. “Does the rest of the
haus
look like this?”

“It’s worse.” A sheepish look came across his handsome face. “At least I spend time
in the kitchen. Not much time, but the room gets used more than the others, except
my bedroom.”

She almost laughed at his embarrassed expression. Even dirty from work and obviously
unhappy with the state of his house, he was so cute. But he was worried too. She didn’t
want him to worry about anything.

“I’ll be happy to help you, Johnny. I know just what to do.”

He let out a long breath. “I’ve got a lot to do outside before the Wagners get here.
That leaves me with almost no time to clean up the inside. I thought about ordering
some food from the restaurant—”

“Nee.”
That wouldn’t do. “If the Wagners want a
gut
meal, I’ll make the best one they’ve ever had.” She started walking around the kitchen,
mentally making a list of everything that needed to be done. When she turned, she
saw him watching her. Her pulse suddenly thrummed, a different rhythm than it did
when she thought about him, or the few times she’d been around him. Heat rose to her
cheeks and she turned away. “Do you have cleaning supplies?” she asked, grateful her
voice sounded somewhat normal.

“
Ya
. You’ll have to blow the dust off them, though.”

She turned to see him smile. With his grin he looked a bit more like himself. “Just
kidding. They’re underneath the sink.
Mamm
made sure I was well stocked after I bought the place. Although she probably thought
I would have used them by now.”

Katherine smiled back. “You’ve been busy.” She moved closer to him, still taking in
the kitchen, seeing its potential. “It’s a sweet
haus
. How many bedrooms?”

“Three. More than enough for me.”

His words made her smile inwardly. So far no mention of another woman. Their district
was small enough, of course, that she probably would have known if he was seeing someone.
Then again, maybe not. Johnny was nothing if not private, and perplexing at times.
But if he was dating someone, surely he would ask her for help, not Katherine. Or
maybe he wasn’t dating anyone seriously enough for him to feel comfortable—

“Katherine?”

She focused on him, realizing she had been staring past his shoulder. He moved to
the back door.

“I’ll leave you to do whatever it is you’re gonna do.” He opened the door. “I’ll be
in the barn if you need anything.”

“All right.” She moved toward him. “I’m sure I’ll be fine.” She smiled.
“Danki.”

His brow lifted. “You’re thanking me? Why?”

She cringed. That did sound stupid, thanking him for asking her to clean his house.
She tried to think of a quick reply, but nothing came.

“I should be thanking you.” He smiled again, and her knees nearly buckled. “I better
get to the barn.”

Katherine nodded. The door shut behind him. She clasped her hands and looked around
the kitchen again. “First thing, open a window.” She yanked it open. The fresh spring
air filtered through, disturbing the dust motes further. Everything needed airing
out.

She went through the house, taking note of what needed to be done. The dingy brown
curtains were ragged and ill fitting, as if they’d been hanging there for years. Those
would have to go.

She pulled open the pitiful curtains to let some light in. The furniture placement
in the room needed improvement too. The couch was shoved up against a wall in front
of the big window, with a saggy chair next to it. A small coffee table was placed
too close to the couch and covered with horse magazines, along with feed and farming
catalogs. Everything looked second-, even thirdhand.

The bathroom downstairs was surprisingly clean. Katherine then went upstairs to the
bedrooms. Two of them were completely empty. A bit of sweeping the dust off the hardwood
floors and she would be done. The third bedroom was Johnny’s. Her hand touched the
doorknob, and she paused.

How foolish. She was cleaning his house. Nothing else. Yet knowing she was going into
Johnny’s bedroom gave her mixed emotions. Like she was intruding. Yet her curiosity
was getting the best of her.

“Katherine!” Johnny’s voice sounded at the bottom of the stairs.

She released the doorknob and went to the top of the staircase.
“Ya?”

“I meant to tell you not to worry about the upstairs.” He took off his hat and brushed
off some of the dust. It floated to the floor. It meant more sweeping for her, but
she didn’t care. He plopped his hat back on his head. “The Wagners won’t be going
up there, so there’s no need to clean.”

“I don’t mind. Really. It won’t take me long at all.” Despite her hesitation in going
into his room, now she was disappointed to be denied.

“Nah, it’s fine. Don’t want you to have to do any extra work.”

His courtesy touched her. Again the thought entered her mind that this might just
be more than a favor. Maybe it was an excuse to be with her. To break the ice that
had thickened between them over the years, at least on his side.

She tried to temper those expectations, but as usual, her feelings overruled her thoughts.
As she watched him walk away, for a brief instant she imagined what it would be like
if the house were theirs. If they were married, and he was going to work the farm
while she took care of the house and their
kinner
.

She gripped the knob on the stair rail, forcing the dreamy thought away.

Johnny walked out the back door, intending to head to the barn. Instead he turned
back and looked at the house, thinking about Katie working inside. Her face had lit
up when he asked her about cooking the meal, and she didn’t even flinch when she saw
the mess in the house. In fact, she seemed excited to clean it.

But he knew that excitement came from her kind heart. It had taken everything he had
not to keep staring at her as she’d walked around his kitchen. She was so lovely,
with her reddish-blond hair peeking out from beneath her starched white
kapp
. She was willowy and graceful. He couldn’t believe he ever thought her awkward. Or
annoying. And when he recalled how he’d treated her in the past, the guilt nearly
drove him to go straight back in the house and tell her how much he cared for her.

Yet his feet wouldn’t move. Apparently his body was wiser than his head, because to
reveal his feelings now would be disastrous. Certainly she would accept that he didn’t
have money, lived in a run-down house, and owned a barn that would likely collapse
in a faint breeze. She would agree to live in poverty and scrape by while he tried
to make a success of the farm. She would work hard at her job and work even harder
when she came home. Because that was the kind of person she was.

And he wanted to be the man she deserved.

At the end of the day, Katherine returned home to the house she shared with her parents
and younger sister, Bekah. She was tired, and she hadn’t seen Johnny since the morning—he’d
spent all day outside working in the barn and mowing and trimming the yard until it
looked perfect.

But like the inside, the outside needed a woman’s touch. There were no flowers in
the beds outlining the front of the house. There was a place in the backyard for a
nice vegetable garden, but it was covered with grass, now neatly shorn.

There wasn’t anything she could do about flowers or vegetables outside, but she could
do something inside. Something that would not only surprise him but make him happy.

She hummed as she walked over to the stove, where her mother stood cooking supper.
Having skipped lunch, Katherine was starving.

“Where have you been all day?” her mother asked.

“Helping out a friend.” She didn’t dare tell
Mamm
that the friend was Johnny.
Mamm
knew all about Katherine’s crush, about the heartache she felt at Johnny’s rejection.
If Katherine told her
mamm
, she’d either get a lecture or “the look.” Katherine wasn’t in the mood for either.
Nothing would spoil her mood.