Huckleberry Christmas by Jennifer Beckstrand

Author:Jennifer Beckstrand [Beckstrand, Jennifer]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Kensington Publishing Corp.
Published: 2014-08-18T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter Sixteen

She knew she’d have to arise mighty early. Tyler got up hours before the sun.

But it didn’t matter. She hadn’t been able to sleep anyway, so getting up at 4 AM. wasn’t much of a hardship. She slipped her dress and apron and sweatpants on, kissed Toby while he slept, and tiptoed out the front door.

Her fingers already felt half-frozen as she clumsily saddled the horse. The buggy might not make it down the hill in all this snow, and she had to get to Yoders’ immediately. She’d never felt such a profound sense of urgency.

The ride to Tyler’s took almost half an hour. She’d covered every part of her body that might be exposed to the frosty air, except for the open folds of her scarf she left for her eyes. By the time the Yoders’ two silos came into sight, she shivered with cold. A three-story white barn housed the family dairy. Two thick silos stood next to the barn, and snow-covered pastures surrounded it on three sides. The barn was built into a rise of earth that made up two walls of the first level.

Beth trudged up the incline through the snow and cracked open a door on the second floor of the barn. The loud hisses and clicks of the several milking machines attacked her ears. She slipped into the barn and closed the door behind her. It wasn’t toasty—ice formed on the cement floor on the edges closest to the outside walls—but it was at least twenty degrees warmer than outside.

A dozen cows stood patiently while Tyler, his parents, and his brother tended to them in the well-coordinated effort of milking. Everyone seemed to have a job and few words were spoken, which turned out to be a good thing because the noise of the milking machines drowned out normal speech. Tyler and his brother Joe washed teats and hooked the animals up to milking machines. His mamm kept an eye on the knobs connected to the tubes and pipes running across the ceiling, while his dat sprayed the floor using a high-pressure sprayer.

Beth stepped timidly toward Tyler’s mamm where she sat on her stool checking gauges. She caught sight of Beth, and a frown flitted across her face before giving way to a reserved half smile. “Nice to see you, Beth,” she yelled above the din of the machines. “I hope you are feeling better today.”

It was a good guess that Tyler’s mamm had heard about Beth’s blow-up at the pond yesterday, although his mamm most likely hadn’t heard the news from Tyler. He never said anything bad about anybody, even when they deserved it. Even when they’d had no call to attack him.

By this time, Tyler’s dat, Joe, and Tyler were all looking Beth’s way. Joe and the bishop appeared mildly curious. Tyler acted as if he were torn between sprinting out the back door and ignoring Beth’s presence altogether. His expression mirrored the one he’d worn on the first day she’d met him.

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