Unsinkable Mister Brown (Cruise Confidential 3)

by Brian David Bruns

  “Ah, the Thousand Lips Pajamas,” I said. “I guess that means the night is over.”

  With a quirk of her lips, she undid the buttons of her pajama shirt, revealing black lingerie hidden beneath.

  “These were a deception,” she said, dropping her pajamas to the floor.

  At noon the next day, Piti’s cucurigu woke us. Sunlight streamed into the bedroom, and I marveled that we had slept through such a glorious, noisy morning. The birds in the trees outside our window were doing their damnedest to simulate a Mötley Crüe concert. After Bianca rose and groggily shuffled away, I lingered in bed, ruminating. The ships were so vastly different from real life that those months felt like a dream. Surely I hadn’t left here eight months ago, had I? Somehow, I belonged here and felt like I was home. What did that mean?

  Bianca seemed practiced at moving forward as if nothing was wrong, and perhaps I could afford to do so for a short time, too. Would that be so bad, to just relax and enjoy myself for a while? I didn’t want to lie to myself. I deplored lying, but was it the same crime when directed inward? How could I justify months of uncertainty disappearing with one look at her rosy apple cheeks? I was such a sap.

  But I didn’t want to justify anything. I was there, and that’s where I wanted to be. I resolved to go with the flow and enjoy myself until I felt it necessary to reign things back to reality.

  Which was that afternoon.

  2

  “Câine rau,” I said, noting the sign on the metal door before us. As was so common in Romania, the property was completely hidden behind tall, battered walls. We waited before a regular doorway set beside a double-wide metal gate. The street was also double wide, an unhappy combination of old bricks repaired with unsightly slabs of concrete. Unlike Strada Crișan, which enjoyed the ample trees and pedigree of the old town, this area was far more spartan. The moment we buzzed for entry, the quiet of the street was rent by frenzied howling from an entire pack of dogs. Big dogs, from the sound of them.

  We heard an irritated shout ordering the dogs to be quiet, then several clicks as numerous locks were undone. Sorin Miere, the Mustard King, opened the door. It was a hot day, so he wore shorts and a T-shirt. His lengthy forehead glistened with sweat.

  “Welcome to my factory!” he cried with delight. He rushed Bianca and gave her an exceptionally big hug and mucho kisses—no doubt taking advantage of his wife’s momentary absence. Sorin then turned to me, shook my hand, and gave me a kiss on each cheek.

  He led us inside to what was actually a small compound. We crossed a large court of brick, defined by a tall stone wall on the left and a large structure on the right. The looming building evidently doubled as both house and factory. The near end was brick and pleasantly dressed with clinging grapevines and hanging flower pots, whereas the bulk extending into the distance was plain concrete. At the far end, several hundred feet away, were large trees shading a huge pen holding back monstrous dogs. They jumped high up their fenced enclosure, snapping and snarling. They most certainly did not say ‘ham ham’.

  “Shut up!” Sorin shouted once again, to no avail. He looked up at me and shrugged his shoulders in defeat.

  “They excellent guard dogs,” he explained sheepishly. “Friendly after you feed them. We let them free at night hungry.”

  While the entire complex was not luxurious, it definitely radiated success. Sorin beamed at me when I commented upon it.

  “We do fairly well,” he said with a modesty proven false by his constant need to giggle. “Come! I introduce you to my parents.”

  We strode across the bricks towards a smoking grill and a cluster of people. Piti and Lucky, who had arrived earlier, were talking to another couple of their approximate age. Moni and daughter Corina had just arrived from the kitchen bearing heaps of meat ready for the grill. It was the most beautiful sight I had yet seen in this summer-washed country.

  “My father,” Sorin introduced. “He is Bianca’s Godfather. He was colonel in army when Piti was... cum zici... sergeant? Yes, sergeant.”

  A solid man with bold, flowing white hair stepped forward curtly. His girth was impressive, almost rotund, and his bearing that of a man used to being in charge. He shook my hand heartily, then grabbed my head and forced it down to kiss both my cheeks. Mrs. Miere was a shy, petite woman who could easily have been Lucky’s sister.

  “Wow,” I commented. “A colonel!”

  “Bah!” he said, gathering my sentiment. Via translator, he dismissed his rank with a comment that ‘everyone has a superior officer, including colonels.’

  Then Colonel Miere proceeded to step back and overtly scrutinize me. Everyone went quiet. Finally he said something to Piti that made everyone laugh. It’s always unnerving when everyone is laughing at you and you don’t know why.

  With a wary smile I asked, “What did he say?”

  Sorin stifled his giggles to answer. “He said ‘if everyone is as big as you, is good we never went to war with America.”

  Only then did I realize that everyone around me was lucky to reach even five foot six.

  Despite protestations that he was ‘a normal guy’, the colonel began barking orders. Bianca was ordered to give him a kiss. Moni was ordered to place the meat on a table. Piti and Sorin were ordered to grill it. All the women were then ordered into the kitchen to prepare food. Corina was ordered to bring me a beer. Everyone complied with alacrity.

  Before grilling, I observed Piti preparing the grill in a manner I did not recognize. Using a long fork, he had stabbed a slab of something and was running it lovingly over the hot grate. Fat dripped into the coals with a satisfying pop and sizzle.

  “What the hell is that?”

  “Slanina,” Sorin answered. He referred to a series of odd-shaped slabs of mottled white and dark gold. One side had been scored to make them look like fatty little combs.

  “Is smoked fat.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Smoked fat of pig,” he repeated. “Goes good on grill. Excellent with eggs, also. Like your... bacon, but no meat.”

  I stared at the slabs in wonder. They were indeed nothing more than a thick slice of skin with a couple inches of fat still attached. How most Romanians could remain so skinny while eating pure fat was a marvel.

  I was particularly fascinated by the meat. There were piles of chubby, linked sausages and mounds of long, coiled sausages that easily measured over two feet had they been unfurled. The largest stack of skinless sausages I did not recognize at all.

  “What are those?” I asked Sorin.

  “Ahh,” he said. “Mititei. Very good.”

  He looked at me helplessly for a moment. His limited English had evidently reached its end. Before he could find a way to respond, his father took over.

  “Corina!” he barked forcefully. The dogs in the pen had nuthin’ on the colonel.

  Seconds later Corina came out of the house and pounded across the bricks to stand at attention. Colonel Miere obviously ordered her to fetch Bianca. Also obvious was that he need not have bothered. Bianca heard him clearly from inside the kitchen, where Corina had been. Bianca approached, holding a sweating bottle of beer and asked, “What is it?”

  The colonel instructed her to ‘educate Mr. Brown about mititei.’

  “Oh, you’ll love them,” Bianca said, complying. “They are sausage rolls of lamb, pork, and beef. They are mixed with paprika, dill, salt, garlic, and... soda of baking I think you call it. We mix them with love and chill for a few hours before grilling so they fatten up. They are eaten with mustard and beer.”

  “Mustard, of course!” I agreed, giving Sorin a grin.

  Eventually we settled around a long table under a shady tree. It was heaped with all manner of wonderful things: tomatoes beading refreshingly cool, grilled meats steaming deliciously hot. I chose a seat beside a half wheel of chalky, semi-hard cheese, but was interrupted by the colonel, who directed where everyone was to sit.

  “Piti, Lucky!” he said, thrusting a finger to
the chairs at his right.

  “Sorin, Moni!” he followed curtly, pointing across the table.

  “Bree-ahn, Bianca—”

  “Colonel!” his wife snapped.

  He stopped in mid-sentence, ran a sheepish hand through his white mane, and quietly sat down. Corina giggled. Sorin looked like he wanted to, but after a glance at his mollified father, wisely kept himself to a smile.

  The whole meal was fantastic, but the mititei were absolutely divine. I had multiple food-gasms of the highest order. Afterwards I seriously considered asking for a cigarette. I couldn’t stop talking about those mititei. They were unlike anything I had ever had before, both juicy and almost puffy-plump. Bianca, pleased at my enjoyment, heaped different mustards on my plate in which to dip the sausages. I particularly liked the one with horseradish.

  Bianca recommended, “If you like the horseradish mustard, before taking a bite of mititei, nibble on a puppy.”

  She placed a clove of garlic on my plate.

  “What’s this?”

  “A puppy.”

  “I don’t want to eat a puppy,” I whined. “The Hell Hounds are mad enough.”

  “Babaloo, that’s what we call one little garlic. If you no want, eat a red.”

  “What’s a red?”

  “A red,” she repeated, gesturing to a tomato.

  “You call them reds? How creative. Why not call a banana a yellow?”

  “No, she calls you a brown,” Sorin joined in, snorting with laughter.

  “And what you call oranges, eh bambo?” Bianca finished. “You can’t eat only meat and cheese, is not good for you.”

  “She says to the giant among Lilliputians,” I added wryly, finishing her sentence for her.

  The banter continued, while the colonel observed that he was not surprised I enjoyed the mititei so much. Since the renewal of hostilities in the Persian Gulf, a sizable American military force had been stationed in Romania. Many of the soldiers expressed a preference for mititei, claiming it surpassed even their love of cheeseburgers. While distressingly unpatriotic, I certainly understood the sentiment.

  After dinner, the men settled into the cigarettes and the women settled into the kitchen. I offered to help with the dishes, but was roundly refused. There was simply no fighting the established gender roles. Instead, Corina asked if I would play badminton with her in the courtyard. With a stomach groaning under the weight of smoked pig fat and raw puppies, I doubted I could handle her youthful zeal.

  But I readied myself to be trounced by a child, sitting on a bench and tying my shoes a bit tighter. I snapped a lace. Immediately I looked around. Fortunately Bianca had not seen it. The colonel had. He threw up his hands and joked disparagingly to Piti something about ‘bringing Rambo to my house.’

  After twenty minutes of playing badminton with Corina, I was mercifully relieved by Bianca.

  “Order my father to take over in ten minutes,” Bianca said. “My godfather will get a kick out of you giving orders. But not to him, of course. Oh, and could you also ask my father to bring me lemon for my tea?”

  As I walked over to Piti and the two Miere men, I nervously mouthed what words I knew in their language. I wanted to try my tongue at Romanian, but didn’t have a clue how to order anyone anywhere. Fortunately I knew how to ask Piti for lemons.

  Or so I thought.

  Romanian words tumbled from my lips. I thought they sounded pretty good, and stood up a bit straighter. Piti did, too. He positively bristled, in fact.

  A yawning silence answered my statement. Even the dogs stopped barking. All three men stared at me, mouths agape. I looked back quizzically.

  “Lamâie!” Bianca shrieked from across the courtyard. She dropped her racquet to run over and cover Corina’s ears. “It’s lamâie! Not lamooyay.”

  “Lamooyay,” I called back, not hearing any difference. “That’s what I said!”

  Bianca’s face turned red, as if she were having a heart attack. She was anything but incapacitated, however. She stormed forward, shouting accusingly, “It’s the ‘A’ with the hat on it! You no hear the difference?”

  Sorin erupted in giggles powerful enough to knock him from his seat. The colonel looked confused, whereas Piti just stared into space, dumbstruck.

  “All right,” I demanded. “What’s so funny about me mispronouncing ‘lemon’?”

  Rather than answer, Bianca’s eyes fell on Piti. She squeaked and scampered away.

  “You wanted to ask Piti for lemons for Bianca?” Sorin asked, spluttering with uncontrollable mirth.

  “Yes,” I snapped impatiently. “Was my pronunciation really that bad?”

  Sorin glanced to make sure his daughter was out of earshot, and explained, “Your accent was very good, in fact. Your Romanian was perfect.”

  “Well, what then?” I asked, vexed.

  “You ask his OK for oral sex with his daughter!”

  3

  “I suggest tour of my mustard factory now,” Sorin said, giggling. “You are lucky Piti is retired, or he would probably shoot you.”

  “I think escape is a great idea,” I agreed.

  “Is nothing much,” Sorin said of his factory as we walked towards the back of the family structure. “But is enough.”

  He led me through room after room, each with concrete floors and several with drains set in the center. Mostly they were large and empty, as there was nobody working today. Each room had some sort of large machine dominating one wall and a long line of laminate counters. He illustrated the various machines used for different levels of grind, from fine for the mustard seeds to loose for the horseradish. It all looked quite simple, actually. The plastic jars were purchased in bulk, of course, then filled by hand and labeled accordingly. One chamber was devoted to exploring differing product lines of soda.

  “I have five... employees,” Sorin said. “One is delivery man. Twice a week I deliver also, and my father takes over here.”

  “I’ll bet the employees like it better when you are boss,” I teased. He snickered in agreement.

  “Is this the premium, or something?” I asked, referring to a plastic-wrapped stack of flats loaded with jars ready for delivery. They were labeled with MIERE across the front.

  “Why you ask?”

  “It has your name on it, but the others do not.”

  Sorin laughed. “Oh, no, is honey mustard.”

  I frowned. “I don’t understand.”

  “In my language, my name means ‘honey,’” he explained.

  I started laughing. “You mean I’ve been terrorized by Colonel Honey?”

  We poked our heads into the final chamber, a large store room, and were surprised to see Piti and the colonel. They waved us over, and the colonel barked at Sorin. He nodded enthusiastically.

  “He says tell you he gave you one case of mustard with horseradish. Is in your car.”

  “Oh, that’s not necessary,” I replied. “Very kind of you, though.”

  “Is done,” Sorin said. “Besides, Piti likes. I don’t think you will get any.”

  The colonel was musing over a wall of heavy shelves loaded with numerous plastic bottles. I recognized them as the same bottles as the sunflower oil Lucky used for cooking her fantastic meals.

  “You produce sunflower oil, too?” I asked.

  “No,” Sorin said, growing excited. “We produce țuica.”

  “Hot damn!”

  “The best țuica is always made at home,” he continued. “My father is... expert. We distill in our house in Moldova. I hope to show you sometime.”

  “Suddenly I’m scared.”

  “Yes!” Sorin agreed. “We sell also, of course, but save the best for family. Some is very, very... powerful. Danger in good way.”

  The older fathers were busy admiring the various shelves, and only then did I see they were labeled. I gathered that the newer ‘vintages’ were on the bottom, but as the levels rose, so, too, did the age. The higher shelves had an increasingly smaller number of
contents, with the very top graced by only three dusty bottles. The colonel pulled up a stool and lumbered up to grab one of these last.

  He dropped down with a pant, and called to me in his usual, forceful manner, “Mr. Brown!”

  The colonel presented the bottle to me, stating something with a voice that was probably as kindly as he was capable. There was still a hint that sounded more dangerous than even homemade moonshine.

  “For you,” Sorin translated. “Is ten years old.”

  “Oh, no, no,” I demurred. “I couldn’t. There’s only three left!”

  “He says is because you are the first man of his Goddaughter’s that he... approves.”

  I took the bottle and thanked him. It was not easy to swallow for guilt. Here I was accepting a ‘welcome to the family’ gesture, when it remained to be seen if I was going to walk away from the entire affair.

  4

  “We need to talk,” I said.

  “Not now,” Bianca replied hastily. “The train is almost here.”

  “On the train, then.”

  “No, bamboclat, when we get to the Black Sea!”

  “Fine, fine,” I said, acquiescing. I glanced around the bustling train station and asked, “Where is the restroom? I want to go before we get on the train.”

  “Oh, no!” Bianca cried, scandalized. “Can’t you hold it?”

  “I’m a boy-person boy, Bianca,” I replied sarcastically. “Being scared of public restrooms is a girl-person thing.”

  “Is not that,” Bianca pleaded. “Number one or number two?”

  “Are you my mother now?”