The Topsy-Turvy Lives of Hattie Kildare: A Middle Falls Time Travel Story by Shawn Inmon

Author:Shawn Inmon [Inmon, Shawn]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pertime Publishing
Published: 2024-05-30T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twenty-Three

When June 30th rolled around, Hattie felt sick to her stomach all day. In her first life, that was when she had learned that Jimmy had been killed.

She felt sure that he should be safe where he was, but still, she felt awful all day. To keep her mind off things, she asked if it would be all right for her to go to the café with her mother and wash dishes to pass the time.

Frances would have been fine with that—they could always use an extra hand with the dishes—but she didn’t want to leave Jackie home alone. “Maybe Jackie can visit one of her friends later in the week, then you can come to work with me.”

Hattie couldn’t explain that going to work and scraping dirty dishes wasn’t the end goal for her; she was just trying to keep herself occupied on one of the red-letter days on her personal calendar.

The end of June meant the strawberries in her grandma’s berry patch were almost picked out, but not quite. After lunch, Hattie and Jackie took the long walk to Abigail’s house. They found her in the berry patch, bent over and picking the sweet red berries.

“Gran, I swear. That’s too much for you. Go sit down and get something cool to drink. Let us finish these berries for you.”

Abigail stood up and Hattie recognized the painful crick in her back as she did. She had suffered from that same pain when she bent over herself not so long ago. Now she was young and strong and flexible, though, and she could finish up the row of berries with no problem.

Gran looked at Jackie. “You’re a little closer to the ground, aren’t you, missy?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Jackie answered with a smile. She took the bucket from Abigail, then went to picking.

“I suppose I can find some other things to do.” Abigail looked toward the house and muttered, “There are always things to do, aren’t there?”

“Jackie? Do you mind finishing this row while I take Gran inside?”

“Huh-uh,” Jackie said. “I don’t mind.” She popped a particularly ripe strawberry into her mouth. Juice ran from the corner of her mouth as she grinned.

“Come on, Gran. I don’t know if the berries will go in the bucket or her stomach, but they won’t go to waste.”

Inside the house, Abigail poured them both a glass of cold water from the tap, which was fed by a spring well.

Hattie had given up debating whether things tasted better in the forties. She had come to the conclusion that everything did, and that was that.

“You going to open the berry stand out front?”

Abigail shook her head. “Don’t really have enough to do that. Not worth the fuss. I thought I’d take this last bucket to Smith’s and let them sell them. Won’t make quite as much, but that’s okay.”

“Jackie and I will take them there on our way home.”

“That’s fine, or you can just take them home and share them with the family.”

Hattie and Abigail sat in the cool of the kitchen, drinking their water and not talking for some time.

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