We may have finally made it from Kovno, but the way things looked, I’d never get to see what Chevron was like

February 1927

Elka

"Can I please, please go?” I begged for the tenth time. The baskets and boxes and valises were piled up all over the floor and I could barely walk without tripping on something.  We may have finally made it from Kovno, but the way things looked, I’d never get to see what Chevron was like.

Mama looked up from where she was cutting a loaf of bread for little Leiba and sighed. “Alright,” she said, “when Papa comes inside, you can ask him. You’ve helped a lot, you deserve to see Chevron a little. “Me too?” Dovid asked, suddenly looking up from the box he was fiddling with.

“You, too.” Mama nodded tiredly. “As long as you push that box to the side so no one trips over it while you’re gone.”

I frowned at the floor. Why did he get to come along? I helped way more than he did, for all he thinks he’s so big and special.

“Go get your boots, slowpoke.” Dovid poked me in the arm on his way back from the bedroom where he had gone to retrieve his own boots. “Papa will be here and if you’re not ready then we’ll leave you behind.”

“You didn’t even put the box away,” I grumbled back at him. But I headed to the bedroom where my boots were lying in a jumbled heap on the floor. It wasn’t worth the risk of getting left behind.

I was still struggling to pull on my boots when I heard Dovid’s voice from the other room.

“Papa,” he was saying excitedly, “Mama says we can go see the shop now. Can we? Please?”

Papa’s deep laugh bounced through the house. “Of course, Dovid’l,” he said, and I could hear the smile on his face. “If Mama lets, we can go.”

“Just wait for Elka,” Mama’s voice wafted through the doorway.