Chapter 1 – Guido

First Chapter

Adam Barboni taught me how to be fearless. I first met him when he arrived in the middle of eighth grade. His blond hair, blue eyes, small stature and intense attention to whatever was being discussed made him a hit with the girls, and a target for the guys. He and I shared some of the same physical attributes; I was also a scrawny kid although I had jet black hair, olive skin, deep blue eyes and a wide smile that could disarm almost anyone. Except for Joey Porcelino.

Joey Porcelino was the quintessential bully. No one dared call him ‘Joey’ or ‘Porcelino’. In deference to his status everyone called him ‘Gino’. Including the teachers. And my parents. Everyone. I could never understand how parents would give their kids a name and then never use it. Seems a bit asinine. However, on the first day of every school year some unsuspecting teacher would say ‘Joseph Porcelini’ during roll call. We, the kids in class, would anticipate and wait in subdued silence as the inevitable occurred.

Gino would place his hands firmly on his desk, slowly lift his head and stare at the poor teacher with the most vile, hateful, vengeful and dangerous eyes in the world, and state, “Present.” Then he would lower his eyes toward his desk and return his gaze at the teacher. “But call me ‘Gino’.”

I never saw a teacher challenge him, no matter how menacing the teacher was. Of course the timid ones would shrivel in fright and simply state something like, “Okay Gino.” Gino would smile, and we would all relax. The courageous teachers, some men, some women, would raise their eyebrows, purse their lips, nod their heads and respond with a standard statement like, “Gino, eh? It says here you’re your name is Joseph.” Gino would take in a deep breath and hold it for maybe fifteen or twenty seconds – Cindy Blane once told me that she timed the breath and Gino held it for thirty-eight seconds – that’s an eternity. He would then exhale for as long as he held his breath, continue to stare at the teacher, change his facial expression to the most benevolent, altruistic smile imaginable and state with the sincerest voice that’s possible, “If you don’t mind, Sir.” Or ‘Madam’ if the teacher was female. Every teacher responded exactly the same, “Okay Gino,” and smiled back at him. And the dye was cast from that point forward. Gino was in control and everyone knew it.

Gino, Tony Amarto, Peter Falcone, Carmine Finarelli, Charlie McShane and I grew up on the same block, Sixteenth Avenue. Gino lived next door on one side of our apartment building, Charlie lived across the street, and Tony, Pete and Carmine lived a few apartment buildings down the street. Even though it was called an ‘Avenue’ it was pretty quiet, at least for a city street. There was a park two blocks away, on Fourteenth Avenue, and to keep the streets safe from vehicles all the streets from Thirteenth and Seventeenth had signs stating, ‘No thoroughfare’. The cops enforced the law and everyone knew not to drive down the streets if they didn’t have any business being there; they either had to live there or visit someone who lived there. The cops stationed themselves at the opposite corners of the streets where they intersected two main thoroughfares, and knew everyone in the neighborhood, as well as anyone who used the streets as shortcuts. If an unsuspecting driver used the street as an access road, the cop on one end of the street would alert the cop on the opposite end and the cop on the opposite end would stop the car and hand the driver a ticket. Over the years I saw many drivers argue with the cop and within a minute another cop would pull up to the driver to support his comrade. Outnumbered, the driver would obediently accept the ticket and be warned not to use the street unless he had business there. I don’t remember a driver ever challenging the unstated edict again.

Gino and I were never friends but when we were kids everyone played together so I had no choice other to hang out with him. Kids from all ages hung out in the streets; the older kids who were twelve or thirteen would tolerate us younger kids being around them. But Gino was different. Even at the ripe age of six, the older kids had a respect for him and treated him as one of their own. They included him in their plotting and schemes, which most times involved using us younger kids to do their dirty work.

Giovanni’s Corner Store was located at the end of Fifteenth Street and at least once a week the older kids decided they needed some activity to break the monotony of the summer; they instructed us younger kids to get a few packs of Marlboros for them, which we couldn’t do legally. So we devised a plan to divert Tommy Giovanni’s attention. We never used his real name and instead called him Guido. He hated that.

Despite the lack of originality our plan worked multiple times. One or two of us would enter the store, look around and stare at the candy display.

“Whatta you kids want?” Guido would scowl with his gruff voice. He was a big burly guy with a bald head, big chest, huge arms and a stogie that seemed to be permanently attached to his mouth.

“Just lookin’,” I would reply nonchalantly and continue to browse. Meanwhile Charlie, Tony, Peter and Carmine loomed outside the store. Three of them were sentries, looking for police and informing the fourth when to walk to the cigarette display at the end of the counter and take a few packs of Marlboros while I distracted Guido. “How much are these M&M’s?” I would ask, holding two packages in my hands.

“You goin buy ‘em or what?”

“It depends on how much they are.”

Guido would sigh, walk out from behind the counter and grab a package from me.

“Look, the price is right here,” he would state, turning over the package. His stogie wobbled up and down in his mouth when he talked, and the ashes fell to the floor; he scraped the floor with his foot to disperse the ashes and without missing a beat he said, “Twenty-five cents. So you want two of ‘em it’ll cost you half a buck. You got that much?”

I would stick my hand in my pocket and came up with some coins. Forty cents. Guido would peer at my hand.

“You only got forty cents so you can only buy one.”

“I got the rest,” chimed in Charlie who would enter the store on queue. He would pull out some change from his pocket and start to count. “Here’s two nickels so that makes fifty cents,” he would say with a smile.

Guido would purse his lips and frown, the stogie following the curvature of his mouth, and count the change. While we had his undivided attention, I could see Carmine through the corner of my eyes silently sneak into the store, grab a few packs of Marlboros and leave in a flash.

“All right, now get outta here before I call the cops on you,” Guido would bark, taking the money from my palm.

“The cops?” I would ask with fake surprise. “We didn’t do anything except buy some of your overpriced M&M’s.”

“You gettin’ smart with me?”

“No, but why are you saying that?”

“Yeah, why?” chimed in Charlie. “We didn’t do nothin.”

Guido would take the stogie from his mouth, turn it over in his hands, walk to the counter, grab a pack of matches, relight it and place it back into his mouth. He then would put the money in the register.

“Because my inventory’s been off and I think you two know something about it.”

I would shake my head, shrug my shoulders and deliberately glance over to Charlie who did the same.

“What does that mean? What’s an inventory?” I would ask earnestly.

Guido would lean on the counter, remove the stogie and point it in our general direction. “That’s how much merchandise I have.”

Charlie and I would continue with the puzzled expressions.

Guido would relight the stogie again, puff on it two or three times to assure it was lit, turn his back to us and point to the cigarette display behind the counter.

“See this?” he would ask, his back addressing us. “This here’s my inventory of cigarettes. It’s the number of cartons and packs I have. Now I’m the only one who orders them, stocks the shelves and removes them for sale. I keep very accurate records of how many I order and sell, and at the end of each week I reconcile them, that is count what I have left. So if I start with ten and sell six, how many should I have left?”

“Four,” volunteered Charlie.

Guido would turn and face us. The stogie would still be attached but burned to the point that the lit end of it would just about touching his lip. He would smile unctuously.

“That’s right. Four.” He would remove the stogie and twist it into the ashtray on the counter which was already filled with cigarette and stogie butts. “That’s what there should be. Four.” He would lean across the counter so that his face was about six inches from mine and Charlie’s and would lower his voice. His breath smelled like a garbage can. “But for the past few weeks it hasn’t been four.” He would take in a deep breath and lean back away from us. “More precisely my inventory’s been off by two or three packs a week. That’s never happened before.” He would reach behind the counter, pull out a fresh stogie, bite off the tip, light it, take a few puffs and place it back into its permanent holding position; his mouth that is. He would peer into my eyes and then into Charlie’s with his deep blue eyes. Those eyes didn’t fit in with the rest of his stature or demeanor and they actually frightened me. My dad said that his family originated from northern Italy and the cafones there were more like the Swiss and Germans who had blue eyes. “What’d you know about this?”

“I guess you miscounted?” I would reply.

Guido’s jaw would drop and his stogie would fall onto the counter. I swear I saw steam rising from his head. He would pick up the stogie, inspect it and place it back into his mouth.

“Miscounted?” he would boom. “I ain’t never miscounted!” The steam would continue to pour out of his head. “Something’s goin on here and I think you two know about it. You better tell your good-for-nothing friends that if I catch them screwing around it’ll be the last time they ever screw around with me!” He would be out of breath and it took him a moment to catch it; a bit of spittle would form around his mouth. “And that goes for you two. Got it?”

Now even though I was only six I knew that Guido wasn’t the brightest guy in the world and I could easily retaliate, or I could back off. I decided on the former.

“Guido, you don’t have any proof of anything. We come here to buy candy, you help us, we pay you and we leave. Why in the world would you accuse of stealing cigarettes?”

“Yeah, and we don’t even smoke,” Charlie would add. Actually that wasn’t true. The older kids would smoke the cigarettes and give us the butts when they were done. Still I nodded in agreement with him.

Guido would always be at a loss for words. He would remove the stogie and wipe away the spittle with the back of his hand; he wasn’t sure where to put it, so he rubbed his hand on his pants leg and returned the stogie to his mouth.

“Just get outta here,” he would yelp, pointing to the door. “And tell your buddies I’m onto them.”

“I guess we’ll have to buy our M&M’s somewhere else,” I would remark to Charlie as we walked toward the door, loud enough for Guido to hear us.

“Yeah, we can to the gas station to get ‘em. And they’re cheaper than Guido’s,” he would reply to me. “And Johnnie there doesn’t accuse us of stealing stuff. Who needs that?” he would add with enough emphasis to irritate Guido.

“Just get outta here you little shits!”

I would grab onto Charlie, turn around, give Guido the finger and we would run out the door.