Patricia Davids - A Home for Hannah

Miriam glanced over her shoulder. “Mamm, it’s time to check your blood sugar. This added stress and lack of sleep could easily throw it out of whack.”

“All right, dear. I’ll get the baby settled and I’ll check it.” She rocked the baby gently in her arms and cooed to her in Pennsylvania Dutch.

“You know what to do if it’s low?”

“Ja. I’ll have a glass of milk and recheck it in thirty minutes. The honey is in the cabinet if it is too low, but I feel fine. Stop worrying.”

“I’ll be back in a few minutes.” Worrying was what Miriam did best these days. Her mother didn’t seem to realize how precarious her health was.

Outside, Miriam walked beside Nick down the lane. He asked, “How long has your mother been ill?”

“She had her first heart attack seven months ago. That’s when they discovered she was a diabetic. She had a second heart attack three weeks ago. Thankfully, it wasn’t as bad as the first one. She’s been doing okay, but I think she should be recovering more quickly than she has. Her energy level is so low. Everything makes her tired, and that frustrates her.”

“You’ve been here in Hope Springs for seven months?” He seemed amazed.

“Yes.” She’d taken pains to remain under his radar. Coming face-to-face with Nick was the last thing she wanted. His presence brought back all the pain and guilt she’d worked so hard to overcome. Now, he was in her home and in her business with no signs of leaving. Why hadn’t she followed her mother’s advice and left the midwife out of this?

“I imagine you had to quit your job in order to stay this long.” His sympathetic tone showed real compassion. It was hard to stay angry with him when he was being nice.

“I took a leave of absence from my job. My leave will be up in another month. I don’t know what I’ll do if I can’t go back by then.”

“That’s got to be hard on both of you.”

“She doesn’t have anyone else.” As soon as Miriam said it, she regretted pointing out the obvious.

A muscle in his jaw twitched, but his voice was neutral when he spoke. “We both know the Amish community will take care of Ada. She isn’t alone.”

“I know they will keep her fed and clothed, but she needs more than that. She needs someone to monitor her blood pressure and glucose levels and to make sure she takes her meds. She needs someone to make sure she eats the right things. If one more person drops by with a pan of cinnamon rolls or shoofly pie for her, I’m going to bar the door.”

“Want to borrow my gun?” There was a hint of laughter in his tone.

“Don’t tempt me,” she replied, amazed that he could so easily coax a smile from her. Her anger slipped further away. They had both suffered a loss when Mark died, but their lives hadn’t stopped. Nick had managed to move on. Perhaps she could, too.

He stopped and squatted on his heels to examine the ground. “My tires have erased any tracks the buggy might have left. I don’t see anything distinctive about the horseshoe marks.”

“Do you think the mother was coerced into leaving the baby?”

He rose and hooked his thumbs in his wide belt as he scanned the countryside. “Frankly, I don’t know what to think. The whole thing doesn’t fit. The Amish don’t operate this way. It’s so out of character.”

“The Amish have flaws and secrets like everyone else.” She would know. Flaws and secrets haunted her, every day and every night.

He must’ve heard something odd in her voice for he fixed her with an intense stare. She gazed at her feet.

He asked, “Who knows you are a nurse? Is it common knowledge?”

“I’m sure my mother has mentioned it to some of her friends.”

“Did you notice the note said ‘Meet me here a week from tonight.’ Did that strike you as odd?”

“A little. Why?”

“I don’t know. It just didn’t seem to fit. What about someone from your past? An Amish friend who might know you’re here with your mother.”

“No, there’s no one like that.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“We were Swartzentruber Amish, remember? They are the strictest of the Old Order Amish. When I refused to join the faith, my parents had to shun me. My friends did the same. It wasn’t until after my father died that my mother chose to become a member of a less rigid order.”

“Didn’t that mean she would be excommunicated by her old bishop?”

“Yes. She gave up her friends and the people she’d known all her life. It was very hard, but she did it so that she could see me again. She was accepted into Bishop Zook’s congregation about a year ago. They are more progressive here. Unlike my old congregation, Bishop Zook’s church believes a person has the right to choose the Amish faith. Those who don’t are not punished.”

He said, “Bishop Zook is not the only bishop who believes that. Amber’s mother and my mother are sisters who both chose not to join the faith. They have siblings who remained Amish. My grandmother embraces all her family, Amish and English alike.”

“Some districts are that way, some are more strict, some are rigid in their beliefs and don’t tolerate any exceptions. People hear the word Amish and they think the Plain People are all the same. There are enormous differences.”

Miriam cocked her head to the side. “Wait a minute. If your mothers are sisters, why do you share the same last name with Amber?”

He grinned and started walking again, scanning the ground as he went. “Our mothers are sisters who married two brothers. Got to love small-town romances. Where did you live before you moved in with your mom?”

“Medina, Ohio.”

Bella left Miriam’s side and went hunting through the old corn stubble of the field beside them. It would soon be time for the farmer who rented her mother’s land to begin planting new crops.

“What kind of nursing do you do?” Nick asked, slanting a curious glance her way.

Was he really interested? “I work in adult critical care.”

“That’s a tough job.”

“Overdoses, strokes, trauma, heart attacks, we see it all.”

“And car accidents.” He looked away, but she saw the tension that came over him.

“Yes, car accidents,” she replied softly.

She expected him to drop the subject, but to her surprise, he didn’t. “Do you like it? I mean, not all the outcomes can be good.”

“Every patient deserves the chance to reach their full potential. I’m part of a team that works to make that happen. Sometimes, what they regain isn’t as much as they had before their event, but it’s not for lack of trying on our part. For every loss of life, we see a dozen recoveries.” It struck her as odd to be talking about her work with Nick, but she wanted him to know she was about making a difference in people’s lives and she loved her work.

“When do you find the time to foster little kids?”

“I don’t. I foster teens.”

“Really?”

She met his gaze. There was a new respect in his eyes that she hadn’t seen before. Lifting her chin, she said, “They are mostly Amish runaways.”

He stopped in his tracks. “Today has been chock full of surprises.”

“You don’t approve? They are kids with nothing but an eighth-grade education. They don’t have driver’s licenses or social security cards. They are completely ill prepared for life in the outside world.”

“I know that.”

“If by some stroke of luck they can find work, they have to take low-paying jobs. Most get paid under the table from employers happy to take advantage of them. Without outside help, leaving the Amish is almost impossible for some of them.”

“You left.”

She started walking again. “Don’t think it was easy.”