A Time to Heal(57)

"Uh, not to worry but—" Chris started.

"Ya?"

"I'd feel better if you don't get too close to Daisy. She was acting pretty wild earlier, almost lashed out at Hannah."

He glanced back at Hannah and gave her a slight smile."Not that Daisy wanted to hurt her, but she isn't feeling well."

"Is there something else you can sit on—" he began and then he spotted an old beat-up chair in the corner of the barn.He dragged it over.

Phoebe had been sitting on a bale of hay. She started to get to her feet and her movements were so stiff and jerky Chris that reacted immediately, taking her arm and helping her up.

"Old bones," she said self-deprecatingly. "Danki."

"My pleasure, ma'am."

Hannah saw her frown and she thought about how much harder it seemed to be for the older woman to get around these days. She wondered, as she had several times recently, if she should try seriously broaching the subject of their moving Phoebe's things to a first-floor bedroom again. Phoebe was looking so tired and pale now.

Distracted, Hannah looked at Chris when she realized that he was saying something to her. "I'm sorry, what did you say?"

"I'm going back to work. Yell if you need anything. I'll check in later."

She nodded. "Danki."

Once she saw that Phoebe was safely settled, Hannah hurried back to the kitchen. As quickly as she could, she finished up the canning, lined up her day's work on the counter, and turned to prepare supper. The sooner she got Phoebe to come in and eat, the sooner she'd get her to rest.

Daisy had to get better. She just had to.





Chris stood under the shower and let the water beat on his sore back.

Farming the Amish way was definitely harder work. But in some strange way, it was more satisfying. He shook his head at that, scattering droplets of water. Funny thought. He loved technology—or so he'd thought.

But the fact was, he hadn't really missed anything from his modern world so far. Well, maybe television, just a little. After all, he'd watched a lot of it at the hospital. What else could you do when patients came and went; it had been hard to make friends and keep them.

Except for the long-termers—the patients who were there for an extended time recovering from serious conditions and doing physical therapy. Trouble was, sometimes it made it seem like you'd been there even longer when you heard them say something about their length of stay. Keeping spirits up became a daily struggle.

He saw a smaller circle of people here in Paradise. Funny, he'd used the word circle. But that's what it seemed like, a circle. People were closely bound here, eager to help with the harvest—the way his men had bonded over a task.

Well, except for one. One man had never seemed part of them, and he'd ended up bringing them all down.

Chris turned off the shower, toweled dry, and dressed. He kept a close eye on the time. It wouldn't do to be late for supper.Jenny ran a tight ship with the meal on the table, dishes washed, and children in bed by a certain time. Bedtime came early here.

He made it to the table with time to spare, his offer of help turned down, as usual. They treated him like family, but he was still a guest who wasn't supposed to set the table or wash the dishes.

Supper was a noisy gathering of the children sharing events of their day, what Chris had always thought of as "chowing down" on big bowls and platters of home-cooked and homegrown food, and then good coffee and conversation with adults afterward.

Chris stood on the porch of the dawdi haus later, watching the sun set over fields that were nearly harvested. His time here was coming to an end, and he was strangely reluctant to leave. Somehow it felt more like home than home had felt when he was there after being in the hospital.

He didn't mind the early bedtime here. It was enjoyable to lie on the big soft mattress, under sheets and a quilt that smelled of the sun, and read a book by the gentle glow of the battery lantern. Sometimes he read the Bible, sometimes the library book or a farming book Matthew loaned him. The window was always cracked open to let in the breeze and nature's music instead of the radio or recorded music he'd always listened to in the evenings.

A sense of peace, something he'd craved with an urgency akin to the worst hunger he'd ever experienced, had begun to steal over him. He was healing here in a way that didn't happen in a hospital. His restlessness and inner conflict was fading.

Except for the inner conflict he felt whenever he thought about the woman who lived next door.

He got up and looked out the window. There was a gentle glow of a lantern in the barn. Someone was obviously up with Daisy. He thought about how he'd promised Hannah that he'd look in later, but had decided against it when Matthew said he'd check in on her.