Big Cherry Holler

  Jim Roy breathes deeply. Most of his treasure has been saved, and saved by a kid who probably wouldn’t know Spencer Tracy from Joel McCrea. Seats and screens and popcorn machines can be replaced, but the prints that Jim Roy has collected all these years cannot.

  “Come on, Jim Roy, let’s take you and Mrs. Ball over to the Mutual’s. Fleeta’s made coffee.” Jack puts his arm around Jim Roy. But Jim Roy doesn’t move. He stands there looking at his theater.

  “I can’t believe it. And on Christmas.” He sighs sadly.

  As we enter the Mutual’s, folks gather around Jim Roy and his wife. Soon we break into small groups in the booths or sit around the Fountain, reminiscing about our favorite movies or the first movie we ever saw at the Trail. Theodore, put to work as a waiter for Fleeta, serves pie off of a tray. Fleeta peels the cellophane and red Christmas ribbon off a Whitman’s sampler box and passes the chocolates around.

  Quietly, through the kitchen, Leah and Pearl come in; Worley rushes to Leah’s side, and she explains all about Albert. Folks buzz around Pearl, who says that Albert will be all right. Folks around here don’t even know the man but are concerned.

  “He didn’t set no farr,” Otto tells me.

  “How do you know?”

  “Chief tole me. Said it was wiring in the sound system. I ought to tell Pearl that, oughtn’t I?” Otto goes off to give Pearl the news.

  Nellie Goodloe, dressed in her red velvet Christmas suit studded with a jeweled Christmas-tree brooch and glittering smaller trees on her ears, gets up and calls the gathering to order.

  “I want to tell you something, Jim Roy. I want you to know that I had my first kiss in the Trail Theatre in 1942.” Wolf whistles fill the soda fountain. “Yes sir, I did. Robert Taylor leaned over and kissed Vivien Leigh on the silver screen, and up in the balcony, Spec Broadwater leaned over and kissed me. I never forgot it.”

  The crowd cheers, and Spec turns so red, he matches his flannel shirt. Spec’s wife, Leola, in a running suit with snowmen painted on it, shoots Spec a dirty look. Then she thinks better of her petty jealousy and chuckles. Fleeta stands up on a step stool behind the counter. “Nellie, I want to know one thang. Did old Spec know what he was doin’?”

  The crowd turns to Nellie. “Honey, I hope to tell ye, he surely did.”

  Fleeta spins her dishrag in the air like a truce flag. Etta is laughing along with the crowd, and she looks so grown-up to me all of a sudden.

  “I think Etta just got her first sex-ed lesson,” I whisper to Jack.

  “Could be worse,” he whispers back.

  Fire or no fire, once I’m home, I have to clean up the dishes. I’m one of those people who must have every dish washed and put away before they can sleep. Luckily, Theodore is one of those people too. My husband, however, is not. He went to bed after putting Etta down.

  “How about I take Etta to Cudjo’s Caverns tomorrow,” Theodore says, stuffing the refrigerator with more leftovers.

  “She’d love it.”

  “What are you going to do on your day off with your husband?”

  “I don’t know.” And I really don’t. I never have a day off with Jack.

  “Maybe you can think of something fun to do together. And I don’t mean clean the oven. I’ll keep Etta away until suppertime. You can have a lot of wild sex while we’re gone.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You don’t even blush. What has happened to you?”

  I look at him, and he laughs. He goes into the dining room to collect the last of the dessert plates while I scrub the sink and think about wild sex. I don’t think of actual wild sex, I’m wondering where mine went. Ours. I expected, before I got married, that I would be the last person to trade passion for comfort and then for routine and now for, I don’t know, privacy. I thought the need to communicate, to physically communicate, in marriage would grow. No one told me, and perhaps no one can, what the truth of it all is. Sex becomes another way of speaking to each other, and when you stop touching, it’s just as bad as if you’re not speaking. When you stop everything except those perfunctory hello and good-bye pecks on the cheek and the hugs, more a way to brace yourself than to express feelings, you’re in Big Trouble. But there is no one day or one thing that sets the Big Trouble alarms off. At first you stop kissing because you’re annoyed at him, and it’s a way to communicate that. And when the message gets through that you’re not kissing for a reason, his behavior seems to adjust to the new rule: you upset me, you hurt me, you disappointed me, no kissing. And when those tender kisses become further and further apart, so goes the sex. It’s impossible to make love when you can’t kiss your lover. Someone once said that sex is the thermometer in a marriage; only when something is wrong is sex an issue. And that is true. But what no one tells you is that once you stop connecting, it is very hard to bring it back. There are times when I see my husband doing mundane things like unloading the truck or stacking the firewood, or today, when he was carving the turkey, and my instinct is to run to him and tell him how much he means to me and how I want to make love to him, and let’s drop everything. But I don’t. Maybe I’m afraid he’ll reject me or maybe it’s just life—there is always something in the way. Time. Work. Etta. Company. Or something else that has to be done. And then you forget. And sex is always the first thing to go, because it’s the one thing that can wait. Who knew the most natural thing in the world could become the most elusive?

  Jack is snoring when I crawl into bed; I give him a gentle nudge, and he turns over. I am looking forward to sleeping long and late since Theodore is taking Etta spelunking. I sink down into the soft flannel sheets like a spoon in gravy. Jack turns over and opens his eyes.

  “I thought you were asleep.”

  “I have an idea,” Jack says, and lies back on the pillow.

  “Yeah?”

  “I think we should take Etta to Italy next summer to see your dad.”

  “Really?”

  “Don’t you think she’s old enough?”

  “I do!”

  “They accepted our bid for the rec-center job in Appalachia. I think we’ll be in pretty good shape financially. If we buy tickets now, we could get a good deal.”

  “Okay. I’ll get on it.”

  “Does that make you happy?” he asks me.

  “Oh my God, yes!” I kiss him good night.

  Jack rolls over onto his side and yawns. Soon he’ll be snoring again. I’ve never seen anyone fall asleep more quickly than my husband. Italy. Next summer. It seems so far away. And I’m happy that he got the job in Appalachia. But it’s odd, he hasn’t mentioned my partnership with Pearl since our argument about it. I thought it was best to leave it alone. No matter how well I think I know Jack MacChesney, he can still surprise me. His reactions to things. The things that hurt his feelings. Things I haven’t counted on. There seems to be this gap between us sometimes; he doesn’t know what I’m thinking, and I don’t always know what he’s feeling. I never would have thought that the family finances would be a problem for us. Both of us were so eager to share everything equally in the beginning. And when I had the babies, it seemed natural to work part-time; after all, we own this house, and his paycheck was enough. Maybe he felt empowered in an old-fashioned way when he was the chief breadwinner. Maybe he liked being the only one taking care of us in that way. Is Iva Lou right? Is this all about the male ego? Or are our fights about money really about something else—something both of us are afraid of, so we use the finances as an excuse? Sometimes there’s a stranger in this bed, and I think it’s me.

  My post-Christmas present to myself is a call to Gala Nuccio, our travel agent. Gala became a big part of our lives after Jack found her in the New York paper years ago and she planned the trip that brought my dad and nonna to me for the first time.

  Gala’s tours are now the gold standard of Italian-American bus tours; she recently shot her first TV commercial (which airs in New York, Connecticut, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania). She sent us a videotape: there sh
e was, an Italian goddess with golden skin, a beautiful teased bubble of black curls with red highlights, full, shiny maroon lips, arched black eyebrows, and a killer pale blue Chanel suit with gold chains on the pockets. Her perfectly manicured nails with French tips pointed out vistas of Mighty Italia in the background: Rome, Florence, Capri, and Milan whizzed by, a supersonic slide show of adventure. Then, at the end, Gala sat on a suitcase and pointed down to her 800 number, which pulsed in red, white, and green.

  “Gala Tours,” the receptionist says when she answers the phone.

  “Is Gala in?”

  “Who shall I say is calling for Mizz Nuccio?”

  “Tell her it’s Mario da Schilpario’s daughter.”

  “Hold, please.” I am on hold for barely ten seconds, then Gala bursts through the wires.

  “Holy Mother, is that you, sister?” Gala barks into the phone.

  “It’s me. You dropped Nuccio? Now you’re a one-name star like Cher or Liberace?”

  “Or God.” Gala cracks herself up.

  “How are you?”

  “I am fan-tab-you-luss.” Then Gala lowers her voice and growls, “Yesss ma’am.”

  “Who is he?”

  “His name is Toot Ruggerio. He lives in Manhattan. Little Italy. He’s busy. And he’s thrifty. He lives in the same apartment he grew up in. Rent control, you know. He’s very close to the senator up there. Senator Pothole, they call him.”

  “Oh, Toot’s in government.”

  “Nope. Construction. Honey, they call it politics, but honest to God, it’s all construction.”

  I tell Gala all about Jack’s new business.

  “I cannot bee-leave that your Jack and my Toot are in the same line of work. We are linked by some giant bubble of karma, you and me. I tell you, we knew each other in another life. My psychic tells me I was a gemologist in Calabria. I have to remember to ask her what you were next time. She reads pictures too. She gets vibes off of them. I’ll bring pictures of Etta from Christmas.” Gala tells me all about her business, how it’s growing by leaps and bounds; when she goes to the Short Hills Mall, she gets mobbed because people know her from television. “Don’t worry, hon. I keep it all in perspective. Success hasn’t changed La Nooch. That’s what Toot calls me: La Nooch. Okay, maybe now I have money and influence and I’m on TV. But believe me, at my center, at my core, fame has not gone to my head.”

  “Gala. I have a job for you.”

  “Let me get a pencil. Give me the dates.”

  As I give Gala the dates, I picture Jack and me in Santa Margherita, on the cliffs of the Mediterranean Sea, in the port by the sea with bright blue water where white sailboats bob like prizes and the nets are filled with shiny pink fish and the moon makes the cobblestones look like they’re brushed in silver glitter. My husband will fall in love with me again in that light. I just know it.

  I drive up Valley Road on my way to Norton. Pearl wants me to see the new building; the deal went through the week after Christmas. It’s easy to find where Mutual Pharmacy II will be, as there are building permits posted in the window. Pearl is waiting for me inside.

  “I wanted to hire MR. J’s, but they’re booked up.”

  “That’s okay. How’s your dad?”

  “He’s going to be just fine.”

  “There’s all sorts of stories in town.”

  “I know.” Pearl frowns.

  “What was he doing in the theater?” I ask her gently.

  “He was sleeping there.”

  “But they say he lives in Dunbar.”

  “Not really. After he left Mama and me, he went and lived with a woman in Dunbar, and then she threw him out after a couple of years.”

  “When was the last time you saw him?”

  “About a month ago. He comes to me twice a year. For money.” Pearl looks down when she says this. “And I give him a little, and he always promises to pay it back, and then he disappears.”

  “How did he find you?”

  “He saw my picture in the paper when I graduated from UVA Wise.”

  “Did your mom know?”

  “Yeah, and she didn’t discourage me from seeing him. I feel bad. Mr. Honeycutt didn’t know he was staying there. He snuck in through an old air shaft behind the screen.”

  “Don’t worry. Old Jim Roy is just happy his collection got saved.”

  Pearl shows me the plans for the pharmacy—no soda fountain here, it will be strictly med counter and health and beauty aisles. She also tells me that the Soda Fountain is such a success, she should be able to pay off the bank loan within a year.

  “I’d better get back to town. We have the sale running.” I turn to go. “Pearl, where’s your dad now?”

  “I got him an apartment in Appalachia. I don’t know if he’ll stay, though.”

  “It’s so complicated, isn’t it?”

  “I’ll never figure it all out, will I?” Pearl asks me by way of answer.

  “Did you ever ask him why he left you?”

  “I did.”

  “And what did he say?”

  “He told me it hurt too much to stay.” Pearl shrugs. “I don’t understand it. But that’s the way it is.”

  The after-Christmas sale at Mutual Pharmacy is a circus. All holiday decorations, wrapping paper, ribbons, and gift sets are marked half off. Jean Hendrick has loaded her trunk with stuff twice. Mrs. Spivey and Liz Ann Noel nearly got in a hair-pulling fight over our last mechanical angel, marked down 75 percent (even though the angel was missing a wing). Peggy Slemp bought the remaining three boxes of Whitman’s chocolates (we polished off the rest on the Fire Night) for half off (she freezes them!). “She gives ’em year-round. She is so cheap. Tighter than a truss,” Fleeta sniffed, but she rang them up anyway.

  The crowds have made the Soda Fountain lunches standing room only. Tayloe Lassiter was promoted to hostess during the post-holiday rush. We have two high school kids from Mr. Curry’s Future Business Leaders Club waitressing in her place. Otto and Worley volunteered to be cooks on their days off. They’re not bad, either.

  By closing time, we are exhausted. Fleeta locks the door behind Reida Rankin, who bought the last few boxes of Christmas lights. “She’d stay all the night if I let her,” Fleeta says, lighting up a cigarette.

  “What a day!” Pearl says as she emerges from the office.

  “Who’s hungry?” Fleeta wants to know.

  “I’m gonna head out,” I tell Fleeta.

  “No, not yet,” she tells me firmly.

  There is a knock at the front door. “Tell ’em to drop dead,” Fleeta hollers, walking back to the Soda Fountain. But it’s Iva Lou, so I let her in.

  “Did you save me the cards with the Delacroix snow village on them?”

  “I put the last three boxes behind the register.”

  “Good girl.”

  “Are you hungry?”

  “Twist my arm.”

  If the sales staff (Fleeta and me) is half dead, the Soda Fountain staff is worse. Otto pours himself a Coke. Worley, who ended up waiting on customers because the Future Business Leader girls got flustered, sits in a booth with his feet up.

  “I’m telling ye, people was so hungry, they’d have eaten a dead rat,” Otto tells us.

  “The sale made them hungry,” Pearl says.

  “What are ye talkin’ about?” Fleeta asks, biting into a stale doughnut.

  “When there’s a sale, folks literally salivate, their mouths water at the possibility of a bargain. They have a physical reaction. It’s exciting to get a deal, and the human body knows it.”

  “That’s just fer women,” Worley says.

  “No, it’s all people. Watch the men when Legg’s Auto gets the new trucks in. You’ll see,” Pearl promises.

  “I thought we was gonna have a full-out fistfight ’tween the Baptists and the Methodists over them religious cards you had out two for the price of one,” Otto comments.

  “The Baptists took ’em. Everybody knows the Baptists got more
bite.” Fleeta puts out plates. “Well, come on, y’all. It’s buffet-style.” Fleeta has displayed all the food that is left in the Soda Fountain. There are four wedges of pie, coconut or cherry (“Yer choice,” Fleeta grunts), a plate of oatmeal cookies, two croissants with cheese, and several individual servings of Jell-O with a small star of whipped cream dead center on the squares. “The coffee’s fresh,” Fleeta says, apologizing for the hit-and-miss eats.

  “You kept me hanging around for this?”

  “Not exactly. This meetin’ is hereby called to order. Now, who’s gonna tell Ave what we heard up in Coeburn?” Fleeta announces. Iva Lou looks at her like she wants to throttle her.

  “What did you hear?”

  “Now, Ave, don’t git pissed at the messenger is all I’m a-gonna say.”

  “I won’t, Fleeta.”

  “All right. Here’s what we know and when we knowed it. Pearl sent me up to Norton to check on a couple of things fer her at the new store.” Fleeta looks at Pearl, who nods. “And when I was up ’ere, I done heard something. But as my mama used to say, you can put what I heard and what you heard together and hear nothin’.” I nod at Fleeta. What she says makes absolutely no sense, but it seems like she rehearsed it, so I don’t interrupt. “I got me a cousin up ’ere. I think you’ve met her. Veda Barker. Small woman. Vurry Christian woman. Well, she was over to the Coeburn town meeting, where they was talkin’ about renovations and such of the town hall up ’ere, and they announced that MR. J’s won the bid.”

  “I know they won the bid on a job in Coeburn.”

  “Yeah, but what you don’t know is that Kurr-en Bell got up and spoke on behalf of MR. J’s.”

  “She vouched for Jack’s company. So what? She manages Luck’s Lumber; they supply MR. J’s with their materials.”

  “Kurr-en Bell is after your husband. And you need to wake up.”

  “Fleeta. Your tone,” Pearl says to her gently.

  “What do I need to wake up about?” I ask innocently. Suddenly, I realize how wives have done this for centuries. We buy time, pretending not to know what folks are talking about when they’re talking about our husbands and how they spend their time and with whom. This pretend act will get me out of here so I can breathe and think.