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“What are those?”
“Windows.” She gestured toward the barn. “Windows.”
“I know what you meant.” He shook his head. “Windows suck heat out of a building. If there are more windows in the school, you’ll be using a lot more propane to keep the building warm.”
“Two small windows won’t make much difference.”
“I’ve been a carpenter since I was fourteen, and I’ve learned a lot in those seventeen years. One thing I learned is that extra windows means needing more fuel to keep the space warm. No more windows.”
“But—”
“You can’t change facts, Miriam, no matter how much you want to.”
“The fact I know is kinder work better in a sunny place than one filled with shadows.” She folded her arms in front of her. “My brother trusts me to know what to do. That’s why he’s having me work with you to design the school.”
He frowned, and she wondered if he’d understood what she said. She realized he’d gotten a bit of it when he said, “Ja, sunshine and shadows. Like in a quilt.”
“I’m going to talk to Caleb about this,” she said.
At her brother’s name, comprehension dawned in his eyes. “Discuss it with him if you want.” He shrugged. “He’ll tell you the same thing I have.”
She looked away. “He’ll agree with me.” She added the silliest thing she could think of. “He does about blue flamingos.”
When she got no reaction from Eli to her challenging words, she stood and walked behind him as if looking at the sketch from another angle.
“I will be celebrating when he agrees with me,” she said.
Again no reaction.
She clapped her hands.
He glanced over his shoulder and frowned. “Why did you do that?”
His question proved he could hear sounds, which was more than her grossmammi had been able to in the three years before she died.
“I told you.” She smiled.
Her expression unsettled him. His gaze turned inward, and she guessed he was trying to figure out what she might have said. The silence stretched between them, a sure sign he couldn’t guess what she claimed she’d told him.
“Oh.” He gathered himself and said with calm dignity, “If you’ve got no other comments about the school...”
As he bent to get the piece of paper, she cupped her hands to her mouth and called out, “I’ve got lots and lots of comments. I want to paint the floor yellow and the walls purple. I want—”
He spun and stared at her before she could lower her hands. Wide-eyed, he demanded, “What are you doing?”
She met his accusing stare. “Testing you.”
“Pestering me? Ja, that’s true.”
“No!” She frowned at him. “Testing. With a t.” She sketched the letter in the air between them.
“I’m not one of your scholars. You don’t need to test me to find out what my reading ability is.”
Folding her arms in front of her, she gave him a cool smile. “That’s not what I was checking. If you want, I can teach you to read lips.”
“What?”
She touched her lips and then raised and lowered her fingers against her thumb as if they were a duck’s bill. “Talk. I can help you understand what people are saying by watching them talk.”
* * *
When he realized what Miriam was doing, Eli was stunned. A nurse at the hospital where he’d woken after the wall’s collapse had suggested that, once he was healed, he should learn to read lips. He’d pushed that advice aside, because he didn’t have time with the obligations of his brother’s farm and his brother’s son. Kyle had been a distraught toddler, not understanding why his beloved parents had disappeared.
During the past four years he and his nephew had created a unique language together. Mostly Kyle had taught it to him, helping him decipher the meaning and context of the few words he could capture.
“How do you know about lipreading?” he asked.
“My grossmammi.” She tapped one ear, then the other. “...hearing...as she grew older. We...together. We practiced together.”
Kyle came outside and rushed to them when Miriam gestured. He wore a milk mustache, and chocolate pudding dotted his chin.
When she bent to speak to him, too low and too fast for Eli to hear, the little boy nodded and took the tissue she handed him. She motioned toward Eli as she straightened.
Wiping his mouth and chin, Kyle faced him. Learn to read talking. What’s that? The puzzled boy looked from Miriam to him at the same time he made the rudimentary signs he used to help Eli understand others.
“I can help.” She put her hands on Kyle’s shoulders. “Kyle...grows up. Who will...you then?”
Who would help him when Kyle wasn’t nearby? He was sure that was what she’d asked. It was a question he’d posed to himself. More and more often as Kyle reached the age to start attending school.
“How does it work?” he asked.
“You watch my lips. We start with simple words. It is how my grossmammi... I learned.”
Watch her lips? Simple? He would gladly have spent days watching her lips. His gaze was drawn to those rose-colored curves too often. Now she was giving him the perfect excuse to stare at them...
He shook his head.
“You...no help?” she asked, and he realized she’d confused his refuting of his own thoughts as an answer to her kind offer.
Before he could answer, Kyle pulled on his sleeve and motioned, Help you. Her help you.
As his nephew pointed at Miriam and then at Eli, Kyle’s signals couldn’t have been clearer. Kyle wanted Eli to agree to the lessons.
Not for the first time, Eli thought about the burden he’d placed on Kyle. Though Eli was scrupulous in making time for Kyle to be a kind, sometimes, like when they went to a store, he found himself needing the little boy to confirm a total when he was checking out or to explain where to find something on the shelves. If he didn’t agree to Miriam’s help, he was condemning his nephew to a lifetime of having to help him.
That wouldn’t have been what his brother would have wanted. Milan and his wife, Shirley, had expected their son to play with friends and go to school and learn to assume responsibility for the family’s farm. The farm had been sold so he and Kyle could start over by Harmony Creek, but he could ensure his nephew had the chance to be a kid. Was Miriam the way God was answering his prayer for help? If so, he needed to agree.
“All right,” he said. “You can try to teach me to read lips.”
She gave him a nod and a gentle smile, not the superior one he’d worried she’d flash at him. “...next Monday. You and Kyle—” she pointed at his nephew and at him, matching Kyle’s motions “—supper. After we eat...”
“All right.”
“Tell me.”
For a second he was baffled, and then he realized she wanted him to repeat what she’d said so she could be certain he’d grasped the meaning of her words. His confusion became surprise. Why hadn’t he considered such repetition was an easy way to avoid mistakes?
“You invited Kyle and me to supper,” he said. “After the meal, you’ll start teaching me to read lips.”