The Pie War That Saved Our Fair

Delphine came by later that afternoon while we were breaking down tables, and told us the fair board would be keeping the pie contest, permanently, full ribbons, real judges, no more talk of a dessert table with no names attached to it. “Twenty two entries,” she said. “That’s more than we’ve had since I’ve been on this board. Whatever the two of you are doing, keep doing it.” Then she added, quieter, almost like she didn’t want Vernon to hear it, “For what it’s worth, Ozella, I wasn’t trying to be the villain in June. I was trying to keep a dying line item alive long enough for somebody to prove me wrong about it.” I told her she had, and meant it, and I have found myself, since that day, actually looking forward to fair board meetings, which is a sentence I never in my life expected to say.

Vernon and I still bicker. I want to be honest about that too, because a happy ending doesn’t mean two people turn into saints overnight. He still thinks my crimping is too fussy. I still think his crust is a shade too thick on the outer inch. But he has taken to stopping by on Thursday afternoons with a thermos of coffee while I bake, sitting on my back steps like he did all summer, and last week he brought his late wife Carline’s old rolling pin over and set it on my counter without a word of explanation, the way he does most things that matter to him, and I understood it for the gift it was without him ever having to say so.

Junie has already told anybody who’ll listen that she’s defending her youth ribbon next August, and that she expects her grandfather and me to keep training her, “since between the two of you, you might finally add up to one whole good baker.”

I told her we’d see about that. But I have a feeling, come next August, the three of us will be right back in that Grange hall kitchen before six in the morning, fussing over a borrowed roaster oven and a string of extension cords, and if you ask me, after twelve years of counting points against a man I hardly knew, there is no fairer trade I could have made than that one point, for this.