A Wedding Quilt for Ella (6 page)

Carefully Clara kept her eyes straight ahead.
Think about the math problem, keep a clear head, and ignore him. Stay focused, and this will go away.
She pulled the drawing from yesterday out of her tablet and stared at it.
This is the drawing Ella said she would use in her wedding quilt. What now? Ella’s lost her love. Is she going to complete her quilt? The work is almost done except for the edges. What would happen if Ella didn’t finish it? Would someone else finish it and claim the quilt as their own after Ella has designed most of the pieces herself? Is this drawing now to be wasted? Surely no one else would want to use this in their quilt.

Clara looked at the page more carefully. Against her better judgment, she had to admit it was beautiful and well done. It would look so wonderful on the quilt. Nee, Ella must complete the work. If not, perhaps Mamm could finish it, and they could keep the quilt in a closet until Ella healed. Perhaps she would eventually find another boy to marry. Yes, surely Ella would soon have someone else. After all, she had been snatched up quickly the first time.

Ella was too
gut
a girl to be without a wonderful man. Who would the boy be this time? All the older boys were already dating someone, but Ella would find someone, and then the quilt would be needed.

Clara placed the drawing of the house back in her tablet and returned her attention to the troublesome
pi
problem.

At recess time, she carefully transferred the picture to her lunch pail. She wouldn’t let Ella see it just yet, but she wanted it at home where she could keep it safe and sound until it was needed.

Ella would not be home tonight. She would be over at Aden’s house to sit with the body. Clara shivered.
Poor Ella.
What a dreadful thing to happen to so
gut
a sister.

After recess, Katie called the eighth-grade students forward for math. They all moved to the front of the classroom. Clara took her completed
pi
problems but kept the paper inside her tablet.
They are too scary to look at. What if my answers are all wrong?

“So how’s everyone doing with their
pi
problems?” Katie asked as if she suspected the truth.

Clara raised her hand. “I don’t understand it, really. Do we have to learn things like this?”

“Yah,” Katie said with a sympathetic smile. “Perhaps if I explained it again, it would help. And maybe we can do some practice on the chalkboard.”

“I’d like that,” Clara admitted, glancing at the others when no one else said anything. “Well, I do need the help even if no one else does.”

“It’s nothing to be ashamed of,” Katie said. “How about the rest of you? Can I assume, then, that you all understood it perfectly?”

Paul grunted but didn’t say anything as he and the rest of the class took their places at the chalkboard. The students worked under Katie’s direction until their frowns turned into smiles of comprehension. On the way back to the bench, Clara glanced up and caught Paul’s eye. He smiled a mischievous warm smile that sent thrills around her heart.

Thinking of Ella and Aden, she quickly caught herself.
Nee, I don’t want this.
She slid into her seat and kept her head straight forward, but her mind couldn’t forget that glance. Several long moments passed when nothing on her desk would stay in focus.
He is still looking.
She was sure of it. Finally she turned around slowly, letting her eyes meet his. They were simply too beautiful to stay away from.

Seven

E
lla, dressed in black, left with Daett and Mamm in the surrey at around eleven. Thankfully no one was in the backseat with her. It was much better this way. Dora had wanted to come along, but Mamm wouldn’t allow it. This way no one would speak extra words because they felt uncomfortable with her or, worse, pitied her.

“You’re needed at home, Dora,” Mamm had said. “Ella should be alone anyway. Let her grieve by herself. You, Eli, and Monroe can manage the chores. You can all come over afterward. Clara doesn’t have to if she doesn’t want to. Let her decide when she comes home from school.”

Ella drew the vinyl doors closed on both sides of the surrey. The darkness inside deepened. It was cold outside, and she pulled the buggy blanket up higher. Mamm and Daett were vague, silent forms up front. She was alone and hidden inside.
Alone.
She considered the word.
Is that not what I am now
—
alone? I might as well get used to it.

They drove down the hill and past the schoolhouse. Thankfully they passed no one on the road. Even at the usually busy intersection at the bottom of the hill with its multiple Amish homes and businesses, there was no one. Any Amish person who saw them would know where they were headed. Even their sympathy would be intrusive at the moment.

Later perhaps, after a little more time, the people could be faced. The funeral would be tomorrow with the house full of people. Was that not asking enough? For now each moment was a long event, a drawn-out effort to survive the pain. Each breath was a shameful event, one in which her heart went on beating and Aden’s no longer did.

“It has been a beautiful morning,” Daett said from the seat in front. “The Lord has given us grace again for this day.”

Ella wanted to say there ought to be rain, great buckets of it, pouring out of the sky. But then her father’s remark had not really been for her, though she couldn’t help but hear it. He usually was more sensitive to her feelings than that.

“Yah, it is,” her mother said, “but we best not speak of it today. It is the day of Ella’s sorrow.”

“I had not forgotten this,” her father said. “I know my daughter’s heart is broken, but we must still give thanks for what
Da Hah
gives us.”

Ella gripped the edge of the buggy blanket. What was there to say? Words couldn’t begin to describe how she felt. Even if she could say them, they wouldn’t help this pain or cause it to ache any less.

Why had the God of her people done this? They taught He held all things in His hands and could do what He wished.
Why then has He chosen to take Aden? Why has He snatched Aden away before I could be his wife, spend time with him in a married state, and at least bear his child? To have his child now would ease the pain. To have a little piece of Aden, perhaps a son to carry on his name, his memory, and his looks would be a comfort. Now there would be nothing. It is as if Aden has been wiped off the face of the earth without any trace left behind. How could the earth be any darker
—
or crueler
—
than it is now?

Not only had God let her down, her faith had let her down too. If it were not for tradition, she would already have been married.

“You have to be twenty-one, Ella.” She could still hear the voices. “We all have to be. It’s the way of our people. It’s the blessing the forefathers left—where children learn to serve at home before they take on their own responsibilities.”

Well, it had been no blessing to her. She had waited for more than two years and longed to share more with Aden than the infrequent embrace he gave her or the momentary kiss he allowed. She didn’t want to breach the sacred privileges of married life. She had just wanted to marry him then, when they had first confessed their love. And they would have but for the rules. Now, it would never be possible. Soon they would bury his body and throw dirt on his brown wooden casket. The image was too awful to imagine, and she almost cried out.

No, I can’t think that. Stop it. He’s not dead at all.

Yet she was now going to where she would see for herself that Aden was dead. That dreaded moment lay ahead. It would be an awful moment of beholding his face frozen in death, his eyes forever closed, his lips hard, and his arms frigid and unable to ever move again.
Why did God so abruptly, with no attempt to warn me, take him away?
The question would not let her go.

“Why was I not allowed to marry Aden?” she whispered. The words came from tense lips that already knew the answer, yet the words must be said or something inside of her would surely break.

Her dad’s head turned slightly, but he said nothing.

He heard me.
“We had wanted to marry a long time ago,” she said, loud enough for her parents to surely hear. “You knew that. Why couldn’t we have been married then? I’d have his child with me now. Wouldn’t that be better than this?”

“There is no answer to this,” her dad said, turning his head to look at her.

Tears swam in his blue eyes. Ella’s cries filled the buggy, rang in her ears. The pain was simply too much. Her people and her God had failed her—had left her alone.

Mamm reached back and gently gripped her shoulder. “We do what we know is best, and God decides from there. Even if you had been married to Aden, it still would have hurt this much—even more perhaps.”

“I would then have had his child,” Ella cried.

“Yah, this could be true,” Daett said, “but we do not know. There are many, even among our people, who have no children. We can only know what is now, what happens this day, and what
Da Hah
has given. It is best you accept what His hand gives, even the sorrow.”

“Yah,” her mother said, “your daett knows what he speaks of.”

“I only know how much I miss Aden,” Ella said. “Why would God take him from me?”

“Are we not from the dust of the ground,” her father answered, “frail and feeble and made by
Da Hah’s
hands? Such questions, it is not our place to be askin’.”

“Yah, but I ask them,” she said, her voice resolute.

“Then
Da Hah
must answer them,” he replied. “I cannot.”

“It is a fearful thing,” Mamm said, her voice tense, “to be questioning the Almighty.”

“Yah,” Daett said, “it is. Yet He has pity on the widows and the orphans.
Da Hah
knows your heart is broken. Ask of Him. Perhaps there will be an answer we know nothing of.”

Ella settled back into the buggy seat. Yah, her father seemed to understand. Perhaps God wouldn’t judge her harshly for her questions. She wiped her hand across her face, blowing into the handkerchief. Mamm took a deep breath in the front seat.

Daett pulled the buggy lines right at the next turn, and the gravel road rattled under the buggy wheels. They drove in silence across the open stretch of field and down the curves leading to the little creek.

The stream ran with clear water. Here and there, the spots sparkled where the sun’s rays made their way through the tree branches and bounced off the ripples. Aden and she had stopped here many times on a Sunday afternoon, tied the horse to a tree, and walked along the banks.

Aden would take her hand as they talked about the future. Lately it had been the wedding, but Aden had once asked her, “Would it be too much for you if I were ever to be ordained a minister?”

“You…a minister?” She asked, knowing her face had registered the surprise. “You should not speak of such things. Is not the lot a sacred thing?”

He had laughed and answered, “Yes. And I do not desire it, nor am I looking for it. I just have this feeling sometimes. Like I hear my name called out by the bishop who says I’ve got the three votes. Then I walk up front to pick out the book. I must say that I wake up in a cold sweat—right scared stiff.”

“It’s just you’re dreaming, then,” she said, pulling his arm closer to her. “You would be making a good preacher, though.”

He glanced at her. “Now, now,” he said, “answer me. What would you be doing if that was to happen? Could you take being a preacher’s wife? Would you be sorry you married me?”

“I’d never be sorry I married you,” she said. “Never. I’d marry you right now. Yah, now, if I could!”

He had laughed that great sound that rolled off into the trees. It was as if the waters in the little steam joined in with their twinkling murmur.

“You are too
gut
for me—much too
gut,”
he said, looking her full in the face until she dropped her eyes. Then he swept her up into his arms and gently kissed her, setting her heart to pounding like a freight train on the valley tracks. Then ahead of them lay the long months of waiting for their wedding.