Emma Miller - Leah's Choice

“But why should that frighten you?”

“We’re Plain folk—we’re a people apart. Do you forget the martyrs who died that we might worship according to our beliefs?”

Leah leaned close and brushed a kiss on her sister’s temple. “How could I forget? Being who I am—who we are—is bred into me, blood and bone. Surely, listening to a Mennonite tell about his mission work doesn’t change that.”

“It’s not just that.” Another tear followed the first. “It was the Mennonite friends you made out in Ohio. You went to their charity auctions, and you went to the fair with Jeanine and Sophie. And at least once, you helped out at their bake sale for their church.”

“I did, but that was to raise money for a mission in the Ukraine. They wanted to send books and school supplies to orphans in a remote town. I wasn’t attending worship services. And going to a fair to look at animals and eat cotton candy doesn’t mean that I’ve forsaken my own faith,” Leah protested. “I haven’t.”

Rebecca’s chin quivered. “Everyone thought that you’d start classes for baptism this spring, but you didn’t. Even Ruth is concerned about you. She and Aunt Jezzy were talking about it last week after church.”

“And Mam? What does she say?”

Her sister sighed. “You know Mam. She just smiles and says, ‘All in God’s time.’ But it’s past time, Leah. You’re the prettiest girl in Kent County, but you’ve never had a steady boyfriend, and you don’t even let any boys drive you home from frolics and singings.”

Leah wrinkled her nose again as she thought of Menno Swartzentruber, who’d tried to get her to ride home in his buggy last Sunday. “Maybe I haven’t met the right boy. The ones around here seem too young and flighty.” Menno was a hard worker, but his idea of a good joke was piling straw bales across the road to stop traffic in the dark or filling a paper bag with cow manure and leaving it on an Englisher’s porch. No, she couldn’t see herself dating Menno.

“And what about Jake King from the fourth district church? He’s what? Twenty-eight or twenty-nine? He likes you, and you can’t think Jake’s too young.”

“I like Jake—he’s a good man. But his wife’s only been dead six months. I wouldn’t feel right walking out with Jake so soon after his loss.”

“You see how you are.” Rebecca stepped away and straightened her kapp, which had come loose when they’d hugged. “You always have a good excuse. But wearing that Ohio-style dress doesn’t help. You know how people are—how they will talk. They start to wonder if you are drifting away from us.”

“It sounds as though you’ve been talking to Aunt Martha,” Leah said. “Or Dorcas.”

“Aunt Martha has a sharp tongue,” Rebecca admitted. “But she means well. She knows Dat would have been worried about you.”

“You miss him a lot, don’t you?” Leah murmured. Their father had been dead almost three years, but the hurt hadn’t faded. Rebecca had taken the loss especially hard.

“I do.”

“Me, too,” she admitted softly.

“Leah! Leah!”

Both Leah and Rebecca turned toward the stairs as the clatter of footsteps echoed down the hallway.

“Leah! There’s a man!” Susanna’s eyes were wide, her cheeks red with excitement. “In a truck! In the kitchen!”

“A truck in Mam’s kitchen?” Leah teased.

“Ne!” Susanna was breathless from running up the steps. “An Englisher man. He wants…” She inhaled deeply. “He wants you!”

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