The Amish Teacher's Dilemma and Healing Their Amish Hearts by Patricia Davids (all ebook reader .txt) 📕

the bishop to give you an introduction. If this man likes your work, he can pick up the hardware when he comes to pick up the lumber. That way, neither one of you have to worry about the cost of shipping. What do you think?”

“I already have a lot to do, but I’ll check with the bishop.”

He didn’t seem excited at the prospect. Eva dropped the subject. He scrutinized her face and she worried that some traces of her tears from last night might be remaining. “Are you okay?”

She managed a big smile this time. “Of course I am. I’m just stressed about starting school.”

“You’ll be fine. The kids will love you.” He waved away her concern. Her fake grin faded. She longed to tell him she might be leaving but she kept silent. One of them hurting inside was enough.

Willis glanced at Otto as the two of them were cleaning up the kitchen after supper that evening. “The first day of school is tomorrow. Are you excited?”

“Not really.” Otto slowly dried the plate in his hand.

Willis grunted. “I didn’t care for school, either.”

Otto looked at him. “Why?”

“It was hard for me. A lot harder than it was for my friends.”

Otto went back to drying the plate. “That’s the way it is for me, too. I’m just dumb, I guess.”

“I’ve heard you described a lot of ways but I have never heard anyone call you dumb.”

“Eva thinks I have something called dyslexia. Do you know anything about it?”

“I don’t. What does Miss Eva say about it?”

“She wants me to have some tests to see if I’ve got it. I don’t know. What good would it do?”

“Maybe they can cure it if they know what you’ve got.” Was he giving the boy false hope?

Harley came into the kitchen. “I heard about it from one of the Englisch kids back home. He said his older brother had it. He was going to be tested because his grades weren’t very good and sometimes it runs in families.”

Willis turned to look at Harley. “You mean more than one person in the family can have it?”

“That’s what he said.”

“Did he get tested? Did he have it?” Otto asked.

“I never found out. We moved here, and I never saw him again.”

Willis mulled over Harley’s information. Was it possible he had this dyslexia thing along with Otto? It would explain a lot.

Maddie came out of her bedroom in her pajamas. She had a book under her arm. She held it up to Willis. “Eva gave me a book from her library. Will you read it to me, Willis?”

“I’m busy, not now.” It was the same excuse he always used when he was confronted with something to read.

Her lips turned down in a frown. Willis wanted to read to her. He often made up stories for her. She didn’t know they weren’t the same words that were printed in the book he was looking at. But soon she would know and she would realize how ignorant her big brother was.

Harley reached over and took the book from her. “Come on, sprout. I’ll read it to you.” He looked at Willis and winked.

Willis’s mouth fell open. He knew. Harley knew that Willis couldn’t read. Shame left a bitter taste in his mouth. He had tried so hard to keep it a secret but a thirteen-year-old boy had figured it out. It made him wonder if Eva knew, too. He didn’t think he could bear that.

“Do you think I should be tested?” Otto asked.

“I don’t know.”

“Harley, me and Maddie, we all like Eva a lot.”

“I like her a lot, too.” He sensed that there was something more to Otto’s comment.

“Do you think you’ll ever get married?”

“Why is everyone so concerned with my marital status? If I don’t want to get married, I am not going to get married. That’s the end of it.” He hung his dish towel over the faucet and walked out of the room and out into the evening air.

The lights were off at Eva’s home. He wanted to see her but he decided against it. He began walking out to the road and instead of following it, he crossed it and went up to the school. He laid a hand on the building. It had been built to last. Harley’s grandchildren and great-grandchildren would stick their gum to the bottom of the seats, sing hymns and put on a Christmas play for their friends and family. He wished his experience had been different, but his childhood memories of school were mostly unhappy ones. He didn’t want that for Otto or for Harley and certainly not for Maddie.

Willis turned his footsteps toward home but he didn’t have enough willpower to pass by the schoolyard without checking to see if Eva was waiting on him on the swings.

She was.

He could still change his mind. He hesitated, but in the end he followed his heart and not his head. He sat down in the swing beside her. “You’re up late.”

“A little. I can’t sleep.”

“Nerves?”

She chuckled. “Exactly. That feeling of oh-what-have-I-gotten-myself-into? What has you walking the playground at this time of the night?”

“I have a lot of things on my mind.” He got up and walked a few steps away. Then he turned to her again. “You are one of them.”

“Me? Why do I trouble you?”

“Because I can’t stop thinking about you.”

“I think of you often, too.”

He took a step closer. “I don’t just think about you. I see you everywhere. I see you when I’m awake and I see you in my dreams. You’re in all the things the kids tell me. I can see your eyes smiling at me from across the road.”

She stared at the ground. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to be a distraction.”

“That is exactly what you are.” He walked toward her, bent down and kissed her. It was every bit as sweet as he had imagined it would be.

He moved his hand to the back of her head but she didn’t draw away.