Cannonsville Pizza: A Story of a War-Lost Love
By Adam
Seth Moss
© 2012 –
Route 189 Productions
Forty-seven years had passed since the last time he
showed up. The town had evolved into a dying resort town overlooking the
Cannonsville Reservoir. The last source of revenue had dried up years ago, and
as a result, there was nothing in town but boarded up buildings, the local
prison, and this pizzeria that didn’t want to leave. The pizzeria, all red and
beautifully decked out with the Christmas lights above could not seem to stand
out evermore than it did. The buildings next to it, long abandoned, windows
falling out of their frames, looked like they had not seen TLC since the last
war.
Sometime ago, I paid a visit to this quiet pizzeria. While driving up
County Route 67, I remember seeing that the last business for quite a while was
back in Hancock, which looked itself like a ghost town, especially after
Interstate 86 had collapsed and they chose to not repair it. Upon entering the
small abandoned village to the north, I saw the collapsing towers of the old
resort, which once served the residents for miles who wanted to get away from
it all. The brown, dirt-soiled buildings had all been boarded up, Route 67
became poorly paved after years of pothole development, and the sense of
loneliness spread throughout the area.
This pizzeria that I talk about stood on the nearby hill. Its red frame
and beautiful Christmas lights lit up the snow around the building and could be
seen as far as the reservoir nearby. I remembered my last trip there, the owner
had been declared missing, and his family never seemed to be able to get over
it. Somehow, they managed to move on and continue operating the family business
through the dead economy. When I pulled up to the parking lot, I looked out
towards the reservoir, which was black, but had this red glow due to the lights.
Inside, the place looked like any normal pizzeria. The lights that hung over
the booths for people to eat in, the lit menu, and even the smell of pepperoni
which filled the room. A young woman, in her twenties looked up when she saw me
at the door; she smiled and called back towards the kitchen.
“Mom! The man you talked about is here!” she shouted.
At that moment, this older woman, clearly in her late sixties, the pale
skin and eyes, entered the room. I looked her up and down; she was the wife of
the missing owner’s son. I hadn’t seen here since we were both teenagers back
during the war. When I was drafted, I never saw her again, because when I came
back, the family had moved to Deposit, which became inaccessible due to
numerous landslides. I pictured this woman with the teenage love that I had
been raised with. The differences after forty-seven years had been so drastic
that she looked nothing like I knew.
“It’s been a long time Megan.” I started to break the silence.
“Oh Adam, it’s been a long time since I’ve seen you. I haven’t seen you
since the war.” She replied as she grabbed at my gray beard and scanned me
over. As she looked, the young woman who called her over scurried off to the kitchen.
Once she was done, I motioned her to a table nearby and sat down in the aging
leather booth seats.
“Yes it has been a long time. I haven’t seen you since I was drafted, and
when I came back, you were gone. Mom and Dad said you had moved to the nearby
hills and lost contact.” I said, tears welling up my eyes.
“My parents wanted out of Hale Eddy. We had gotten sick of the
neighborhood and the overrun it had dealt with. When my parents passed away,
they donated my husband’s late father the money to open the pizzeria they
wished to open. When he went missing, my husband promised to keep the business
running; despite the effects of war melting down the economy near Cannonsville.”
That’s all she could utter before the depressed woman finally collapsed into
tears.
I cleared off my glasses of the tears I had, and grabbed a napkin for
Megan, who had clearly lost it going down memory lane. Her husband had died in
a car accident on Route 67, when he drove at night into a boulder that had
fallen from the mountainside. It was unfortunate that I could not be invited,
but his grave was right behind the pizzeria. Megan’s daughter walked up to her
mother and tried to calm her down. She gave me a look for a second then brought
her into the kitchen. When the daughter returned, she had this curious look on
her face.
“What happened? Why is my mother so upset?” she asked me. The sound of
displeasure in her voice was more than inviting a rude answer in return.
“She remembered everything in her life that’s happened. I think all the
repressed memories that she has held these last forty-seven years has come out.
The best thing to do would let her think these all back, eventually she’ll have
calmed down.” I responded.
I told the daughter I would come back in the morning, but ordered a large
pepperoni pizza to bring back to Hale Eddy with myself. When I got back to my
apartment in Hale Eddy, I looked out my windows in the hills overlooking the
Delaware River. I thought about how Megan had fallen apart into tears. Before I
went to bed, I decided to dig around the boxes in my apartment, and when I
opened this box in my closet that was marked “Adam’s Memories”, I saw this
picture of a boy and a girl that had been dusted over. I had never been married
in the times after I was drafted. Post-traumatic stress disorder ruined my
social life. I dug out the ring my father gave me in case I ever did. It was dusty;
the gold had begun to look worn. After I looked out over the riverside one more
time, I dug up an old ring box in the apartment, and put the ring in it.
The next morning was a very putrid morning in terms of the weather. It
had rained all day yesterday, and as a result the grounds through the area were
wet and full of mud. Some portions in the mountains had even iced over due to
the cold nights. I got into my ’10 Ford Focus and drove up the hills along
State Route 97 and County Route 97 before driving up to the pizzeria.
Noticeably obvious was that a Hearst and the car from the Delaware County
Coroner’s Office had been parked at the front door. In the front of the
building, a small man in officer uniform was comforting the daughter. I walked
up to the police officer and asked what had happened.
“We got a report early this morning from this woman that a person had
collapsed in this pizzeria. She was crying so hard she could barely speak, we
rushed up from Hancock as fast as we could, but when we got there, it had been
too late. She was gone. The Coroner’s Office just arrived with the medical
examiner. Based on her looks, I’d say she was lost when something finally broke
mentally. May I ask who you are by chance?” he responded.
“Adam Jackson, I am a long time friend of Megan’s, and at one time, her
lover in high school. We got separated when I got drafted for war nearly a half
a century ago. I came to visit the pizzeria last night after being told by a
friend in Hale Eddy that they might have found her. Everything seemed normal
last night, except that she broke in tears when she saw me and thought of all
the memories of her husband, who is buried in the family grave out back.” I
responded, trying to hold back tears. “I….I was supposed to propose to her
today, despite my older age. I thought it was time with her husband gone. I….I…guess
God said it not to happen.”
The officer gave me this look of depression when I told my tale,
obviously feeling sorry for me after all I went to. He finally said “Well,
unfortunately she’s gone. Could you do me a favor and bring the daughter down
to Hale Eddy for the weekend? I think it would be in her best interest.” I
nodded in agreement and motioned the daughter, who looked very distraught. I
brought her down to the car, cleaned off my beard and repositioned my Yankees
cap. Before starting the engine, I walked up to the officer once more.
“Would you mind if I took a look around?” I asked him.
He gave me permission. I walked into the pizzeria, which again had all
the lights on, but noticeably different, a picture of me from before the war
now hung in front of the menu. A non-educated guess would be that she put that
picture up after she saw me. The picture of me was the one taken for me in High
School dressed in the tuxedo my parents had rented. In the same picture, there
was a teenage view of Megan, her long hair and white dress sticking out over
the blue Delaware. I had never been given a copy of this photo, because Megan
wanted it, and before leaving, I took down the photo from the menu and put it
under my arm. I walked outside, walked over to the medical examiner, who was
putting her body in the Hearst.
“What did she die from?” I asked.
He ignored me and continued on his work. Seeing that response (or lack of
a response), I walked down to my car with the photo, which I put in my trunk. The
daughter had calmed down enough to speak. Her cheeks were bright red,
tear-filled and then some. It was gut-wrenching to watch her break down like
this. It didn’t help things when I started the engine and Bobby Vee started
playing over the radio. She started crying again as I drove down County Route
67 towards Hancock. After pulling into my apartment driveway in Hale Eddy, I
brought her and the photo upstairs. After getting her stuff put together in the
guest room, I took the photo of her mother and I and hung it up on my wall. Tears
welled in my eyes when staring at the photo. Someday, I thought, we’ll be in
heaven together. Her time had come before mine unfortunately.
The day of the funeral, I was in the best suit and tie I owned, with the
red burgundy shirt that fit so well. At some point, I was asked to speak in
honor of Megan and her daughter. I walked to the microphone and spoke about
what an honorable woman she had been for so many years and how she had persevered
through a lot of life’s hardships. I was still trying to hold back tears after
I finished reading a prepared line from George Bernard Shaw, the writer. Before
they buried the casket, I took the ring my father had given me and buried it in
the dirt below. This was my way, I felt, of saying goodbye to the woman I
thought would be my future wife. It was at that moment that I realized war
stunk.
