Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered. – 1 Peter 3:7
Joseph crawled into bed beside Rebekah. “You are certainly a miracle worker. Gotte heard you today, heard your prayer, and answered it immediately. I have never seen anything like it. But then again, your whole life has been a miracle, has it not?”
“My whole life.” Rebekah narrowed her eyes at him in the falling darkness. “What does that mean?”
“It means like mater like kinder. You are both miracles and Gotte blessed me with both of you.” He leaned over and kissed her sweetly, scooping her hand into his. “Danki for making me a fater today. Ich lieb you, Rebekah. More than you could ever imagine.”
Tears pricked at Rebekah’s already tear-dry eyes. “I did not think I would feel like this. I am so tired, Joseph. Every part of my body, every bone. Every fiber.”
He placed his arm over her shoulder. She leaned into him gingerly. “I thought I would feel different once Lil’ Bit arrived. I thought I might finally feel…”
“Feel what?” The tone in Joseph’s voice told her that he would go to any length to delve into her mind. “Relieved?” he offered.
“No. Not relieved.” Rebekah wondered how honest she should be. “I thought I would actually feel happy.”
“Rebekah?” Joseph cocked his head. “You are not happy?”
Her eyelids fluttered with exhaustion. “I am grateful. But not happy. I am just so wunderbaar tired.”
Joseph sat in silence for a moment. “I suppose that is normal. You have had the biggest day that anyone could ever have, really.” Gently, he gave her shoulders a jiggle. “So, Dawson. I like that.”
Rebekah looked up at him through her eyelashes. “We did not talk about that name. And I know we agreed that we would talk about everything together regarding the bopplin before we made any decisions.”
Joseph kept jiggling. “It is really fine. I like the name a great deal.”
She patted his arm to stop the incessant jiggling. “I just opened my mouth and out it came. I do not think I have ever even heard the name before.”
Joseph let his newly stilled fingers tickle down her arm. “Another gift from heaven. A miracle name for our miracle kinder from my miracle fraa. We are so incredibly blessed, Rebekah.”
“Ja.” Rebekah tried to relax each muscle. As soon as one relaxed, another tensed. Now, only to tame those troublesome shoulders that kept hunching up around her ears. “We are.”
Lil’ Bit snoozed in his cradle and had been for several minutes. Despite trying to relax, every muscle in Rebekah’s body ached. Still, she could not help shifting to peek every few seconds at the bopplin, in his dark, blue bonnet and matching dress, both of which were gifts from his grossmammis. Her shoulders, adorned with all the tension they could stand, refused to cooperate. They remained hunched up at her ears, no matter how she tried to get them down.
Joseph reached over and plucked a cup from the nightstand. “I thought you might like something hot to drink.” He handed her the cup he had brought her. “Shepherd’s purse tea for you. It will help your stomach to feel better if what my mater tells me is true. Supposed to help with relaxation, too.”
Rebekah accepted the cup but did not answer, so Joseph continued. “Also, my mater and your mater are sleeping downstairs, eager to be of help with the bopplin when we feel we are ready to go to sleep.” He gave a little laugh. “It is like a sleepover, and they are both maedels again, not grossmammis.”
Rebekah took a long swill from the steaming cup and smiled. “The watermelon seed tea they made for him certainly soothed him to sleep. Thankfully.” Her brow furrowed and her smile turned into a frown. “He acts like he is in so much pain, Joseph.”
“He seems fine now,” Joseph said. “And I will be sure to tell Samuel how well the bopplin slept in his cradle. Did you see how his face fell?”
As if on some unspoken cue, Lil’ Bit let out a monstrous, agonizing wail. Rebekah leaned to get him, but Joseph was faster. “Come here, little buwe.” He plucked him up like a tiny turnip. “Have you given any thought as to who you would like to use as our hired maedel?”
Rebekah thought about the Old Order Amish custom of taking a young, unmarried girl from the village into the postpartum home. Sure, it helped gently introduce the younger girls to what married life in the Amish home looked like and consisted of, but it also provided a young lady to help around the home of someone who really needed the assistance.
Rebekah had never given much credence to the custom and, since she had always secretly wondered if she would ever even get to be a mother to a bopplin of her own, she had never considered having a hired girl in her home.
The young girl would be provided a wage for helping with cooking, dishes, laundry, and cleaning while also helping with anything the new mother and baby might need. In other words, she would be a right-hand-woman. However, given the level of exhaustion she felt now and how much Lil’ Bit did not sleep, Rebekah found herself wishing she had her hired girl already in order.
She looked at her husband and shrugged. Pains shot so sharply through her breasts that she winced. “No, I have not really given it much thought.” She thought briefly about all the young girls in the village. “Perhaps Molly Raber?”
Molly was almost thirteen and was a friend of Thomas’s. In fact, Molly was the only person, boy or girl, who could beat Thomas in a footrace, a fact which did not sit well with her freckle-faced bruder.
“Molly would be a good choice,” Joseph said. “As long as no races are to be run, there should be no problem.”
“Molly it is,” Rebekah agreed.
“It is decided then. I can make the arrangements once the grossmammis have to go home to their own families.”
“That may be never if they are oll ready having sleepovers.”
Joseph, obviously over the moon over his buwe, despite the screeching, shifted from foot to foot at the end of the bed. “How much do you reckon he weighs?”
“Eight pounds I would say, though I have not gotten to hold him much.”
“Your fater will weigh him tomorrow officially. But my guess is four pounds. Maybe five.”
Rebekah reached for him. “Perhaps I can try to feed him now.”
Joseph shrugged. “Custom says we wait until your milk comes in, but I am certainly not going to tell you no.”
Rebekah, remembering Katie’s letter, hefted her whimpering son. “You don’t think he could be closer to, say, ten pounds?”
Joseph answered quickly. Too quickly. “There is no way. He is much too small.”
Rebekah looked down at her tiny buwe. It was true, he was thin. And long. And perfect. “He also decided to come a bit before bopplins usually come, no?”
Joseph, still grinning, nodded. “I cannot imagine the time you would have had if Lil’ Bit was as big as bopplin Ruth.”
