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doctor had insisted.
    “I feel trapped . . . like this will never end,” Brandon had confided to Hen afterward. His vulnerability had surprised her, and she reached to touch his arm as she drove him home.
    “I don’t blame you, hon. If this had happened to me, I don’t know what I’d do.” Now, recalling the short-lived moment, Hen realized they had been almost companionable.
    Most days the strain between them was an enduring undertow. Both seemed reticent to address the fact their togetherness might be only temporary.
    She caught herself sighing frequently, especially on days when she worked at the fabric shop—the very thing she’d fought so hard to do. Yet the hours at work put even more distance between herself and her wounded husband. Hen considered their dilemma as she shelved dress material or rang up orders at the cash register.
    It seemed Mattie Sue was their one and only link to happiness, their only chance to fleetingly reconnect. Mattie Sue would surprise them by saying the sweetest or funniest thing at the dinner table or as Hen and Brandon tucked her into bed. And helpless not to burst into gentle laughter, they found enjoyment for a second . . . only to return to tiptoeing around each other and their volatile issues. Hen was holding her breath in so many words, waiting for the day when Brandon could once again lay eyes on her “dowdy” dress and apron .
    Now, before heading back to Salem Road, she stopped in at the Quarryville library. With the cold, she’d resorted to driving her car again today. Brandon had suggested she reconsider selling it, at least while he was staying with her. So, to be more agreeable, she’d put the sale of her car on hold. After all, Brandon already had to adapt to Amish life in so many other ways.
    While she stood in the checkout line at the library, Hen sorted through the books her sister had requested—each one featured a young woman pining over a forbidden or lost love.
    Poor Rosie, will she ever find happiness?
    Hen wouldn’t think of faulting her sister for wanting to lose herself in a sweet love story. There were times when she, too, was tempted to escape into a good book. How might my life have turned out had I married a nice Amish boy?
    But it was too late to rewrite her own story. She must be true to her marriage vows.
    Later, after placing the library books in the front seat next to her, she started the car and drove through Quarryville, aware of the horses and buggies on the main street.
    While stopped at the traffic light, she glanced over at the parking lot for Brandon’s land development office and noticed him getting out of a car. She watched her husband wait for his friend and partner to help him into the building. Where was Mattie Sue? She looked at the car, thinking she might be in there. But no, her daughter hadn’t come. Why not?
    Perhaps Mattie Sue had been invited to stay at the main house. Maybe some of the younger Petersheim grandchildren had come to visit. She hoped so. She hadn’t known what to make of Brandon’s plan to take her to his office in the first place.
    Turning her attention back to her husband, Hen was struck again at just how dependent he was on others. Her heart ached for him as she recalled his words at the doctor’s office.
    “How soon will I see?” he’d asked, and Hen’s jaw clenched as she waited for the kindly doctor’s answer.
    “It’s rare for cortical blindness to hang on as long as yours, but we still expect sight to return within a few weeks,” the man had replied.
    The day before the appointment, Brandon had told her he’d contacted his attorney brother when last at the office. Hen worried his plan for their divorce was still on his mind. She’d hoped by now that he might have reconsidered legally dissolving their union.
    She recalled her father’s pointed question to them last fall, before Brandon’s accident. “Did ya ever think there might be something each of you can surrender?” He