Brokenhearted in Bakersfield

 

65 - MY FIRST STAFF MEETIN’

My cab pulled up in front of an old pool hall.  “Hey, what’s this?” I shouted at the back of the cab driver’s turban.  “I said I wanna go to Broken Heart Park, Inc.”

“You are most definitely here, sir,” the cabbie pointed to the building.  “You will notice over there by the little door between the pool hall establishment and the Kit Kat Klub?  That’s the entrance that leads to the offices you desire.  That will be $7.50 before tip, please sir, thank you very much.”

I handed him a ten.  As I waited for my change I checked around.  This was not what I expected.  Broken Heart Park may not be much to look at, but it sure beat the hell outta this dump.  I pocketed my change and headed toward my destiny.

The building’s door stuck a little, so I pushed it open with a hard nudge from my shoulder.  As the door dragged across the floor I got dust all over Dookie’s pretty orange shirt, and I hoped Maggie wouldn’t be mad about that.

In the hallway I could see the walls was cracked, the stairs creaky, and the light at the top of the stairs was real dim.  Three flights up the narrow staircase I stopped and read the message carved over the door:

Brocken Hart Park, Ink. - A Subsidary of RobbinsYOUZ Corp.

This had to be the place.  I let myself in.

Perched on the corner of an Army surplus metal desk sat a dame intently filing her nails, her legs tightly crossed.  Her blouse was cut real low and her skirt was hiked real high.  Yeah, this was a dame all right, a classical piece of work.  She looked up from her manicure and sighed, giving me the once-over.  She sighed again as she slipped off her heels and wiggled her toes, apparently deciding whether she needed a pedicure.  I noticed the dame’s chest swell and heave when she finally hollered out in a whiskey voice reeking of stale cigarettes, “Hey, Frank, your new Park Manager’s here.”

Without bothering to look up she motioned with her file towards a couple of Army blankets strung across the room.

I pulled back one of the blankets and peered into a thick cloud of smoke.  Five cigar-smoking guys glared up at me from their card game.  The big guy in the center yelled, “Hey, Doll-Face.  Run out and get us some more beer and chips, unless your friend here would like a soda?”

They all laughed.  Cigar smoke, card games, and beer.  My first day on the job was getting off to a great start.

“A beer will do just fine,” I nodded agreeably.

I let the blanket fall behind me as I crossed the threshold into the small dark room.  Five guys between the age of fifty and death gave me the once-over a couple'a times.  It was like their eyeballs was glued on my every move.  Since everyone was staring so much, I figured I’d give them the once-over a couple'a times right back.  I saw a bunch of cigar-chomping, belly-scratching, beer-guzzling, card-playing guys.  I knew this would be all too easy.

The big one in the middle pulled the cigar out of his mouth.  “So, you da new Park Manager out at Broken Heart, huh?  We gotta call last night from headquarters about you.  Say, I know you, don’t I?  I seen you dere before, when you lived dere, right?  Yeahhh, dat’s it.  You went deadbeat on us an’ disappeared.  Now ya shows up and ya fukkin’ own half da organization.  Nice to make da acquaintance,” he opened his arms.  “Come over here.  Meet my boys.”

He began pointing and slapping those he could reach.  “Dis is Matt, and dat’s Marko, Lucas over dere, and dat’s Juan, da baby of da fambly.  I’m Christos, as you most probably know already.  Everyone calls me Da Boss.  You should call me Da Boss, too.  Ya know?  You can manage da renters at Broken Heart Park, but I still get to be Da Boss.  Got dat?”

The Boss turned quickly to one of the boys, “Juan!  Where’s your fukkin’ manners?  Get him a fukkin’ chair.  Hey.”

I took the fukkin’ metal folding chair Juan graciously offered me and I pulled up to the makeshift table, which consisted of four boards laid across a low file cabinet and a sawhorse.  All five men smiled tight little smiles and puffed on five chewed-up and really smelly stogies.  I heard the outer door open behind me and the flash of sunlight indicated that Doll-Face had come through the curtains.  Her perfume made my eyes water.

She slammed down a pair of 16-oz. six-packs and a bag loaded with chips.  “That’s $39.99.”

“Christ, Doll-Face, you get fukkin’ champagne an’ caviar to go wit dem chips, or what?”  Then he looked down at his cards while he put his fat cigar back in his mouth, growling, “Fukkin’ pay her, Marko.”

“Yeah, Boss,” Marko pulled open a file drawer.  I couldn’t help but notice him reaching into a file marked Billy Peevy Scholarship Fund as he pulled out five tens.

Doll-Face swiped the money from Marko’s hand.  “Hey, I got enough to do around here without running out every half hour like some floozy for you boys.”  Her lips formed a red asterisk.  “So shut your pie-hole, Frank.”  Then, in a move that reminded me of the girls at The Stardust, she disappeared behind the swish of a blanket.

The boys didn’t hesitate to dive right in, grabbing for beers and chips.  Since nobody bothered to offer me a cold one I made my first executive decision and seized one for myself.  Marko began to pick up the cards off the table as Lucas dumped the contents of ashtrays on the floor.  The Boss reclined in his chair and stared at me.

“I know you been up to HQ,” he said.  “But I don’t want you gettin’ no ideas, see?”  He began to tap on the table with his three thick fingers, the fourth of which was unaccountable.  “I am headquarters to you, you unnerstan’?”

I blankly stared right back.

He opened the palms of his hands to heaven above.  “What’s to unnerstan’?  We make da money, an’ we spend da money.  An’ headquarters is sittin’ pretty.  Capish?  You da Park Manager now, so you just need to make us some fukkin’ profits.  I don’t care how, I don’t even wanna know why.  I don’t wanna know nutt’n about it excep’ I get da rent money on time.  It’s dat simple.  You fukkin’ got dat?”

“Sure,” I answered, confident in my status as a corporate insider.  “I got a gazillion ideas how to make Broken Heart Park the funnest place on earth.”

The Boss shouted, “Lucas!  Take him to Gato’s office to sign dose fukkin’ papers from HQ.  Oh, an’ here,” he pulled open another drawer taking out more papers and handing them to me.

“What’s this?” I asked.

“Dat’s your Everyting-Dat’s-Not-Nailed-Down contrack.”  The Boss winked at me as if we was co-conspirators.  “Every fukkin’ manager gets one.  It’s like a signin’ bonus,” he gave me an encouraging slap on the back.

On my way out, just as I got to the blanket, I turned.  “By the way, you never told me your last name, Boss.”

“I tought you already knew dat.  Da name’s Kartone, Christos Francis Kartone.”  (After scrutinizing The Boss real careful, I was relieved to see there was no way we could be humanly related.)  “Doll-Face over here calls me Frank, but everyone else calls me Da Boss, includin’ you.”

With that said, Lucas took a firm grip of my arm and escorted me out of the Bakersfield office of Broken Heart Park, Inc.  And so, my first Staff Meeting was successfully concluded.