A Stranger's Wish (20 page)

So we must each ask ourselves this: Can I choose to change my circumstances or are they beyond my ability to change?

If I’m unhappy with my car, I may be able to buy a new one. I can choose to change my situation. If I’m unhappy with my children, I can’t trade them in. I cannot deny the genetic strands hidden in their bodies.

I realize these are extreme examples, but the principle holds: Some situations are changeable; some are not.

“But I deserve better,” you say.

I deserve a better home/house.

I deserve decent neighbors.

I deserve a church that feeds me.

I deserve to be understood.

That last line was me. Didn’t I deserve parents who understood me? Or at least accepted me?

When what you have and what you deserve aren’t a match, your response to this less-than-perfect situation is your choice. You can be hurt and bitter. You can withdraw. You can become sharp of tongue and manner.

Or you can give up the need to get what you deserve.

Give up the need to be understood? Accepted? Just like that? I shut the book, not wanting to read his too-facile thoughts. I felt as if the depth of my hurt had been devalued. Suddenly I wasn’t as upset about Clarke’s silence as I’d been five minutes ago.

I managed to be mad at him a whole hour, not that he knew or even cared.

The third Sunday of my stint in kindergarten church I went to early service, and then I taught the kids. I’d enjoyed my morning with them in spite of the fact that today they raised wiggly to a whole new level. I was exhausted when they raced into their parents’ arms and were borne away.

I lingered as long as I could afterward, straightening up already neat shelves of supplies, arranging toys in orderly rows. Still, when I walked outside, Todd was waiting for me in the parking lot. My stomach cramped at the sight of him and his I’m-so-glad-to-see-you smile.

Even before the dinner with Clarke at Aunt Betty Lou’s, I’d known it was only a matter of time with Todd. Reading
It’s Up to You
had confirmed what I’d already realized. Here was a circumstance I could change,
must
change in fairness to Todd. I couldn’t jettison Mom and Dad for their lack of acceptance, nor did I want to, but I could release Todd. I just had to be strong enough. I shuddered.

I knew there was a good chance that Clarke would never call me, that he’d just been as caught by the magic of the evening as I, nothing more. With me, the magic lingered. With him, it seemed not. Much as I might want to, I couldn’t control his choices. Common sense told me an incredible romance was not about to replace this lukewarm one with Todd.

Still, I knew what I had to do. Coward that I was, I just didn’t want to do it.

Lord
, I called silently as I stood in the church parking lot looking into the smiling face of this man who would be my love.
The right words? Please?

“Hey, Kristie. How were the little devils this morning?”

“Fine.”

“I envied them, spending that time with you while I had to sit alone in church. Where shall we go to eat?”

I clutched my papers and workbooks to my chest and studied the toes of my navy flats.

“Kristie?” Todd’s voice became uncertain. He had sensed my hesitation. “What’s wrong?”

I took a deep breath. I hated times like this! “No, Todd.”

He touched my arm. I looked up and saw confusion and something else—fear?—in his face.

“No, what?” he asked. “No, you have other plans? No, we can’t do anything today?”

“No to both.” I forced my eyes to stay steady on his. “No, I have no other plans, and no, not today.”

He looked at me silently, thoughtfully, sadly. “Tomorrow? Next weekend?”

I shook my head.

“Ever again?”

My eyes fell before the pain in his. I whispered, “No,” as I leaned against my yellow car for support. I felt like an airline official telling waiting relatives there were no survivors.

“Why?” Todd asked. “What happened? What have I done?”

I shivered. This was every bit as bad as I’d feared, and my voice shook as I answered.

“You haven’t done anything, Todd. You’re a very nice guy. I like you a lot, but—” How could I explain something I could barely articulate to myself? I cleared my throat and tried anyway.

“I know you care for me. Or you care for who you think I could or should be, but I’m not who you want me to be. I’m just me, and I can’t be anyone else. I don’t want to be anyone else. And too much about me—my weaknesses and peculiarities and independent spirit—bothers you too much.”

“But—” he interrupted, the lawyer in him ready to argue.

I plowed on. “It’s not sensible to continue a relationship where there is such a clash of personalities. And that’s the way it is with us, whether you admit it or not. I want someone who will accept me the way I am—painting, yellow car, Amish farm, and all. I want someone who doesn’t get embarrassed when I burst into song. And you…you need someone who will cherish your guidance, not bristle under it.”

I watched his eyes widen in denial and silently entreated him to understand what I was trying to say.

He studied my face intently, making me feel like a sloppy Marine at inspection.

“Jon Clarke,” he finally said. “It’s him, isn’t it? Don’t think I haven’t noticed how he watches you.”

He does? He watches me?
My heart soared, but I forced myself not to show my elation.

“And don’t think,” Todd continued, “that I’m unaware that he took you to dinner at his aunt and uncle’s.”

Oops. Word certainly got around.

He turned and leaned against the car next to me, as if he couldn’t look at me anymore. It hurt too much.

“And you know what?” He ran his hand through his curls. “I can’t even get mad at him or you because I like him too. Always have, from back when he finished high school here.”

He looked at me, disarranged curls sproinging, eyes sad. “It
is
Jon Clarke, isn’t it?”

I blinked. “No…yes…I don’t know,” I stammered. “I honestly don’t. But I wouldn’t be thinking about him at all if I loved you the way you want me to.”

“Maybe you just haven’t given us enough time.”

Talk about grasping at straws. I shook my head. “No. I think two years is more than enough time.”

“Kristie, please—”

“No. Because you don’t really love me, Todd. At least, not the
real
me. I’m sorry.” I smiled weakly, turned, and fumbled my way to my car.

Only when I began to back from my parking place did he rouse himself. He walked away slowly, shoulders drooping. I felt so guilty!

But the guilt at being a heartless heartbreaker didn’t last long. By the time I reached the farm, I felt marvelous, so light and unencumbered. I truly felt bad about hurting Todd, but I was so sure I was right that I felt butterfly free.

As I changed into old jeans and pulled my mauve, lavender, and lilac sweater over my mauve shirt, I sang snatches of whatever came to mind, changing the lyrics to fit my mood. I was glad no one was home but me. I could rejoice as loudly as I pleased.

Glory, glory, hallelujah.
Glory, glory, hallelujah.
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
I’m free! I’m free! I’m free.

I took the mysterious key from my bureau and slipped it in the pocket of my jeans. Maybe today was the day I could take charge everywhere. Maybe I’d visit Mr. Geohagan and make him take the key back whether he wanted to or not.

Fat chance. I’d probably be carrying the thing around when I was an old lady and he a wizened, desiccated mummy. Still, I had more than enough to sing about as I puttered around Mary’s empty kitchen making some lunch.

“I’d say you were having a good day,” Jake said from his doorway. “You’ve been singing like a demented bird.”

“Jake! You’re sneaking again. And I
am
having a wonderful day! I made a momentous decision, and I’m relieved, relieved, relieved!” I threw my arms wide and spun in a circle.

“So what happened?” he asked. “You quit your job? No, you like that. You’re getting married?” He shook his head. “I don’t think that special someone’s asked you yet. You hit it big in the lottery?” He wheeled across the room, and I poured him a Coke.

“Need a sandwich?” I asked.

“No, thanks. You sold a painting?”

“Did I tell you Clarke bought one?”

“Several times. Has another been sold?”

“Don’t I wish. You’ll never guess. I said farewell to my ‘good friend’ Todd.”

Jake looked at me with a smug smile. “I knew it all along.”

“Sure you did.”

“Well, let’s say I
hoped
it all along. I like Jon Clarke too.”

I put up my hand. “No conclusion-jumping, please. Clarke and I are merely good friends.”

“Hmm. And you’re hard on good friends. I’d better warn him.”

I put away the lunch things and tidied up the kitchen. I wouldn’t want Mary to find it different than she’d left it.

“Want to go for a ride?” Jake pointed to his van in the drive. “I’m going whether you come or not, but it’d be fun to have company.”

I accepted readily. “This is freedom day. We’ll celebrate my release and your independence.”

As we settled in the van Jake said, “I can’t tell you how good it feels to drive again, to take myself somewhere instead of being taken. I’m so glad your rent payment makes payments on this possible.”

His hands were steady and certain on the controls, and he hummed tunelessly as he drove. I leaned back in my seat and watched the glory of autumn in the golden oaks and brilliant sugar maples.

Jake blew his horn suddenly and waved.

“Aunt Naomi’s,” he explained. “That’s where Mom and Father and Elam are visiting.”

“You didn’t want to go?”

“I feel uncomfortable when it’s meeting Sunday and I know everyone’s thinking that I wasn’t there and should have been.”

I could understand that. “Where’s Ruth?”

“She and Isaiah went away for the weekend.”

“Isaiah?”

“Isaiah Beiler, her boyfriend.”

Away for the weekend? “Rhoda’s brother?”

“A distant cousin. I think they’re going to get married.”

“I thought boyfriends were kept secret until the engagement was announced.”

“Sometimes, and sometimes it’s like Ruth and Isaiah. They’ve been going together for two years. How can you hide that when everybody in the group knows everybody else?”

I smiled at a tangle of goldenrod and milkweed growing at the road’s edge. “So, where did Ruth and Isaiah go?”

“To the Poconos with Dan Beiler, Isaiah’s brother, and his girlfriend.”

“Is Dan English so he can drive them?”

Jake smiled crookedly. “No, he’s Amish. He just hasn’t joined the church yet. He keeps his car in a rented garage in town.”