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Dori doubted that. It was strict and overshadowed by so many rules. Too many to keep track of.
She wanted to run after the car that had dropped her off but instead stood in the midst of the buggies for several minutes, contemplating what to do. The vehicles mocked her, reminding her that she didn’t belong. But somewhere beyond them, inside the house, sat Eli Hochstetler. Had she not run into him and seen the potential for the Amish to treat her with even a small amount of compassion, she doubted she would have come.
She stepped between the buggies, and her breathing came in catches. She didn’t want to go inside and have everyone stare at her. She’d hoped to arrive unnoticed. Just her family would know she had come. Not only would they be surprised but shocked. She couldn’t turn back now. No way did she want to return to the unpredictable women’s homeless shelter. The one thing she could say about the Ordnung rules, they made life here predictable.
She ventured toward the house she’d grown up in and climbed the porch. Sweat broke out on her upper lip. Just look for Eli. He will welcome me. She was sure of it.
Voices rose in a cappella with the words from hymn 131, “Das Loblied,” “Hymn of Praise.” Always the second song.
The words floated back to her like a gentle breeze, and she mouthed the all-too-familiar hymn as she stowed her suitcases at the end of the porch. As though being drawn forward by something outside herself, she moved toward the open doorway. With a deep breath, she slipped inside at the back of the room. Fortunately, everyone was on their feet for singing. Wouldn’t Eli be surprised to see her?
And there he stood in the last row on the far side in the corner. His usual place. He looked in her direction and stared for a moment with wide eyes, probably wondering why she—an Englisher—had invaded an Amish service. He motioned her over and pointed to his place.
Her stomach twisted even more. She shook her head, undeserving to take his seat and preferring to stand by the door for a quick exit if she needed it.
He crossed to her, causing several of the single men who always inhabited the back of the room to turn. He guided her to the bench.
She wanted to refuse, but more than that she didn’t want to draw attention to herself. No going unnoticed now. She stood where he’d been, and he positioned himself between the end of the bench and the wall. “Thanks,” she whispered and turned from him. She had been right about him welcoming her. At least until he found out who she was.
The man she stood next to jerked his attention forward. He’d obviously been staring. Was he the same one with Eli yesterday? She knew him but couldn’t pull his name out of her tumultuous brain. It would come to her later. Rather than singing, she hummed along with the other voices, not wanting to give away her heritage. People would know all too soon who had invaded their midst.
After the next hymn ended, everyone sat. She did so as well, now grateful for a seat. She would blend in better sitting as opposed to standing by the door. As much as she could blend in with brightly colored hair and Englisher clothes.
How unorthodox for a woman to be among the young, unmarried men. This would cause a stir. Without enough room on the bench, Eli stood against the wall, as did a few other young men. Having him near gave her courage. Several of the men along the bench glanced in her direction. She tried to feign invisibility.
The bishop stood in the front of the room, Bishop Bontrager, her grandfather. Strict. Inflexible. Judgmental.
She held her breath. Would he see her? Of course he would with her hair. How could he miss her? She might as well be wearing a flashing neon sign on her head. But would he recognize her? Would he accept her back? He and the other leaders were hard on young people who indulged too much during Rumspringa or left the faith altogether. Both of which she had done. She’d never planned to return, but here she sat. She wished she’d worn a dark beanie hat to hide her hair.
He was giving one of the three sermons that would be preached by three different men this morning. Though his voice didn’t have the edge to it she remembered, it still grated on her nerves, hearing his years of admonishments echoing in her head.
Please, don’t have him see me. Now she wished she had waited on the porch. She could’ve listened from there just as well.
She glanced up at Eli, who was staring at her, and her heart skipped a beat. He jerked his gaze away and to the front where it should have been. Had he been trying to figure out why an Englisher was here? Or had he recognized her?
She turned her attention to the bishop, who spoke about the woman caught in sin.
Strange. Dori tilted her head. Was that compassion for the woman in his voice? In times past, he would pound the point home that the woman had been caught in sin and would focus on her sin and how wrong she’d been.
His gaze flitted over his flock but kept returning to Dori, and finally, it rested on her. His words halted momentarily. Could he have recognized her? Even with her strange hair and makeup? What would he do now? Single her out as the sinful woman she was?
His eyes softened even more, and his lips pulled up ever so slightly at the corners. He didn’t take his eyes off her as he went on. He thumped his fingertips on his chest when he emphasized that the eldest among the accusers dropped his stone first and walked away. “‘Neither do I condemn thee.’” He spoke the words as though they were just for Dori.
She swore she could see a tear roll down his cheek. Had he changed in the years she’d been gone? She couldn’t imagine that he had. Too much to hope for.
When he was through, he sat in one of the chairs up front off to the side reserved for the church leaders but kept his gaze on her.
She couldn’t tell if he was chastising her for being the biggest sinner of them all or if he was... Dare she hope he forgave her?
It didn’t matter. Even shunned here with the Amish was better than being in the shelter out there, wondering where her next meal would come from. Scared. Alone. She would actually prefer to have people not speak to her rather than face their condemnation.
When the service concluded, Dori remained seated while others filed outside to eat lunch in the late-spring sunshine. People glanced at her on their way past or pretended not to see her at all. Just as well. Dori kept her head down when her parents passed by. Everyone left except Dori, Eli Hochstetler and the bishop.
Eli motioned toward the door and spoke in English. “We eat a meal together. You’re welcome to join us.”
She delighted in his kindness and wanted to savor it. The fact that he was handsome didn’t hurt. His nearness fortified her nerves.
Bishop Bontrager approached and spoke in Deutsch. “I’ll see to this young lady.”
Though Eli appeared reluctant, he gave a nod and left without protest.
She wanted to call back her benefactor. Her champion.
The bishop held out his hands, palms up, continuing in Deutsch. “You’ve come home. At long last.” He had recognized her. What was this welcoming attitude?
“Ja. Ne.” But she was here, and this had once been her home. “Ja.” Dori stared at his hands a moment, then put hers in his. She didn’t know what else to say. Should she come right out and tell him she was going to have a baby? She should tell him, but he seemed genuinely pleased to see her. She didn’t want to destroy that. Didn’t want to see the disappointment on his face when he learned how far she’d fallen. She wanted to bask in the joy and love she felt at this moment. What must he think of her wild appearance?
“You’ve grown up in the years you’ve been away.” He squeezed her hands. “Let’s go tell your vater and mutter you’ve returned.”
Dori pulled free. “Ne. Not out there. Not in front of everyone. I didn’t realize it was service Sunday. I hadn’t even realized it was Sunday at all.”
He pulled his eyebrows down. “You didn’t know it was Sunday?”
She shouldn’t have admitted that. She braced herself for a lecture about going to church.
But instead, he held up a hand. “Wait here, and I’ll bring them to you.” He walked out, but stopped at the door and stared at her. “Welcome home, meine enkelin.” He left.
Was she welcome? Would she be welcomed by her vater and mutter? If the bishop could welcome her, then certainly her parents would. She put one hand on her stomach. But would she still be welcomed when she told them? Even the New Order Amish here in Elkhart County, Indiana, had their limitations of what they would tolerate. She had gone far outside those boundaries.
She should leave. Before the bishop and her parents returned. But how could she escape without being seen? If she left now, where would she go? Return to the shelter? To Craig? He’d made it clear that the only way he’d have her back was if she “got rid of it” as he put it. She caressed her growing stomach. Her baby was a person to be loved and who would love her. Not something to be gotten rid of.
When the door opened, Dori jumped and spun around. She faced her parents.
Bishop Bontrager motioned toward her. “Our Dorcas has come home.”
She cringed at her given name.
Mutter’s face lit up, and she rushed to Dori and hugged her. “You’re home. You’re finally home.”
Dori hugged her in return. She’d missed her. “I’m back.” Sort of. No sense clouding the moment by telling them she didn’t plan to stay.
Vater hung back. “Until the next time she doesn’t like the Ordnung rules.”
Two out of three people happy to see her wasn’t so bad. Or was that three out of four if she counted Eli?
Would she be forced to abide by the Ordnung if her stay was only temporary? Would she follow the rules for the sake of her child? The Ordnung offered a degree of safety and security. Two things she needed most right now. “I will try.” She couldn’t promise anything more than that.
He gave a nod. “Then welcome home.” But his words weren’t filled with cheer or even pleasure, only resignation. “Come eat.”
She couldn’t have pretense and secrets if she was going to live under her vater’s roof. When he found out, it would be worse. “Wait. I have to tell you something first.”
Three sets of questioning eyes stared at her.
Best to get it over with quickly. “I’m going to have a baby.”
Mutter clapped her hands together and put them to her lips. “Our first grandchild.”
Vater glanced around and then narrowed his eyes at her. “Where is your husband?”
The temptation to tell him that her “husband” had died tickled her tongue. He would accept that, and everything would be fine. No one would have any reason to shun her or hate her.
But she couldn’t.
“I have no husband.”
Mutter gasped.
Vater glared. “So this is why you have returned. Where is the vater?”
“He doesn’t want us anymore.” Craig’s rejection had hurt more than anything.
“See where your sin has gotten you?”
“Andrew,” Bishop Bontrager said.
Her vater narrowed his gaze at his own vater, the bishop of the whole community. “She has brought this on herself. I want no part of her.”
Mutter gasped again. “Andrew, you can’t mean that.”
“I do. And you are to have nothing to do with her either.”
The bishop put his hand on his son’s shoulder. “We must all forgive trespasses as the Vater in heaven forgives us.”
Her vater shot his hand out to the side, pointing at the floor. “Not this. If we forgive her, what does it say to all the other young people going on Rumspringa?”
The bishop straightened. “That we show grace and mercy as our Heavenly Vater shows grace and mercy to us.”
“Ne. It shows we condone their actions. Then every girl will return pregnant and every boy a vater-to-be.”
“Release the rock in your hand, Andrew.”
Her vater glared. “You might be able to forgive her, but I can’t.” He wheeled around and walked to the door. He stopped and turned. “Come, Leah.”
Dori’s mutter glanced between her daughter and her husband.
Dori gave Mutter a nod that she understood her mutter wasn’t abandoning her like Vater.
Her mutter gave her a weak smile and followed her husband out.
Dori blinked, freeing the tears pooled in her eyes. Then she turned to the bishop. “What do I do now? I thought my parents would allow me to come back. I have no place to live, no money and no job. I assumed I’d be shunned, but I’d at least have a roof over my head.”
“You have a roof.”
“I don’t want to be in my vater’s haus if he can’t tolerate my presence.”
“You’ll come and live under meine roof. I’m across the yard in the dawdy haus.”
This was a turnaround. She’d thought her grossvater, the bishop, would be the one to reject her and her vater to welcome her. “The dawdy haus isn’t big enough. It has only one bedroom.”
“We’ll manage. I’ll hear no arguing over the matter.”
“Danki.” She needed to know where she stood in the community. “Am I to be shunned?”
The bishop smiled. Or was that her grossvater smiling at her? “Did you join church before you left?”
“Ne.” But he knew that already.
“Then there are no grounds on which to shun you. You don’t fall under the Ordnung or church rules.” He smiled broadly. “So we can eat together.”
“Don’t you eat at the big haus with Vater, Mutter and the rest of the family?”
“I did. But now that you’re here, you can cook for the two of us.”
“Are you sure?” It was as though he was choosing to be cut off like one who was shunned.
“Let’s call it your rent for staying in meine home.”
“Danki. I appreciate this so much, but I have to ask. Why this change of heart? You never would have accepted me home before.”
“You aren’t the only one who did some growing up while you were gone. I’m an old man. I don’t want to spend what few years I have left at odds with meine family.”
“But you are at odds with your son because of me.”
“Andrew will come around. Given enough time.”
Would she be here long enough to see his change? And when she left again, it would confirm that he’d been right about her.
Eli Hochstetler had stared in wonder when Bishop Bontrager left the haus and then returned with his son Andrew Bontrager and his son’s wife, Leah. Why had the Bontragers gone back inside? Why would the bishop want them to meet Rainbow Girl? Unless...they knew her? But how could they? Who was she?
He thought hard and could come up with only one name. Dorcas?
Couldn’t be. But the twisting in the pit of his stomach and the leap of his heart said otherwise.
Rainbow Girl had seemed familiar, and now he knew why. She was Dorcas Bontrager, the sweet girl who had turned her back on her Amish life.
And him.
Anger boiled inside him. Why hadn’t she told him? Why had she returned? Was she here to stay?
