When we got to Spumoni Garden, we had to circle the block looking for a parking space. It was crowded as usual. Police cars and fire trucks were parked in front and firemen were sitting on the curb eating pizza.
“Assholes are hogging all the parking places.” Junior said.
We found a spot around the corner and walked back. A long line stretched out from the pizza window and all the picnic tables were filled. Christmas lights were strung across the front patio and everyone was eating square Sicilian slices.
“Oh my god, this is the best pizza.” Erica said, almost jumping up and down. Maybe, she was getting a little drunk, I thought.
“Yeah, the pizza, then the ice. Italian ice.” Marty added, without hopping around.
I realized that I was hungry too. I hadn’t had anything to eat all night long. I watched as the people ahead of us carried their plated with three or four slices past. I was seriously tempted to grab one. “I’m starving.” I said. “My sister made me ziti but I didn’t have any before I left the house.”
Erica whispered to me. “I have the munchies. I think we smoked too much pot.”
“You a bad girl?” I asked. Erica slapped at me gently and then whispered. “Yes.”
I wrapped my arms around her and tried lifting her in the air. “My dress.” She said. “Watch my dress.”
“Look, they’re leaving.” Junior said, pointing to a table that people were getting up from. “You and Erica sit here and save it from us. We’ll go get the pizza. How many slices do you want?” He asked.
“Four.” Erica said.
“Yeah, me too.” Marty was rubbing her belly. “Maybe five.”
“How are we going to carry that many slices? You can’t eat that much.”
“You watch.” Both of them said at the same time and then put their hand up to their faces laughing.
“Jesus, I’m going out with the Goodyear Blimp.”
“Just get the pizza, no wisecracks. If you’re lucky, we’ll still be here when you get back.” Marty said.
“Yeah, and maybe we’ll have some company too, if you don’t hurry. Maybe, some of these Bensonhurst boys will feed us first.” Erica was eyeing every plate of pizza that passed. Junior put the knuckle of his finger between his teeth and growled. Erica mimicked him and then Marty did the same.
The line was long but it moved quickly. At the window, we ordered a half pie, which was eighteen slices. “Think this is enough for them?” Junior asked mockingly.
“Probably not. But we can go back if we need to.”
“These girls… We might need to back a truck up to the fucking window.” Junior said as we were walking back to the table. “And look at this, everyone sitting here minding their own business. Am I in Brooklyn, pinch me.”
“There’s never any trouble when people are eating. They can’t say anything when their mouths are full.”
Junior though for a second before speaking, “Mob guys get whacked at dinner.”
“Yeah, but that’s business not trouble.”
“Your right.” Junior said. “Good point.”
Back at the table, the girls were waiting. I tossed some paper plates at them like Frisbees and Junior opened the box and put it in the middle of the table. “I want a corner.” Erica said. We all sat quietly and ate, barely exchanging a word. Every few minutes, Junior said something like “Fucking unbelievable. This is fucking unbelievable.”
We all nodded like zombies in agreement and the girls didn’t even bother to give him a hard time about cursing. Erica and Marty sat beside each other and each of them had a napkin tucked into the front of their dress. Erica was twisting a piece of hot cheese in the air and guiding it toward her mouth when the lights over the patio started flickering.
“That kind of looked like lightening.” Marty said.
“Which reminds me…” Junior started.
“You’ve got sauce on your mouth. Wipe it off, will you.” Marty interrupted him after having been interrupted herself.
“Which reminds me. Last summer in Prospect Park a family was out riding their bikes. You know, Sunday afternoon, or something. Suddenly it starts to rain and they all go and stand under a big tree. This is true. So they’re standing there waiting for the rain to stop when a lightening bolt hits them. There were like five of them, the two parents and a couple of kids, right. I think the parents were killed. Like totally fried and the kids were all burned up. So they are all lying there and this group of kids comes along and what do they decide to do? Tell me?”
“I read about that.” Erica said.
Junior continued. “Anybody? Anybody know? I’ll tell you what they did. They stole the family’s bikes. Can you imagine that shit. Instead of helping those people or calling the cops, they take the bikes. Fucking unbelievable.” He was almost yelling.
Marty was shaking her head. “Enough with the cursing already.”
I sat thinking about the family that Junior was talking about. Some things are just so weird. Sometimes, that sort of strangeness makes things not seem as bad, kind of funny, or something. I mean, anyway… I was interested in stories and sitting there, in a sort of semi-stoned way, I tried to figure out what made this story worth repeating. I think stealing the bikes, at least if you were from Brooklyn, was the thing that caught people’s attention. You would think that in a situation like that that people would stop and help. Maybe, that was too obvious. But God, everyone was afraid, afraid of everyone else. Not that they were wrong, but everyone thought the worst, sort of envisioned the worst possible thing. Maybe, this story confirmed it.
Erica noticed me being quiet and brushed at my hair with her hand. “What are you thinking about?” She asked.
“Nothing, I think I’m going into a pizza coma. I overdose on this stuff every time I’m here.”
“Me too.” Erica said, while shielding a burp with her hands. “Let’s go to Manhattan Beach and take a walk.”
“Walk on the beach?” Junior was nodding. “That could be fun.”
Erica was looking at him, maybe through him when she said. “And we can throw that gun you have in the ocean.”
Junior grumbled before stuffing more pizza in his mouth. “I’m not sure about that.”
I put my hand up, like I was blessing the pizza box. “Enough. Let’s just get out of here before I explode.”
Marty was standing up, holding her belly. “I got a pizza baby in here.” She said, with her hands both clasping her stomach. “I think I’ll call him Spumoni.”
“What if it’s a girl? What then? “ Junior said.
“I’ll call her Gardenia. Gardenia Spumoni.”
“I knew a girl named Gardenia in eight grade, some black girl from Sunset Park. She cut a bus driver’s face with a razor and never came back to school. She seemed nice enough.” Junior said.
“Who don’t you know?” I asked. And it was true. Junior seemed to know everyone and everyone knew Junior. He even knew girls with made up names, like Gardenia. And apparently, he knew her sister, too. “I knew her sister, too. I can’t remember her name. She never said anything, nothing to nobody. She was tight as a clam, even when the teacher called on her, nothing. She made this clucking sound and looked at her desk. I was trying to behave better in class, you know, stop talking all the time. So I had this idea, I figure I’ll talk to her and find out how she does it, you know, never says anything. I bugged her for about a week. She never said anything, she just clucked at me. Teacher said she should just wear a tee shirt that said “Be quiet, Junior.” I was trying, though.”
Marty was shaking her head. “I relate. Every time we go to a movie, he gets in a fight, people telling him to shut up. I mean, I’m sitting there telling him to shut up. Shut up, Junior. Does he listen? Ever? No way, he just keeps on talking. What happened? Who’s that? You know what?” She was shaking her finger at him. “If you paid attention, you’d know what was going on.”
“That’s crazy. I love the movies. So I got in a couple of fights, big dea
l. They were thrust upon me.”
“Where do you get this shit?” I said. “Thrust upon you. What are you, like some guy from Greek mythology, or something?” I couldn’t think of any of their names. Like Attaturk, maybe?”
“Attaturk was a Turk. He wasn’t Greek.” Erica said. “And besides, he’s more modern. Like the father of Turkey, or something”
“What the fuck is a Turk? Junior said. “Like a young Turk? A tough guy?”
“No a Turk is from Turkey. Get it?” Erica said.
“So this guy’s name is kind of like saying attaboy, like good Turk. Attaturk.”
Erica rolled her eyes. “I don’t know. I don’t speak Turkish, not lately, anyway.”
I could tell that this was going to be one of those conversations that you need a subway map to follow. Back in the car, Junior says, “So what about the turkey, you know, on Thanksgiving. Why do we call it a turkey?”
“Oh, fuck it, Junior. Who cares?” I started to laugh. “What’s it matter?”
“I was just wondering. You got a problem with that? Maybe, Columbus named it. You know, when he got here and planted the Italian Flag and they had Thanksgiving with the Indians. Maybe, the turkey looked like a Turk to him. You ever think of that?”
“You’re all mixed up, Junior, as usual. You’re confusing two things. Columbus discovered America but the Pilgrims started Thanksgiving. Right, Erica?” Marty was rubbing Junior’s neck while he drove.
“Yeah.” Erica didn’t seem much interested in educating Junior at the moment.
We pulled into the parking lot at Manhattan Beach. A couple of other cars were parked there and we could see some kids off in the distance. “Leave your shoes in the car everyone.” Marty said.
“I don’t go anywhere without shoes. What if we get into a fight? You can’t fight without shoes on. This is the concrete jungle, not the other, real kind.” Junior was running his hands under his arms like a monkey. “We have a gun, remember, Tarzan? No one is going to bother us.” Erica said, with her hands on her hips.
“Listen, about the gun. I’m not just going to throw it in the ocean. That’s sick. What if it washes up on the beach and some kid finds it? What then? That’s like a public safety issue. I’m just saying…”
“I don’t care what you do with the gun, Junior.” Erica said. Her hair was blowing in the wind and she was squinting. “It’s your gun, anyway. Do what you want with it.”
Junior had the gun in his hand. He was sort of waving it around while he talked.
“Put it away, would you.” I said. Junior tucked it into his sash and we started walking to the beach. We could hear the waves crashing and little bits of sand flew in the air like dry raindrops. “Its so pretty here.” Marty said. “Even at night.”
It’s nicer at night.” I said. “ This place is a zoo during the day. Everybody in Brooklyn is here when it’s hot and you can’t even walk on the beach without stepping on somebody.”
“Yeah.” Erica said, agreeing with me. “And too many perverts.”
“I remember when I was a kid and my grandfather used to take me and Rainie here. He’d sit in the sand all dressed up smoking his pipe. Just like he was sitting on a bus. He’d have the pipe in one hand and a newspaper in the other. Every so often, he’d look over the top of the paper and make sure we weren’t drowning. He never even took his shoes off.
“I loved that guy. He always gave us money.” Junior said.
“Yeah. The whole time we were on the beach, he’d be getting us ice cream, knishes, soda. Sometimes he’d buy himself a beer, or two, and he’d sit there drinking, with his pipe smoking away like a chimney.
“He still around?” Marty asked.
“No, he died. Walked down to the cellar and a blood clot in his leg exploded. He bled to death. I still think about him, still miss him.” I remembered that after he died, Junior took me to a sporting goods store. He told me that he had to buy a hockey stick for his cousin, or something. The kid was a lefty, like me. He wanted me to pick out the stick. Later that day, this was like a couple of days after the funeral, he comes over and gives me the stick. “Here.” He says, “This is for you.” I didn’t know what to say and neither did he but ever since that day, no mater what he did, or how much trouble he got me in, we’ve been best friends. Funny how a gesture like that stays with you. I thought about telling the girls what Junior had done but decided not to.
“I didn’t know my grandparents. They weren’t around. Kind of like my father.” Marty said, looking into the sand and then looking out over the water.
“ Let’s not get all sappy here, tonight.” Junior said. “And turn this into some sort of rap group.”
With that, Erica got up and raced down to the water. “Hey, Junior” She yelled back at us. “Let me shoot the gun off. Out into the water.” I looked at Junior and shook my head no. He ignored me and ran down to the water with Erica. I sat with Marty and watched as Junior showed Erica how to hold the gun. He made her hold it with two hands and extend it away from her body. “They’re crazy.” I said to Marty. “Fucking crazy.”
I couldn’t tell if Marty was smiling at me but it was a half-smile, or something. She shivered a bit and so I asked her if she wanted my jacket. She nodded, so I took it off and wrapped her in it. When I was standing behind her, I breathed in everything about her, including the smell of the ocean. I almost fainted because it all smelled so good. That little bit of heat coming off her seemed to intensify the mingled scents of her sweat, the ocean, her perfume and the way her hair smelled. “Shoot already.” I yelled, feeling sort of high again. “Come on, Bonnie and Clyde.”
The sound of a wave crashing was followed by a gunshot, and then by the sound of Junior yelling. He was running around with his hands in the air. I could see that Erica was bent over laughing but I couldn’t hear what they were saying. Junior came running back to us. His pant legs were soaking wet. “She threw my gun in the water.” He said. “Can you fucking believe it?” He was shouting and smiling but it wasn’t a smile really. It was more like a grimace. ”My gun is in the water. And look, my shoes are all wet. So are my pants.”
He began to undress, stripping off his pants and then his shirt. “Junior, what are you doing?” Marty said. The sand was running off her dress as she stood up, running off in little rivulets between the creases.
“I’m going to get my gun. It’s not that far out. Then, I’m coming out and going to shoot Erica.”
“Hey.” I said. “Don’t even joke like that. I told you not to let her use the gun. It’s your own fault.”
“She didn’t have to throw it in the water, did she?”
I ran down to the water with Junior. Erica was still standing there, kicking at the waves. “What the fuck, Erica? Are you crazy, or something? I paid good money for that.” Junior was jumping up and down, and yelling at her while he shivered.
Erica smiled. “I told you I was going to get rid of that gun. What did you think I was joking?”
“I didn’t think anything. But I didn’t think you’d do that.”
“Maybe that’s the problem, Junior. Not thinking. Did you ever think about that? Did you ever think about not thinking?” She was drawing things in the sand with her toes while she talked to him. “The cops pull us over and find that gun in our car, we’ll all end up in jail. Imagine that happening on our prom night. “ And then she yelled at him. “On our fucking prom night, Junior”
Brooklyn 1975 Page 6