Free Leah's Choice by Emma Miller

couldn’t help wishing that her church could reach out to help strangers.
    As everyone made final preparations for bed, Leah let Jeremiah, Irwin’s little terrier, outside to relieve himself. Mam had gotten her share of disapproving looks from her neighbors for permitting a dog to sleep in the house instead of in the barn with Flora, the family’s sheepdog, but Mam had stood her ground. Irwin had been a lost and troubled boy, and Jeremiah an abandoned mutt. The two had bonded from the first day that Leah’s sister, Ruth, had carried the starving pup home, and Mam insisted that Jeremiah and Irwin had healed each other. Usually, Jeremiah curled up at the foot of Irwin’s bed, but tonight Irwin was spending the night with his Beachy cousins, and it fell to Leah to see to the terrier’s needs.
    “Don’t take all night,” Leah called to the little dog. It was very dark, with only a few stars piercing the heavy cloud cover. She thought that it might rain again this evening. In the west, she caught sight of a flash of lightning. “Jeremiah!” Leah called. “Come on!”
    The kitchen door squeaked and Leah’s mother stepped out on the porch beside her. She didn’t have to turn to see who it was, and Mam didn’t need to speak to be recognized. There was no mistaking the scent of lavender soap that Mam favored.
    “Daniel asked me if I wanted to help at the Mennonite Food Bank in Dover on Tuesday afternoon. Caroline and Leslie Steiner will be there.” Leah hesitated. “I told him I would, and he’s going to pick me up after lunch.”
    “I see.”
    When silence stretched between them, Leah called for the dog again and then said, “He must be chasing a mouse or one of the cats.”
    “He’ll come when he’s ready,” Mam said. “I wanted a minute alone with you. It seems that my instincts were right.” Soft fingertips brushed Leah’s chin. “You find Daniel Brown attractive, don’t you?”
    “Daniel?”
    Her mother chuckled. “He is a nice young man.” Her voice grew more serious. “But he’s not for you, Leah. He’s not one of us.”
    “I went to see his program,” she defended. “And I’m helping to give out food to people who need it. I’m not walking out with him.”
    “ Ne, you’re not, but you’ve imagined what it might be like, haven’t you?”
    Leah didn’t answer. She wasn’t ready to admit to Mam or even to herself that the attraction she felt for Daniel was different…stronger than for any of the boys with whom she’d grown up. Instead, she called for Jeremiah again. Still no ragged little black-and-white dog with a silly plumed tail. “Where can he have gotten to?”
    “Leah.”
    She sighed. “I know he’s Mennonite, Mam, but it doesn’t hurt to think what might be, does it?”
    Her mother’s hand closed around hers. “It is your running around time, and it’s only right that you see how others live, but don’t look too far. It could make you unhappy when you choose the Plain life.”
    “It’s not like I’m smoking cigarettes or making a show of myself with the English boys at Spence’s. I’m going to be helping those less fortunate, families in need. Is that so wrong?”
    “No, not wrong, but dangerous all the same.”
    Her shoulders stiffened. “Are you forbidding me to go?”
    “ Ne, child. That’s not my place. You’re a woman grown.”
    Again, Leah couldn’t answer. Would she have gone anyway if her mother told her not to? She suspected that she might.
    Mam’s voice took on a thread of steel. “Have you never wondered about my other family? My mother? My father? My sisters and brothers?”
    “Ruth used to ask when we were kids, but you told us that was in the past. We were your family then and now.”
    Mam squeezed her hand. “I should have been honest when Ruth asked, but it was still too hurtful for me. I was weak, and it was easier not to talk about them. I’m afraid I’m a work in progress. You don’t know how many nights I’ve gone on my knees