Chapter 10
Ali Kat
True to her word, Ma has me set the table for dinner, pour the waters, and call in the boys while she finishes the ham steaks.
After returning from camp, Prim and I went out to the orchard and picked five barrels of apples, some of which she baked into a pie. A simple enough pleasure, but as delicious as it looks, I have no business eating it. Not with the roles I have coming up.
The food smells fantastic, promising me yet another night of broken diets and bloated waistlines. I can just see the look on Ted’s face when he realizes that I haven’t been following the meal plan laid out for me. It was his idea to send me here, so it’s his fault, and I’ll tell him that. Not that he’ll listen.
“The knives are pointed the wrong way,” Ma says, fixing my error.
I roll my eyes, annoyed that she couldn’t have simply let the knives face outward.
Pa comes in first, followed by Jake and Garrett. They each take their seats, not giving me so much as a glance.
As much as I’d like to respond in kind, my eyes are drawn to Garrett as though he has some kind of magnetic pull.
“Whaddaya want?”he had said so coldly to me, not the reaction I was hoping to achieve. What I had wanted couldn’t have been more obvious, or so I had thought.
Pa breathes in deeply. “Mmmm, smells great!” he says, rubbing his hands together.
Mom doles out our portions, and we say grace. What little resistance I had to my momma’s cooking disappears after the first bite enters my mouth.
“Kevin’s been scaring the chickens again,” Jake grumbles.
“They’ll be fine,” Prim replies with an edge.
“The mutt better make himself useful, or else he has no business being on my farm,” Dad says.
“Hank Olaf Carter!” Ma snaps. “Don’t you go acting like Kevin isn’t your favorite one of the bunch.”
A guilty look spreads across Pa’s face. “I’m-I’m just trying to teach him the ropes. Give him a fighting chance.”
Ma casts him a cynical gaze. “By sneaking him table scraps after each meal?”
“It’s called motivation.”
“It’s called doting,” Prim snaps back.
Pa directs his attention towards Jake. “Oh, did ya see that new girl workin’ at the feed store?”
“Nope,” Jake replies.
“She looks nice,” Pa says.
“I’m sure she is,” Jake replies flatly.
“She moved some ten miles up the way. Come fall, she’ll be teaching at the elementary school.”
Jake glares in Father’s direction. “You seem to know an awful lot about this woman, Pa.”
“Oh, I don’t know, I was just making friendly conversation. Found out she has something called a Facebook, you can find her under—”
Jake’s face contorts into an angry rage, and he gets up from the table, his chair falling to the floor.
“Jake—” Momma shouts.
“I’m headed back home,” he says and storms off to the guest house.
