Jack sniffed the air. “Our house caught fire once 'cause my dad put up too many Christmas lights. I had to stand in the snow for an hour in my pajamas until the fire department let us back in. It got one wall of the garage. My mom was pretty scared. She kept hugging me and my sister.” He cleared his throat and shuffled his feet. “I guess I better go. Mom's expecting me home.”
Rose bit her bottom lip. “It's okay if you take the shortcut.”
Josiah studied Rose's face and nodded. “I'll warn Rose's aunt Bitsy so she doesn't come after you with her shotgun.”
Jack looked impressed. “Okay. Sick.”
Josiah left Rose's side long enough to see Jack to the door. “If you ever see anything suspicious going on over here, will you let us know?”
“Sure.” Jack scrunched his lips together. “But what do you consider suspicious?”
“Anything that doesn't look Amish enough.”
Jack shrugged. “I don't really know what you mean, but I'll keep my eyes open.”
“Thank you,” Josiah said.
“Okay,” Jack said, giving the door a solid tug. “See ya.”
Josiah was back at Rose's side in an instant. He knelt on one knee next to her stool and pulled a white, expertly pressed handkerchief from his pocket. “Do you want me to walk you back to the house?”
Rose dabbed at her face with Josiah's handkerchief. It smelled like laundry fresh from the line. She'd humiliated herself with her irrational fears, and Josiah felt obligated to help her because he thought she looked helpless.
She was helpless.
And Josiah had made her his project.
She wished with all her might that she could square her shoulders and announce that she could walk herself to the houseâthank you very muchâwithout help from anyoneâbut she couldn't. She was terrified of things lurking in broad daylight. No matter how humiliating, she needed Josiah to walk her to the house. Josiah placed his hand over hers.
Jah.
He thought he needed to take care of her. “Rose? Are you okay?”
She pulled her hand from his and folded her arms. His eyes flashed with uncertainty. She didn't like that look, as if she'd spoiled all his hopes and dreams. It didn't matter what she did. She always made things worse. “I'm sorry I got so scared over nothing.”
Oh sis yuscht.
Tears were again dangerously close to the surface.
“It wasn't
nothing
. Someone tried to burn down the honey house last week. I would have been frightened too. You never have to apologize. I am more than glad to do what I can for you.”
Jah,
he felt sorry for her.
“Denki,”
was all she could say.
His gaze lit on the honey super on the table. “Is this a new hive you're painting?”
She looked down at her hands. “It's still rough. My first sketch on the super.”
“The super?”
She patted the white box that held the nine frames that the bees would one day fill with honey. “Each box is called a super. We stack three or four supers on top of each other to make a hive.”
“You're doing something different than flowers on this one.”
“A farm scene.”
“I love it,” he said. He picked up one of her paintbrushes and eyed the tubes of paint sitting in a bin next to the super. “I've never seen so many different colors.”
“I've probably spent too much money on paints, but I love all the different shades.”
“My favorite hive is the one with the tiny pink roses. It makes me think of you.” He stared at her in silence before clearing his throat. “I hope it doesn't offend you that I have a favorite. It doesn't mean I like the others less.”
His blue eyes were earnest and attractive on his face framed by his dark auburn hair. The effect looked like orange-red maple leaves against a deep blue sky. She found his look unnerving and breathtaking at the same time. “The roses are my favorite too.”
He ran his hand along the lines of her drawing. “This farm scene will be wonderful-
gute.
People will want to come to the farm just to see your paintings.”
“
Nae.
I don't think they will.”
He smiled. “I drive by your farm just to see the Honeybee sign out front. I like the butterflies.”
Rose's heart beat double time at the sight of that smile. “I love monarchs.”
Josiah seemed to get unreasonably excited. “Really? My sister has a butterfly garden. There are monarchs everywhere in her yard.” He lowered his eyes. “Would you let me show you sometime?”
Rose's stomach could have been a butterfly garden. The thought of Josiah showing her around Suvie's yard made her giddy with anticipation and sick with anxiety. Josiah was handsome and kind and eager to please. But she dreaded being alone with him. He'd expect her to keep up a conversation and say clever things and make him laugh. She'd fail miserably, and Josiah would feel sorry for her, and she'd be humiliated yet again.
Perhaps Josiah wanted to show her the butterfly garden because he pitied the poor, painfully anxious girl who seemed to need rescuing. Josiah wanted to do his duty as a Christian.
She couldn't bear either possibility.
Maybe she'd just pretend he hadn't asked. “It wonders me if you will walk me back to the house?”
The light in his eyes dimmed but didn't go out. “I'd be glad to. Can I carry anything for you? Paints? Pencils? Cats?”
“Will you carry the paints? I will see to the cats.”
Rose shepherded Farrah Fawcett off her pillow and herded her out the door. She picked up Leonard Nimoy and the scratching post and walked out of the honey house.
Josiah followed a few steps back, as if shielding her from an attack, and whistled a tune from the
Ausbund
. She relaxed a little. The whistling meant she didn't feel pressure to have a conversation with him. Her head was swimming with too many worries already.
They walked up to the porch and found a dead mouse waiting for them on the welcome mat. Rose shuddered. Josiah gave her a sympathetic smile. He must have thought she was the most pitiful girl in the whole world. He picked up the mouse by the tail and flung it off the porch.
Inside, Aunt Bitsy stood regarding the sink with a pair of sunshine-yellow rubber gloves on her hands, a plunger in her fist, and a temporary spider tattoo crawling up her neck. She turned when she heard the door open. “Josiah Yoder,” she grunted. “I'm glad you're here.”
Josiah grinned like Leonard Nimoy with a ball of yarn. “You are?”
Aunt Bitsy rolled her eyes. “I'm not glad to see you. I'm glad you have strong farmer's arms. My sink is clogged, and I can't press this plunger hard enough to clear it.”
Josiah's grin only grew wider. “I'm happy to help.” He set the bin of paints on the table and took the plunger from Aunt Bitsy. With all the force of his broad shoulders, he shoved the plunger into the sink, pumping it up and down vigorously and making water splash on the counter and the floor and Aunt Bitsy.
“Don't flood my kitchen, Josiah Yoder. I haven't made supper yet.”
Josiah worked that plunger up and down for another minute, then pulled it from the sink. Both he and Aunt Bitsy eyed the drain.
“Nothing,” Aunt Bitsy said. “It was no use for you to be here after all.”
“I could unscrew the curved pipe thingy below the sink,” Josiah said.
Aunt Bitsy narrowed her eyes. “The curved pipe thingy? Josiah Yoder, I get the feeling you don't know much about clogged sinks. I'll wait for Luke Bontrager. Much as I'm against it, he's coming to see Poppy tonight.”
Josiah stood up as straight and tall as a sycamore. “I can do it. I've watched my brother-in-law unclog a sink before.”
Aunt Bitsy took the plunger from Josiah. “All right then. Let's see what you can do yet.”
“Do you have a bucket?”
Rose fetched the cleaning bucket from the storage room as Josiah cleared all the soap and rags and supplies from the cupboard under the sink. He turned onto his back and slid so half of his body was inside the cupboard and he was looking up at the sink from below. Rose handed him the bucket, and he set it down at his knees within easy reach.
He began unscrewing one of the washers connected to the elbow-shaped pipe.
Aunt Bitsy leaned over to watch him work. “You're going to getâ”
The water trickled slowly out of the unsealed pipe for a few seconds and then in a great
woosh
, soaked Josiah and his clean blue shirt with filthy, gray dishwater. Josiah howled, sat up suddenly, and smacked his forehead against the metal pipe. Rose winced. That was going to leave a mark.
“âwet,” Aunt Bitsy said.
Pressing his hand against his forehead, Josiah shot out of the cupboard as the rest of the dishwater splashed to the bottom and dribbled out onto the floor.
“Are you all right?” Rose said.
His entire upper half was soaked, and there were little bits of rice and lettuce and other food particles stuck to his navy shirt. He took his hand from his forehead, leaving a smudge of black scum. A small goose egg was already starting to form just above his eyebrow. Looking a little dazed, he attempted a grin. “Bitsy, your clog is fixed.”
Aunt Bitsy's nostrils flared as if she were barely keeping her patience. “What were you planning on using the bucket for?”
He squinted in Aunt Bitsy's direction and scratched his temple, leaving more sink scum. “I didn't think any water would come out.”
Aunt Bitsy smirked. “It wonders me what you thought
would
come out.”
Leonard Nimoy splashed her paws in the puddle on the floor as if she were playing in the rain. “Stop that!” Aunt Bitsy scolded as the kitten started lapping up scummy sink water with her tongue.
Josiah lifted Leonard Nimoy by the scruff of the neck and deposited her a few feet away from the puddle. “Do you have a towel?”
Rose raced into the storage room once again and collected four old towels they used for rags. She came back and handed them to Josiah. Instead of drying himself off, he knelt down, wiped out the cupboard, and then sopped up the water from the floor. Bitsy took one of Rose's towels to wipe the water from the back of Josiah's neck. The minute she touched him, he reared his head in surprise and smacked the back of it against the inside edge of the cupboard.
“
Oy
, anyhow,” he said. He pulled his head from inside the cupboard and scrubbed his hand along the back of it.
Aunt Bitsy snorted, which was as close to laughter as she ever got. “You're jumpy for someone so tall.”
With his hand wrapped around the back of his head, Josiah looked at Aunt Bitsy out of the corner of his eye and chuckled. “I thought you were a spider.”
“I didn't want you to drip.”
“Is your head bleeding?” Rose said.
Josiah looked up at Rose, and his blue-eyed grin made her heart gallop. “Thanks to your aunt Bitsy, I have a bump on both the front and back of my head.”
Aunt Bitsy grunted her disapproval. “Don't blame me that you're so thick.”
Watching Aunt Bitsy warily out of the corner of his eye, Josiah tightened the washer back onto the pipe and finished wiping out the cupboard. It looked cleaner than when he'd started.
Though he tried to refuse her help, Rose grabbed another towel and helped him wipe the disgusting water from the floor. He crawled around on his hands and knees, trying to get every drop he'd spilled. His trousers as well as his shirt were soaked by the time they were done.
Josiah gathered up the wet towels. “Washroom?”
“I can take them,” Rose said.
“I'm already wet and dirty, and I sort of stink,” Josiah said. “And you smell like lavender. You'd better let me take them.”
She twisted her lips into a lopsided grin and led Josiah to the washroom. He dumped the soaked towels into the sink and wiped his dirty hands on his equally dirty trousers. “I'd better go home. I need to take a shower. Or three showers. I don't know that this smell will ever wash off. Your aunt might not let me back in your house again.”
“She might if our sink clogs.”
He laughed. “She won't let me near that sink.”
“
Cum
,” Rose said, taking the small hand towel from the hook over the sink and running some water over it. She reached up and wiped the black scum from Josiah's forehead, being careful not to press too hard on that goose egg. He turned to stone, not taking his eyes from her face as she carefully dabbed at first his forehead, then the side of his face. A shower would be best, but at least he could ride home without looking like he'd been swimming in the sewer. “That's better,” she said, rinsing out her towel and hanging it on the hook to dry.
With his unnerving gaze still glued to her face, he cleared his throat and gave her a doubtful smile. “
Denki
. I made a mess of myself.” He stretched out his arm where Rose had put the bandage yesterday. “But look. I told you this wouldn't come off in a hurricane. Still as secure as ever.”
Unable to withstand that piercing gaze, she lowered her eyes and stared at Josiah's boots. “
Denki
for your help at the honey house. I feel silly for letting things scare me.”
“The things that have happened on your farm would scare anybody.” He reached up and smoothed a thin strand of hair behind her ear. Her skin tingled where he touched her. “We're going to find out who is making all the trouble. Please try not to worry. I hate to see you so upset.”