Big Cherry Holler

  “I wasn’t skeered of that old buck.”

  “I know. But the excitement might’ve caused you some trouble.”

  “Aww, I feel fine,” Naomi tells me, and gets up.

  Spec has cleaned up the glass in the living room. Two of the men are taping cardboard along the frame where the glass had been.

  “I’m gonna put on some coffee, boys. Any takers?” Naomi offers.

  The men grumble appreciatively. Spec leaves his number with Naomi.

  “Now you call me, youngun, if you need me.”

  “I will.”

  The ride down through the veiny roads of East Stone Gap is dark except for our high beams and the occasional jack-o’-lantern on a porch. As we speed through the black night, I have a sense that time has stopped. I am somewhere in the past, when I was younger and wore the same orange vest and sat beside Spec in this very wagon that forever smells of tobacco and spearmint.

  “Ave?”

  “Yeah, Spec?”

  “That there was a good run.”

  “For everybody but the deer.”

  “Yup.” He smiles.

  “It was a mystical experience.”

  “Don’t start that stuff, Ave.”

  “Spec, that was a visit from the beyond.”

  “It was a visit from the woods. That deer saw a light through an open door and went in Naomi’s house uninvited. And that there is the end of it.”

  “Nope. Naomi thinks it was a visit from her husband on the other side.”

  “You’re givin’ me the creeps.”

  “I thought you were a believer.”

  “I am. If it’s Bible-approved, or if it makes any goddamn sense. People don’t come back as animals. That’s nuts.”

  “I wish I knew where we go when we die.”

  “What good would that do?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe I’d live differently. Maybe I wouldn’t be so afraid to lose people. I get scared that I’ll never see my mother again. My son.”

  “I shore would like to see my mama agin. And my pap, too. ’Cause if I could see ’em agin, I would ask ’em a lot of things. Things that weigh on my mind.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like why both of ’em died on me before I could git to ’em. Both of ’em. Ma went in her sleep, and Pap died at the hospital. But I never did say good-bye to neither of ’em. I wish that were different.”

  “I wish I would have made my mama go to Italy. She never went home, you know. That bothers me.”

  “I knew your mama. You couldn’t make her do nothin’ that she didn’t want to do. So you got to let go of that one.”

  “I guess so.”

  As Spec drives us up the holler road, I wish for a minute that the run weren’t over. There are things I’d like to talk about.

  “Thank ye, Ave. You done good.”

  “Don’t flatter me, Spec. It ain’t your style.”

  Spec smiles. I grab my gear and go into our old stone house.

  Etta must be asleep, I can see the glimmer of her nightlight from the bottom of the stairs. I place my gear on the bench and head back to our bedroom. Jack is propped up in bed, reading.

  “How’s Naomi?”

  “How’d you know?”

  “They made an announcement at the carnival. A guy from the Norton fire department called down the mountain with details.”

  “It was something to see.”

  “I’ll bet.” Jack goes back to his reading. When I see my husband, so comfortable in our house, in our bed, I feel as though we could last forever. I want to tell him about Naomi’s dream, and I wonder if he believes in that sort of thing. We never talk about things like that, so I don’t know.

  “Do you ever dream about Joe?” I ask him.

  Jack puts down his newspaper and looks at me, surprised that I brought Joe up. “No, I don’t,” he says softly. “Or maybe if I do, I don’t remember it.” We never talk about him; it’s just easier that way. I turn to go into the bathroom to wash up for bed.

  “Why do you ask?”

  “I wonder where he is.”

  “In heaven.”

  “God, Jack.”

  “Don’t you believe that?”

  “I tell Etta that; I guess I’m hoping it’s true.”

  “I thought you believed.”

  “Oh, I believe. I just don’t know in what,” I say. Jack looks at me funny. “What?”

  “Ave, sometimes … I don’t know. I don’t get it.” He shrugs and goes back to his reading.

  “Honey?”

  Jack puts down his paper. “What?”

  “Sometimes you don’t get me.”

  I go into the bathroom and take a good, long time brushing my teeth. Jack appears in the doorway. “Is everything all right?”

  I want to say, “No. I’m scared. Who was that woman at the carnival? Are you tired of me?” Instead, I look at my husband and say, “Everything is fine.” He buys it and goes back to bed. And that, I am sure, is the root of our problem.

  CHAPTER THREE

  For the first time in his life, Jack MacChesney is officially his own boss. MR. J’s Construction Company opened its door on November 20. MR. J stands for Mousey, Rick, and Jack. Very clever. Rick finagled a small office for them at the car dealership. Morgan Legg, the owner, was happy to oblige them, as Rick was his top salesman on the floor last year. I have never seen my husband so happy. And they’re off to a good strong start. They bid on a job to renovate the Fellowship Hall at the Methodist Church, and they won. Jack is having a ball designing the new space. No money coming in yet, but it doesn’t matter, my husband’s smiling face is payment enough. Jack’s new job frees up extra time for Etta too. When he was a miner, he left before dawn and often came home after dark. Now he controls his time, so we see more of each other. I feel our troubles lifting a bit. A real reason to celebrate come Christmas.

  I’m back to working full-time, and I like it. Jack didn’t like the idea at first, but I was so supportive of his new company that he let go of any misgivings he may have had about my schedule.

  The grand opening of the Soda Fountain is December 1. (Otto and Worley are practically living in the Mutual’s, trying to finish the job.) We’re having specials and giveaways all month. (Maybe we can unload some of that partially used Estée Lauder cream that Fleeta pinches.) Pearl has sifted through lots of employment applications, looking for two waitresses and a cook. She has decided to hire Tayloe Lassiter as head waitress, who, despite having two babies now (Misty was joined by baby Travis last year) is still a looker and can draw a crowd. Sarah Dunleavy, the high school teacher who replaced Theodore when he left for the University of Tennessee, directs the Outdoor Drama and has taken Tayloe under her wing. She gives her acting lessons, and everyone in town agrees that Tayloe has gone from amateur to semiprofessional actress beautifully. Sarah has also encouraged Tayloe to model. Occasionally, we see Tayloe in the Kingsport Times on the hood of a new truck or in an ad for kitchen appliances.

  Pearl comes in with a large packing box. “Fleets, the tinsel is in.”

  Fleeta takes the box and rips into it.

  Pearl comes behind the counter. “I’d like you to come over to Lew Eisenberg’s with me.”

  “Right now?”

  “Yeah. If you don’t mind.”

  “What’s the matter?”

  “Nothing. Just need your help on something.”

  “Okay.” I grab my coat and follow Pearl out.

  Lew Eisenberg has gone from the best local lawyer for the coal companies to representing the townsfolk in all matters from wills to divorces. He’s always busy, and he’s very good. He’s even happy now that his wife, Inez, has gotten back her race-car body. She is a Weight Watchers leader, having kept off fifty-eight pounds for over seven years. It’s been a long time since I’ve heard Lew mention moving back to Long Island, New York.

  Lew’s hair is completely gray; other than that, you’d never guess he was flirting with sixty. “Hey kids,” he s
ays from behind his desk. “Ave, your husband was in with his buddies incorporating last week. What do you think of that?”

  “If you can’t keep Westmoreland Coal Company in town, we’ll take it,” I tell Lew.

  “We’re real busy over at the Pharmacy,” Pearl tells Lew, cutting the chitchat in half.

  “Okay, so let’s get to it. This is easy. Ave Maria, Pearl wants to make you her partner at the Pharmacy.”

  “A partner? Why?” I turn so that I’m facing Pearl. She glances at Lew, then looks at me.

  “Because I need a partner now. We’ve grown so much that I can’t oversee everything alone.”

  “I can’t do it.”

  “Sure you can.”

  “No I can’t. I have more than I can handle.” I can’t tell Pearl and Lew that for the first time in three years I feel my home life is returning to normal, that the hole left by Joe’s death is slowly being filled by time, routine, and change. How could they understand that?

  “I’m going to hire more help for you.” Pearl offers.

  “No, I’m sorry, Pearl. No.”

  “But you need it,” Pearl blurts. It’s no secret that with the mines closed, anyone with a miner in the family is struggling.

  “We’re doing fine.”

  “Let’s say that you are doing fine, I still need help. I’m looking to expand, and I want to keep the flagship going strong. I’d have to hire a manager; who better than you?” Flagship? Little Main Street Mulligan’s Mutual Pharmacy a flagship? What is Pearl talking about?

  I turn to Pearl. “You’re expanding?”

  “I’d like to open a pharmacy in Norton. I’ve been looking at a building.”

  “You’re serious?”

  Lew pulls out a file and shows me a picture of the old insurance building, which has been abandoned for several years, in downtown Norton.

  “We’re talking to the realtor right now,” he tells me.

  “I think my concept of a down-home variety drugstore is one that can work anywhere. And Norton needs a pharmacy. They have two hospitals but no pharmacy.”

  “Pearl’s on to something here. You should consider this,” Lew says, peering at me over his glasses.

  I know I should. I’d have fewer Night Worries about the bills, college, and pensions. And the other part of all of this is just selfish. I’ve missed my pharmacy. I loved making the day-to-day decisions; I used to be a person who ran something. Being in charge gave me a sense of accomplishment that I don’t get working part-time or at home scrubbing the oven. I still have to scrub the oven, and that’s okay, but I love my job.

  “Ave, please do this. I wouldn’t have anything, I wouldn’t be anything, if you hadn’t helped Mama and me. It forever changed us. I owe you.” Pearl looks off for a second, and then that familiar concentration crease between her eyes deepens. “And I don’t like owing people. So let me at least begin to pay you back by sharing in the success of Mutual’s.”

  “The chain,” Lew pipes in.

  “Let me see what you’ve got there.”

  Lew hands me papers; Pearl lets out a whoop and claps her hands. It’s a simple deal. On the flagship store, I will be salaried as a manager and pharmacist and take 50 percent of the profits; the other share goes to Pearl. As I sign my name, I am thinking of my daughter and her future. She needs security. My husband will never leave Cracker’s Neck Holler, and now that he’s found work he enjoys, I have to contribute all I can, however I can.

  As Pearl and I walk back to the Pharmacy, she chatters on about her business plans, and I think about my family. This break will help us; I’m tired of worrying, and maybe this will help me stop. Ever since Joe died, when something wonderful happens, I have a moment of elation, then I remember my son and feel a pang of doom. What good is anything without my son to share it with? Now that I’ve ruined the moment for myself, I plunge further into despair. I feel a strange sense of defeat: here I go again, I’m tied down to a business I didn’t choose in the first place. When I gave the Pharmacy to Pearl, it was a no-strings deal. I knew the power that guilt can have over a person because it had defined my life. How I wanted to do the choosing and be free to invent myself. I had made a plan. I was going to leave Big Stone Gap and find myself out there in the world, seek my happiness, own my destiny, have a life of adventure before it was too late. Instead of going away, though, I fell in love and stayed here. I married Jack Mac and believed that the only cage I had been in was one of my own creation. Why do I now have that old boxed-in feeling when I should feel relief?

  Jack’s truck is parked in front of the Mutual’s when we return. “I hope Etta’s all right,” I tell Pearl.

  When we get inside, we find Jack, Rick, and Mousey working with Otto in the Soda Fountain. Etta is wearing Fleeta’s smock and painting one of the wood panels on the base of the counter.

  “Hey, what’s going on?” I say to the men, who look up but keep working.

  “Well, we was worried that we wasn’t gonna make our deadline. So I called old Jack Mac and I done tole him my troubles and he come over and here we are,” Otto explains.

  “I’m painting, Mama!” Etta says proudly.

  “I can see that,” I tell my daughter, who haphazardly streaks paint down the wood.

  “Don’t worry, Ave. It’s just the base coat,” Otto says under his breath.

  “Try not to get any paint on Fleeta’s smock.”

  “She can ruin it for all I care,” Fleeta says as she stacks boxes of Christmas tree lights onto the shelf.

  I watch my husband as he stands on a ladder, maneuvering a ceiling tile into place. I consider what I told Pearl about spending fifteen years in this town without a boyfriend. Suddenly, I am not in the present—I am the woman I was ten years ago, when I worked in this Pharmacy and it was my life. My husband swivels on the ladder. I don’t think any man could look better in a pair of old overalls and a bandanna. We’re so different; he’s talented with his hands, and the last book he read was Moby-Dick in the eleventh grade. I can’t hammer a nail, and I wait for the Bookmobile every Saturday. I must be attracted to what I don’t have, but I wonder what I fill up in him. He catches me looking at him and smiles. “What are you looking at?”

  “You,” I tell him.

  “Jack, you gots a call.”

  My husband and I are really looking at each other in a way we haven’t in a very long time, and I don’t want this moment to end.

  “She says it’s important,” Fleeta says impatiently.

  “Who is it?” I ask. My tone of voice causes every man in the room to look at me.

  “Karen. Karen somebody,” Fleeta barks.

  “I’ll be right there,” Jack says, and steps off the ladder. He touches my arm as he passes; I’m going to take that as a sign of reassurance for now. I look over at Rick, who studies the trim of the counter a little too intently.

  “Who’s Karen?” I ask him. Without looking up, he shrugs.

  Mousey interjects. “She manages the lumber store up in Coeburn. We git our lumber there.”

  I’m so glad I asked.

  “Hel-looo?” Iva Lou calls out from the front of the Pharmacy.

  “We’re back here,” I holler.

  “Well, lookee here. This is gonna be some soda fountain.” Iva Lou inspects the job. “All we need is Lana Turner on the stool and we’re in business.”

  “Who’s Lana Turner?” Etta asks.

  “She was a sweater girl in the movies when I was a boy,” Otto tells her.

  “A sweater girl?”

  “Yeah, she made me sweat.” Otto laughs.

  “Mr. Honeycutt shows her movies sometimes. I just haven’t taken you to any of them yet,” I tell my daughter.

  “I got tickets over to the Barter The-A-ter in Abingdon for tomorrow’s matinee,” Iva Lou tells me.

  “What are you seeing?”

  “Fiddler on the Roof. Remember that Womack girl who used to understudy June in the Drama? Well, she’s playin’ one of the sisters. I put
a group together. I was hoping I could take Etta.”

  “I want to go to the show!” Etta says. She puts down her paintbrush and shoves her bangs out of her eyes.

  “Okay, honey.”

  “I’m gonna be all alone this weekend without my women,” Jack Mac says from behind me.

  “Really? You throwing me out?” I tease.

  “Kind of.” Jack kisses me on the forehead and pulls a ticket from his pocket. UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE VS. ALABAMA, it says in orange letters.

  “What’s this?”

  “You’re going to Knoxville to see Theodore.”

  “You’re kidding.” I’m thrilled. Utterly surprised and a little confused, but thrilled at the prospect of a weekend without chores and errands and worries. I have the most thoughtful husband in the world.

  “Go on home and pack. Your bus leaves in an hour.”

  “Etta, you’ll be all right?”

  “Mama. Go,” she says, and rolls her eyes.

  “Okay. Great. I’m leaving.” I kiss Etta and then my husband.

  “I’ll follow you home and give you a lift back down to town,” Iva Lou says as I head for the door.

  Once I’m home, I throw together a duffel bag of clothes, feed the cat, and turn up the heat so it’ll be warm when Jack and Etta come home later.

  “You need to git away,” Iva Lou tells me as we descend the mountain into the Gap.

  “I do?”

  “Honey, you’re worn to a nub. We’ve all noticed it.”

  “I thought I was fine.”

  “Not to those of us who know ye.”

  We travel in silence for a moment. I dismiss the fact that folks are discussing my moods behind my back.

  “There was something I meant to ask you a while ago.”

  “Shoot.”

  “Do you remember a woman with blond hair buying books at the Halloween Carnival? She was small?” I was going to use the word “petite” but that sounds too pretty.

  “There were so many people there.”

  “This one kind of had a tan?”

  “Hon, I don’t remember.” Iva Lou looks at me. “Why do you ask?”

  “I just never saw her before. I thought maybe you knew her.”

  “No. I could ask James. Maybe he knows her.”