I tossed my crumpled napkin onto the table. “Are you trying to be funny? How am I supposed to know what I did?”
Lark tugged on the straw on her milkshake. “It’s not supposed to be funny at all. Sounds to me like you want it to be easy. I mean, you want to make it right, but you want to do that the easy way.”
“No, I don’t.”
“Yes, you do. You’re going to have to figure out what you did that has him so upset. Not everything is easy and simple and plain.”
I didn’t appreciate her veiled jab at my Plain way of life. “I never said it was. But I am not a mind reader. There were just five days between the moment my father called me and the moment I got here. Five days. How could I possibly have done anything to Brady during that time? First he wanted me here, and then he didn’t. So what happened to change his mind?”
She took a drink from her shake. “Okay, I admit it’s going to be a challenge. But think about it. It’s obviously something you did before you came.”
“Within those five days?” That made absolutely no sense. “How is that possible? Brady and I never even spoke.”
Lark shrugged. “Your guess is as good as mine. But whatever it is, you can show him how much this rift matters to you by how hard you work to figure it out. Asking him to tell you is the easy way. I might not tell you either.”
She pulled her straw out of her empty shake and licked it clean.
I knew there was wisdom in what she was saying. I knew it because I could hear Rachel telling me the exact same thing.
I pondered her words for a few moments. “I don’t know where to begin.”
“I would write down everything he has said to you about this.”
“Okay, that will take two seconds.”
She tossed a French fry at me. “Have you been listening to me? Stop looking for the easy way out. Write down everything he has told you about this problem between the two of you.”
I tossed the fry back. “He hasn’t told me anything. Have you been listening to me?”
“For a nice guy you sure are thickheaded. What was it he said to you last night? Something about how you’re ‘wasting your time’ here? If he really believes you feel that way, well, that sounds significant to me.”
I was beginning to sense a light dawning. There was substance to what Brady was saying, vague as it was.
“Everything he doesn’t tell you is something he’s telling you, Tyler. You’re not listening. No wonder you don’t get it.” She tossed the fry back, and this time I let it hit me in the chest and fall to the table unchecked.
“All right. I see your point. I’ll do it. But I don’t know what I’m looking for.”
Lark smiled. “You’re looking for truth, just like the rest of us. And one more thing.”
“What?” I sighed. Audibly.
“Sometimes the things that hurt the people we love aren’t the things we’ve done. They’re the things we haven’t done and should have.”
“Like what?”
“Well, you came here for your dad, right? Maybe Brady wishes you had come for him.”
Sitting there in a pool of brilliant sunlight, I was overcome by the weight of a fresh realization. From the time I was six I had been taught to live a life of selfless service, thinking of others before myself, as Jesus had taught us.
But I had come to California for really just one reason—and that reason was not Brady. That reason was not even my dad, as Lark assumed.
I had come here for myself. For me and only for me. It was the most un-Amish thing I had ever done.
TWENTY-ONE
After I dropped Lark off at her house, I prayed the whole way home that God would give me wisdom and patience to make things right with my brother. I knew it was up to me to discern what I had done or not done that had somehow convinced him that I could not be trusted. For now at least, I needed my relationship with Brady to be my top priority.
The moment I turned into the driveway and pulled to a stop, I felt God whispering an answer to that prayer with just four simple words. They were words that were familiar, as I’d been taught them since the moment I arrived in Lancaster County as a child.
Honor others before yourself.
I turned off the car and closed my eyes. Why would God bring to mind this important truth at this moment? Why now, when I was already on this intense search for truth and for the place I belonged? Was I to put that aside entirely?
Honor others before yourself, Tyler.