A Simple Charity (36 page)

“Your dat had faith in Gott’s plan for you.” Hearing Tommy fuss from the front room, Fanny retrieved him from his playpen and settled him on the kitchen floor with a pot and wooden spoon.

“What’s all that about?” Elsie asked the baby, kneeling on the floor beside him. “Are you going to do some cooking?” She put the spoon in the pot and stirred.

Rising to his feet in a wobbly stance, Tommy watched her with rapt attention.

“Here. You do it.” Elsie offered him the spoon.

Tommy clutched it and pointed it at the pot. He had to bend his knees a bit to reach the pot, but when he did he grinned with satisfaction at the clanging noise.

The two women laughed, and Fanny felt a tug of pleasure at the prospect of Elsie having children of her own. Elsie had not mentioned marriage yet, but Fanny was sure that event would come around next wedding season.

In the aftermath of the accident, Elsie had become friends with Ruben Zook, who’d also been a passenger in the van. Although older than Elsie and probably three feet taller, Ruben had helped Elsie in so many ways, taking over the heavy lifting in the shop and keeping the Country Store open for her when she needed time to grieve.

“Who would have thought a year ago that I would have a beau? Especially a prankster like Ruben.” Elsie rolled her eyes. “Do you remember how he used to play tricks on everyone? He took every joke too far. I never would have guessed at what he was really like.”

“Ruben is a godsend,” Fanny said. “Thomas would be very glad to see the good changes in your life.”

“Ya, we’ve all been through some changes.” Elsie kept her attention on the baby. “With many changes to come. Soon it will be time for you to put away your black dress, Mamm.”

A sadness trembled inside Fanny. In some ways, she had longed for her mourning to end, but now … now she wasn’t sure she was ready for that.

“Do your old dresses still fit?” Elsie asked. “I’d be happy to do some sewing if you need a new one. There’s plenty of fabric in the shop for you to choose from.”

“I haven’t tried them, but the old dresses are probably fine,” Fanny said warily.

“You’ll want to do that this week,” Elsie advised, sounding like the mother instead of the daughter. “You’ve got some changes ahead, too. Now there’ll be no worries about you being seen with Zed.”

Embarrassment washed over Fanny as she quickly looked down at the table.

“And don’t you think Zed wants to come back to finish the work on the center?” Elsie looked up from the floor. “We could have him come for supper. Will and Beth would like that.”

“Oh, Elsie, I don’t know.” Fanny wanted to get off the topic, away from the emotions that were more tangled than a neglected batch of yarn.

“Everyone misses Zed. Don’t you, Tommy?” she asked, tweaking the baby’s chin. “And I knew you favored him long before second Christmas.”

In the quiet pause in the warm kitchen, Fanny wasn’t sure how to answer. Honesty was deeply ingrained in her, and if she was to tell the truth, she could not deny her love for Zed. “There may be a better match for Zed out there,” Fanny said. “You can never know what Gott’s plan is.”

“That’s true, but I think Zed would be lucky to marry you. And what fella could resist stepping into such a wonderful good family like ours?”

Footsteps bounded down the stairs, and Beth and Will scurried into the kitchen.

“Will found a spider in the bathroom!” Beth reported as she followed him to the mud porch. “He’s letting it go free.”

The muscles of Will’s face were clenched in concentration as he tramped through the kitchen with his cupped hands in front of him. “Just a little one,” Will said bravely.

Just then Caleb appeared at the back door. “Will? Elsie? You two ready to go?”

All at once, Tommy rattled the spoon on the pot, Beth squealed when Will opened his hand to show Caleb the spider, and Elsie fell back onto the floor beside the baby, doubled in laughter.

Just another morning in the Lapp kitchen. Fanny thanked the Almighty for the blessing of family.

30

T
he January day was cold and crystal clear with a sky so blue it could have jumped off a paint sample card. Compacted snow crunched under Meg’s boots as she and Jack walked glove in glove down the path to the frozen pond. Although the temperature was in the upper twenties, Meg felt toasty and warm, though a bit puffy in the layers of thermal ski gear borrowed from Zoey. She was glad to have the day off to spend with Jack. If a local woman went into labor today and wanted to have her baby at Fanny’s birthing center, Dr. Trueherz was going to make the trip in from Paradise to handle the delivery.

“I like that big smile on your face,” Jack said.

“I’m happy to be with you, Jack.”

He grinned. “Same. You’ve been one hard lady to pin down this week. What did you guys have, three deliveries? You worked through my day off.”

“I know, and I wasn’t planning to be working this much yet. Not really.” Women were starting to come to the birthing center for
their prenatal visits, but the facility wasn’t quite prepared for that yet. Dr. Trueherz had been laid up two days with the flu, and Anna had told Fanny she wasn’t feeling quite up to doing deliveries yet. That left Meg and Fanny to cover the prenatal visits as well as three deliveries in one week. At one point, they’d had two women in the center, both in labor at the same time. “You know I love delivering babies,” Meg told Jack, “but man, I wish they would cooperate with scheduling.”

“But it’s all good in the end, right?” He slid an arm around her waist and pulled her close, so that they were walking in sync. “When that little baby gives a holler, you know it’s all good.”

“True. And I’m getting to know Fanny really well.” During the lulls in labor, they had talked, quietly and slowly. She learned that Fanny was struggling with guilt over some wrong she had committed, but Fanny wouldn’t say any more about it. When Fanny expressed an interest in Meg’s record-keeping, Meg showed her the way she tracked how each mother’s labor started and how it progressed, as well as the mother’s vitals and the fetal heart tones. Noting Fanny’s interest, Meg loaned her two books—an anatomy textbook and a midwife’s guide. Fanny was grateful and curious, but she explained that she would keep the books in the center, out of reach and sight of little hands and eyes. The contradictions in Amish culture intrigued Meg. While the facts of life were all around Amish children, with animals mating and delivering their young, human reproduction was not discussed, and women did not acknowledge their pregnancies, even to their children. Meg tried to be discreet, even as she armed her patients with facts when discussing their pregnancies.

However, Meg could not complain about the Amish women who had delivered at the center. So far each and every client had been cooperative and calm. They remained active until the last stages of labor, and their deliveries were swift and routine. They
commented a few times on the pain, but did not complain. If these women were any indication of her new practice here in Lancaster County, Meg was more than “halfway” to Heaven.

After each delivery, Fanny had taken to complimenting Meg on her handling of newborns. “The way you talk and coo over the babies is so natural,” Fanny said. “I believe Gott intends for you to be a mother because you already know all the right things to say.”

If only it was that simple
, Meg had thought.
If only my body would cooperate
.

The pond was occupied by more than a dozen Amish youth. At the far end, a hockey game was in progress, and the boys skated fast and hard as they called out to team members to pass the puck. A few slid down to their knees to keep from falling. Closer to the path, a handful of young women skated in a wide circle, chatting as they went along.

Meg tried to ignore the knot forming in her lower belly as she sat down and pushed off her boots. Cramps. She knew they were coming on, but she figured she would power through them.

She and Jack laced up their skates and took to the ice. From his days of playing street hockey, Jack liked to skate fast with knees bent, staying low to the ground. Meg had only been skating in rinks with groomed ice.

“Whoa.” She held out her arms for balance. “Pretty bumpy.”

“You get used to it,” one of the Amish girls said.

“After you learn where the bumps and ridges are,” said another girl.

On closer inspection, Meg realized she was a woman, a little person. Fanny’s daughter. “Hi, there, Elsie. Do you skate here often?”

“Only in the winter,” Elsie answered with a smile. She wore a black coat with a blue scarf that wrapped around her neck and under her black bonnet. “My friend, he likes to come and play hockey. I like to get out in the fresh air, but not for too long.”

“Yeah, you’ll turn to a snowman in this weather,” Jack interjected.

Elsie giggled, covering her mouth with a mitten. “Or a snow woman,” she answered before she skated off.

“Hey, girl.” Jack skated up to Meg and took her arms. “You’re really pale. You feeling okay?”

She held on to his forearms as pain tugged at her abdomen. “I’ve got cramps. Bad ones.”

“Okay. You just hang on to me and I’ll be your guide over the bumps.” And just like that, he began to skate backward, pulling her along slowly like a tugboat.

“You can skate backward? I never learned to do that.”

“Yeah, I got mad skills.”

She relaxed a little, relieved to let him propel them and keep her steady. Face-to-face, she could bask in his eyes, which spoke of love and concern for her. It was highly romantic, a close, personal dance.

But their bliss was short-lived.

“I’m just going to sit down for a while and swallow some ibuprofen,” she told him.

“Poor kid. I’ll sit with ya. We got that thermos of hot chocolate.”

The snow pants and puffy coat gave her plenty of padding as she maneuvered into a comfortable spot on the log. Being off her feet helped ease the pain immediately, but the cramps usually held on. When Jack perched beside her and opened the thermos, she realized this was her chance. Her teachable moment.

“I’ve always had a problem with cramps,” she told him.

“Female stuff?” They both watched the steaming cocoa gush into the cup.

“Actually, it’s a little more extreme than that. Have you ever heard of endometriosis? Because that’s what I have.”

He capped the thermos and handed her the cup. At least he
wasn’t racing off through the snow yet.
So far, so good
. “So tell me about it.”

She swallowed the pills down with a sip of cocoa and handed the cup back. “It could limit my ability to have children.”

He stared off over the pond as she spilled out the details. It was hereditary but not usually serious. She often suffered painful cramps, but only during her period. Zoey had it, too, and she’d managed to get pregnant. She told him about the laparoscopic procedure, which she had scheduled for February. “The doctors think surgery will improve my chances of pregnancy.”

“Well, that’s great. I mean, bummer that you’ve got this thing, but it sounds like you’ve got it all figured out. And then you’ve got a window of fertility for a year or so?”

She nodded, relieved that he comprehended the situation immediately. “That’s what studies indicate.”

Jack put the empty cup aside and rubbed his chin, a thoughtful light in his eyes as he processed it all. “Okay, then. What’s your thinking on a time line for the next year? For us.”

“I don’t know. Mostly I wanted to give you an out. I know you really want kids, and it’s a deal breaker for a lot of people. I want kids, too, I really do, and I’m going to do my best to make it happen. But you can’t ignore science.”

He squinted at her. “You’re giving me an out? Come on, Megs. I’m not giving you up. Get that through your pretty head.” He pretended to knock on her knit cap. “I’m in this for the long haul, for better or worse.”

She looked up at him, wanting to laugh and cry at the same time. She didn’t think she would ever love anyone as much as she loved him in that moment.

“I’m not going anywhere.” He angled his body toward hers and took her in his arms. “I’m gonna stick with you and take my chances.”