Christmas at Rose Hill Farm (5 page)

“Bertha . . . did you hear me?”

“Roses belong to everybody,” Mammi said. Again she looked aside. Bess knew enough to keep her mouth closed tight.

“You could call Penn State and see what they have to say about it.”

“And let them chop it apart and bisect it?”

“Dissect it,” Billy corrected.

“Never!” Mammi didn't trust the government, and that included universities.

“They'll make sure it stays safe.”

Mammi sat back in her chair and patted the topknot tucked under her prayer cap in a satisfied way. “It'll be safer with me. I'll make sure it has southern explosion.”

“Exposure,” Billy corrected. “What are you going to do with it?”

“Grow it.”

Billy snorted. “First you gotta bring it back from the brink. That thing is about dead.”

Mammi wasn't paying him any mind. Maggie Zook had gone unnoticed in the kitchen until she started poking at the pathetic-looking rose. “Don't touch it, Maggie Zook, or I'll have your father get after you.”

Billy rolled his eyes. “As if Caleb Zook would ever scold Maggie. He's way too soft on her.”

Maggie slipped across the room to whisper to Bess. “He's only saying that because his own father is a bear. Wallops him for the slightest thing.”

Shocked, Bess shuddered. Her own father had never even raised his voice to her, not once.

“Billy's brothers are just like his father—big unfeeling louts—and I'm related to them so I can say so. But Billy, he's more like his mom. That's why your grandmother took Billy under her wing.” Maggie patted Bess on the arm. “Your grandmother—she's one of a kind. My dad says she likes people to think she's a grizzly bear, but she's a teddy bear at heart.”

Bess glanced over at Billy and Mammi, heads bent together, one brown, one salt-and-pepper, poring over the book of botanical rose prints.

———

With a bang, Billy closed up his books and turned to Bess, vaulting her back to the present. Should she tell him what she knew about this rose? But what did she know? Not much. She couldn't even remember what Mammi called it, or if it had a name at all; her grandmother had so many special roses. She felt the gossamer-thin memory shimmer and glint in the back of her mind, just out of reach. Something vague about a Most Special Rose. But it was there, waiting for her to bring it sharply into focus. She tried to reset her face.
Tell him. Don't tell him.

“I'm ready to go. If you're too busy to drop me at the bus stop, I can walk. It's not far.”

“You're not staying for supper?” The chickens had gone to roost, and the chill of afternoon had begun settling in.
Stay, Billy Lapp. Please stay.

“No,” he said firmly, bending over to stuff his camera into his backpack. “Dark sets in earlier these days. I want to get back.”

“I'll let Dad and Lainey know that you're leaving.”
Tell him? Don't tell him. Tell him
?

“No need. You can tell them goodbye for me after you get back from dropping me off.” His face set stubbornly as he rose,
tugged his hat brim down low, and lunged down the brick path of the greenhouse, pride stiffening his posture and adding force to his shoulders.

Definitely do not tell him.
Bess closed her eyes, then opened them, as if to rewind the events of the day. But of course that was impossible. Time moved in only one direction.

The buggy ride to the bus stop was a repeat of the morning's trip. He had told her quite a bit. And he had told her nothing.

A
s Billy rode the bus back to College Station, he tried to focus on the characteristics he had gleaned about the Rose Hill Farm mystery rose, but his mind kept flicking back to the events of the day. And he couldn't dispel the image of a pink-clad girl who filled his mind.

Finally, he closed his note pad, stuffed it in his backpack, and stared out the window. Over the years the vista hadn't changed at all: horses, harvest, horizon. Beyond the window the sky at twilight was awash with pink, red, and orange, but it couldn't lighten the tumble of uncertainty that rolled around inside him today: he had gone home.

Home.
He thought of what he had left behind, years ago. A father, three brothers, the farm where he'd been born and raised. The town. All the familiar places and people he'd known his whole life . . . yet it wasn't home anymore. He was prepared to feel detached, cut loose, to be reminded of a vague sense of deprivation. But he had been completely unprepared for his reaction at seeing Bess again.

He felt . . . stunned, stricken. Bess, with her woman's body, hair swept and fastened in a knot, and . . . that
face
. That breathtaking face, filled with an expression of openness glowing at
him, schoolgirl's cheeks flushed pink, lips shining, azure eyes that seemed to send all the blood in his head right to his heart, causing it to pound like a jackhammer.

By the time the bus arrived in College Station, he was in a state of agitation. He forced himself to a semblance of calm before he reached the camera shop, arriving just after the manager had closed up for the night. It took cajoling, but he talked him into letting him drop off the film cartridges for development. Next stop was the Extension office at the university, where he could find resource books on lost roses. Jill had given him a key so that he could use the small library when he worked weekends. There was a rack of bookshelves and a small table under the window where he had spent many quiet Sunday afternoons, poring over dusty magazines and old books about extinct roses. He grabbed a few books and tucked them under his arm, then hurried to the place he loved best. His greenhouse. Penn State had a number of greenhouses, but one in particular felt like home to him. Even if it was a cheap hoop house, it was his.

He moved through the greenhouse to reach the shelf that doubled as his desk, breathing in the warm, moist, musty air. Here was his domain. Here he had total control. Here nobody laughed at him, like his brothers did, or found him lacking, like his father did. The greenhouse was more than a workplace to him, it was a sanctuary. During his darkest hours, when faith deserted him, his love of plants had sustained him.

This time of day, the greenhouse was clean and quiet, no work to be done. And nobody to listen to his ranting frustrations over the day's turn of events.

He went straight to his shelf, turned on the desk lamp, and leafed through the books, trying to narrow down the parentage of the mystery rose. If only he had a better idea of what characteristics the bloom would reveal, identifying it would be much easier.

He suddenly felt a gust of warm air, looked behind him, and there was the hobo from Friday, smiling broadly as if he'd just been waiting for Billy to return so he could come in for a visit. He looked at Billy as if he was something special.

“Hello there, Billy Lapp.”

Oh no. He hoped this guy wasn't going to come around to bother him every day. “George, isn't it?”

George nodded. “You're working late.”

“I got something important on my mind.” The hobo didn't catch his hint, so Billy added, “I'll give you a cup of coffee, but then I gotta get back to work. Not even sure the coffee's still hot, but you're welcome to it.”

“What are you working on?” George glanced at Billy's sketches and the open books on the shelf.

“I'm trying to identify a rose discovered at an Amish farm.” Billy had bent over to unzip his backpack and get his thermos. He opened it and sniffed. Not hot, but not cold.

“Weren't you raised Amish?”

He snapped his head up to look at George. “How do you know that?”

“Your accent, for one. I can tell English is your second language. And then there's that.” He pointed to Billy's hat on the metal stool.

His old felt hat, distinctly Amish. Billy loved that hat. It had been his grandfather Zook's hat, the one thing from his old life that he couldn't get rid of. “Yeah, well, that was a lifetime ago.”

George had an odd look on his face: surprised, amused, he couldn't tell. “Interesting choice of words.”

Suddenly, Billy felt stupid. Here was a man who had once lived another life, was clearly well educated, and was currently just down on his luck. He could practically read the hobo's thoughts: What would Billy Lapp, at the ripe old age of twenty-
three, know about other lifetimes? He probably thought Billy was a fool. Perhaps he was.

In the quiet of the evening, Billy found two fairly clean mugs and wiped their insides with a paper towel. It surprised him to discover he didn't mind the hobo's company so much; it eased the burden of his loneliness.

George walked halfway down the length of the greenhouse and stopped to sniff the orange blossoms on a potted tree. “Did you know that oranges were only eaten, not made into juice, until Albert Lasker sold packaged orange juice?” He grinned, revealing a row of bright, white teeth set against his dark face, and clasped his hands as if he held something secret in them. “I marvel at all there is to discover on earth. Just a hint of what's to come. An eternity of discoveries.”

Billy gave a nod, but he had trouble parsing meaning from the hobo's curious sentences. He poured lukewarm coffee into the mugs and handed one to George. “Do you take anything in your coffee?” He looked around the shelf where he kept supplies. “Not that I have anything to offer. Maybe I could find some sugar someplace.”

George took a sip. “This is fine, Billy. Just fine.”

The coffee was dreadful, bitter and oily. Billy set down his mug. “George, can I ask you a question?”

“Ask me anything you like. I'll answer anything I like.”

“Don't you want more for yourself than just being a drifter?”

“Well, drifting isn't all bad.”

“But what have you got to show for it? You're plenty smart. Don't you want to get a real job? Find some purpose in life.”

“A purpose. I like that kind of thinking, Billy Lapp. I'll give it some thought.” George nodded solemnly. “Mind if I look through your sketches?”

Obviously, George wasn't leaving and Billy found he didn't mind. Not so much. He felt a tickle of admiration for the hobo's
peaceful countenance, and sensed the internal churning from the day settle as he handed George the sketches. Billy moved his hat and sat on the stool and combed through the books, taking notes on different possibilities of rose species. After a while, he nearly forgot George was there.

“Maybe it's this one,” Billy said aloud, looking closely at a photograph of a rose in a book.

George came up beside Billy and looked over his shoulder.

“This is the oldest known rose in the world,” Billy said. “Over one thousand years old. It's from a cathedral in Hildescheim, Germany. During the Second World War, the cathedral was bombed and the rose was destroyed. Believe it or not, new canes sprouted up.”

“Love those stories.” George smiled. “New life coming out of something so implausible.” He ran his fingers along the vein of a leaf. “Slightly different here than from your drawing.”

George was right. A subtle difference that Billy didn't even notice. “But it does look close, doesn't it?” Billy bent his head over the book and tried to match any characteristics with the Hildescheim rose and with the Rose Hill Farm rose. There were marked similarities, which meant that the Rose Hill Farm rose was probably bred in Europe. He felt encouraged. Maybe he was getting somewhere.

As the evening progressed, a comfortable companionship settled in between the two men. Now and then, George posed questions about Billy's Amish upbringing. Unguarded and relaxed, half the time with his head in a book of botanical prints, he answered them. It felt good to sort through all the emotions that were spinning through him from the day's events, and George was a good listener. He didn't pry, didn't give advice, nodded in all the right places. Billy might have said more than he intended, but what did it matter? George was a drifter who would drift away. His secrets were safe.

Billy had no idea how much time had passed when he turned a page and came awake as if someone had set off a firecracker. “That's it! That must be it. The Perle von Weissenstein! Come here, George! I found it!” He looked up, but George had already gone. When had he left? His coffee cup was on the bench, stone cold. Billy was shocked when he looked at his wristwatch: after midnight.

His attention went back to the description of the rose. This must be it. It must be. He had to get to Rose Hill Farm and question Bess.
Now.

Bess awakened to a pink sunrise creeping over the sill and the sound of someone walking up the long driveway of Rose Hill farm, the crunch of gravel under his footsteps. Barefoot, she tiptoed to the window and peered through the frosty windowpane, watching a man approach the house with that familiar long-legged stride. Why, it was Billy Lapp! So early!

She grabbed a shawl, then rushed downstairs to open the back door and step onto the threshold, not even aware of how cold it was on her toes. “You're sure up with the chickens, Billy Lapp.” She tried to hold back a smile, but she felt it tug at her mouth, then fade as she caught the grim look on his face.

“You knew what it was. You knew and you didn't tell me.”

“What are you talking about?”

Billy tipped his hat brim back, hooked one boot on the bottom step, and braced a hand on the knee. It occurred to her that he had never taken his hat off yesterday. A metaphor in a way, as a covering, because he really was a different person than the boy she had known. This Billy seemed so closed up, so hardened, like a curtain was drawn over his eyes. Not the Billy she used to know, the bright, lighthearted young man she used to work
alongside in her grandmother's greenhouse, who never seemed to remember his hat.

Billy was glaring at her. “Your grandmother and the rose. That October when you came out to stay with your grandmother and she had a rose she wanted me to identify, but I couldn't—all the leaves were off and I thought it was about to die.” He pointed his thumb in the direction of the greenhouse. “
That
rose.” He walked up to her. “You remember. You must remember.” He came a few steps closer to her. “I stayed up half the night last night trying to identify that rose. You would've saved me a heap of trouble if you'd just told me about it yesterday. So why didn't you say something?”

Billy's words sounded like an accusation, and Bess felt a storm brewing in her throat.

He glanced at the farmhouse. “Maybe I should just talk to Jonah about the rose.”

What? How dare he! Now he'd crossed the line. She wasn't sure if he intended that comment to sting, but a flash of indignation threatened to voice itself anyway.
Just who do you think
has been tending Mammi's roses for the last few
years?
she wanted to say.
Who do you think
has been encouraging my father to expand the business?
Certainly
not
you
.

She shot him what she hoped was a withering look. “And a good morning to you too, Billy Lapp.”

When Billy caught sight of Bess on the kitchen stoop in a white, ankle-length nightgown, she looked so lovely that, for a moment, his heart did a stutter step and suddenly all thoughts of roses fled from his head. She had curves in places where she used to be stick thin and it definitely became her. He felt his cheeks flare and he tried not to stare as she unconsciously splayed her hand over her chest. Her hair was flying every which way, out
from under her prayer cap, her feet were bare, and from this distance she looked carefree and happy.