The Carrot Cake Girl And Nine Other Short Stories

By Chris Metteer

Anna Elling sells her delicious carrot cake to passing tourists in her tiny southeastern Colorado town. A young man arrives, and she recognizes him even though she's never seen him before. He's the spittin' image of his father, a man town folks called The Knife when he was here about thirty years ago. Residents tagged him with that nickname because he was slender and had an arrogant attitude that slices through his surroundings. Anna was only 13 years old then, but she remembers something else. The Knife tasted like cigarettes. Now she must face memories she's tried to keep hidden for decades. Her plight is only one story in this collection. Liana Podborny faces a cancer diagnosis in her first visit with a noted surgeon in The Magnificent Dr. Five Star. Ishmael delivers pizzas in the Los Angeles suburbs and lives a humdrum life until he meets the perfect girl in My Angel Angelica. Daryl Colley is the polite owner who delivers better offerings to one woman (and his wife finds out about it) in Good Service at the Y Not. Ed Stone is an elderly man who tries to counsel a young couple considering an abortion in Coffee and Wisdom at the Food Court. Alden Ames looks forlornly at the home he and his family used to occupy and remembers better times in The Empty House. Doris Mae McAuliffe fights against the racist attitudes she was brought up with in Rebel To The Core. A twisted modern take on Jonathan Swift's iconic satire is unveiled in A Modest Proposal, Revisited. Bobby Harrell tries to be strong in a Central American jail and relies on his grandma's wise advice in Integrity. A writer faces a cosmic challenge when he finishes his short stories in The Final Chapter.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Chris Metteer
• Release date: Feb 5, 2021
• ISBN: 9781005041212

Chris Metteer

I was a veteran writer/editor at several great newspapers in the American West. I rely on my journalism instincts in almost everything I do. My latest work, The Search for Circe, concentrates on broken relationships, emotional wounds from childhood and divorce, and attempts to find redemption.I love to travel and learn something every day. I enjoy family, good friends, cappuccinos, good beer and Manhattans, great movies, and novels that grab me by the collar and pull me along. Life is good.

Book preview

The Carrot Cake Girl

And Nine Other Short Stories

By Chris Metteer

These are works of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

This collection is the property of the author and is made available for purchase through Smashwords. Do not share this work with others. Have interested persons purchase their own copies. Treat the author fairly.

Cover design by Tatiana Villa of Vila Design.

Copyright © By Chris Metteer, 2021

Chapter 1 – The Carrot Cake Girl

Anna Elling recognized the man although she never saw him before. He was the spittin’ image of The Knife, maybe a little broader in the shoulders and thicker in the hips. He moved with an arrogance that sliced through his surroundings, although this younger version had a tamer quality to him. He was slender with bony elbows. Anna couldn’t help thinking, my God, how long has it been since The Knife was here? He’s as present now as the heat of this day.

This new man was talking to Mr. Williston across the road, but Anna knew it was only a matter of time before The Son of The Knife came over to see her. Everyone came to see Anna if they needed to know anything about this town. She had been at this marketplace on every Saturday and Sunday for thirty-plus years, selling her carrot cakes to visitors and vacationers in this dusty little southeastern Colorado town. Everyone who came through these parts usually was heading for Rocky Ford, the epicenter of cantaloupe country.

Anna learned early on that those visitors could be enticed by the greatest carrot cake recipe in the world. It was a family legacy, a blend of carrot shavings, nuts and batter cooked to perfection. Her cream cheese icing was so delicious that it could encircle a person’s soul and tempt God himself.

She had eight cakes that she got up in the middle of the night to bake before each market day. She had her refrigeration unit plugged in so her cakes would be just the right temperature. Men with large bellies and wide behinds and women who looked just like their spouses would tire of tasting melons and line up six deep at her cake stand.

Today was going to be different. The Son of The Knife was here, and Anna was going to be faced with questions she hadn’t had to consider in years.

The Knife blew into town on a Saturday that was as hot as this one. He was young, maybe in his early twenties, and blade thin. His jeans hung on him. Anna noticed his nose more than anything else. It looked like someone took an Indian arrowhead and snapped it in two, then put half of it on his face. His attitude was as sharp as his looks. Anna’s father described him as brash and full of himself, probably some kid just out of the service who wanted the rest of the world to know how tough and talented he was.

Anna remembered something else. He tasted like cigarettes.

She was thirteen years old back then, although her mother described her as a girl who grew up way too fast. She could pass for sixteen easily, and she could probably get by as an eighteen-year-old if she needed to. She’s advanced for her age was the way her father put it. She wasn’t particularly pretty, but she turned the head of every man in town when she walked by. Turned the heads of every male visitor, too. Turned the head of The Knife the first time he set eyes on her.

He smiled at her in a way that made her mother sidle over to provide protection. The Knife feigned interest in the cantaloupes and honeydews the family had in crates behind the table, which was shaded by an awning that had Anderson Family Fruits sewn on it. He asked for a slice of that pretty honeydew over there, and he smiled even wider when he said it. Anna could feel his eyes on her, on her breasts and her hips that were covered by a thin white cotton dress because the day was so damned hot.

Excuse me, are you Miss Anna? he said, and he smiled from under a nose that looked like half an Indian arrowhead. The people over there said you knew just about everything there is to know about this place and what’s happened here.

People be right, Anna said. I have been here for so long that I have blended into the background. Care for some carrot cake? It’s the best you’ll ever taste.

Reckon I might once my business here is done, and the man smiled. My name is Robert Cantwell, and I am looking for information about this man.

He reached into the pocket of his light blue plaid shirt and pulled out a photograph. He handed it to Anna.

Ever see this man?

Anna recognized The Knife, but he wasn’t in the James Dean outfit he was wearing when he rode into town. This photograph showed a man in the uniform of the U.S. Army, and he had a rifle in his left hand and held the weapon sideways like he was showing it off. Every time Anna saw The Knife around here, he was wearing those floppy jeans and a white T-shirt, and he never had a weapon. Well, he never had a weapon other than his smile and his arrogance.

I have seen more than a million people come by my stand, Anna said. None of them stand out, Mister.

This is my father, and I am trying to trace his whereabouts. He got out of the Army in 1982, and he headed to New Orleans to see an old friend he grew up with. He told his friend he was heading into the Wild West. The last time anyone saw him for sure was when he got on his Harley and turned for Texas.

"I am just an old woman, but my guess is you think he might have