An Uncommon Grace by Serena B. Miller

the weaving strips. He felt sorry for the little guy.
    And then the strangest thought struck him. With Abraham gone, Jesse would never have to weave a basket again. Not if Levi didn’t make him—and Levi had no intention of making him. Jesse was simply not cut out for it. Not this sweet child who would rather watch the aerial acrobatics of a barn swallow than pay attention to finishing off yet another badly made basket.
    Jesse was fascinated with everything that walked and crawled or galloped. As much as he fidgeted when he was forced to weave baskets, the child could lie still and watch a lizard for hours. He could already name most of the birds that nested around their farm.
    Levi turned Jesse’s palm over and traced the cuts. No—his little brother would never sit and cry over making baskets again. Levi was the head of this family now, and he would get to make those decisions. The idea pleased him, but then he remembered his mother’s grief and plunged into remorse over the way his mind was straying.
    God’s will be done . Just as the preacher was saying.
    Suddenly, everyone stood up. Levi had been so deep into his own thoughts he had not heard the cue for prayer. He scrambled to turn around and kneel on the ground with his elbows on the bench as everyone else did.
    Then he heard a quiet sob and shot a glance over his shoulder at his mother, who, unable to kneel, was bowed in prayerin her wheelchair. Rose had taken little Daniel into the crook of one arm. Her other arm rested around her sister’s shoulders. Maam sat with her arms wrapped around her stomach, her head bowed—shaking with sobs.
    There was a rustle as the group finished their prayer, rose again as one body, and sat down upon the benches for another two hours of preaching.
    Levi forced himself to concentrate on the service. Despite his own issues with his stepfather, Abraham had done the best he could with what he knew, and the man deserved a decent funeral and a respectful family.
    Why was it so hard to focus today? Through the open barn door, he could see the woods behind their house where the dogwood trees were in bloom. Their white blossoms were the size of a squirrel’s ear now. The weather had been quite warm and humid, which meant that the morel mushrooms his mother loved would be springing up from the spongy ground. Hunting morels was one of his favorite things.
    But it was not the time to think about gathering morels. It was time to listen to a couple more hours of preaching. Then the sad ride to the Graabhof , the modest cemetery where four generations of Abraham’s family had been laid to rest.
    The preacher finished and the church broke into song, their voices rising as one. They sang the songs shlow —very slow. They did this because prison guards had once mocked his people by dancing to the hymns they sang while awaiting execution. Those long-ago martyrs had deliberately slowed their hymns down until it was impossible to dance to them. That practice had lingered. Levi had been told that Swartzentruber singing was even slower than in the other Amish orders.
    There was comfort in blending his voice with the others.Becoming one with his church family in spirit and in voice. Levi felt the holiness of it penetrate his soul.
    And then he caught sight of Zillah Weaver, the bishop’s daughter, staring at him from the women’s side. She was watching him intently, as though hoping to catch his eye. When she saw him looking at her, she smiled.
    Zillah was blond and pretty, and she had been blessed with dimples that she never missed a chance to flash. In fact, the smile she used in order to show off those dimples best was a little odd. Even though his people were not allowed to hang mirrors on their walls, he would be very surprised if Zillah didn’t have a hand mirror tucked away in a drawer somewhere with which she had spent time practicing the art of smiling. She was that kind of girl.
    He quickly looked away. Zillah could be as sweet as