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but her legs wouldn’t move. She glanced down at the ugly metal braces strapped to them and drew in a shuddering breath. “Come back, Grandma. Come back to me!”
    Grandma was gone—vanished into some kind of a misty, thin air. Tears streamed down Rebekah’s face, and she trembled. “Please, please ... don’t leave me. I need you!”
    “Rebekah, what’s wrong? Why are you crying?”
    Rebekah turned and saw her mother moving slowly toward her. She extended her arms, but Mom kept walking right past Rebekah, heading in the same direction as Grandma had gone.
    “Mom, don’t go. Wait for me, please.” Rebekah struggled to lift her right foot, but it wouldn’t budge. She gritted her teeth and tried to move her left foot, but it seemed to be stuck like glue. “Don’t leave me! Don’t leave me!” she shouted as Mom disappeared into the eerie mist.
    “Calm down,” Dad said as he trudged past her. “You’ll wake
the dead if you keep on hollering that way.”
    “Something terrible is happening, and I can’t seem to stop it.” Rebekah gulped in some air and almost choked on a sob. “Can’t you make it stop, Dad? Can’t you bring Grandma and Mom back to me?”
    He shook his head and kept on walking as though he hadn’t heard a word she’d said.
    “I need you!” Rebekah shouted to her father’s retreating form. “I can’t make it on my own. I need someone to love me and care for my needs.”
    Dad lifted his hand in a backward wave; then he disappeared into the misty vapor.
    “Come back! Come back! Come back to me!”
    ***
    “Wake up, sister. Wake up. Do you hear me, Rebekah?”
    Rebekah felt someone shaking her shoulder, and she struggled to open her eyes. Was it Grandma? Had the dear woman come back from the shadow of death to be with her?
    She tossed her head from side to side and moaned. “Grandma. Grandma, don’t leave me.”
    “Rebekah, calm down at once, and look at me.”
    It took great effort on Rebekah’s part, but she forced her eyes open and squinted against the invading light. “Wh–where am I? What’s happened to Grandma?” she asked as Nadine’s face came into view.
    “You’re in your own bed. You must have been having a bad dream because I could hear you hollering all the way upstairs.” Nadine’s forehead wrinkled as she stared at Rebekah. “That must have been some nightmare you were havin’.”
    Rebekah nodded, noticing that her nightgown was sopping wet, and so were her sheets. “I—I dreamed that Grandma was with me, but she disappeared in a fog. Then Mom and Dad came along, and they vanished, too.” Her voice caught on a sob, and she shuddered. “It—it was so real, and I—I was so scared.”
    Nadine patted Rebekah’s shoulder. “You’ll feel better once the funeral is over. Mom says it’s easier to deal with the loss of a loved one once we see them buried and allow ourselves some time to grieve.”
    Grabbing the sides of her bed, Rebekah pulled herself to a sitting position. That’s right ... today was Grandma’s funeral. No one could have foreseen that just three short days ago the dear woman would be taken from them, but she had slipped quietly away from her family, making her journey home to be with the Lord. It had been determined that she’d died of a stroke. As soon as the news of her death had gotten out, the entire Amish community had rallied to do whatever was necessary in order to help with the preparations for the funeral service and the meal afterward.
    Rebekah supposed that was some comfort, but oh, how terribly she missed her dear grandma, and not just because the woman had taken care of Rebekah through so much of her childhood. Rebekah would miss everything about Grandma Stoltzfus—her kind, helpful ways; her soft-spoken words; and her sweet, tender spirit, which was a testimony of God’s love in action.
    ***
    As Rebekah rolled her wheelchair into the living room a short time later, she caught sight of Grandma’s coffin—a plain pine box