Read Online A Wedding for Julia by Vannetta Chapman - Free Book Online Page B

clothes on a Monday?
    Nein .
    She needed to go upstairs and change. Besides, the Englisch clothes she’d worn to the movies were still stuffed in her bag. Best to go to her bedroom first, the room she shared with her baby sister, Ruthie.
    She almost made it.
    But she stopped to look out the window that was positioned halfway up the stairs. Her brother Jonas was walking from the barn to the field. He looked so happy, almost as if he were whistling. At six thirty in the morning? What could he possibly be so happy about? Why was he content within their community and faith when she wasn’t?
    Shaking her head, she stepped back to continue up the stairs, and that was when she forgot to avoid the middle of the step. Nearly all of them creaked.
    Her mother had been walking from the kitchen toward the front door to throw out some water on the flower bed. When she heard the squeak, she detoured around to the stairs, thinking it was one of the boys, but instead she saw Sharon.
    Their eyes met, and Sharon was certain that her mother knew. What Marion couldn’t tell from Sharon’s disheveled appearance, she would guess.
    The question was, how much would she share with Sharon’s father?

    Marion didn’t bring up the matter until they were hanging the second load of laundry. The breakfast dishes had already been done, the boys were off to school, and Ruthie was playing in the leaves at their feet. Sharon’s little sister was nearly four, and if there was one thing she’d miss when she left home, it was the little tyke with curly hair who looked at her as if she were perfect.
    “What you did was wrong, Sharon.”
    “Which part?”
    “All of it.” Marion held up one end of the sheet while Sharon walked the other end down the line and pinned it.
    Laundry for two adults and seven children was an enormous task. One line alone was completely filled with Ruthie’s clothes. Sharon’s little sister was adept at making a mess. Two sets of dresses and aprons a day was not unusual for her. They would be lucky to be finished with the laundry by the time the boys returned from school.
    It was one of the reasons her parents had not pressured Sharon to find a job. Her mother could use all of the help her older daughter provided. At seventeen, no one was in a hurry to see her leave, though there had been several discussions about settling down and marrying when the right man came along. Sharon’s mind drifted to James, and she had to ask her mother to repeat what she’d just said.
    “You told us you were going to the singing.”
    “We did.”
    Her mother wagged a finger at her, a clothespin in one hand and the other hand planted on an ample hip. When had her mother gained so much weight? When Sharon was young, she’d been thin and beautiful. She still was beautiful, but—
    “We’re only having this conversation alone if you speak truthfully. I still plan on speaking with your dat , but things might…” She took the clothespin and attached it to a pillowcase. “Things might go better if you aren’t in the room at the time. I’ll speak to him tonight after dinner, and I’ll bake his favorite dessert too. Soften him up some.”
    “Oh, mamm . What difference does it make? He’s going to blow the hat off the top of his head either way.”
    Marion peered at her from between two of Ruthie’s dresses. “Why did you do it, Sharon? Why do you keep testing him so?”
    Sharon didn’t answer immediately. Instead, she continued hanging the laundry as she mulled over her mother’s question. When the last piece of bedding was hung, she plopped down on the ground. Ruthie immediately crawled into her lap. Somehow it was easier to speak the things of her heart while holding her baby sister.
    “Have you always wanted…” Her hand came out to encompass the laundry, the fields, the barn, and even the house. “This?”
    Marion swiped at her hair, pushing it back into her kapp . She moved over and sat down on the ground with a grunt that made