Read Online Until I Love Again by Jerry S. Eicher - Free Book Online Page B

all without complaining or interfering with how I have raised you. I can only say how really sorry I am. I know that you have not sinned, Susanna, and that some of your troubles are a result of my own sin. Even so, Ernest has agreed to do for you what Linda did for me. Ernest will take you as his frau if you are willing. He will love you, and together you will bury the past. If you think anything else can be done, Susanna, you are wrong. None of the other young men from the community will take you as their frau . If you haven’t already noticed, then I can assure you this is true. Their parents will not allow them to marry a girl who has wild Englisha blood in her. And please don’t protest, Susanna. You have not helped in this matter. Even this afternoon when you left with this Joey fellow, you have shown us beyond a doubt that this is true. Something must be done or you will jump the fence into the world and be lost from us forever. Ernest is a kind man to consider taking you as his frau under these circumstances. And a brave man, I must say. We will all be forever in his debt.”
    Daett paused and dropped his gaze while Mamm glanced toward Susanna. Only now, this wasn’t her mamm . The thought tore through Susanna and left a fiery trail in its wake. How could this be? How could it be that her real mamm was an Englisha girl?
    Ernest spoke for the first time. “I believe we can make it together, Susanna. I know this is a shock to you, and I had my doubts whether this was the best way to approach things. I most desperately had wished to begin our relationship under different circumstances, but your daett has assured me that there isn’t much time. He thinks this is the best way to handle things. He wants you to know that I am willing to stand by you. I hope you understand.”
    Susanna tried to focus. Had Ernest spoken to her? The living room spun in slow circles around her. She tried to speak, but no sound came out of her mouth. Mamm ’s hand reached for hers, but the gas lantern on the ceiling slowly dimmed and Susanna felt herself sliding sideways on the couch. Daett ’s concerned cry was the last thing Susanna heard.

Chapter Nine

    T he next few days seemed to drag by as Susanna wrestled with the news that would change her life forever. What else in her world was not what she thought it was? The very question brought her to the edge of fresh tears.
    The following Sunday morning dawned with a clear sky, and a slight breeze blew in from the Adirondacks. The smell of cedar and spring was heavy in the air. Susanna closed the window of her upstairs bedroom and then climbed back into bed and pulled the heavy quilt over her head. She had left the kitchen after the breakfast dishes were finished. If she didn’t go back down soon, Mamm would be up to check on her, but Susanna would not go to the church services today. Mamm had to know that. The shame was too great. Plus, she still couldn’t think straight. Since she had passed out that evening on the living room couch, the horror of who she really was gripped her—and to think that most of the community knew all along. The ones from Mamm and Daett ’s generation had kept the origin of her birth a secret, divulging the information only to their sons if they showed an interest in her. This was why no community man had asked her home from the hymn singing.
    Surely by now everyone knew that she had wild Englisha blood. Those had been Daett ’s own words last Sunday night. Nothing could change that. If she had behaved herself in her rumspringa time, the past might have been overlooked—but she had stretched the limits of what was permissible. Even if she hadn’t, she might have never received a decent marriage proposal from an Amish man. The truth was, she was an outcast.
    Susanna buried her face in the quilt, but this time no tears came. Tears were a thing of the past. She had cried for three days straight last week. At