you at lunchtime,” Caleb said.
“All right.”
“And don’t slam—”
The door banged shut.
“—the door,” Caleb finished, shaking his head.
Hannah was still mopping up the milk while Caleb washed at the kitchen sink. Through the window above the basin, he could see Jonah racing like a jackrabbit across the field to the silo. Jubilee, the collie mix that followed the kid everywhere, loped along at his side. With a sudden leap, Jonah launched himself into the air, then planted his hands on the ground as his legs and bare feet flew overhead in an exuberant handspring. This was the boy’s special skill, his lithe young body’s expression of pure joy, perhaps his way of embracing the perfect summer morning.
In the kitchen, an awkward silence hung as thick as the smoke. Lately, Caleb didn’t know what to say to his sullen niece. She had been so young when he’d left Middle Grove under a glowering shadow of disapproval from the elders. He’d had every intention of finding a life away from the community. But he had returned, reeled back in by a hideous tragedy. By that time, Hannah had turned into a skinny, nervous twelve-year-old, haunted by nightmares of her murdered parents.
Now his niece was a stranger, the lone girl in a household of men, with no woman’s hand to guide her. Just Caleb, who was ridiculously ill-equipped to deal with her, and his father, Asa, a man who clung with iron fists to the old ways. Already, some of Hannah’s friends were getting baptized and promised to young men. He could scarcely imagine his little niece as a wife and mother.
He finished scrubbing his hands and dried them, then fixed up a tray with his father’s breakfast and left it on the table as usual. Asa always got up early to read Die Botschaft in the quiet of the toolshed adjacent to the house. Caleb opened a cupboard and took a wad of cash from the coffee can, folding the bills into his wallet. After chores, and after his talk with Rebecca, he planned to go up to Grantham Farm to bring home a new horse. Baudouin, the sturdy Belgian, was old. He’d given his all and had earned a fine retirement in the pasture, and now Caleb needed a replacement. He ran a yoke of draft horses to make extra money to keep up with the bills on the farm. His team was in demand, especially in winter, when cars got stuck and fallen trees needed to be dragged out of the way. It was remarkable how much hauling English folks needed.
Glancing out the window again, he saw Jonah scrambling like a monkey up the conveyor belt to feed the bound corn shocks into the grinder. The kid loved high places and always volunteered for them. Caleb had always liked that chore too. The world looked entirely different when viewed from the high opening of the silo. He used to imagine the tower scene from Lord of the Rings, a forbidden novel that had once earned him a caning from his father when he’d been caught reading it. While feeding the stalks to the shredder, Caleb used to pretend that the mouthful of whirring, glistening blades belonged to a fierce dragon guarding the tower.
“Sorry about the toast, Uncle Caleb,” Hannah spoke up, taking the charred remains out of the wire rack.
“Not a problem.” To lighten the moment, he grabbed a piece and took a huge bite, closing his eyes and pretending to savor it. “Ah,” he said. “Ambrosia.”
She laughed a little. “Oh, Uncle Caleb. Don’t be silly.”
He choked down the rest of the toast and grinned, showing his charcoal teeth. “Who’s being silly?”
“What’s ambrosia, anyway? You’re always using big words, for sure.”
“It’s what the gods of Greek myth ate,” he said. “So I reckon it means something good enough to feed to the gods.”
She gasped at the mention of Greek gods—another forbidden topic—then whisked the toast crumbs from the counter. “You’re so smart.”
“Knowing the meaning of a word doesn’t make me smart.”
“Sure it does. I heard Rebecca say you went away and came back smarter, and that’s why you still haven’t joined the order—’cause your head’s all full of prideful English nonsense.”
“Rebecca likes to hear herself talk.” At the mention of her name, Caleb felt a trickle of sweat slide down his neck. Rebecca’s notion that his time away had made him proud was yet another reason they weren’t a good match. Getting an education didn’t make a man proud. Instead, it was humbling.
In his time away, Caleb had done the unthinkable. Against all Amish principles, he had attended college classes. The traditional eighth-grade education had left a thirst in his soul, and he’d sought out books and knowledge the way a man seeks cold lemonade on a hot August day. He used to ride his bike thirteen miles each way to take classes at the community college, soaking up lessons in history, philosophy, logic, calculus, and the kind of science that had nothing to do with crop yields or tending livestock. It was humbling to discover how much he didn’t know about the world, how much he had yet to learn. He had just been starting out when he’d had to come back. These days, he imagined the world he’d discovered beyond Middle Grove shimmering like a chimera on the horizon, out of reach, yet tauntingly real.
Hannah finished tidying the kitchen in her negligent, haphazard way. When Caleb’s father came in, he’d likely point out the crumbs on the floor and the dish towels left out on the counter. He’d probably also scowl at his breakfast tray and remark that a proper Amish family broke bread together around the table, their scrubbed faces lit by the inspiration of silent prayer before they dived into hotcakes with berry preserves and thick slices of salty ham.
But they weren’t like other families. Caleb could only do so much.
“Uncle Caleb?”
At the tentative note in Hannah’s voice, he turned to her. To his surprise, her cheeks shone a dull red against the loose strings of her black kapp.
“What is it, liebchen?” He used the old endearment, hoping the familiar word would sound soothing to her ears.
“There’s, um, a singing Sunday night at the great hall,” she said. “I was wondering, um, could I go?”
“I reckon you could do that,” he said. The singings took place on a church Sunday after services. The adults would leave for the evening so the kids could gather around the table and sing—not the slow morning chants meant for devotion, but the faster ones, meant to get the kids talking. And “talking” actually meant sizing each other up, because the goal was to get the young folk started with their courtships. It seemed contrived, but no more so than a high school dance in the outside world.
“All righty, then,” Hannah said, all fluttering hands and darting eyes.
“Anything else?” he asked.
“Can I get a ride home in Aaron Graber’s buggy?” she asked, all in a rush.
Caleb felt an unpleasant thud of surprise in his gut. Aaron Graber, he thought. More like Aaron Grabber. Caleb wasn’t so sure he liked the idea of little Hannah running around with a boy, particularly that one, who looked at girls the way a fox eyes a hen.
A distant, frenzied barking sounded through the window, but Caleb gave his full attention to his niece. This was kind of a big deal. She wanted to go courting. His little Hannah, courting. It seemed like only yesterday he was showing her how to get a hit in slow-pitch softball and making her giggle at his stupid
