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"Welcome to Black Bear, Pennsylvania." The carved wooden sign is new — dark forest
green with gold-leaf lettering — the best that the firehouse cake sale could buy, no
doubt. Little else seems changed as I drive down Main Street. I've been gone half my lifetime,
and this tiny, insular mountain village appears just as threadbare as ever.
Seventeen years ago, I fled Black Bear, returning to Paris for university, vowing I'd never
come back. If it hadn't been for that anonymous phone call, I never would have set foot in
this town again. Does death nullify vows? In the center of the village, at the crossroads
where it all started over a hundred and fifty years ago, are the vener¬able steepled Moravian
church and the modern single story Catholic Church across the street. For a Monday after-noon,
the Chug-a-Lug beer distributor is busy, with two mud-splatter¬ed pickup trucks and an
old beat-up Mustang in the lot. As usual, Cliff's True Value's inventory spills out
onto its cracked asphalt parking lot, trying to convince lake tourists and returning snowbirds
to stop and buy as they zoom past, routinely breaking the 25 miles per hour speed limit.
Why Cliff doesn't close on Mondays had been a mystery to Grampa. "No one does yard work
or barbecues or puttering on Monday," he would say. "Not when they have the weekend to rest
up from, and the work-a-day week ahead of them."
And there, next to Engelhardt's sprawling Ford dealer¬ship, the vile old school is
still a blot on the land-scape, boarded up and falling down. How typical.
But no, not everything is the same. Some things — and people — are irretrievably lost.
Next to Engelhardt's Auto Supply and across from the old school is Grampa's drug store,
now a second-hand clothing shop. I wonder, what have they done with Gramp's soda fountain
and snack counter? Are neatly folded recycled baby jumpers piled on the chrome and red leatherette
stools where I used to love to twirl? Black Bear must have been one of the last places
on earth where the local pharmacist would greet you by name and know how you liked your
milkshake as well as what medicines you took, when and why. The Rite-Aid in Hamlin put an
end to that about fifteen years ago, forcing Gramps out of business, but he had written
me that he'd been thinking of retiring anyway. Or had he already known that he was dying
and would be gone in a couple of years? I pull into Dutch's service station, to top
up the fuel tank. Ever since I first learned to drive, Gramps drilled into me that I should
never, ever let the gas get below a half tank — just in case. Not that I was an overly
obedient teenager; I would often drive until the car was almost empty. But I learned my
lesson that horrid night after the homecoming game in my senior year, when I ran out of
gas on Drumheller Lane. Fleeing for my life from that dark dirt road was a suit¬ably
wretched finish to the miserable day that changed every-thing. Now, back in Black Bear,
where I vowed I'd never return, I'm determined to heed every precaution necessary to make
it through this one week, including filling up my rental car at Dutch's before leaving
town for the farm. Just as I flip open the door to the car's
gas cap, a big white man in his mid-thirties yells from the service bay, "Hey, I'll do
that for you, miss!" and limps toward me as quickly as his bad right leg lets him.
I remember how Old Man Dutch used to rant at the alleged convenience store gas stations
that had sprouted along the interstate. "Where the hell's the service in self-serve?" he'd
ask. This enormous man, with his unkempt, thinning,
dark blonde hair and that beer belly protruding over his low jeans, isn't Dutch. Still, he
must agree with Dutch because after he starts pumping the gas, he actually squeegees the
car's wind¬shield and rear window. All the while, staring at me.
Well, I knew that would be part of coming back. They never did get used to my dark skin,
flat nose and *** hair around here in Wonder White Bread territory. "You're like a one-two
punch, for some folks," Gramma once tried to explain. "You're Schmoyer through and through,
down to the family hazel eyes and high cheek bones, but in a very differ¬ent package from
anything they've ever known. You confuse them." Confuse isn't the word I would use to describe
how Black Bear reacts to anyone who's "different." From a young age, I learned to try to ignore
the rude stares and cruel jibes. So, why does the way this man's icy blue eyes
bore into me make my skin crawl? Something about how his lop¬sided grin seems to consume
his entire face — it's all too disturbing — and familiar.
Even as he replaces the pump nozzle, caps the tank and wipes a spot where the gas splashed
on the side panel, he doesn't take his eyes off me. "Jo...?" he finally asks, then, catches
himself before saying anything else. Now, those pale, searing eyes that he couldn't
keep off me just a moment ago are diverted everywhere but on my face. Mostly, he focuses
on the oil splattered, cracked concrete around his feet.
Oh no! It can't be. Not this massive wreck of a man. His puffy face has that grizzled
look of someone who's lived and worked hard. Wrinkles punctuate his eyes and mouth, like
parentheses cut into his flesh. His nose has obviously been broken, perhaps more than once.
And he's hunched over and soft, nothing like the wide-eyed, fair-haired, muscular football
hero of our high school days. Once upon a time, nothing could have convinced me that
a day would come when I wouldn't instantly recognize Joe Anderson, regardless of how
long we'd been apart. Yet, it takes hearing his hesi¬tant, hoarse voice, saying that
damned nickname he gave me, before I can be sure he really is Joe Anderson.