She’d told herself she was celebrating Jase asking to go to the get-together with her. But underneath, she knew the motivation for chowing down on those broken chunks of brownies. She’d seen the one Jase loved. The girl with shiny, straight blond hair instead of unruly red curls, with a trim figure instead of a pudgy one, with sky-blue eyes instead of pond-water-green ones. How could she possibly compare with someone who looked so perfect?
The emptiness brought on by inadequacy gnawed at her, and she couldn’t rest until she’d somehow filled that gigantic hole. Her stomach was full now. Achingly full. Sickeningly full. But the emptiness was still in place.
She was a special kind of fool to fall for a minister, a man who had it all together. She’d be an emotional drain on him, the way she was to her dad during her teenage years. Dad had told her too many times to count that if she couldn’t get her act together, there wasn’t a man in the world who’d take her on. And he was right. Especially when it came to Jase. Jase was too good for her, and that was a fact.
She pressed her finger to a crumb, turned her finger upside down, and carried the bit to her mouth. She put the crumb in her mouth. Let it sit on her tongue for a few seconds. Swallowed. Then she turned off all the lights, curled up into a ball on the corner of her sofa, and stared into black nothingness.
Kenzie
Kenzie spread Lori’s outfit across the end of her bed. The women had arranged for Lori to take a quick shower and change into fresh clothes at Kenzie’s before going to the bowling party. Kenzie smoothed wrinkles with her palms. The tunic and leggings had been rolled up in a sack with a makeup pouch all day, and it showed. But even wrinkled, the pieces were cute—floral leggings and a kelly-green tunic with ruffled bell sleeves. Kenzie could never wear something so flashy, but it was perfect for her perky friend.
She put Lori’s makeup pouch on the bathroom vanity, then went to the living room. She’d already washed up and changed for the get-together. A customary T-shirt, this one baby blue, over a midcalf-length broomstick skirt and her tennis shoes. Compared to the ankle-length plain-colored dresses she’d worn throughout her childhood and teen years, even this outfit was flashy. But compared to the clothes worn by the women her age at church, even though they dressed modestly, she usually looked plain.
She didn’t belong in her Amish community anymore. But did she really belong here? Why was she questioning it so much these days?
Voices on the stairs alerted her to Lori and Brother Jase’s arrival. She opened the door as they stepped up on her small landing, and she welcomed them in. Lori gave Kenzie a quick hug, then darted for the bedroom and closed the door. That left Kenzie with Brother Jase, who remained just inside the door with his hands in the pockets of his tan cargo shorts. Lori had told her she’d need to entertain him, but until that moment she hadn’t quite realized it meant they’d be alone.
She stared at him, uncertain. When she’d checked her email after work, she’d been surprised to find one from him, sent to her FinderznotKeeperz account. She wished she could have told him she had his ring, but his description, although close, hadn’t included an inscription. Ruby said the real owner would know about the words etched inside the band. Even though she’d already sent her standard “Sorry, not your ring” message to him, she was tempted to ask him about the ring he’d lost. But then he’d know she was FinderznotKeeperz, and he’d surely ask where she had found the ring. If she told him the ring was in the pocket of some donated clothes she used for her rugs, she might let slip what she did with her projects. “But when thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth.” The biblical instruction of Matthew 6:3 was as woven into her being as the strips were onto the loom’s strings. Worried that it might sound like she was bragging about her mission work, she held her tongue.
He grinned and bobbed his head in the direction of the sofa. “Do you mind if I sit?”
Some hostess she was, staying as silent as a statue