First Aid and Surprises

Chapter 9

For as long as I’d been friends with Angie I’d never been invited to his apartment in the Project. People I knew like Patsy that lived in the project had small apartments and they were Okay. I figured Angie might be ashamed at the way the apartment looked so I never pushed to visit. When we entered the hallway leading to his apartment, I was surprised to see a man in a rocking chair with a double-barrel shotgun across his lap.

Angie greeted him, “Hi Rocko.”

The man returned his greeting and asked, “Who’s that with you?”

“He’s my friend, he just got dumped by Tony Scipio’s ex-gang, I brought him home with me so my mom could check to see if he’s alright and maybe fix him up.”

Moments later, I was in a kitchen that was another surprise, it was almost as big as Patsy’s apartment. Angie’s mom had her back to us as we came in, she was stirring a pot on the stove. Angie went over and told her who I was and what had happened to me. While he spoke to her, I looked around everything in the kitchen looked brand new. His mother turned from the stove, looked at me and said, “You need fixin.”

Dousing her cigarette first she then led me by my shoulder to the kitchen sink and turned on the faucets. As the sink filled, she cut my torn shirt off with a pair of scissors and dropped it into the trash. After washing the dirt and caked blood she dried me gently with a soft fluffy towel. Next came Iodine and bandages on my cuts and scratches. The sting of the iodine didn’t distract me from noticing that Angie’s mom was beautiful. Her blond hair, clothing, jewelry, and lipstick fingernails made her look like a movie star. As she bandaged me, her touch and perfume caused a strange feeling in me I’d never had before. Embarrassed, I shifted my gaze to a framed picture of a blond, bearded Jesus hanging on one of the kitchen walls. On the same wall above the picture was a large Crucifix with a very realistic figure of Jesus nailed to it. Crosses like that one were in the Metropolitan Museum of Art not in people’s apartments.

Suddenly, I felt weak and began to tremble I had no idea that I was going into shock. Angie’s mom knew exactly what was happening to me, she sat me down, got out a bottle of whiskey, poured some into a glass and said, “Drink this, I’m going to get a blanket.” I remembered how sick I got after chugging whiskey on a dare at a party. That kept me from drinking more than a few small sips, I didn’t want ever to get sick-drunk like that again.

A short while later I began feeling better and told Angie’s mom that I was Okay.

She looked me over and then said, “Angie take Josh to your room and give him whatever clothing he needs. I’m sure the excitement made you both hungry, while you’re getting the clothes I’ll make sandwiches for both of you, and holler when they’re ready.”

Angie led me out from the kitchen into a room that had two large gold chandeliers hanging down from the ceiling. Under them was a long table surrounded by more chairs than I could count as we walked by. Angie told me it was their formal dining room when his parents had people over. To me it looked more like a dining room in restaurant than a dining room in an apartment.

From the dining room we passed through a large carpeted living room with couches, puffy chairs, gold lamps low tables and framed pictures on the walls. Like the dining room It was a living room I would’ve never expected to see anywhere else but in a movie. We passed through and then entered an alcove leading to a door identical to every apartment entry door in the Project. Then it came to me, the Cantera’s apartment was huge because it’s made up of apartments that had been joined together. The door led us into a long hallway with doors on both sides. One of the doors was open, out of curiosity I stopped to look inside. It was a large bedroom, the walls were covered with mirrors, as was the ceiling directly above the biggest bed I’d ever seen. Puzzled, I asked Angie about the mirrors I hadn’t the vaguest idea why they were in a bedroom. Angie just grabbed my arm and said, “Come on, keep moving,” he pulled me through another entry door that opened into his room. It was a large room that was neat with everything in place. Games were on shelves, comic books stacked neatly, a Lionel electric train set was on the floor and his bed was made.

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I asked Angie, “Do you clean up your room like this and make the bed?”

“Nah” he said, “We got a live-in maid that cleans up the whole place. My dad brings in a new one from Italy whenever my mom asks him to. This one is ugly, but she really knows how to keep the place clean and neat: and my mom really likes her.”

There were three large glass jugs on a dresser that were identical to the pickle jugs in Katz’s Deli. All of them filled to the top with silver coins, there must have been thousands of dollars in them that a thirteen-year-old could’ve saved that much money amazed me. Angie went over to the dresser and took out a neatly pressed shirt and pants, handed them to me and said, “Try these on, if they fit, they’re yours to keep.”

Not wanting to change in front of Angie because I didn’t want him to see my underpants so I said, “I need to pee where is the bathroom?”

Angie took me to his own private bathroom I went in and then locked the door. I undressed, cleaned myself up, put on the clean shirt and pants. With my underpants rolled up inside my torn pants and under arm I left the bathroom.

from a loudspeaker somewhere in the room came the staticy voice of Angie’s mom,

“San-wiches are ready come-n-get-em.”

We headed w back to the kitchen.

In the kitchen waiting for us on the table were two big sandwiches and two glasses of milk. Angie sat down and began eating, I hesitated, I’d never eaten a sandwich made with Italian bread and what was worse was I didn’t know what was inside of it.

“Mrs. Cantera, please tell me what’s in the sandwich you made for me?”

“Sure, honey, there’s salami, prosciutto, mortadella, cheese, lettuce, tomato, olive oil and mustard. Don’t worry, in that sandwiches is the best of the best. Take a bite, I know you’ll t love it. Mange, mange!”

I didn’t know what some of the things in the sandwich were, but the salami and cheese told me that the sandwich wasn’t kosher. Never eaten having eaten traif (non-Kosher) before I was at a loss as to what I should do. My growling stomach made it clear it was hungry. First a tentative bite, I chewed it slowly, swallowed and then waited for God’s punishment, nothing happened. Knowing full well, drinking milk with meat was a sin too, I took a sip and waited, again nothing happened to me.

while eating the traif sandwich and washing it down with milk, in my head I spoke to God and said, “Please forgive me, I’m really hungry, I swear that when I get home, I’ll only eat kosher.”

Halfway through the sandwich I impulsively blurted out, “Mrs. Cantera, you, live in the nicest apartment I’ve ever been in, it must be ten times bigger than Patsy’s.” I was about to say more but, the look on Angie’s face told me I’d better not. Angie put what was left of his sandwich down and said, “You’re the first friend and only friend I’ve ever brought home with me. I’m warning you, don’t tell anyone what you’ve seen, I mean no one. If you do, and I find out that you did you’ll be really fucking-sorry.” His mom said nothing.

“I swear, Angie, I won’t tell anyone.” After that I said very little, I finished the sandwich and milk, it was time for me to go.

I thanked them both for everything, at the door Angie said, “Don’t worry you’re safe now, I’ll check on you soon, see ya.”

On my way out of the building I waved to the man with the shotgun. He smiled flashing a mouthful of gold teeth at me.