Chapter 1.
Normally Sarah liked to cook, but tonight baked breaded lamb chops were on the menu and the smell rising from the meat as it sizzled in the pan, sent Sarah rushing for the outdoor convenience. She thought it was called ‘morning sickness’ because it happened only in the morning. No one had told her it could happen throughout the day as well. In fact, for Sarah, it seemed to be happening all through the day. She considered that it should be called ‘all day sickness’ rather than morning sickness.
After she was finished being sick, she quickly splashed her face with the icy cold November water that flowed from the well around the back of the house. As she usually did after one of these episodes, she plucked a sprig of fresh mint and popped it in her mouth, as she made her way back to the kitchen. Mint was the only thing that Sarah could find to settle her nausea.
As Sarah pushed the back door open, her mudder who had her hands on her hips, and a very sour expression on her face met her. Oh no, she’s figured it out. She knows I’m expecting. Nee, she couldn’t possibly know for sure I’m not even showing yet, she thought. The only clue of her early pregnancy was the terrible nausea that she’d had for a little over two weeks.
“It’s that dreaded flu, Sarah. Were you sick again this time?”
Sarah nodded her head at her mudder’s question pleased that her secret was still safe, but not pleased that she had to keep this secret from her parents. However did she get herself into this situation? If Sarah had heard that someone else in the community was not married and expecting a boppli she would have had a very low opinion of them indeed, and now, here she was in that very same situation.
Thankfully, the flu was going around the community and many were quite ill, so that gave her a good cover up story for the moment.
Her mother put the back of her hand to Sarah’s forehead. “You don’t seem to have a temperature though.”
Sarah barely had the strength to speak, but managed to say, “That’s gut.”
“Go up to bed and I’ll bring dinner up to you.”
Dinner was the last thing that Sarah felt like. The last thing in the world she wanted to think about was food. She couldn’t arouse suspicion and tell her mudder that she wasn’t hungry and besides her mudder’s tone was firm and Sarah did not have the strength to argue. She was thankful that at least she would be able to hide in the safety of her room and wouldn’t have to smell the meat cooking any longer. “Denke, mamm.”
As she carefully made her way up the stairs to her bedroom, she wondered if her mother suspected her condition. She was sure she saw her eyes flicker toward her slightly swollen belly. Was she checking to see if my belly is increasing? Or maybe it’s my guilty conscience, she thought. Either way, Sarah was glad to be able to lie down because when she was lying down she didn’t feel quite as sick.
Her mudder called after her. “I’ll make you some hot lemon and honey.” Hot lemon and honey in boiling water was the standard remedy her mudder used for everything, not just a cold or the flu, it was her standard cure for everything.
“Denke, Mamm.” One squeezed fresh lemon, two tablespoons full of honey in a mug of boiling water, Jah that will cure everything. If only it were as simple as that, Sarah thought. If only I could take the honey and lemon drink and I wouldn’t be in this situation anymore.
There was no cure for what Sarah had. Sarah realized that for the first time in her life this was something she could not change her mind about and something that she could not get out of. She could not change her mind on a whim and say she didn’t want to be an unmarried expectant mother anymore. It wasn’t like a game of volleyball where she could stop playing whenever she wished and have someone else take over. It wasn’t like school where she could pretend she was sick and stay home. Everything Sarah could think of in her life up to this point she had always been able to change her mind about or find some way out of. These circumstances were different.
Why couldn’t her life be plain and simple like her two older sisters’? They were both happy to stay and live within the Amish community and had both fallen in love with Amish menner. One was about to be married and the other was already happily married with a boppli on the way.
That’s the trouble, Sarah thought, with having two older sisters, the younger one is supposed to turn out just like the older ones, just as if they were cut from the same cookie cutter. Sarah felt she had dismally failed to live up to the life that her older sisters were leading. I guess the problem was that Benjamin and Jessie didn’t have a younger bruder; she tried to see the funny side of things as her two sisters had married two bruders who they had practically grown up with. Yet, she had to be the one to fall in love with an Englisher.
Sarah sighed loudly as she thought of how her older sisters always had things work out so well for them. She could already see that her life would be hard in comparison with theirs. Nothing ever seems to work out easily for me, she thought. I fell in love with John as soon as I looked into his blue eyes.
She closed her eyes and remembered that first time she gazed into his eyes and felt lost in his presence. Nothing in the world up to that point had given her the feeling of elation as John spoke his first words to her. She didn’t even remember what he said; she could only remember how her heart seemed to dance as if nothing in the whole entire world mattered at all. It was too late for my heart to disregard him for being an Englischer. When he told me that first night that he wasn’t really Amish, and was just visiting his Amish cousin, we were already deeply in love.
Even though it was mighty chilly outside, Sarah pushed up her bedroom window just a little, for the fresh air that always made her feel better. She stood in front of the window even though the cold wind was sending chills up and down her spine. Sarah took several deep breaths before she closed it and sank into the coziness of her familiar bed. As she placed her head on the softness of her pillow, her hand automatically reached for the well-worn photo of John she kept under the pillow. The photo had been inside his very first letter to her and she had gazed at it longingly every day since.
The photo was nice to have for now so she could see his handsome face anytime she wanted to, but Sarah longed to be able to see him in person again very soon. She craved to look into his deep blue eyes and to have his strong protective arms around her once more. She didn’t know why she felt about him the way she did, it was just that everything seemed a lot better when he was around.
Sarah ran the tip of her finger over his face then drew the photo to her lips and kissed it.
She let out a large sigh. They only had two short months together, but in those two months they saw each other every single day. At first Sarah was pleasantly attracted to his handsome looks, but then as she got to know him, his personality far outshone his looks. Sarah had found herself also attracted to his intelligence. Compared to Amish menner John was able to speak on a whole range of topics and he had even travelled to different countries. Sarah loved to hear him talk of his adventures on his travels. In comparison Sarah thought Amish menner dull as they never go anywhere and just do the same thing over and over again.
Sarah wanted the life that she saw she could have with him. Since Sarah, like most Amish, only had a grade eight education, John said he would show her how to get her GED so she could go to college and have a career. Sarah had never even known these things were possible before she’d met John. Being a gut fraa bringing up well-behaved children and keeping her husband happy was the life Sarah had previously envisioned for herself. John inspired her to want to see what she was capable of in the Englisch world, but now with the boppli coming Sarah knew she had to re-think all of her previous plans. The boppli had become Sarah’s main priority.
