I walked through the door and I was home.  The Manger looked almost exactly like Angel's back in Pittsburgh.

Complete with the unwashed noontime masses.

I sat at the bar and signaled the bar tender.  When he saw me his face goes white.  He turned to the mirror behind the bar that is covered with snapshots.  He found a particular picture and goes even whiter.

He walked towards me as though he trudged through glass and lava.

"C-can I help you?"

"Yeah get me a beer."

"No problem."

His entire body relaxed as though a huge weight had been lifted.  When he came back he avoided eye contact.

"Thanks, hey, I was wondering if you could help me?"  The bartender stiffened up.  Something strange was going on.

"What'cha need, friend?"

"I'm looking for someone..."

"Who's that?"

"Sam Conners."

Ever see an old western, when the Stranger comes in and says one name and everything just stops.  The music, the laughing, everything just hangs on that breath.

I quite suddenly had many sets of eyes on me.

"Why are you asking about Sam Conners?"

"I heard he hung around here a lot.  In fact I was told he was here the night before he disappeared."

"Are you a cop or something?"

"No, just a...friend."

"Well if you are a friend of his, you ain't real close.  Sam's been gone for five years."

"I know, I talked to Naomi Rose before I came here."

"Well, that bitch ain't all there."  He scoffed and started cleaning a glass.

I was losing his interest, they weren't going to tell me shit.  "Well, if he hung around here a lot, I see you have a ton of pictures on the mirror, any of him?"

"Maybe, maybe not."

"What was that picture you looked at when I first sat down?"

"None of your fucking business."  He moved down the bar away from me.  

I reached into my pocket and pulled out a fifty.  "What do I owe you for the beer?"

"Three seventy-five."

I waved the bill in the air, he relunctantly grabbed it.  I tell him to keep the change.

He stood for a moment, as if his next movement was the most important thing in the world.  The bartender turned and grabbed the picture he was looking at earlier.

"Here, this is the only picture I have of Sam.  Though if you really wanted a picture that bad you could have saved us all time and looked in the mirror.  You two could be twins."

I looked at the picture.  I looked into the mirror.  It was me, but something was different.  I wasn't Sam Conners, but I had to be a brother.

"Why didn't you give this picture to the police?  His sister put in a missing persons report but didn't have a picture..."

"Sam's sister is a bitch.  She drives up here all the time for some ectasy and oxycotin.  No one took her seriously.  Sam had a habit of disappearing from time to time."

"Where is she now?"

"Morgantown down in West Virginia.  Some place called the Brew Pub is where she drinks every night."