Sarai’s father didn’t stay too much longer. He had the cows to milk and other work waiting for him, so he headed out again with repeated promises that they’d sort out the coop the next day. For one night, the roof would just have to be set back on top of the frame and tacked down with a few nails. It would do.
When Sarai and Mammi were alone in the kitchen again, Sarai cast her grandmother a smile.
“You stood up for yourself very well, Mammi,” she said.
“I’m your father’s mother,” Mammi replied. “There is a certain understanding between mothers and sons.”
“Does he know what Moe means to you?” Sarai asked.
Mammi sobered, and she sighed. “No. I don’t believe he does.”
“It might be worth telling him,” Sarai said.
“Sarai, your daet is right. That family is only trying to take care of Moe. That’s a time that comes for all of us. But it doesn’t mean it’s any easier on us old folks.” Mammi headed toward the counter. “Let’s get dinner started. Moe and Arden will be hungry.”
It was as close to an admission of tender feelings that Sarai could get out of her grandmother right now, but she’d seen how passionately Mammi had argued for Moe, and Sarai couldn’t help but smile to herself as she tied on her work apron and went to wash her hands.
Dinner that night would consist of Mammi’s meaty chili, a noodle casserole and some skillet corn bread. Mammi was particular about her chili, and so she started the pot on the back of the stove with all of her ingredients to simmer. Sarai chopped onions, celery and zucchini from the garden, and she could hear Arden pounding nails now—thwack, thwack. Never more than two blows with the hammer.
Would Arden really work against Mammi and Moe getting together? It sounded like everyone was against it, and Arden was here on a mission to bring his grandfather home. She now understood a little bit better about their financial constraints, but was there really no other solution?
The hammering stopped, and Sarai went over to the window to look outside. Arden was opening a new package of shingles, from what Sarai could tell.
“The two of you seem to be getting along,” Mammi said.
“I suppose.” She went back to her chopping. “You know the kind of flirt Arden always was, so if you’re suggesting more than two people getting along...”
“Yah, he sure was a flirt,” Mammi agreed. “I was afraid back then that Lizzie would marry him.”
There wasn’t any risk of that. No girl had been able to rope Arden. For a couple of minutes they worked in silence, and Sarai swept the vegetables off her cutting board and into a big mixing bowl. But her mind kept going back to that conversation on the stable roof.
“Let me ask you this, Mammi,” Sarai said. “If I am one way here in Redemption, and I go to visit Katie in Shipshewana, would I be a different person out there?”
Mammi paused in her stirring, then shrugged. “No, I don’t think so. Are you thinking of going for a visit to see your cousin, dear?”
“That’s not what I mean, exactly,” she hedged, because she couldn’t go to Shipshewana for her own fresh start with things the way they stood, anyway. Mammi needed someone with her. “What I mean is, hypothetically speaking, if I went to Shipshewana, everything that mattered—my character, my faith, my beliefs—they would all be the same, right?”
“Yah,” Mammi said. “I should certainly hope so!”
“Well, Arden likes who he is better in Ohio. That’s what he says, at least. And I don’t think a person changes all that much just by putting him in a different state. It doesn’t change our weaknesses or our strengths or...anything! It’s just a change of scenery. No place has that power over us.”
“I daresay you’re right,” Mammi said. “But isn’t that the lure of a fresh start? You can be anyone you want to be if you start out right.”
When Sarai didn’t answer, Mammi nodded toward the big black skillet hanging on a hook on the wall. “I need you to start the corn bread. Do you mind?”
“Of course I’ll do it,” Sarai replied.
And she pulled the skillet off the hook and brought it to the hot woodstove. She pried the cover off the burner with a hook, put the skillet on top of the open circle and placed a lump of lard in the bottom of the pan. It took a moment, and then it started to melt.
But while Arden’s insistence that his past wasn’t a part of him annoyed her, a different small worry had started to form in the back of Sarai’s mind. When people moved away, they oftentimes didn’t move back. Arden certainly wasn’t going to. She was just now realizing that if she went to Shipshewana and met a farmer to marry, she might never live in Redemption again, and that thought brought a lump to her throat.
Arden might be perfectly happy to leave this place behind like some old disappointment, but she was not. Redemption had formed the best parts of her.
Early that evening, Arden walked next to his grandfather back toward the Peachy property. The sun had sunk lower in the sky, but it still shone hot. Arden had finished the roof on the Peachy stable. There would be no leaking from the area he’d patched up—that much was sure. And after he and Dawdie had washed their faces and hands and changed their clothes, they headed over to the neighbors’ house for dinner.
“Ellen sure can cook,” Dawdie Moe said. “You’re in for a treat. You know, if you stayed around here...”
“Dawdie, I can’t stay,” Arden said.
“But if you did, you’d be able to eat rather well visiting Ellen Peachy from time to time, I can tell you that.”
Arden just smiled. It was hard to argue with that. Dawdie was probably right, but Arden wasn’t staying. Here in Redemption, he felt like his old reputation haunted him. He’d have to stand shoulder to shoulder with the fathers of the girls he’d flirted with, and he’d have to face Job Peachy, too. His future was not in Redemption.
“Have you never even considered it?” Dawdie asked. “I could sure use some help around the farm.”
“You’re supposed to come home with me.” That was the solution. That was their duty as his family.
“But what if you stayed here instead?” Dawdie asked.
What if...? The farm didn’t make much. It was small, and a lot of the equipment needed replacing. Would he make enough to pay back what he owed to Job? Not likely. Besides, as he’d told Sarai, he liked himself better in Ohio. He was a better version of himself there. In Ohio, he was helping to build something from the floorboards on up. In Pennsylvania, he was trying to repair something he’d already broken.
“Dawdie, I’m helping my parents,” he said. “They need me, too.”
It was part of his reason, at least.
“Of course, of course...” But he heard the disappointment in the old man’s voice.
Arden found himself looking forward to seeing Sarai again tonight. He’d told himself he wouldn’t do this, though. He was ready to put Redemption behind him and bring his grandfather home.
