Naomi’s Christmas Page 15

  “Nice and close to Isaiah and Libby, too.” Leah glanced out the kitchen window, to where Naomi’s brother’s place stood just across the lane. “They’ll like having you so close.”

  “I hope so.” Naomi glanced at the house as well. “They didn’t exactly have a choice about it, since both properties belong to Nathan.”

  “Ach, you get along fine with those two,” Leah said. She paused, blue eyes questioning. “Is it any better with the rest of the family?”

  Naomi’s throat tightened. “Not really. I had hoped that today…” She let that trail off. No sense in hoping for the impossible. Daadi did not forgive easily, and maybe Elijah had decided to follow Daad’s lead.

  Leah clasped her hand for a moment. “It will get better,” she said. “Things will settle down to normal soon.”

  Naomi nodded. There wasn’t really anything else to say, and it was hardly fair to grieve over those who hadn’t come today. She must just be thankful for those dear friends who had.

  Libby came in the door, her cheeks flushed from the cold, saying something back over her shoulder to Isaiah. The box she carried must have been heavy, because she set it down with a thump on the table.

  “Goodness, what have you brought?” Sliding the last glass in the cabinet, Naomi closed the door and went to greet her young sister-in-law. Excitement was sparkling in Libby’s eyes, and maybe it was that feeling, rather than the nip in the air, that had brought the flush to her cheeks.

  “This came yesterday to the house. Isaiah said I should wait until today to bring it and surprise you. It’s from Anna and Sara.”

  “So your sisters didn’t forget you,” Leah said, smiling. “They might be too far to drop in easily, but they wanted to join us.”

  “I didn’t open it, much as I wanted to,” Libby said. “But hurry, Naomi.” She darted to the counter and came back with a pair of scissors. “Let’s see what they sent.”

  Smiling at Libby’s enthusiasm, Naomi slit the tape and pulled the box lid open. She drew back the tissue paper to reveal the vibrant colors of a quilt.

  “How lovely,” Leah said. “A bear paw design.” She stroked the patches. “It must be from Anna, for sure. She always was so artistic.”

  Since Leah had been Anna’s teacher in school, she would remember. Naomi lifted the quilt out. Sure enough, a note from Anna was tucked inside.

  For your new home. Love from Anna.

  She stood still for a moment, holding the quilt against her, almost feeling her little sister’s arms around her neck.

  Libby, not waiting for sentiment, was diving into the box, pulling out a stack of tea towels, pot holders, and quilted place mats. “These are from Sara,” she said, glancing at the note before passing it over to Leah. “I remember her telling me she didn’t have the patience to make a whole quilt.”

  “Ach, but it was so sweet of her to do these.” Naomi looked at each place mat and pot holder. Her family had not all lined up with Daadi, it seemed.

  Leah raised her eyebrows, as if she knew what Naomi was thinking. “You see, your family is happy for you.”

  “Of course we are,” Libby said, immediately indignant. “Just because…well, never mind.” She censored herself. “And I will have my favorite sister-in-law right next door to me.” Her eyes danced. “Don’t tell the others.”

  Leah laughed. “I won’t.”

  Nathan and the children came in the back door just then, and the small kitchen was suddenly very crowded. Before she had time to do more than greet Joshua and Sadie, Naomi was swept away to make decisions about where the various pieces of furniture were to be placed, and whether she wanted the rocking chair in the living room or the bedroom.

  The next hour passed in a haze of activity. If she ever figured out where everything was that someone else had put away, it was going to be a miracle.

  She was setting a box of books on top of a bookcase to be sorted through later when she realized Nathan was standing next to her. She straightened. “Do you need me for something?”

  “Not really. We’re going to set up the big bedroom next, but you may as well stay out of the way until the bed is put together.” He hesitated. “I just wanted to be sure everything is all right with you. That I didn’t rush you into something you are regretting.”

  The concern in his eyes caught at her heart. “Denke, Nathan. But I have no regrets.”

  “Not even about your family?” He’d lowered his voice, although there was no one else in the living room to hear.

  She sighed, feeling not so much sad as rueful. “Those regrets were there already,” she said. “They don’t really have anything to do with you.”

  His straight eyebrows drew down a little. “Are you sure? I can’t help but see that Elijah didn’t come today. If he’s resentful—”

  “If he’s resentful of my decision, I am sorry. I love him dearly, but I must do what is right for me.”

  “Naomi—” Whatever Nathan was about to say was lost when Isaiah thudded down the stairs.

  “We’re ready to set up the bed, Nathan. Are you helping?”

  “Coming,” he called, and hurried toward the stairs without another word.

  Naomi stood where she was for a moment, lost in thought. Nathan had seemed almost tentative, which was unusual in someone who was always so sure of himself. All in all, it was turning out to be a day filled with surprises.

  And apparently the surprises weren’t finished, because when she returned to the kitchen, Elijah and Lovina were just coming in the door.

  “I’m sorry we weren’t here earlier,” Lovina said, setting the basket she was carrying on the counter and lifting the lid to reveal steam coming gently from a casserole dish inside. “Elijah had to be sure the morning rush was over and he had enough help.”

  “Saturday morning is always busy,” Elijah said. He took off his gloves and slapped them together. “You know that about the store.”

  If his voice and his posture were a bit stiff, Lovina more than made up for it with a cheerful smile and a warm hug.

  “Well, we are here now.” Lovina was brisk. “Elijah, I hear hammering upstairs. Why don’t you go and help?”

  He nodded curtly and headed toward the stairs. Lovina’s gaze met Naomi’s.

  “He’ll get used to it,” she said. “Don’t let it worry you. Now, komm, let’s get to work.”

  The rest of the morning passed with much coming and going. Naomi didn’t have time to think about her brother’s attitude, and maybe that was just as well. At least he was here. She could simply be happy for his presence.

  A flurry of snowflakes in the early afternoon caused a sudden exodus, as people realized the snow might turn into something more than flurries. Naomi was kept busy saying good-bye and thanking folks, only to suddenly realize that the house was almost empty.

  No, not quite. She could hear voices upstairs. She moved toward the steps. It was Lovina and Elijah. Maybe they hadn’t noticed the snow.

  She’d better tell them so they didn’t get caught on slippery roads. She took a few quiet steps up the stairs.

  “…stop being so prickly about Naomi watching Nathan’s kinder instead of ours,” Lovina said.

  “You’d think her own kin would come first.” Elijah’s voice was a discontented rumble.

  “Don’t you realize what caring for Nathan’s kinder might lead to? I think it’s very likely that Nathan will end up marrying her.”

  Silence for a moment. Naomi pressed her hand against her lips, trying to keep from exclaiming.

  Elijah burst out laughing. “Marry Naomi? Impossible.”

  Holding her breath, Naomi backed soundlessly down the steps. She had to get away. She couldn’t let them know she had heard. That would be the worst humiliation.

  She made it to the kitchen and stood leaning against the sink, gripping it with both hands. She couldn’t get their voices out of her ears, and she wasn’t sure which of them had hurt her most.

  “Let’s try to get the paste on th
e paper, not on yourself.” Naomi wiped away a blob of paste that Sadie had managed to get on the end of her nose. The children were busy working on their Christmas cards at the kitchen table.

  “Can we mail them as soon as we are done?” Joshua was finishing a card covered with stars that was intended for his grossmammi.

  “If the mailman hasn’t gone yet, we can walk out to the mailbox and send them.” Naomi glanced out the window. The red flag was still up on the mailbox by the road.

  Looking the other way, across the pasture, she could see both Isaiah’s place and hers. Hers. Wasn’t it odd that the small grossdaadi house felt so much like home after such a few days?

  Maybe not so odd when she compared it with the time spent at Paula’s apartment. As welcoming as Paula had been, Naomi had still felt like a guest there.

  But comparing it to the house in which she’d grown up—that surely was strange. Still, even though it belonged to Nathan, the little house was hers in a way that Daad’s place had never been. She could sit up all night and read if she wanted, with no one to tell her it was time for bed. Not that she would, when she had to be up early with the children, but it was nice to have the freedom, even if she didn’t use it.

  “How does this look, Naomi?” Sadie held up a card decorated with the angel Naomi had helped her cut out. “Will Grossmammi like it?”

  The angel was more than a little crooked, and some globs of paste had escaped around its edges, but that would hardly matter to Emma.

  “She will love it,” Naomi said, bending over to drop a kiss on Sadie’s hair. “Now print your name here at the bottom, the way I showed you. Then she’ll know it’s from you.”

  Joshua darted a quick look at the card, and she suspected he was thinking that Grossmammi would know even without the wobbly letters Sadie was printing. But he didn’t say it.

  Naomi had noticed that quality in him any number of times. Unlike most slightly older brothers, Joshua rarely teased his little sister. He seemed to have a naturally tender heart.

  She rounded the table to look at his card. Merry Christmas from Joshua. The printing was even, the English words spelled correctly. Joshua’s work was the equal of any first grader’s, she felt sure.

  And he wanted to learn. He’d blossomed under even the small efforts she’d made to teach him, and his curiosity knew no bounds.

  Joshua should be in school. The difficulty would be in convincing Nathan.

  The door opened, letting a blast of cold air into the back hall and kitchen. Nathan closed it quickly, stripping off his gloves.

  “Brrr.” Sadie gave a dramatic shiver. “It’s awful cold. Do you think the bees are all right? Don’t they get cold in the winter?”

  “They’re safe in their hives,” Nathan said, heading for the coffee that was kept warm on the stove.

  “But they’re outside,” Sadie protested, sliding down from her chair, holding sticky hands away from her dress.

  Naomi caught Sadie and wiped her hands with a damp cloth. “In the cold weather, the bees all cluster close around the queen. They’re snuggled up tightly, and they move a little all the time to keep the hive warm. If you listen very closely, you can hear them.”

  “And the hives are wrapped in their winter blankets,” Nathan said, smiling at her. “Remember when Naomi and I put the black coverings around the hives? That’s to keep them warm.”

  “I still think they’d like it better in the house.”

  That was too much for Joshua. “Silly. It would be so warm in the house they’d think it was spring, and they’d all come swarming out of the hive to sting you.” He wiggled his fingers, buzzing to imitate the bees, and dived at his sister. Sadie ran, shrieking, and he followed her.

  Shaking her head, Naomi smiled back at Nathan. “And I was just thinking about how gut he was, not teasing his sister like Elijah used to tease the smaller ones.”

  “He is a gut boy.” Nathan looked toward the living room, maybe thinking he should intervene, but the shrieks had turned to giggles.

  “Very gut.” Naomi picked up the cards the children had made. “Look what a wonderful neat job he did on this card for his grossmammi. Such fine printing,” she added.

  She was tempted to speak directly to Nathan about putting Joshua in school, but the memory of his earlier reaction stopped her. Maybe this was a time when a roundabout way to the goal was better.

  Nathan’s face softened as he looked at the cards. “Emma will be cheered up by these, ain’t so?”

  “I know she will. I’ll just get them in envelopes, and we will take a walk to the mailbox.”

  She went to the drawer to fetch an envelope. When she turned back, Nathan was looking at the materials for her Christmas honey jars, still in the basket in which she’d brought them that morning.

  “You shouldn’t be entertaining the kinder all the time,” he said. “You have your own work to do.” He held up a jar. “You should be getting these ready to go on sale.”

  “I’ll work on the jars this afternoon.” She was a bit surprised. Some employers might think that she should be working on the honey jars on her own time, not his. Like Daad, for instance, who could always find work for what he considered idle hands.

  Nathan touched one of the fabric circles. “Does the trimming really make them sell better? I would think folks would buy because they want honey, not because of what the jar looks like.”

  “Just because something’s useful, that doesn’t mean it can’t be pretty, as well. And Paula says that she can sell them about as fast as I can make them. To Englischers, mainly, who give them as little Christmas gifts.”

  “Women, probably,” Nathan said with a smile. “A man would not think of such a thing.”

  “What? A gift, or the decoration?” They were talking easily, and she was grateful. So often in the time since Ada’s death their conversation seemed overlaid with sorrow.

  “Both, probably,” he admitted. “And that reminds me, if you think of anything Sadie or Joshua might like for Christmas, will you tell me? Ada always took care of Christmas presents, and I don’t have an idea in my head, I fear.”

  Naomi nodded, glad that there hadn’t been a shadow in his face at the mention of Ada. “I’ll think on it.” She slid one of the cards into an envelope. “I will want to go to the Christmas program at the school on Friday. May I take Joshua and Sadie?”

  He shrugged. “Guess I hadn’t heard much about it. Ja, take them, if you want.”

  “Denke.” She tried to keep her smile to herself. Nathan might not have heard much about the school’s Christmas program yet, but she suspected attending would whet Joshua’s appetite, so Nathan would soon be hearing more than he wanted to about school.

  Nathan went through the doors at the hospital entrance, his stomach tightening almost as automatically as the doors. Foolish. He should be over this reaction to the hospital by now, after several visits to Emma.

  Still, he hadn’t been in a hospital at all before the night he’d rushed here after Ada’s accident. Nor since, until Emma’s fall. Maybe it wasn’t so odd that the very sounds and smells of the place made him want to run the other way.

  Clutching the tin of snickerdoodles the children had helped make, he got on the elevator. It whisked him to the third floor almost before he could get his face composed in a smile.

  Remember, be cheerful, Daad had cautioned him as he’d gone out to the waiting car for the trip to the hospital. Daad must have thought he’d needed the reminder.

  He pushed open the door, wondering how many of the community’s women he’d find there today. Emma had had a steady stream of visitors since word had got out—mostly Amish, but a few of her Englisch neighbors, as well.

  But the hospital room wasn’t crowded today. Jessie was there, of course, and Katie Brand from the quilt shop. His gaze went to the Englischer standing next to the bed. A doctor, he supposed.

  The man turned, and a jolt of recognition hit Nathan hard enough almost to make him gasp. It was Seth—
Seth Miller, Ada’s older brother, who had jumped the fence to the Englisch world when he was just eighteen and never looked back.

  “Nathan.” Seth eyed him warily. Waiting for a reaction? Or maybe having a negative one of his own for his sister’s widower?

  “Seth. This is a surprise.” He probably should say a wonderful-gut surprise, but he wasn’t so sure.

  Seth shook his head slightly. “I’m afraid I lost the dialect years ago,” he said. “You’ll have to speak English if you want me to keep up.”

  That merely served to emphasize the difference between the boy Nathan remembered and the man who stood before him.

  “No problem,” he said in English. “Emma.” He bent over the bed to kiss her cheek. “You are feeling better today, ain’t so? You have some color in your face.”

  She nodded, her faded blue eyes shimmering with what were probably happy tears.

  “Seth is here,” Jessie said. “My big brother has komm, so Mamm is glad.”

  Nathan gave Jessie a cautious look, wondering how glad she was to see this brother she probably barely remembered. She seemed…He sought for the word. Reserved, that was the word. For someone who normally wore her emotions on her sleeve, that was unusual.

  “Well, here is something else to make you happy.” He handed Emma the cookie tin. “Naomi and the kinder made snickerdoodles. They sent them to you with their love.”

  “Naomi?” Seth made the name a question.

  “Naomi Esch,” Emma said. “You remember her, Seth. She was two years younger than you and Ada’s best friend all their growing up years.”

  “Yes, Naomi. Hard to believe she’s all grown up now.” Seth glanced at Nathan. “Are you and she…” He gestured in a way that seemed to link Nathan with Naomi.

  “Ach, no,” Emma replied before he could answer. “Naomi has just been taking care of Joshua and Sadie since my accident.”

  “That’s all,” Jessie added, with what seemed like unnecessary emphasis.

  “You haven’t told me yet how your accident happened.” Seth drew a chair close to the bed and sat down, his hand on Emma’s.

  “Foolishness, that’s how,” Emma declared.