A Lancaster Amish Memory for Jacob: A Lancaster Amish Home for Jacob, #7

By Rachel Stoltzfus

Anger. Accident. Amnesia.

When anger leads to a terrible accident, will orphaned Philadelphia teen, Jacob Marshall, regain the memories of his Amish life before it's too late...

After a fight at the dinner table, orphaned Philadelphia teen, Jacob rushes out of his Amish foster father, Thomas Mast's home only to wake in the hospital with no memory of himself or the Mast family who have sheltered him. Now, as Jacob struggles to find his place again, he is haunted by the ghost of a Jacob whose shoes he can't hope to fill or even understand. Will Jacob regain his memories, and even if he does, will the Mast family accept who Jacob is now?

Find out in Book 8 of the Amazon Bestselling series, A Home for Jacob.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Global Grafx Press
• Release date: Jan 26, 2015
• ISBN: 9781507041987

Book preview

​​

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

––––––––

I have to thank God first and foremost for the gift of my life and the life of my family. I also have to thank my family for putting up with my crazy hours and how stressed out I can get as I approach a deadline. In addition, I must thank the ladies at Global Grafx Press for working with me to help make my books the best they can be. And last, I thank you, for taking the time to read this book. God Bless!

​Chapter 1

Now dear, Dorothy said to Sarah, who stood beside her, eagerly awaiting the opening of the oven door. When you take this, in your hands, use the black oven mitts, over there on the counter, you see? Don’t use the red ones because we’ve already worn them down to the threads. If you pick up the cast iron in those, you may take the Lord’s name in vain, and then we’d have to stone you.

Sarah paused for a moment, considering that threat. They wouldn’t actually stone her, would they? She had never seen a stoning, but then again, she had never heard anyone in this house or in Hope Crossing take the Lord’s name in vain. She shrugged inwardly and took the black oven mitts from their hook on the wall, just above the counter. She slid her small hands into the fabric, her fingers barely filling out the mitts and waited patiently for her mother to decide that the meal was done.

The one thing she had always been in awe of was her mother’s ability to determine just when the meal was done cooking without any sort of timer. She had asked about it numerous times, always receiving the exact same answer: It is ready when the good Lord tells me, and when it’s your time, the Good Lord will tell you too! She often wondered why the good Lord would have a hand in their meals, but she supposed that the Good Lord had a hand in everything, didn’t he?

It seemed to be taking forever, and they had already been in the kitchen for what seemed like hours. She paced nervously around the table, rubbing her newly mitted hands together.

Stop that dear, Dorothy said. You’ll wear a hole in the floor again.

Father would be none too happy about that, Sarah agreed as she stopped and waited patiently once again. At some point, that thing was going to come out of the oven and she would see the fruits of her labor. She tried to take her mind off of it for a moment, staring instead out of the kitchen window, watching the sun as it lowered in the sky, soon to make its final passage for the night, leaving them in complete and utter darkness.

Sarah, Dorothy said. Ye need to pay attention to the stove, not the outside. Don’t let your mind wander. You wander for a minute, and you can lose an entire meal, and then what will you do?

Somehow, Sarah sensed that the correct answer would not be ‘Fetch leftovers from the ice box’.

I’m sorry, Mamm, she said. I’m just trying to pass the time.

You need to not be so impatient, Dorothy said, shaking her head as she finally turned to the oven and pulled the massive cast iron door open. All things come in time, if you just have patience.

Sarah rushed around the table to the now wide open stove and reached in eagerly, wrapping her fingers around the handle of the heavy cast iron skillet, paying little attention as it scraped against the metal rack inside the stove. She lifted it carefully and set it on the range top, examining her work with a measure of pride unmatched by almost anything she had ever felt in her life.

You see? Dorothy said. That is how you make a shepherd’s pie!

It really is beautiful, Sarah said. I almost never want to eat it.

Well, if you wait too long then you really will not want to, Dorothy said.

Moments later, they heard the front door open, and in came Jacob and Thomas. Sarah always dreaded this moment. It was difficult to tell whether they would be laughing or at each other’s throats. Who was Jacob exactly? At some point, she had endeavored to stop explaining to all of her more inquisitive friends, but it still helped to get it out there, at least to a point. One would have thought however that the situation would have made its way to every corner of Hope Crossing, as much as gossip liked to spread itself.

Jacob was an Englischer, adopted and brought to Hope Crossing to live. Sarah remembered all too clearly the day he had first been brought here, and she remembered the family meeting that had taken place shortly before.

They had sat in their living room, Sarah completely unaware of what was about to transpire.

He’s a boy, a little older than you, Her father, Thomas had said. And I won’t lie, he’s been in a little bit of trouble. Actually he’s in some trouble now. If he doesn’t come here before morning, he’ll go to jail. Now my friend Carol seems to think there’s some hope for him but only if he gets out of that environment. There aren’t many places to send a boy his age, especially one who acts like a...boy.

As Joseph said that, a pained look crossed his face. Anyone who was looking at him at the time could clearly see that he had wanted to say something else but somehow managed to stop himself. It was Sarah who had spoken first though.

Where will we put him? She asked. My closet is full!

Under normal circumstances, there might have been a chuckle, but neither Dorothy nor Joseph were in the mood, innocent as Sarah’s question had been.

He’ll stay in the guest room, Thomas said. It’s no problem. I don’t expect him to be here more than a few days before he’s begging to go home.

But, didn’t you say he’d go to jail? Dorothy said. If he didn’t come here and stay here?

Remember the Millers? Thomas posed the question to Dorothy. The Millers had been an English