Mary Davis - Courting Her Secret Heart

“I’m going as fast as the Ordnung allows.”

“But this is kind of an emergency. You would be allowed to go faster.”

He thinned his lips. “This isn’t an emergency. Your vater’s being well looked after. Whether it takes us five minutes or five hours to get there will have no bearing on your vater’s condition.”

He was right, of course, but she had already missed so much. She very much wished they were going by car. “When was my vater hurt?”

“First thing this morning.”

So long ago? He must have gotten hurt soon after she had slipped away. Now she really did feel guilty.

Like Amos said, if she got to the hospital with everyone else or in the next hour, she wouldn’t have been able to make a difference. But at least she could have been with her family. And know what was going on.

She settled her nerves for the plodding, boring journey. “Do you miss Pennsylvania?”

“Ne.”

That was a sharp reply.

“But you grew up there. Your friends are there. The rest of your family is there. Don’t you miss any of them?”

“Ne.”

Again, his single word sounded harsh.

“There’s nothing for me back there. This move was supposed to be gut .”

But she sensed it wasn’t. She wanted to press him, to understand why he seemed to harbor bitterness toward the place where he’d grown up, but doubted he would tell her anything. After all, they were basically strangers.

Eventually, Amos pulled in next to several other buggies outside the hospital.

She jumped out. “You don’t have to stay. I’ll get a ride back with my family. Danki. ” She trotted inside. She inquired at the information desk and soon found her family, with all her sisters, as well as several other community members. Her vater sat in a wheelchair, waiting to be discharged.

His left arm rested in a sling, and his left leg was in a cast and propped on a pillow on one of the wheelchair’s leg supports. He’d chosen neon green. Would the church leaders approve of the color? Probably not, but they wouldn’t be able to do anything about it until he had the cast changed in a few weeks.

Thirteen-year-old Naomi made a face at her.

Deborah ignored her younger sister, who liked to stir up trouble, and hurried over to him. “ Vater , are you all right?”

Vater gave her a lopsided smile. “I’m feeling great. They gave me something for the pain. But I don’t have any pain.”

“There you are, Deborah.” Her mutter frowned. “I was wondering where you’d gotten off to. Did you go to the vending machines without telling me?”

Vending machines? Hadn’t her mutter noticed that Deborah had only just now arrived? That she’d been absent all day? Was she truly invisible to her family? Did any of them even care? No wonder she could be gone for hours and hours without repercussions. No one ever realized her absence.

Amos joined them then. “How are you doing, Mr. Miller?”

Vater waved his hands aimlessly through the air. “It’s Bartholomew. I don’t have any pain.”

Deborah turned to Amos. “I thought you left.”

“If you would have waited, I would have walked in with you.” He turned to Mutter . “I brought Deborah.”

Mutter gave Deborah a double take. “You weren’t here? Then where were you?”

Oh, dear. “I went for a walk, and before I knew it, I had gone farther than I realized, and it took me a while to get back home.”

“Oh.” Mutter turned back to the nurse behind Vater’s wheelchair. “Are we leaving now? I want to leave now. I have supper to start.”

“We need to wait for the doctor to sign the release papers.”

How had any of them survived infancy and childhood with Mutter always forgetting things? Well, mostly forgetting Deborah. She didn’t have trouble with the rest of her daughters. Just her middlemost one.

The familiar pang of being left out twisted around her heart. One of these days, she might decide not to return. Would her mutter even notice? Probably not.

Well, it had been a perfect day until she’d come home and found out her world had been turned upside down.

Amos’s inviting brown gaze settled on her. She wished now the buggy ride had taken longer. His look of sympathy warmed her heart. Well, at least he acknowledged her presence.

* * *

Amos studied Miriam, who smiled at everyone in the hospital waiting room. Did she truly like a lot of young men? Or was she just really nice? He’d been fooled by girls before. More than once. His gaze shifted back to Deborah. She stood on the edge of the crowd, with them but not really a part of them. How could no one have noticed she hadn’t been with the family when they left for the hospital? Or at least once they arrived. He admired how she seemed to take that in stride. The hospital lights didn’t spark the red hints in her hair the way the sun had.

Deborah turned to him, and he smiled at her without thinking. Her green eyes seemed as though she could see his broken heart. There was something more to her than met the eye. Something he couldn’t quite figure out. Like she had some sort of secret. Probably just his own guilty conscience. He didn’t want to look away, but he did.

From down the hall, a man stared at him. It was his cousin Jacob. His shunned cousin Jacob, who’d left the Amish church and community. He glanced back at the crowd of his fellow Amish waiting for Bartholomew to be released.

He moved around the crowd to Bishop Bontrager. “I have something I need to take care of. Will you let the Millers know that I’ll meet them back at their farm?”

The bishop nodded. “ Ja. Danki for agreeing to lend them a hand. Bartholomew is going to be laid up for some time. Will your vater be able to spare you to stay on at the Millers’?”

“ Ja. I’m sure he can.” His vater had already declared the farm not big enough for Amos. He glanced in the direction where Jacob had been. “I won’t be far behind everyone.” As he hurried down the hall, he threw a glance back over his shoulder at Deborah and almost went back to her, but didn’t. When he turned the corner, he came upon his cousin, who was leaning against the wall. Jacob looked strange but gut in his English clothes, jeans and a hooded sweatshirt. They suited his cousin. “What are you doing here?”

“I saw you drive up with one of the Miller girls. Quite a collection of Amish you’re with. None of them your family, though. And the bishop.”

“Bartholomew Miller broke his leg.” Amos glanced back to make sure no one had followed him. “The bishop asked me to help out at their farm while they took him to the hospital.”

Jacob nodded. “You seemed pretty content with all of them. Are you still interested in leaving?”

Amos’s insides knotted. This would be a life-changing decision, but he didn’t see the use of the Amish life anymore. His vater didn’t have land enough for all his sons, and the Amish girls here seemed no different from the flighty ones back in Pennsylvania. Except Deborah. She seemed different. But that was what he’d thought about Esther. And Bethany. “ Ja , of course I am.”

“It might take a few weeks to get everything set up. I’ll be in touch with more information.”

“I’ll wait to hear from you.” Once away from the community and no longer having to keep this a secret, he’d feel better about his decision. “I should go before they get suspicious.” Amos could be shunned just for talking to an ex-Amish member. But once he left, he would be shunned and turned over to the devil and excommunicated from the church, as well.