A Courtship for the Amish Spinster, page 17
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Eunice nearly dropped the plate she was drying on the floor when her dat’s phone rang. Her dat’s phone never rang. The only reason he had one was because of the market. The bishop usually approved cell phones for business owners, but many people kept theirs turned off and in the barn. Her dat kept his on the counter in case anyone at the market needed him. But the market was closed. Who could possibly be calling?
“Wrong number, maybe,” Amos muttered as he picked up the phone, peered at it suspiciously, then flipped it open.
“Ya, this is Amos. Okay. Slow down. Okay. We’ll be right there. Yes. Meet us in the parking area.” He flipped the phone shut, stuffed it into his pocket, then turned to Eunice. “Josh is missing. He’s probably somewhere on the market grounds. Zeb needs our help.”
She had a thousand questions. And she didn’t ask a single one. Instead, she rushed to her room, grabbed her purse off the hook by the door, then snatched up her coat. By the time she made it to the front porch, she could see her father in the barn, harnessing Oreo.
Eunice ran to Becca’s house, clamored up the steps and burst through the front door.
She’d been to her schweschder’s house many times.
But what she saw there in that unscripted moment was so simple and touching that it brought tears to her eyes even as her heart was thudding away in fear for Josh. Becca sat in a rocker, knitting something with a soft yellow yarn—probably for Sarah’s baby. Little Mary lay on the floor, her chin propped in her hand, a picture book open in front of her. And Gideon was lying on the couch, Abram sound asleep on his chest.
“What’s wrong?” Becca asked.
“It’s Josh. He’s missing. Zeb is at the market, and he needs our help. He needs help looking.”
By the time she got those few words out, Gideon was already up, handing Abram over to Becca and fetching his hat and coat. He hurried out the front door, no doubt to help her dat with the horse.
“We’ll pray,” Becca said. “He’ll be okay, Eunice.”
“Okay. Right.” She nodded, wanting to believe it, needing to believe it.
“Please let him be alright,” she whispered as she ran to catch up with Gideon.
She climbed into the back of the buggy, and her dat passed her the phone.
“The numbers for the phone booths are programmed in. Call and leave messages.”
Her fingers were shaking as she worked her way through the menu. She’d used the phone maybe once. The first time she hit End instead of Enter and the call dropped. The second time, she got through and left a message. She called the five closest phone booths, left three messages and spoke with two youngies. They’d get the word out. You could always count on teenagers to spread the word.
By the time she’d flipped the phone shut, they were turning into the market’s parking area. She was surprised to see several buggies and a Shipshewana police cruiser parked next to Zeb’s buggy.
“It was Zeb’s idea to call the police,” Amos said. “I thought it was best to have all the help we can get.”
The officer was just finishing up when Eunice stepped out of the buggy. She heard him say that they’d get the word out. All four of the Shipshewana police officers on duty would join in the search. Eunice wanted to go to Zeb, to assure him that everything would be all right, but she held back. Maybe now wasn’t the time.
Then he looked up, his gaze locked on hers and she couldn’t stop herself. She dashed across the space between them and threw herself into his arms. “It’ll be okay,” she promised.
“I know it will. I’m so glad you came.” Zeb hugged her tightly, then stepped back. “Amos, Gideon. Danki for coming.”
“Tell me how we can help,” Amos said.
And even as Zeb explained where the police were looking and who was coordinating search teams, more buggies pulled into the area. Eunice wasn’t surprised. Amish helped one another. They showed up in a crisis. But then she saw Old Tom’s large SUV, and Jocelyn’s van and finally Martin’s retrofitted school bus. And she understood in that moment that they weren’t merely an Amish community. They were more than that. They were a small town made up of Amish and Englisch that cared for one another, looked out for one another, and helped when they could.
Each person stopped to encourage Zeb, who now had his bruder standing beside him. Samuel looked concerned. Well, of course he was concerned. How was it that she’d never thought of him as an adult? He’d simply clung to his rumspringa a bit longer than most. Or perhaps he hadn’t met the right woman yet. Possibly he would live a happy and productive life as a single person. It wasn’t unheard of in an Amish community.
Gideon had retrieved a box of flashlights, which he proceeded to pass out. The Englischers were using their phones to light their way. The Amish accepted the flashlights. Eunice reached into the box, retrieved one, flipped the switch to On. A small oval of light projected onto the path, and she let it lead her away from the parking area.
Several of the youngies were setting up a coffee stand. The rain had stopped, but even as the skies cleared, the night grew colder. Gideon had turned on most of the ground lighting, which they only used at Christmas when they had markets in the evening. It provided a soft light along the footpaths. Eunice thought it was possible that Josh would look out from wherever he was, see the lights and follow them. Or maybe he would see beams from the phones and flashlights. From a distance, they must look like dozens of lightning bugs.
Eunice was headed toward the center of the market. She stopped and turned to look back at Zeb. He was showing a small sheet of paper to Amos. Eunice wanted to read the note. She understood that it was what he’d found in the seat of the buggy. It was what Josh had written. She’d heard the police officer talking about it. They weren’t worried about an abduction, only about a small child who’d picked a cold night to run away. Her curiosity could wait. The important thing now was to find Josh.
Searchers were broadening out from the market, checking adjacent stores and restaurants.
Have you seen a small Amish boy?
Nein. We don’t have a picture, but he’s about this tall.
Dark pants, blue shirt, suspenders. Dark coat. He might have been wearing a straw hat.
If you think of anything, please phone the police.
As Eunice walked the perimeter of the market, she heard her friends approaching strangers, saying the same things over and over. She kept walking. Josh loved the market. He’d told her once that it seemed like an Amish Disneyland. He hadn’t been to Disneyland, but he’d seen a poster for it.
“Would you like to go?” she’d asked. “To Disneyland?”
“Nein. Not now. Maybe when I’m older. Like seven.”
Eunice had accepted her feelings for Zeb. She loved him whether he was ready to love again or not. She cared for him and believed she always would. But as she walked the perimeter of the market, as little snippets of past conversations with Josh played in her mind, she realized that sometime in the last few months, she’d also learned to love this little boy.
He wasn’t merely a cute kid.
He wasn’t only her best friend’s boy.
He was Joshua Mast, a very special young person. And he always would be, regardless of what happened between her and Zeb. Eunice had never felt much of a maternal urge. Not when she held her nieces or nephews. Not when she helped with the bopplin during church luncheons. Not when she couldn’t sleep at night and lay staring at the ceiling wondering about her future. But she felt that maternal pull now.
Her heart ached.
Her throat tightened.
Her mind wanted to lurch about.
So she stopped, closed her eyes, prayed for wisdom and clarity. Then she started walking again. She was now on the opposite side of the market, probably directly across from the parking area where Zeb was waiting for his son. She looked around, seeing only the dim outline of the auction barn, the canteen, the office building and vendor stalls.
The Backyard Barnyard.
Her mind flashed back on how excited Josh had been that October day when she’d watched him while working at the Barnyard. The day he’d fallen off the cow. The day Zeb had decided he couldn’t trust her with his child. That was behind them now—at least she thought it was.
Eunice climbed over the three-slat wooden fence, which was mostly for appearance, and began to walk toward the barn. Her shoes squished in the wet grass. Her dress clung to her body. Her kapp felt like a damp rag. She played the flashlight’s beam along the ground as she jogged the last few steps.
Looking down she saw that someone had already been there. Large footprints told her someone had come from the opposite direction and gone inside. She wasn’t the first to think to look here. And still—
She opened the door of the barn, shone the flashlight over the small ticket office, the supply area, then proceeded back toward the animal pens. The weather report had been predicting rain all day, and whomever had closed up the Barnyard had secured the animals inside for the evening.
The ponies nodded their heads, eyes wide, no doubt wondering why she was stumbling around in the dark.
The goats bleated, sounding for all the world like a child.
The rabbits hopped when her beam fell on them, noses twitching, eyes dark and solemn.
The milk cow swung her big head toward Eunice and mooed softly.
Finally, she came to the sheep area. At first it looked like all the other pens. The sheep had bedded down, so the beam of her flashlight only revealed a pile of wool—tan, white, gray, brown and blue.
Blue.
Her heart leaped as if she’d received a jolt of revelation and maybe she had. She opened the pen, hurried over to the boy, stepped through and around the sheep who began baaing loudly. Loud enough to wake up a five-year-old boy.
Josh rubbed at his eyes as he sat up.
Eunice dropped down beside him and pulled the child into her arms.
“Hey, Eunice.”
“Hey, Josh.”
They stayed that way a moment—Eunice offering a silent prayer of gratitude, Josh patting her back with his small hand. She must have been holding him tightly, because he began to squirm. He pulled away from her, cocked his head and said, “Say, Eunice. What are you doing here?”
“We were looking for you, Josh.”
Now his expression changed—in the blink of an eye he went from mildly curious to terribly sad. “If you mean my dat, he doesn’t really want to find me.”
“That’s not true, Josh.”
“It is.” He sighed heavily. “I’m nothing but a bother.”
It occurred to Eunice that she should run outside, shout at the top of her lungs, let everyone know that the child who was lost had been found. But she thought that perhaps that could wait another minute. Maybe what she was doing right this second was more important. So she sat on the ground that was covered with hay, sat with her back pressed against the wall of the pen and patted the spot beside her.
Josh shrugged and moved so that he was sitting next to her. Their legs splayed out in front of them, his much shorter than hers. She turned the beam of the flashlight toward the far wall so that it provided a small bit of light for them.
“Why do you think you’re a bother?”
“Stick around and you’ll see. I’m always doing stuff wrong. I’m always making him mad.”
“Mad?” She asked the question gently.
“Okay, maybe not mad. But frustrated, you know? Like when I track in mud, or get my clothes dirty or drop something and it breaks. He goes like this.” He dropped his shoulders dramatically and let out a massive sigh. “See?”
“Ya. I do.”
“Why are you smiling?”
“Because I remember my dat and my oldest schweschder having the same reaction to me.”
“They did?”
“Yup. You know, Josh. My mamm passed when I was only four years old.”
“I was three.” His voice trembled and he pulled in his bottom lip.
“I know you were. It’s hard to lose a mamm when you’re so young.”
Josh nodded, swiping at his eyes with his sleeve.
“But it was just as hard on my schweschdern, and they were older. No matter our age, we miss people when they pass.”
“I miss Mamm something awful.”
“Of course you do and so does your dat.”
“Is that why he’s so grumpy?”
“Maybe.” She shrugged because honestly she didn’t know how to answer that question. “We just have to give people time, let Gotte do the healing in their heart.”
“I guess.” Then he said what he’d been holding back. “Some days I’m afraid I’ll forget what she looked like.”
“Josh, look at me.” When he did, she turned toward him so that they were looking directly at each other. She reached forward and put her hand against his shirt, against his heart. “Your mamm is here, in your heart, Joshua. You might sometimes forget the color of her eyes or the way her hair fell on her shoulders, but you’ll never forget her. Your heart won’t let that happen.”
“Okay.” His voice was small—hoping, trusting.
Eunice waited another beat, then stood, brushed off her dress and held a hand out to Josh. He looked at her, searched her face for something, then gave her an impish grin that she would remember if she lived to be older than the oldest member of their congregation. She would see that tender smile in her dreams.
“Guess we should go find Dat.” He put his hand in hers.
“Guess we should.”
“He’s going to be awfully mad.”
“Maybe not. He just might surprise you.”
They walked across the grass, walked toward the center of the lights where Zeb was waiting. When he saw them, for a moment he froze, almost as if he was afraid to believe his eyes. And then he ran toward them, wrapped his arms around them both and held them close.
Chapter Sixteen
The next two weeks passed in a blur. Each night Zeb woke from a nightmare—a terrible dream in which once again he’d lost his son. Sometimes Josh was hiding in the market. Other times he’d made it out to the highway. Occasionally he was lying in a creek bed. Each time, Zeb lurched from bed shaking and feeling ill. Each time, he calmed his breathing, told himself it was only a dream, then walked down the hall to check on his son.
He would have liked to say that after that terrible night at the market he never again lost his patience. Not true. He hadn’t become a perfect father that night. But maybe he’d become a better one. Maybe he’d realized in the moment he saw Eunice and Josh walking toward him, walking hand in hand, what a blessed man he was.
He continued attending counseling sessions. He met weekly with the bishop. He wrote to Suzanne’s family in Pennsylvania telling them he would be staying in Indiana. Shipshe was his home, and it was Josh’s home. He would build their lives here. And he focused on making small but important changes in his relationship with his son.
No matter how busy he was, Zeb took a half hour each afternoon to play with his son—whether it was throwing a ball back and forth, playing hide-and-seek in the yard or checkers on the front porch. And every evening, he set aside his worries and spent an hour helping his son ready for bed, talking to him about his day, hearing his worries and also the things that had made him laugh.
They’d begun going to the Shipshewana library and checking out books—simple ones to be sure, but ones that Josh was interested in studying.
Did Zeb know that sheep had long wooly tails that kept them warm?
Pigs make their bed every day.
Hens make friends.
Cows love music.
His son’s interest in animals seemed to know no limits. It was Eunice who came up with the idea to visit the petting farm over in Middlebury, which they did the last Saturday in January. Samuel had taken over the tours for the day, and Becca had assured them she could be the fourth stop. She’d spend a half hour telling them about her mission trips. Zeb realized he should take off one Saturday a month to spend with his family. Work wasn’t that important, and people were more than willing to help.
He and Eunice hadn’t begun dating again, but they were intentional about spending time together with Josh. To try and support the boy as a pair.
The day dawned cold but beautiful.
Josh could barely eat his breakfast he was so excited, and he readily moved to the back seat when they picked up Eunice.
“Gosh, you look pretty today, Eunice.”
“Stole the words right out of my mouth, son.”
Eunice blushed a soft pink, then changed the subject to the lunch she’d packed for them.
There were a dozen things that Zeb could and probably needed to do that day. They’d decided not to have tours during the month of February since the weather tended toward unpredictable. The tours had been a success though. Zeb and Samuel had gone to the bank the previous week and finalized the paperwork to purchase the farm. Zeb was thrilled about that and also aware that he needed to rise to the occasion. Instead of going to a petting zoo, he needed to tend to things in his own barn, clean the house, wash sheets, scrub the kitchen.
He didn’t do those things though. He didn’t even mention them as the three of them walked through the Critter Cove Farm. He held Eunice’s hand and watched his son delight in the animals which included sheep, rabbits, goats, chickens, ducks and swans, ponies, alpacas, pigs and a miniature donkey no larger than a dog.
With each new animal encountered, Josh turn to his father and say, “Wouldn’t it be great to have one of these at home?”
Zeb would smile, nod and pray fervently that his son forgot that particular wish before his birthday.
“It’s his third time to visit the sheep,” Eunice pointed out. “Maybe you should get some.”
