Growing up in lancaster.., p.37
Growing Up in Lancaster County, page 37
Finally, she placed the pie in the oven, shut the door, and set the timer for fifty minutes.
“Now I think I’ll make some bookmarks using the pressed flowers I have in my room,” Rachel said. She hurried out of the kitchen and was halfway up the stairs when she remembered that she’d forgotten to take the ladder back to the barn.
“Guess I’d better do it now,” she mumbled. “If I don’t, I might forget.”
Rachel raced out of the house and headed straight for the pasture. The ladder seemed even heavier as she dragged it back to the barn.
By the time Rachel returned to the house, she was tired. Guess I can make the bookmarks some other time, she decided.
Rachel flopped into a chair and rested her head on the table. She felt so drowsy.
Ding! Ding! Ding! Rachel’s eyes popped open, and she jumped out of her chair. “The pie! I’ve gotta check on the pie!”
She opened the oven door and stuck a knife into the pie. The apples seemed tender, so she grabbed a pot holder, removed the pie, and placed it on a cooling rack on the counter.
“It looks pretty good,” Rachel said, feeling rather pleased with herself. Juice oozed through the piecrust, begging her to taste it, but she summoned her willpower. She needed to wait until it was time to serve the pie for dessert tonight, and she couldn’t let on that this wasn’t the pie Mom had baked.
Rachel yawned and stretched her arms over her head. Doing grown-up things sure took a lot of work.
“I smell somethin’ good,” Jacob said as he entered the kitchen through the back door. “What’s for lunch?”
“It’s an apple pie you smell, and I don’t know what’s for lunch yet, because I’ve been busy with other things,” Rachel said.
“Are you going to start lunch soon?” he asked.
“I guess so.”
“Well, do more than guess so. Grandpa will be in from the greenhouse soon, and he’ll be hungry.” Jacob marched across the room, took the cookie jar down from the cupboard, and grabbed four peanut butter cookies. Then he turned to Rachel and said, “I’ll be outside with Buddy. Call me when lunch is ready.”
“You could at least offer to help,” Rachel mumbled when the door banged shut behind Jacob. She glanced out the window and saw him heading for Buddy’s dog run. When Jacob opened the gate, Buddy ran out, jumped up, and licked Jacob’s face. Jacob pushed Buddy down and held out a cookie. Buddy opened his mouth and took a bite; then Jacob popped the rest of the cookie into his own mouth.
Rachel wrinkled her nose. “Yuk! Boys can be so gross. I’d never let that bad-breathed mutt touch my cookie with his big dirty mouth!”
She turned toward the refrigerator to find something for lunch. That evening, Esther, Rudy, and their baby came for supper. Little Ben still had no hair, but at least his face wasn’t so red and wrinkly anymore. Rachel figured that after a few more weeks, he might look almost as cute as Hannah.
“Who’s ready for dessert?” Mom asked after the family members had finished their chicken and dumplings.
“I’m pretty full,” Rudy said, “but I might have room for a little more. What are we having?”
“I baked an apple pie this morning before I came over to your place,” Mom said. She pushed back her chair and started to get up, but Rachel jumped up first.
“I can serve the pie,” Rachel said. “Why don’t you stay at the table and visit?”
“Are you sure?” Mom peered at Rachel over the top of her glasses. She looked as though she thought Rachel couldn’t serve the pie by herself.
“I’m very sure.” Rachel hurried across the room and took a knife and pie server from the drawer. Then she pulled back the dish towel covering the pie and cut the pie into eight even pieces. Next, she took eight plates down from the cupboard.
“You’re certainly getting tall, Rachel,” Esther commented. “You didn’t have to reach very far at all to get those plates.”
Rachel smiled and stretched herself so she would appear even taller. “I think I’ve grown almost an inch this week.”
“I think you might have at that,” Pap said with a chuckle and a twinkle in his eyes. “Jah, Rachel’s growing like a weed.”
Rachel grinned as she lifted the pieces of pie out of the pan and placed them carefully on the plates. After she’d given everyone some pie, she took a seat at the table.
“Mmm…this sure looks good.” Rudy took a big bite, and a strange expression came over his face. He grabbed his cup of coffee and quickly swallowed some.
Jacob bit into his piece of pie. “Agggh…this pie’s baremlich!” He jumped out of his chair, rushed over to the garbage, and spit out the pie. Then he grabbed a glass from the cupboard, turned on the water at the sink, and took a big drink.
Mom took a bite of pie and made a horrible face. “This can’t be the same pie I made today,” she said with a shake of her head. “Something is definitely wrong with this pie.”
Rachel slumped in her seat as her face turned warm. She’d blown it again, and she figured she’d better confess right away.
“I baked the pie,” she admitted.
Mom’s mouth dropped open. “What?”
Rachel quickly explained how she’d put her elbow in Mom’s pie and then went out to the pasture and picked some apples so she could make another pie.
“You picked apples from a tree in the pasture?” Pap asked.
Rachel nodded. “They were kind of small, so I had to use sixteen instead of eight.”
Pap stared at the piece of pie on his plate; then he looked back at Rachel. “Those apples you picked from the pasture are crab apples, Rachel. They’re sour and tart and not meant for baking pies.”
“Oh no!” Rachel cried. “How could I have made such a mistake? I’m just a big dummkopp [dunce].”
“Now, Rachel, don’t be so hard on yourself. Everyone makes mistakes sometimes.” Mom patted Rachel’s arm. “If you’d told me what happened to my pie as soon as I got home from Esther’s, I’d have helped you bake another pie.”
“But there were no more apples on the tree in our yard,” Rachel said.
“We could have baked some other kind.”
“Trouble, trouble, trouble!” Rachel moaned. “My life’s always full of trouble!”
“Trouble’s like a bubble,” Grandpa said. “It soon pops and moves away. Why, I’ll bet by tomorrow you’ll have forgotten all about the pie you made today.”
Rachel sniffed, trying to hold back her tears. “But now we have no dessert.”
“I think I can take care of that.” Pap rose from his chair. “I’ll make a big batch of popcorn, and we’ll have some warm apple cider to go with it.”
“You didn’t make it with crab apples, I hope,” said Henry.
Pap shook his head. “Although I’ve heard that adding a few crab apples to a batch of cider can make the flavor a bit more interesting.”
Rachel wrinkled her nose. “I think I’d prefer my cider and pie without any crab apples, thank you very much.”
Everyone laughed, even Rachel. She was glad that no one in the family seemed to be mad about the pie she’d ruined.
My day might have started out on a wrong note, she thought, but it turned out good in the end, and that’s all that counts.
Chapter 11
Bad Advice
Tap! Tap! Tap! “Rachel, are you in there?”
Rachel sighed. She’d just sat on the floor to look at some of the flowers she had pressed, and she didn’t want to be disturbed.
“What do you want, Jacob?” she called through her closed door.
“I need to talk to you.”
“About what?”
Tap! Tap! Tap! “Can I come in?”
Rachel sighed again. “I suppose.”
The door opened, and Jacob stepped into Rachel’s room. He raked his fingers through the sides of his hair. “I was wondering if you’d do me a favor.”
“What favor?” she asked.
“I need a haircut.”
Rachel’s eyebrows shot up. “You want me to cut your hair?”
He gave a quick nod.
Rachel shook her head really hard. “I’ve never cut anyone’s hair before. That’s Mom’s job.”
“But Mom’s not here. She’s been busy helping Esther, and she never has time to cut my hair.”
Rachel sat there shaking her head.
Jacob came over and took a seat beside her on the floor. “Come on, Rachel; you can do it. I know you can.”
“I—I don’t think so. I might mess it up.”
“I’m sure you won’t. You’ve seen Mom do it many times. Please, Rachel, it can’t be that hard.”
“I don’t know—”
Jacob touched her arm. “It’s just a simple cut. Maybe you could put a bowl on my head and cut around it.”
Rachel snickered. “Jah, right, Jacob. Now that would really be dumm [dumb].”
He chuckled. “Maybe so, but I’m sure if you just take your time, you can cut my hair with no trouble at all.”
“I have trouble with almost everything these days,” Rachel said. “I think you should wait until Mom has time to cut your hair.”
“She may never have the time,” Jacob argued. “Between taking care of Hannah, helping Esther with Ben, and keeping things going around here, she’s busier than a bird building a nest.”
Rachel couldn’t argue with that. Mom was busier than ever these days, and Rachel had been given a lot more chores to do since Hannah came along.
Jacob shook Rachel’s arm. “Will you cut my hair or not?”
“No.”
“I’ll pay you a quarter.” “That’s not enough.” “How about fifty cents?” “Make it a dollar and I’ll do it.” Jacob frowned. “You drive a hard bargain, Rachel. Are you sure you won’t do it for less?”
She folded her arms and shook her head.
“Okay, I’ll pay you one dollar for cutting my hair.” Jacob jumped up. “I’ll get the scissors and meet you in the kitchen,” he called as he raced out the door.
Rachel groaned and rose to her feet. “I sure hope I don’t mess up Jacob’s hair.”
When Rachel entered the kitchen a few minutes later, she found Jacob sitting in a chair in the middle of the room. A pair of scissors and a comb lay on the counter. He smiled up at her. “Ready?”
“Ready as I’ll ever be, I guess.” Rachel picked up the comb and ran it through the sides of Jacob’s hair.
“What are you doing? You’re supposed to be cutting my hair, not combing it,” he grumbled.
“I know, but I need to make sure all the ends are straight before I begin.” Truthfully, that was only part of the reason Rachel had combed Jacob’s hair. She was really stalling for time. “I—uh—need to clean my glasses so I can see clearly what I’m doing.”
“Your glasses don’t look dirty to me.” Jacob grunted. “Just hurry up and get this done. I don’t have all day!”
Rachel gritted her teeth and picked up the scissors. It would serve Jacob right if she cut all his hair off and he ended up bald like baby Ben. Snip! Snip! She cut one side, and then she moved to the other. Snip! Snip!
“Oops!”
“Oops, what?” Jacob’s forehead wrinkled. “What’d you do to my hair, Rachel?”
“Uh—the left side looks a little shorter than the right side.”
Jacob raced to the mirror hanging on the wall. “It’s not so bad,” he said, pulling his fingers through the left side of his hair. “All you need to do is cut a little more hair off the right side of my head and everything will be fine.”
Rachel wasn’t so sure about that, but she nodded and said, “Take a seat.”
Jacob plunked down in his chair and turned his head so the right side was facing Rachel.
She picked up the scissors. Snip! Snip!
“Oh, oh.”
Jacob’s eyes widened. “‘Oh, oh,’ what, Rachel?”
“Now the right side looks shorter.”
“Then take a little more off the left side.” Jacob glanced at the clock on the wall. “And hurry up. I don’t want to be sitting here all day.”
Rachel studied the left side of Jacob’s hair; then she studied the right side. She snipped a little here and a little there. Finally, she smiled and said, “I think both sides are even now.”
“What about the back? You haven’t cut any of that yet,” Jacob said.
Rachel moved behind Jacob and lifted the scissors. Snip! Snip! Snip!
“‘Oh no!” she groaned.
“‘Oh no,’ what?” Jacob frowned. “What’d you do to my hair, Rachel?”
Rachel shifted from one foot to the other. “Well, I—uh—”
“Just say it, Rachel! Tell me what you did!”
Rachel’s chin quivered, and her eyes filled with tears. “Th–there’s a chunk of hair missing, and—and it looks real bad.”
Jacob touched the back of his head and winced. “Can’t you fix it?”
She shook her head. “Not unless you want me to glue it back on.”
“Very funny, Rachel.” He scowled at her. “Wait until Mom sees what you’ve done!”
Rachel gulped, wondering what kind of punishment Mom would dish out for this.
“This is what I get for listening to you,” she said, pointing at Jacob. “You begged me to cut your hair, and you said it wouldn’t be hard.” She slowly shook her head. “You gave me some very bad advice!”
Jacob grunted. “You’re the one who messed up my hair, so don’t blame me. You should have held the scissors steadier and paid closer attention to what you were doing.”
Rachel dropped the scissors on the counter and held out her hand. “Where’s my money?”
“What money?”
“The money you said you’d pay me for cutting your hair.”
Jacob pulled his fingers through the back of his hair and grunted. “You expect me to pay you for messing up my hair?”
Rachel nodded. “You said you would.” She figured if she got paid, it might make her feel a little better. After Mom came home and looked at Jacob’s hair, Rachel knew she wouldn’t feel good about anything.
Jacob marched across the room to the mirror. He turned his head from side to side; then his face got red.
“I can’t see what you did to the back of my head,” he said, glaring at Rachel, “but I can see what you did to the sides, and they look baremlich!” He grabbed his straw hat from the wall peg and pushed it on his head. “I’ll never be able to take my hat off again!”
“Sure you will…as soon as your hair grows out.” Rachel held out her hand. “Are you going to pay me or not?”
“No, I’m definitely not!”
“You’d better keep your promise, Jacob Yoder.” By now, Rachel’s patience had ended. She hadn’t wanted to cut Jacob’s hair in the first place, but he’d insisted. She wished she hadn’t let him talk her into it. What a huge mistake.
“I won’t pay you one single cent!” Jacob shouted.
“What’s all the yelling about?” Mom asked as she came through the back door with Hannah. “I could hear you two hollering clear out by the buggy shed.”
Mom halted, and her mouth dropped open. “Ach, Jacob! What happened to your hair?”
Jacob pointed at Rachel. “She cut it, and now it’s ruined!”
Rachel gulped. How could she explain her way out of this? She couldn’t fix the mistake she’d made on Jacob’s hair, and she sure couldn’t hide it, either. “Er hot mich verschwetzt [He talked me into it],” she said, pointing at Jacob.
Mom squinted at Jacob as she shifted Hannah to her other arm. “You asked Rachel to cut your hair?”
Jacob’s face turned red as he nodded slowly.
“Why’d you do that, Jacob? Why didn’t you ask me to cut your hair?” Mom questioned.
“I did ask, but you always said you were too busy.” Jacob pointed to his hair. “I didn’t think it’d be that hard to cut, so I asked Rachel to do it.”
“Actually, he begged me to cut it,” Rachel said. “He even promised to give me a dollar if I cut it, but now he won’t pay what he owes.”
Mom’s eyebrows furrowed as she looked at Jacob. “I’m not happy that you asked Rachel to cut your hair. You should have waited until I had the time.”
Jacob hung his head. “I know that now.”
“But since you did ask her, and since you promised to pay her for doing it, then you need to make good on that promise.” Mom tipped Jacob’s chin up so he was looking at her. “I should make you go around with your hair like that until it grows out.”
Jacob’s eyes got real huge. “Aw, Mom, please, can’t you do something to make me look better?”
“I suppose I can try to even it up some.” Mom handed the baby to Rachel. “Hannah has a dirty windel, so I’d like you to change it while I trim Jacob’s hair.”
Rachel wrinkled her nose. “Eww…do I have to?”
Mom nodded. “You should be glad I’m not punishing you for cutting your bruder’s hair.”
“Changing a dirty windel is punishment to me,” Rachel mumbled as she carried Hannah out of the room.
On Saturday morning that week, Rachel was headed outside to feed her cats when a blond head appeared around the corner of the barn. It was her English friend Sherry.
“Hi, Rachel,” Sherry said. “I came over to see if you could play.”
Rachel smiled and lifted the sack of cat food in her hands. “As soon as I feed my cats, I’ll be free for the rest of the day.”
“Do you need to check with your folks first and see if they want you to do something else?” Sherry asked.
Rachel shook her head. “Mom took Hannah over to my sister Esther’s house awhile ago, and she’ll probably be gone for several hours. Pap, Henry, and Jacob are working in the fields, so they won’t need me.”
“What about your grandpa? Will he need your help in the greenhouse?”
Rachel shook her head again. “I don’t think so. He hasn’t had much for me to do there lately.”
“That’s too bad. I know how much you like working in the greenhouse,” Sherry said.
“I do,” Rachel agreed, “but I’ve been busy with schoolwork and other things.”
