First Christmas on Huckleberry Hill by Jennifer Beckstrand

Author:Jennifer Beckstrand [Beckstrand, Jennifer]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Zebra Books
Published: 2021-06-22T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 9

The pies and cakes and casseroles started coming not six hours after the accident. Mamm was beside herself, partly because Felty had sort of been run over by a car, but mostly because they would never be able to eat all the goodies accumulating on the kitchen table.

Felty wasn’t completely comfortable with all the attention, but his shoulder and knee hurt too much to worry about it. The man who had been driving the car had called him a hero. Rosie Herschberger had bawled like a baby and thanked him seven times for saving her nephew’s life.

Felty limped into the kitchen, clutching the blanket draped over his shoulders. Even the light pressure of the blanket on his aching shoulder was too much, but the house was cold, and after a winter in Korea, Felty had learned that he’d rather be acutely uncomfortable than freezing cold.

Mamm turned and propped her hands on her hips. “What do you think you are doing?”

“I need a drink.”

“You were just run over by a car. Go sit in the living room, and I’ll bring you a drink. For goodness’ sake, Felty, that’s why I had Dat bring in the cowbell.”

Felty curled up one side of his mouth. “I refuse to summon my mamm with a cowbell. You’re not my servant or a cow.”

Mamm laughed softly. “It won’t hurt me to wait on you for a change. You do more than your fair share around here.”

Felty shrugged and immediately regretted it. Pain tore through his shoulder and down his back. “You gave birth to me. I’ll never be able to repay you for that.”

Mamm nodded. “Twenty hours of labor, and don’t you forget it. So be obedient and go sit down. I don’t want you aggravating your injuries. If it gets worse, I’m taking you to a doctor.”

A nasty reddish-purple bruise was already forming, covering his entire left shoulder and a gute portion of his upper arm. Felty didn’t even want to guess what his left upper back looked like. He’d be black and blue by morning, and he wasn’t sure how he would be able to keep Mamm from wanting a look. But if she looked, she’d see the scar near his heart, and he didn’t want her to know. At least he could protect her from that.

Mamm handed Felty a glass of water, and he drank the whole thing. “Now go sit,” she said. “We need to change the bandage on your knee.”

Someone knocked on the door, and Mamm sighed even as her eyes lit up. She didn’t want more goodies in the house, but this was the gute kind of attention, the positive kind of attention from the community that Mamm had missed for two years. It warmed Felty’s heart to see Mamm less worried and more her old self.

Felty turned to answer the door, but Mamm clucked her tongue in a scold. “Go sit. There have been people in and out of here for an hour. You can’t answer the door every time someone knocks.

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