The All-American by Susie Finkbeiner

Author:Susie Finkbeiner
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Historical Fiction;FIC042030;FIC066000;FIC044000
Publisher: Baker Publishing Group
Published: 2023-04-27T00:00:00+00:00

thirty-five

BERTHA

Teddy’s Food and More—“since 1919,” the sign would like you to know—was the biggest building on Main Street in Bear Run. Dad had told me that when Uncle Matthew bought out the original owner, he’d tried to change the name to Harding’s Market, but people in town had started a petition.

“They didn’t want the new guy coming in and changing everything,” Dad had told me.

At that point, Uncle Matthew had lived in town for ten whole years.

Still the new guy.

I wondered what that made the four of us since we’d been in town less than a month.

That morning Mam had handed me a list of things she needed from Teddy’s, and I’d asked if she was sure she wanted to send the home economics dropout to get her groceries.

She’d shrugged and went out back to hang laundry on the line to dry.

I checked and double-checked the list to make sure I had everything. Elbow macaroni, stewed tomatoes, carrots, and so on and so forth. I couldn’t be sure, but it looked like we’d be having goulash that night. The only thing I couldn’t find was canned pineapple for the upside-down cake Mam had been dying to give a try.

Fortunately, I saw Uncle Matthew on the other side of the dry goods section, consulting a clipboard and staring down a shelf full of flour bags as if they’d just insulted his mother.

I pushed my cart toward him, zipping past a display of canned peanuts and around a pallet of boxed sugar cubes.

“Uncle Matthew,” I called.

He gave a quick nod of the head in recognition and went right on glaring at the flour.

“Do you know where the canned pineapple is?” I asked, showing him the list as if to prove that I did need the stuff.

“Hm.” He furrowed his brow as if trying to recall. “This way.”

I followed him—gosh, he walked fast—to the other side of the store where was shelved every kind of canned fruit imaginable. Peaches and berries and pears. Even fruit cocktail. That was my favorite. Flossie’s too. But she’d just pick all the little cherry bits out, so Mam hardly ever bought it except for special occasions.

“Slices or chunks?” Uncle Matthew asked.

“Golly,” I said, scratching my temple. “I don’t know.”

“What’s she making?”

“Pineapple upside-down cake.”

He grabbed a can of slices from the shelf. Then he took a few steps and found a jar of maraschino cherries for me.

“Well,” I said, checking my paper one more time. “They aren’t on the list.”

“They should be.”

“Oh.” I took the jar and placed it in the cart. “Okay.”

“If you wait”—he checked his watch—“five minutes, I’ll drive you back.”

“That’s okay,” I said. “I don’t mind walking.”

“You want to carry all of that a mile?” He nodded at the cart.

“You’ve got a point,” I said.

After the cashier tallied the total and the bagger did his job, I stood by the doors to wait for Uncle Matthew, a brown paper bag balanced on either hip. He took one of them before leading me out to his car.

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