“Me first!” Joel insisted.
“Nay! Me!” Asa bellowed.
“I knew you’d see it our way, Ellen,” Micah said above the voices of his nephews. He rose from his chair. “I was so sure you’d agree that I brought fishing poles. You always used to like fishing. Maybe you and me could wander down to the creek and see if we could catch a fish or two before dark.”
Ellen looked at Micah, then the table of seated guests, flustered. “Go fishing? Now?”
“Oh, go on, Ellen,” her father urged. “We can get our own pie and I’ll help your mother clean up the dishes.” He glanced at Micah. “Smart thinking. Best strike while the iron is hot, boy. Get the jump on Neziah and put your claim in first.”
Mischief gleamed in Micah’s blue eyes. “It’ll get you out of here.” He motioned toward the back door. “Come on, Ellen. You know you want to. I’ll even bait the hook for you.”
She cut her eyes at him. “As if I need the help. If I remember correctly, it was me who taught you how to tickle trout.”
“She did,” Micah conceded to the others, then he returned his attention to her. “But I’ve learned a few things about fishing since then. You don’t stand a chance of catching the first fish or the most.”
“Don’t I?” Ellen retorted. “Talk’s cheap but it never put fish on the table.” Still bantering with him, she took off her kapp, tied on her scarf and followed him out of the house.
* * *
Fifteen minutes later, Micah stepped out on a big willow that had fallen into the creek. The leaves had long since withered, but the trunk was strong. Barring a flood, the willow would provide a sturdy seat for fishermen for years. And the eddy in the curve of the bank was the best place to catch fish.
He turned and offered Ellen his hand. “Don’t worry,” he said, “it’s safe enough.” He had both fishing poles in his free hand, while Ellen carried the can with the bait.
The rocky stream was wide, the current gentle but steady as the water snaked through a wooded hollow that divided his father’s farm from her dat’s. When they were children, he, Neziah and Ellen had come here to fish often. Now, he sometimes brought his nephews, Joel and Asa, but Neziah didn’t have the time. Sometimes the fishing was good, and sometimes he went home with nothing more than an easy heart, but it didn’t matter. Micah thought there was often more of God’s peace to be found here in the quiet of wind and water and swaying trees than in the bishop’s sermons.
“Thanks for asking me to come fishing, Micah,” Ellen said as she followed him cautiously out onto the wide trunk. “I needed to get out of there, and I couldn’t think of a way to make a clean getaway without offending anyone.”
“Jah,” Micah agreed. “I wanted to get away, too. Not from supper. That was great. But my dat. When he takes a crazy notion, he’s hard to rein in.”
“So you think that’s what it is? His idea that you and Neziah should both court me, and that I would choose between you? It’s a crazy notion?”
The hairs on the back of Micah’s neck prickled, warning him that he’d almost made a big misstep, and not the kind that would land him in the creek. “Nay, I didn’t mean it like that. It’s a good idea, one I should have come up with a long time ago. Me and you walking out together, I mean, not you picking one of us. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it. My vadder is right that I’ve been rumspringa too long. I didn’t want to discuss it back there, but I’ve been talking to the bishop about getting baptized. I’m ready to settle down, and a good woman is just what I need.”
Ellen sat down on the log and dangled her legs over the edge. She was barefooted, and he couldn’t help noticing her slender, high-arched feet. “I’m nearly four years older than you,” she said.
He grinned at her. “That hasn’t mattered since I left school and started doing a man’s work. I’ve always thought you were one of the prettiest girls around, and we’ve always gotten along.” Maybe not the prettiest, he thought, being honest with himself, but Ellen was nearly as tall as he was and very attractive. She’d always been fun to be with, and she was exactly the kind of woman he’d always expected to marry when he settled down. Ellen never made a fellow feel like less than he was, always better. Being with her always made him content...sort of like this creek, he decided.
“And our fathers’ lands run together, of course.” She took the pole he offered and bent over her line, carefully threading a night crawler onto the hook. “Handy for pasturing livestock.”
He studied her to see if she was serious or testing him, but she kept her eyes averted, and he couldn’t tell. He decided to play it safe. “We’ve been friends since we were kids. We share a faith and a community. Maybe that’s a good start for a marriage.”
“Maybe.” She cast her line out, and the current caught her blue-and-white bobber and whisked it merrily along.
“Dat says all the best marriages start with friendship,” he added.
“And it doesn’t bother you that I’m thirty-three and not twenty-three?”
“Would I be here if it did?” Now she did raise her head and meet his gaze, and he smiled at her. “It was my vadder’s idea, but I wouldn’t have agreed if I didn’t think it was something I wanted to do. You’re a hard worker. I hope you think the same of me. I’ve got a good trade, and I own thirty acres of cleared farmland in my own name. And the two of us have a lot in common.”
“Such as?”
“I like to eat and you’re a good cook.” He laughed.
She smiled.
“Seriously, Ellen. You get my jokes. We both like to laugh and have a good time. You know it’s true. There’s a big difference between me and Neziah.”
“He has always been serious in nature.”
“And more so since the accident. He doesn’t take the joy in life that he should. Bad things happen. I didn’t lose a wife, I know, but I lost my mother in that accident. You have to go on living. Otherwise, we waste what the Lord has given us.”
She nodded, but she didn’t speak, and he remembered that he’d always liked that about her. Ellen was a good listener, someone you could share important thoughts with.
“Sometimes I think my brother’s meant to be a preacher, or maybe a deacon. He’s way too settled for a man his age. Just look at his driving animal. I always thought you could tell a man’s nature by his favorite driving animal.”
“Neziah drives a good mule,” she suggested.
“Exactly. Steady in traffic. Strong and levelheaded, even docile. An old woman’s horse.” It was no secret that he was different than Neziah. He liked spirited horses and was given to racing other buggies on the way to Sunday worship, not something that the elders smiled on.
“Don’t be so hard on your brother,” Ellen defended. “He has his children’s safety to think about. You know how some of these Englishers drive. They don’t think about how dangerous it is to pass our buggies on these narrow roads.”
“Jah, I know, but I’m careful about when and where I race. I don’t mean to criticize Neziah. He’s a good man, and I’d not stand to hear anyone criticize him. But he’s too staid for you. Remember that time we all went to Hershey Park? You and me, we liked the fast rides. Neziah, he got sick to his stomach. We’re better suited, and if you’ll give me a chance, I’ll prove it to you.”
“I think I—” She sounded excited for a second then sighed. “I had a bite but I think the fish is playing with me.” She reeled in her line and checked the bait. Half of her worm was missing. “Look