Des Tswet Des Drit Sich

“STOP!!!”

I skidded to a halt, handle on the door, ready to rush out. When Mother gives permission to play, you don’t stop to give her time to have second thoughts.

“You came in that door! You’re old enough to know by now, to leave by another! And don’t you bring bad luck on Jakey’s family, you do the same there, or else misfortune befall!”

“Ay-yi-yi, Mother, I’ll remember! Thank you for permission!”

And I was gone.

Honestly, Mother is, as we say, “muchly much.” No swimming after eating for at least thirty minutes, and any lip got you five minutes more. No eating ice cream after eating fish for dinner, because that’s how the English boy’s Matty died, and no matter that he got the wheezes after eating fish for years. No sleeping outside, because a centipede will crawl in your ear. It happened, you know, to my cousin’s nephew’s camp mate, two generations ago.

Superstitious nonsense, but Mother lives by it. She drove both of my sisters-in-law crazy, telling them what to eat, when, how much, when they got pregnant. Now she brutzes when they don’t speak to her, and blames them for their babies being too fat. Or thin. Or sad. My nieces and nephews are doing fine, but don’t ask Mother her opinion on the “ungrateful not-daughters” that her “foolish sons” married.

At fourteen, and a come-along-behinder that has to still mind her every problem, I will be very, very glad to go on Rumspringa. Just to get away from her.

I feel sorry for Father, but he chose her, so I don’t feel as bad as I should.

Fourteen. A young man in my community, but still a child in other ways. Why shouldn’t I play with Jakey, while I’m still young? We usually go fishing, and talk about what we want to do when we grow up.

Getting out, I mean. Rumspringa. None of Mother’s stupid rules, none of Jakey’s father’s hypocrisy. Pious Elder on Sundays, drunken sot the rest of the time. Mildred, Jakey’s younger sister, has her cap set for me, and I’ll have none of it. Won’t leave us alone, neither, unless we make ourselves scarce at the river. Last time she followed us to bother me, we made her clean our catch. In her nice courting dress. Then, she finally left us alone.

When I got there, Jakey was ready, with both fishing rods.

So was Mildred. Peeling apples.

Uh-oh.

“John! John! Look, come see! I peeled the apple! It spelled your initial, look!” Mildred had jumped up, dragged me over to the fire, where apples were being cooked into applesauce. Sure enough, a peel was tossed near the fire ring, and it spelled out a “J.”

Hannah, one of the older sisters, snorted. “So, is it for John? Or Johannes? Josiah? Jurgen? Jethro? Or, perhaps, Jacob, your own brother?”

Jakey reached down, plucked up the peel, and twisted it. It’s supposed to be a full peel, all in one stripe, that is cut evenly. He re-formed it in his cupped hand, and it was obviously only half a peel. “Nice try, Mildred. Next time, try feeding him cheese, I heard that works.”

Mildred sputtered, Hannah laughed, and we skedaddled.

Jakey looked especially nervous, peering behind us, shifting sideways on the path to the river, climbing trees to scout like a soldier. I was beginning to get nervous myself, wondering what was going on in that noggin of his.

When we got to the river, I couldn’t take it any more. “Jakey, what’s wrong? You’re jittery, like you have ants in your pants.”

“I kinda do, John.” Jakey lifted his shirt, and I hissed. The welts were purpled, and horribly bruising.

“Your father?”

“Yes. And Ma gave me the ‘you must forgive him’ song and dance again. I’m done.” He handed me both poles, rummaged in a pricker bush. He pulled out his pack without a scratch. “I’m leaving, John. Now. Tonight. I stole a nickel out of Ma’s pin money, called my brother. You know the one.”

I knew. No one was allowed to say Amos’ name out loud, because he chose to stay with the English. Outside our community means outside the faith, so he was excommunicated.

“He’s coming for me. Something about bringing his roommate’s automobile. He can get us settled, help us find some jobs. There are people, he says, who help ease people into the English world, during Rumspringa. Others helped him, so he says he’s, um, paying it forward. Asked me to invite you, too.”

“Me?”

“He knows your ma’s a few bricks shy of a load. He has lots of friends in the Gay Deutsch community. Lots less strict than us Plain People. Knows a few farmers that could use a hand with the crops, and will pay fair wage. What say you?”

“But… my things…”

“What things?”

I thought. What was mine, indeed? Hand-me-down clothes. The rest belonged to Father, and he reminded me of that fact weekly.

“Let’s go.”

Fording the river isn’t hard. You just follow the deer path to the shallow spot, and be careful when crossing. Some of those rocks are very slippery, and that’s where Jakey stubbed his toe, hard.

“Ay du gut!” I helped Jakey get to the far bank, where he hopped and spit and said bad things that neither of us should know to say. Of course we did, but, well, a stubbed toe hurts like dunnervedder.

I nearly jumped out of my skin when I heard Mother’s voice, clear as day, say, “That’s one.”

I looked around, but I saw nobody.

Jakey was all for continuing, but I bade him sit, and I made him wiggle his toes. Not broken, then. He mentioned an ax in his pack that certainly shouldn’t be there, so I chopped and trimmed a walking stick for him. I couldn’t hide all the evidence, but it was better than nothing.

We moved on.

Skirting some fields without being seen would be tricky. Alfalfa’s too short, and corn’s too wicked. Those leaves will slice you to ribbons, if you go running in them like a dummkopp. We settled for limping down one of the dirt lanes, lined with walnut trees.

I’d left my hat back at the river, I guess, and I didn’t pay attention to the squirrel chittering above us, because when a cluster of three nuts dropped square on my bare noggin, it hurt.

Jakey was gasping, trying to keep the laughter inside. I glared, and he remembered I’d helped him with his toe without laughing. He helped me clean off the worst of the juice stain – after I threw the nuts, one at a time, back at the culprit who nipped them off the tree. I may have said something about wanting his hide for a hat, but he finally scampered out of reach.

And I heard Mother’s voice: “That’s two!”

I’m not listening, Mother!

On we walked, far away from our homes.

As the sun was setting, I figured we’d be missed about now, and said as much.

Jakey nodded. “Amos said he’d meet us where the north road became gravel. This is Wentzel’s road, and where that oak is, that starts Zimmerman’s land. Beyond that, the gravel. And Amos, with any luck.”

“Our luck’s not the best so far. Maybe we should have stolen a horseshoe, to change it.”

“Stole it? Are you mad? Let’s go, before that walnut juice stains your brain, too.”

On we walked, into the twilight.

We heard the clop-clop before we saw anyone. It was twilight, so easy to hobble off the road, into the bushes. Spicebush, luckily, because this is where the poison ivy also likes to take hold. We hid, still as mice, as the rider passed by.

Jakey’s father. We could see his silhouette, unmistakable. Wait, isn’t if bad luck to ride the farm stock? That’s what we were told, anyways, every time we tried to ride a goat, a dog, one of the cows. We spurned sheep, or I’d’ve been mutton busting from an early age.

But Jakey’s father passed right on by – straight to the meeting point.

Oh, no…

We followed, but quietly. The night chorus of tree crickets and cicadas covered our noise, but I now dreaded what might happen.

Suddenly, two lights!

And silhouetted in them, was Jakey’s father, perched on a giant draft horse.

We hurried on, but could hear every word.

“You! I should have known. What are you doing here?”

“None of your business, Father. And you’re talking to someone who’s been excommunicated, naughty naughty! What would the Bishop say? Shame, Father, shame, shame!”

Jakey’s father then spit some words I shan’t translate, they were that bad. Those words should have never come out of an Elder’s mouth.

“Get over yourself, old man. You can’t scare me anymore.”

“Give the boys back, and I’ll forget this ever happened.”

Amos laughed. “You can see for yourself, they’re not here. Nothing to give back. They’re grown, old man, and you can no longer command them, either. Go home. Go back to your bottle, the only thing you care about.”

“You! Go away, back to whatever infernal hell that spawned you! You can’t take my other son! My line will die!”

“Oh, please. Just like you, to think the girls are worth nothing, and the boys are the only children with value. But the girls will leave, sooner than later, to get away from you. And the boys have now left, and won’t come back. What’s the matter, worried that everyone will see you for what you are, a failure? Let the farm go to one of your son-in-laws, they’ll do better than you will, with your dandelion hooch.”

“Get lost, boy, or I’ll run you over.”

Amos moved in the shadows behind the headlights, and there was a click-click. “Go on, try. I’m warning you: you are standing where I’m about to shoot.”

A silhouetted snarl. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“Sure would. Recognize Grandfather’s gun? Winchester. Sure, it’s only bird shot, but that’ll get Old Gideon there moving rather fast. Are you so sure of your balance, that you can stay on, when he bolts?”

Silence.

And Jakey’s father turned, and left.

He didn’t even see us standing there, off to the side.

Amos did. He waited till their father was well gone, then strode forward, grinning. “Boys! So good to see you. Let’s go, let’s get out of here.”

We stumbled forward, but Jakey stopped where his father had been. Bent, and picked up a giant horseshoe.

Amos shook his head. “Poor Gideon. Keep it, Jake, for luck.” Jakey nodded, put it in his pack.

We slid into the car, and Amos turned the car towards the macadam, and the lights of a distant city.

The tire didn’t go flat till we were getting gasoline at a station, and we helped Amos put the spare on while he swore just about as bad as his father. Horses almost seem better, but it is easier to change a tire, than re-shoe a horse.

And I heard Mother’s gleeful voice, “That’s three!” I sighed, and touched the horseshoe when I got back in the car.

Sorry, Mother, I’m on Rumspringa. It may be early, and it may be forever, but there are things I’m leaving in the past.

But I picked up the rusty nail that had flattened the tire.

Just in case.