Abby Finds Her Calling (15 page)

As Abby waved from the doorway, it seemed he should be saying something more to such a fine friend. But he couldn’t think what it would be, or how to say it the right way, as Abby would. So he left it alone.

As Abby stepped onto the front porch at the Graber house, she hesitated. She’d spent a lot of time here with Emma, especially in their growing-up years: the gray enameled porch floor and the wooden swing hanging to her left seemed as familiar as those at her own home. She prayed that she and Emma would remain gut, close friends again. They had parted under a cloud, and a lot more of Zanna’s story had come to light since then, too.

She knocked loudly, and then waited to hear footsteps coming through the house. No doubt Emma was trying to catch up on her afternoon chores now that the four Grabers had eaten their noon meal. As her best friend opened the door, Abby smiled warmly.

“Emma! I picked out some fabric, and then I cut pattern pieces to fit your mamm, from the clothes you put in my rag bin,” she ventured. Abby patted the partially sewn dresses that were draped over her arm.

“That was fast work—especially considering what all happened with Zanna over the weekend.” Emma held open the door. The Grabers’ front room seemed a little more cluttered than usual, its cream-colored walls a little more scuffed than Abby recalled… but it was her cluttered, scuffed conscience that concerned her now.

“Emma, I’m always happy to sew for your family,” Abby began, “but Saturday when you were up in my sewing nook, I felt awful bad about—”

“Oh, Abby, I’m sorry I got so huffy!” Emma grabbed her in a quick hug, her eyes shining with tears. “There wasn’t a thing you could do about the way the Coblentz twins and your sister spread that story about Zanna’s baby. I—I was just shocked and I felt bad for James, not mad at
you
!”

“Sorry I snapped at you, too, Emma.” Abby shifted the pieces of fabric on her arm to show her best friend the colors she’d chosen. “They’re basted and ready to try on, if you and your mamm have a minute.”

“I don’t know how you get so much done, Abby. Come to the kitchen,” Emma added as she walked in that direction. “The light’s better in there at this time of day. I’ll get Mamm.”

Abby followed Emma between the two upholstered rocking chairs, past the long sofa in the front room, and then into the Grabers’ kitchen. While her friend went down the cellar steps, Abby smiled at James and Emma’s dat. “How are you today, Merle?” she asked.

He was seated at one end of the big table, intent on picking the nutmeats from cracked black walnuts. He popped a chunk of walnut into his mouth as though he had no idea Abby was there.

Abby smiled and laid the clothes over the back of a chair. “Those are gut-looking nuts in your bowl, Merle,” she said in a much louder voice. “Did your trees put out a lot of walnuts this year?”

“Hmm?” He blinked and then grinned at her. “Abby Lambright! Didn’t hear you come in. Eunice keeps me mighty busy, you know.”

“Helps you stay out of trouble,” Abby teased. She was used to the way Merle didn’t always answer what she’d asked him.

Eunice’s reedy voice came up the cellar stairs then. “Jah, and we can keep an eye on him better when we sit him there, too,” she remarked. When she reached the top step, Emma’s mamm peered across the kitchen, adjusting eyeglasses with thick, pointy-cornered lenses. “Some days we can’t tell from one minute to the next what Merle might take a notion to do. Now what’s this Emma tells me about you sewin’ up some new dresses? I wasn’t any too happy about her clearin’ out my old ones, you know.”

Abby smiled patiently. “Jah, it’s hard to let go of our favorite clothes,” she said with a nod, “but the snow will be blowing soon. We can’t have you shivering in dresses that are worn thin. If you’ll
try this on for me, Eunice, I can get the sizing right for the black church dresses—”

“Now, Merle, are you paying attention to what you’re doing?” Eunice crossed the linoleum floor, making a racket in her sturdy, hard-heeled shoes. “If I bake these walnuts into a coffee cake and somebody bites into a piece of—look at that shell!” She plucked a large dark shard from the nutmeats her husband had sorted on a dinner plate. “I would’ve lost a tooth if I’d bit into that! And the dentist would’ve cost a pretty penny, too!”

“But that didn’t happen, Mamm,” Emma pointed out with a patient smile. “And that’s because you and I always sift through Dat’s nut chunks after he’s finished.”

“He’s not paying one bit of attention,” Eunice continued, throwing up her hands. “Some days I don’t know why I bother talking to him! Now, what’ve you got here, Abby?”

When Emma raised her eyebrows and gave Abby an apologetic look, Abby smiled back. It was a wonder Emma wasn’t going a little crazy, dealing with her difficult parents day in and day out. As she held up one of the basted dresses so Eunice could see it better, Emma’s face lit up. “Look at this pretty teal fabric, Mamm!” she said, her voice rising with excitement. “And this cranberry dress reminds me of the Christmas quilt you and I made a few years ago.”

Eunice’s eyebrows flickered above her glasses, as though she were about to make another critical remark, but then she blinked and ran her fingers over the deep red fabric with a sigh. “I miss sewing, you know it?” she murmured. “Used to make all our clothes, but I can’t see gut enough to thread a needle anymore. Makes me cranky sometimes, gettin’ old does.”

Abby’s throat tightened. What a blessing it was that her own mamm was still able to cook and sew—and that running Treva’s Greenhouse gave her days a purpose and kept her in contact with other people. “We all take our turns at being cranky, Eunice,” she remarked quietly. “I picked these colors from the new fabric we just
got in. And the way this polyester crepe washes up, you can dry these dresses on hangers and they won’t need to be ironed.”

Behind her mother, Emma flashed Abby a thumbs-up sign and a grateful grin. “We’ll be right back after Mamm tries on a dress.”

As the two women left the kitchen, Abby took a chair across from Merle. The kitchen looked clean, but not as tidy as Barbara kept hers—probably because Emma had plenty to do without cleaning every little corner of it each day. Maybe it was best that seventeen-year-old Zanna had realized she wasn’t cut out to care for James’s aging parents…

“I put that big piece of nutshell in there to see if Eunice was payin’ attention, you know.” Merle smiled sweetly, and Abby couldn’t help laughing with him. She’d never once heard James and Emma’s dat lash out in anger, and it was good to see his sense of humor had remained intact.

“That
is
a mighty fine shade of red, Abby. Like a Red Delicious apple.” Merle’s wrinkled face lit up with a boyish grin. “Takes me back to when we were courtin’, and Eunice had more spring in her step—and more smiles on her face, too,” he added in a wistful tone. “She wore red quite a bit back then. One time she made dresses for herself and the three oldest girls that got Beulah Mae Nissley and the other gals talking about how colorful they were. Worldly and immodest, they said.”

Abby smiled. Merle Graber might be slipping a little memory-wise, but when he recalled his past he always got such a glow on his face.

“I put a stop to that nonsense,” he added with an emphatic nod of his head. “Asked the bishop if Beulah Mae and the others might be showin’ signs of covetousness. Pointed out how God had made cardinals and dark cherries and poinsettias that shade of red. Vernon agreed with me, and that ended that kind of talk.”

“I remember those dresses you’re talking about,” Abby replied with a grin. “My older sisters and I wanted dresses from that same bolt of cloth. That was back when Dat was running the store—”

“And how is Leroy? Haven’t seen him around much.” Merle peered intently at her, perfectly sincere.

Should she correct Merle… remind him of Dat’s passing? Or should she humor him? Abby felt a pang of sadness for the cruel way old age was treating James and Emma’s parents, and she was glad when Eunice returned to the kitchen wearing the basted teal dress.

Emma came around from behind her mother, smiling. “I told Mamm how awfully nice she looks in a dress that has some perk to it. Reminded her that it’s no sin to replace worn-out clothes—especially since you make them into rugs, Abby.”

“Not much goes to waste,” Abby agreed. She moved quickly around the older woman, checking to see that the sleeves joined the shoulder seams at the tops of her arms rather than sloping down too far. “How do you like it, Eunice? Does it fit the way you want it to?”

Emma’s mother smoothed her wrinkled hand over the fabric. “I like it fine,” she replied with an edge to her voice, “but it’s such an extravagance, havin’ you sew me four new dresses at one time, Abby.”

Abby had a feeling Emma had gotten a talking-to while she helped her mother try on this dress. She considered her reply as she knelt to look at the length.

“A three-inch hem should be gut,” Emma suggested purposefully. “I’m thinking you can use this dress as the guide for the other ones, Abby. And as long as Dat’s trousers follow the same size as the ones I pitched out—but an inch shorter—they’ll be fine, too.”

Abby heard her cue to leave: her friend was trying to prevent another unpleasant lecture from her mother. “Jah, I can do that. Thanks for checking the hem size for me.”

“We sure do appreciate such personalized service,” Emma added. “I bet you’ve got lots of orders to sew up, so we shouldn’t be taking any more of your time.” She turned to her mother then, her smile looking a little weary. “Let’s get this dress off you, Mamm, so Abby can take it back with her.”

As she waited, Abby watched Merle pick out a few more nutmeats.
He was meticulous about it, seeming engrossed in his work and happily occupied. There was no missing how he and James resembled each other, the way they both held their mouths just so as they concentrated, and the matching noses and strong, broad hands—though Merle’s fingers trembled slightly as he held the metal pick.

When Emma bustled back into the kitchen, Abby gathered the clothing she’d brought over, glad that her friend wanted to escort her to the door.

“Bye, Abby!” Merle called behind her. “Tell your mamm and Barbara I’d be happy to pick out their walnuts, too. I know they’re busy, and it helps me pass the time.”

“I’ll do that, Merle. You take care, now.”

As she and Emma stepped out onto the front porch, Abby lowered her voice. “Do your folks need to be careful about the money? If you can’t pay what I usually charge—”

“Puh! Abby!” Emma grabbed both of her hands, her eyes wide. “The farm’s crops and James’s business are doing better than ever. Lately Mamm’s been pinching pennies until Mr. Lincoln yelps, and there’s no need for it. It’s not like we’re extravagant, and we’re certainly not poor.”

“Thrift and frugality are habits we all learned from our mamms—and they learned from their mamms. I just didn’t want to cause a problem for you.”

“Denki, Abby. Those dresses are just what she needs, maybe to feel better about herself.” Emma gripped Abby’s fingers before letting go of them. “Some folks have a hard time being happy about anything.”

“There’s that,” Abby agreed. “We’re most of us about as happy as we decide to be.”

Emma cleared her throat as she looked past the mercantile to the big white house across the road. “And what about Zanna? Is
she
happy now, Abby?”

How could she answer that? Abby let her gaze follow two black and white dogs as they herded a cluster of sheep toward the sheep
sheds. “I believe my sister’s done the right things, taking on her shunning and deciding to raise the baby,” she replied quietly. “Sometimes we’ve got to wait and see how the Lord works it all out, and be happy that He’s in charge instead of us.”

As Abby left the mercantile late Tuesday afternoon, she felt the heaviness of an approaching storm: the sky loomed gray in the distance and she smelled rain on the breeze. The sheep huddled near the fence, bleating and bawling as they nudged toward the trough. Customers had chatted about the season’s first real cold front bringing a heavy frost and maybe some snow this evening.

Abby stepped into Barbara’s kitchen and inhaled deeply. “Smells gut, girls! What’re you cooking up?” she asked Gail and Phoebe. Ruthie grinned at her from the far end of the table, where she was setting places for dinner.

“Had some day-old dinner rolls at the shop, so we baked a hen. Creamed the meat with celery and onions to ladle over top of them,” Gail replied. “Mamm got called to help with a birthing—”

“Marian Byler’s having her twins, more than a month early,” Phoebe added in a concerned tone.

“—so it might be a while before she gets home.”

Abby washed her hands. Marian had been a classmate, and now she supplied the mercantile and area gift shops with her handmade soaps. She’d been feeling poorly for most of her pregnancy. “How much of Zanna did you see today? It’s too bad she’s not allowed to keep cleaning her houses—at least until she’s showing more,” Abby remarked. “The six weeks of her ban will drag by, especially since she needs to earn money for baby things. But Sam said she wasn’t to be out and around—”

“And you’ll not be changing my mind about that, either,” her brother said, coming through the kitchen door along with a gust of chilly wind. He glanced around the kitchen. “And where might your mother be, girls?”

“Off to Bylers’ for a delivery.” Gail stood straighter at the stove, stirring the creamed chicken to keep it from sticking to the pan, while Phoebe arranged rolls on a cookie sheet for warming.

Sam’s eyebrow rose. “We won’t wait for her. Matt’s got a couple ewes needing attention, and what with it getting dark earlier, he and I will be going to the barn as soon as we eat.” He glanced out the window, toward the road. “Here comes Mamm, finally. She needed help covering her plants before tonight’s frost, but Zanna was nowhere to be found.”

Gail and Phoebe exchanged a glance. Their smiles faded as they looked to Abby for support. “She’s napping, Dat,” Ruthie replied quietly. “Been feeling puny ever since she tossed up her lunch.”

Sam hung his denim coat onto a peg behind the door. “Might as well call that sort of behavior to a halt right here and now. I’ll be back in a few, when I’ve rousted her out of bed. Then we’ll eat.”