Brokenhearted in Bakersfield

 

80 - STAND BY YOUR MAN

If you don’t want to see a grown man cry, sometimes you can’t look him in the eye.

After Maggie and me finished our breakfast and reading the newspaper story about the digging incident in Broken Heart Park, we headed off to Broken Heart Park, Inc.

This time Doll-Face was tryin’ to balance herself as she stood on a chair.  The old Army blanket walls was pulled back so she could hang soggy checks and dollar bills along the suspension cord using paperclips for clothespins.  A Sinatra record was playing loud in the background.  As she was busy drying out the rent, Doll-Face shouted over the music, “Hey, Frank, it’s your Mr. & Mrs. Anti-Christos.”

Moving past Doll-Face we could see Christos sitting with his fat head down on his desk.  Standing around him in silent vigilance was the Kartone Boys.  The Boss lifted a tear-stained face and picked up a copy of the newspaper and threw it at us.  “Dis is all your doin’.  Da cops got my byootiful bizness impounded wit yellow ribbons no less, and now dey wanna excavate for bodies.  Bodies!  Oy, oy, oy!”

Maggie spoke up, “The authorities are looking for your former management team at Broken Heart Park.  Are you afraid of what they might find?”

Christos dismissed her with a wave of a hand.  “Afraid?  Who you kiddin’, girlie?  So maybe da Twains ain’t around no more, so what?  Like I gotta pay for dat?  Huh?  You tell me.  But I hadda right to make an executive decision, and da Twains hadda go.  Dey cost me a fortune wit dat stupid golf tournament.  It was a fukkin’ fiasco!  But you won’t find no dead bodies buried under my property.  No way.  Okay, maybe some rags, but dat’s it.”

Maggie arched her back, “That’s it, huh?  What about all the Native American artifacts they’re finding?”

The Boss grabbed his head with both hands.  “Oh, yeah, and tank you again.  It ain’t enough you got da cops on my ass, now you got da tribes after me too.  Dat’s wunnerful.  Why don’t youse two crucify me some more?  Is it on purpose you tryin’ to kill me, or what?”  Then Christos fell silent until, without warning, he suddenly slammed his fist on the table boards and shouted, “Well, you can just forgeddaboutit!  I didn’t escape from da old country to be stopped by da likes of you two.  And you can forgeddabout me payin’ your damn furniture bill, too.”  Christos stood up and came closer and closer until he was towering over Maggie and me.

Maggie roared back like a lioness, “You’ll pay that bill and any other goddamn bill we give you, Kartone.  You forget an important fact.  Although he might be your management stooge,” she pointed direct at me, “we still hold an influential stake in the RobbinsYUZ Corporation, and RobbinsYUZ is the parent company of this Sicilian goat rodeo.  I could terminate your Bakersfield operations in a heartbeat, and I wouldn’t have to dig a hole to bury it,” she hissed.

As you might expect, Maggie’s comments set off a socially awkward moment.

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