Jenny's Choice (Apple Creek Dreams #3) (26 page)

“Is death forever, Mama?”

Jenny was taken aback by the unexpected query and hesitated for a moment before answering.

“It is forever, as far as being gone from this life, Rachel. But for those who know Jesus as their Savior, death is only a doorway into the next life.”

“What is the next life like, Mama? Do we turn into angels?”

“No, darling. We stay as people, but we have bodies that never grow old.”

Rachel hesitated for a moment and then asked the question that had been troubling her. “Is death a bad thing that comes and gets you and makes you die?”

“Who told you that, Rachel?”

“My friend at
schule
said that death is a ghost that comes in the night. So sometimes I’m afraid to go to sleep.”

Jenny paused. She realized she had become so absorbed in her own grief that she hadn’t considered Rachel’s grief. Rachel’s silence after the funeral made Jenny assume that her
dochter
was dealing with the tragedy. But the little girl’s questions showed Jenny that Rachel was seriously thinking about the subject of death.

“What else did your friend tell you, Rachel?”

“She said that you have to be careful when someone dies so that you don’t catch it and die too. Did
Grossdaadi und Grossmudder
catch it from Papa?”

“No, Rachel. What happened to my papa and mama had nothing to do with your papa. They didn’t catch dying from him.”

Jenny led Rachel to a place under the willow tree that grew close by the creek. The small brook burbled its way through the farm on its way down to its junction with Apple Creek not far from where they were sitting. Soft grass lined the banks, and the smell of wildflowers filled the air. Jenny sat for a few minutes, thinking about what to say to her daughter. Then she took Rachel’s hand.

“Are you worried about anything, Rachel?”

Rachel stared at her mama for a long moment, and then she burst into tears. “I…I don’t want you to die too, Mama! Everybody has died, and I’m scared!”

Jenny pulled Rachel close to her side and put her arm around her. She waited until her sobs quieted. Then she took Rachel’s face in her hands and kissed away the tears.

“I know this has been a very hard time for you, Rachel. We lost Papa, and now we lost
Grossdaadi und Grossmudder.
It’s been
ein sehr hartes Ding
, a very hard thing. But we have to put our faith in God and—”

Rachel pulled away and crossed her arms. “How do I know there
is a God, Mama! I can’t see Him or hear Him. And why would He let everyone I love die? I just don’t understand. Why should I believe in Him?”

Jenny sat for a long moment. And then she realized that she didn’t understand either. She took Rachel’s hand and drew the little girl back to her side.

“I don’t have the answer to that, Rachel. What I do know is that believing in something is different from having faith in something. Belief is when you think something that someone else told you is right, but faith is knowing that something is true without having proof. Does that make sense?”

“Kind of, Mama.”

“Well, for instance, your friend told you that death is a ghost, and you believed her because she told you. You didn’t really know that death is a ghost, right?”

“Well…no I didn’t, but she seemed so sure.”

“Yes, but she was just saying something that wasn’t true at all. Death is not a ghost that comes in the night. But still you believed her. Now let me ask you this—what season is going to come after summer?”

“Fall.”

“And after the fall?”

“Winter.”

“How do you know that?”

Rachel thought for a moment. “I don’t know, I just know it.”

“So you know that winter will come this year even though right now it is summer, and you don’t know how you know that it will.”

“Yes, I know that winter will come because it always has.”

“But there is no way you can prove that to me, so you must have faith that it will come, see? And the only proof you will have will be when it really comes.”

“So…faith is knowing something is true without being able to prove it?”

“Yes, dearest. Only when winter is here will you have the evidence that your faith that winter would come is real. And that is how
Gott
is. We know He is real because He is real. I can’t prove it to you by showing Him to you, but the evidence that He is real is all around us.”

“Where, Mama? Where is the evidence?”

Jenny reached down and picked a wildflower. It was a beautiful lavender color, and each petal was perfect in form. A delicious fragrance came from it as Jenny held it under Rachel’s nose.

“Look at this flower. It is so beautiful. The color is wonderful, and what about the smell?”

“It smells
gut,
Mama.”

“Yes, it’s perfect. Now I want you to make me one just like it.”

“I can’t make a flower! That would be too hard.”

“So if you took some dirt and some paint and some grass and piled them up and stirred them, it wouldn’t make a flower?”

“No, Mama. It would just be a mess.”

“But someone made it, Rachel. It’s so perfect and beautiful. There is a plan and a design in this flower. It couldn’t just make itself, could it?”

Rachel’s eyes widened. “Did
Gott
make it?”

“Yes, Rachel.
Gott
made it. And He also made you—beautiful on the outside and full of questions on the inside.”

“Is it bad to ask questions, Mama?”

“No, dearest. Questions are good. And as you get older and keep asking questions—as you live life and experience these things for yourself—the answers will make more sense to you.”

“Will they, Mama?”

“Yes, Rachel. And though I don’t understand everything, I do know this—
Gott
knows exactly how long each one of us will live because He
made us and He has a plan for each of us. No one knows how long that might be, but we do know that while we’re alive we must love each other as much as we possibly can and trust that
Gott
only wants the best for us.”

Rachel snuggled up close and Jenny held her tight. “All right, Mama, I believe you…I mean, I have faith that
Gott
is real.”

Jenny looked down at her daughter.

I wish it were as easy for me!

That night Jenny took out the book—the story of Jenna’s quilt. She read through it slowly. Here was the quilt being made, now the story of the big storm and the car crash that killed the bad man. And here were Uncle Bobby and Papa fighting in the war. When she read the part about Jerusha holding her through the long, cold night and saving her, Jenny cried. She cried because she remembered the beating of her mother’s heart. That had been her earliest memory—her mother’s heart beating strong and sure, keeping her safe and warm in the midst of every storm. And now that heart was stilled.

When I was writing this, I was so sure
Gott
told me to do it.

Every word in the book had flowed so easily, and as Jerusha told her the story, she and Jenny grew so close. It seemed that only
Gott
could do such a wonderful thing. When the book was finished, it was as though she had painted a picture of her family’s life, a picture that had just been waiting for her to set it down on paper and fill in all the little details. The historian in her had filed away all of the bits and pieces, the stories and the memories, and the work had fulfilled her as nothing else in her life except her marriage to Jonathan.

But now none of it made sense. She had the book, but she didn’t have her parents. She had the memories, but she didn’t have her husband. A great wheel had turned in her life, and everything had changed. She was lost in a strange land where nothing was familiar anymore.
There was nothing to hang on to, and nothing seemed real. Even this house seemed unfamiliar and in some ways frightening. Rachel’s questions about death had challenged her own fears, and now the home where love once lived stood like an abandoned castle, full of ghosts and empty hallways.

Without her mama’s love to guide her and encourage her, the writing now seemed empty and meaningless. The words on the page seemed to mock her. The joy that her mama and papa found, the restoration and healing—what did it all mean if they were gone? Jenny put her head down on her desk. She was tired…so tired.

Gott,
why did You let me do all this if You were just going to let them die?

And then she heard the quiet voice, the one that was the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not yet seen.

I didn’t do it for them, Jenny. I did it for you. And I did it for those who need healing and restoration in their own lives. But that time is not yet. Give the book back to Me.

Jenny lifted her head and spoke out loud. “Give it back?”

Yes, Jenny. Put it on the altar as a sweet savor of incense to Me. I have the keys that will open the doors that cannot be shut. And I will open those doors in My time. Give Me the book.

And so Jenny put the book back into its envelope and tied it with a red string. She went to the cedar chest where Jerusha kept the quilt and put the book inside. When she closed the lid, it was as though time stood still for just that moment. And then that season was over.

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY
-S
EVEN

The Decision

Jenny read the words again. She remembered writing them one morning when she was thinking about moving from Paradise back to Apple Creek. They had just floated into her mind, and she had pulled out her little pad and jotted them down. Now as she read them again, they seemed to be terribly prophetic. The Springer house in Apple Creek had become just that—a prison. Without the presence of her mama and papa, the rooms were quiet and still. This morning, after she sent Rachel out to play, she pulled out her journals and began to leaf through them. She came upon the scrap of paper, stuck between two pages. As she read it, the reality of what had happened began to push its way into her thoughts.

Home? Where is my home? The ones I love are gone, and I feel as though I have flown off into space, never to feel solid ground again.

She slipped the paper back between the pages and then sighed and
got up from her desk. She walked down the hall into her parents’ room and sat on the bed, taking in each article in the room as though some essence of Jerusha and Reuben remained that she could touch or hear or smell.

This is the bed where they slept, my papa keeping watch over Mama even in his dreams. And here is the dresser my papa made for Mama. She sat here every morning and brushed her wonderful blonde hair and then pinned it up into a bun and hid it under her kappe. Papa loved her hair. When she took it down at night, I could see in his eyes how he loved her. My papa’s eyes…Jonathan’s eyes were like Papa’s, deep and blue and…

She stood up quickly and walked out of the bedroom. It was dangerous to dwell on the things that had happened. There were so many emotions locked inside her. The smallest thing would make them spring unbidden into her heart—a word or a picture or the way the sunset shone through the kitchen window on a summer evening—and with them would come the awful reality that reminded her of those she had lost.

They are not lost—I am lost. Everything has been stripped away, and I don’t know who I am anymore. All the landmarks are gone, and I’m wandering in the mist, dark trees reaching for me with twisted branches…

“I want to scream!” Jenny cried out.

A familiar voice interrupted the moment. “Jenny? Are you all right?”

“Jeremy?” But it couldn’t be.

She went out of the kitchen into the living room. The front door was open, and Jeremy King stood behind the screen with a worried expression on his face. Jenny looked at him in surprise.

“Jeremy! What are you doing here?”

“May I come in first?”

Jenny blushed at the thought that Jeremy had heard her ranting in
the kitchen. She opened the screen. It was so good to see someone, anyone. Jeremy stepped inside.