Still Life in Shadows Read Online Free PDF

into his back pocket. When he reached the front door, Amos called after him, “Do most?”
     
    “Do you mean, do most escapees stay or go back to their communities?”
     
    “Yes, that’s what I meant.” Amos stood at his elbow now.
     
    Gideon thought for a moment. “I know of only one kid I helped who ended up returning to his family in Goshen.”
     
    “What happened?”
     
    “Let’s just say he sowed his wild oats and then ran out of money.”
     
    “Couldn’t he get a job to support himself? That’s what I plan to do.” Amos’s chest seemed to expand, pride filtering through his squared shoulders.
     
    Gideon shrugged. “I think he missed his family.” He felt a large sigh here would add weight to his statement, but no sigh formed in his lungs. “The real world is not an easy place for everyone, Amos. Even for the English born into it.” Amos wouldn’t fully understand his words. It would take time to grasp them in the fibers of his being and feel their value.
     
    “Come on over for dinner,” Gideon said. “D’you like chitlin stew?”
     
    Amos’s face showed he had yet to experience the food culture of the South.
     
    Gideon retrieved a dog-eared business card from his pocket and scribbled his address on the back. “I live in another set of apartments about a mile from here.”
     
    Amos took the card and glanced at himself in the mirror on the stark wall. “Do I look like I could fit in?”
     
    “Depends on what you want to fit into.”
     
    The boy studied his features. “I’ll never grow a beard. I won’t look Amish.”
     
    “It’s not just about looks. The heart has a way of coming into play.” Gideon could have said more, could have explained how it took some time away from a religion so entrenched in a culture and a lifestyle before you could recognize what you wanted to keep and what you wantedto toss. The tossing held its own set of demons. But as the boy yawned twice, Gideon decided to let him get some rest. He’d save his sermons for their dinner conversation.
     
    T he truth was, Gideon thought as he made his way back to the shop, the one kid who went back to life in Goshen—Ezra Wagner, a wide-eyed boy with a frothy laugh—was not around to tell the story. Although his family had welcomed him back, and he’d joined the church, married a Yoder girl, grown a long brown beard, and worn the customary black attire each Sunday, he wasn’t happy. One night he’d packed a small bag and left again. Months passed; he didn’t come back to Twin Branches or to Goshen. To this day, Gideon had no idea where he was.
     
    But there were rumors. There would always be rumors, and rumor had it that Ezra had moved to California and married a local girl he met at a bookstore. Ezra never told her he was already married to Annie Yoder because to the day he died, she was to be his wife. Mr. Yoder had made that clear. Divorce was not an option in the Old Order Amish community of Goshen, Indiana.
     
    Ezra was still on Gideon’s mind when he entered the shop, but what he saw in his bay jolted him quickly from his thoughts. There she was—that girl—seated on the floor, with her bike leaning beside her on its kickstand. He stifled the urge to tell her to get out.
     
    Ormond and Luke hovered around her as she removed the front wheel.
     
    She smiled at them and then, without any sign of strain, put the wheel back on.
     
    Gideon had watched his own mother swiftly and effortlessly use a treadle-powered sewing machine to create clothes for his family. He was still in awe of her expertise, and since that time he’d not experienced that sense of wonder. Yet here was this girl, this troublemaker. What was her name? With the help of a pair of open-end wrenches, she’d taken off the wheel and replaced it. Just like that.
     
    Seeing Gideon, Kiki announced she was going to adjust the brake pads. She spun the front wheel and the back, working the brakes as they made a shrill noise. Then, using