A Forbidden Rumspringa (Gay Amish Romance Book 1) Read Online Free Page B

surprisingly pale for all the hours he spent in the fields.
    He whispered, “When are you going to ask her out?”
    Isaac followed Mervin’s gaze to where Mary Lantz sat with her friends on one of the women’s benches on the other side of the room near the back door the women entered through. His eyes met Mary’s, and she jerked away, ducking her head close to her sister beside her to whisper something. Their pinned wheat-colored hair blended together perfectly beneath their black caps. Anna was barely a year younger, and they looked almost like twins.
    In Zebulon girls wore black caps and the married women white, although the girls who were finished school wore white caps at home during the week. Never off the farm, and never on Sunday, though. They all wore black bonnets over their caps if they were out in a buggy. Back in Red Hills the women had rarely worn bonnets at all, and their dresses had been lighter and a little shorter.
    In Zebulon dresses had to reach the tops of the feet, and Katie had grumbled that morning about the thick black socks she had to wear with her shoes to church even in summer, although she had never known anything different. No elastic or rubber was permitted, and they tied black shoestrings around their calves to keep socks from slouching down. And of course the women and girls had long sleeves on their dresses all year round, even when it was so hot the air shimmered off the road in waves.
    Often the Ordnung did not seem to follow any logic Isaac could identify, but of course it was not for him to question. He’d asked Father once why the bands on their hats had to be precisely five-eights of an inch, and why brims on married men’s hats were four inches, while for the bishop and preachers they were four and a half. Naturally the answer was that it was because the Ordnung decreed it. It was their way.
    “You should ask her brother to ask her for you. It’ll work, I know it,” Mervin added.
    “Shh,” Isaac hissed. David Lantz sat on the bench in front of them, but five men down to the right. Isaac glanced at David’s profile, the tip of his nose just visible. Around him the men all wore their hair past their ears, the strands forming little wings where it had curled beneath their hats. But since David wasn’t following church yet, he was allowed to keep his hair a little shorter like Isaac did. David stared straight ahead and didn’t seem to have heard Mervin’s too-loud comment.
    “Do you want to hear something?”
    Isaac tore his gaze away from David and stared at his scuffed boots. After a summer being barefoot most of the time, his toes felt hot and confined. But come winter he’d have to get used again to boots every day. At least they didn’t wear their heavy felt hats inside. He wished they could wear their straw hats in the heat, but in Zebulon it wasn’t allowed on church days. “Do I have a choice?”
    “Ha ha. I talked to Jacob.”
    “Eli’s Jacob?”
    Mervin huffed. “Why would I talk to him? No, New-corn Jacob.”
    “Oh.” Jacob Stoltzfus had recently planted rows of corn on his farm on the outskirts of Zebulon. “What did he have to say?”
    Mervin rolled his eyes. “How are you still so dense? I asked him to ask Sadie if she’d go out with me!” He grinned. “She said yes! I’m driving her home after the singing tonight.”
    “But we’re supposed to go to the lake tonight!” At the sharp glance from Josiah Yoder nearby—Hog Josiah he was called, since he raised pigs—Isaac lowered his voice. “You said you were going to show me that trick you do when you jump off the rock.”
    “We can go to the lake any old time.” Mervin glanced at Sadie Stoltzfus across the room and sighed. “She’s the prettiest girl in Zebulon. Isaac, don’t you want a girl of your own? We’re eighteen now. Mark is already joining the church and he’s going to marry Josiah’s Katie come spring. What are you waiting for?”
    Isaac shrugged, since he didn’t trust his