Copyrighted 2021
All rights reserved. No part of this story may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
Author: The Lazy L
The Apple Tree
All rights reserved. No part of this story may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
Author: The Lazy L
The Apple Tree
“I do too!” declared Lilly.
“No you don’t! You were little when Grandpa died. Little like you are now!” Lilly’s older brother Ben hissed back at her.
“He had that brown spot on his jaw that made his eyes go crosseyed when you pushed it. I remember him!”
Ben was two years older than his sister and had forgotten about that brown spot on Grandpa’s jaw. Typical sibling rivalry wouldn’t let him admit defeat. “Silly! That was a mole. And pay attention to what you’re doing!”
Lilly turned to face Ben before flashing her index finger and thumb in a “L” for loser at Ben. She had picked all the apples she could reach from the ground. Now she was using stick. On the end of the stick and shaped like a big fork was coat hanger wire. They hung their coats on wood pegs on the wall so Lilly didn’t understand what a coat hanger was and why they said the wire came from one. Last time she asked Ben what a coat hanger was he had just rolled his eyes and said she didn’t know anything. Lilly suspected Ben didn’t know either!
Using the stick with the fork on the end she could reach higher and pull more apples down from the tree. A couple times she looked over at Ben to see what he was doing. He was always looking away from her, looking off in the distance. She started to jump to get the apples hanging higher, when Ben told her it was his turn.
Ben waited until Lilly had swapped places with him before he picked up the stick with the fork. He lashed a longer tree branch to the stick so he could reach higher for more apples. Ben started feeling sorry for the way he treated Lilly. She could be such a pain at times! Wasn’t her fault she was the littlest. Ben looked and saw his sister doing the same as he had, looking at everything but him. Trying to make amends Ben asked, “Remember when mom got mad at Grandpa for giving us apples from this tree?”
Lilly answered by nodding her head up and down without looking at him.
“Grandpa showed us how to cut the worm holes out of the apples with his pocket knife and gave us the slices from the good parts to eat. I thought I’d share some with mom, I didn’t mean to get grandpa in trouble.”
“Mom said something about the tree hadn’t been sprayed? Sprayed with what” asked Lilly.
“Chemicals to stopped the worms from eating the apples I guess.”
“When we went to the grocery store mom always bought the organic apples. She said “organic” meant no chemicals were used. But isn’t that the same as the apples grandpa gave us? He said that’s why the apples had worms in them because they hadn’t been sprayed. Ben why aren’t there apples trees in the city where we lived.
Ben not knowing the answer he ignored her question. “We’ve got all the apples we can reach and it’s getting late. Lilly glanced at the low hanging sun and nodded in agreement.
Ben unlashed the tree limb from the fork stick. Then he laid both sticks on a low hanging tree limb where they’d be available for the next apple picking. They took turns filling their backpacks with apples before swinging them unto their backs. Lilly took the lead back into the woods using a longer route home than the one they had used to pick apples.
They didn’t talk as they walk silently towards home.
Lilly was trying to understand why they apples weren’t safe when grandpa had picked them but now, from the same tree, they were?
Ben was thinking about maybe this time his parents would let him to use a knife to cut up the apples into thin slices. Laying the slices in the sun to dry was a little kid’s job, Lilly could do that and Dad could let Ben cut the apples up, he was old enough now.
Lilly stopped just short of the clearing. She looked back at Ben who nodded his head at her. Lilly unclipped the radio from her belt. “Lincoln Boy from southwest. Lincoln Boy from southwest”. Ben was listening on his radio as Lilly had radioed. He was the oldest so the call should have been “Boy Lincoln!”
The three mike clicks they heard indicated it was safe to come on in.
Ben stuck out his tongue in the direction of the back of Lilly’s head as Lilly readjusted her rifle sling.
They both started forward again. They both wondered if grandpa’s apples were now OK because the canned fruit was gone?
The End
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