Patsy

  Chapter 11

  Patsy’s apartment windows faced Avenue A, it would have been impossible for him to have heard the gang‘s attack, my screams or Angie shouting. The residents in the apartments in back facing the park though had to have heard the tumult during the attack. Curiosity if nothing else would have brought them to their windows to see what was going on below. If that didn’t do it, Angie’s shouts amplified and echoing off the brick facades of the buildings would have. Of the hundreds of people who I’m sure were watching me getting beat up, not one of them called down from their window for the gang to stop or called the police.

  Patsy and his family although upset that Angie and I hadn’t shown up for the party couldn’t call my parents they didn’t have a telephone. It wasn’t until the next day that Patsy found out that Tony’s gang had beaten up someone. And, that Angie had stopped them before they did any serious damage and had taken the gang’s victim home with him. Based on what he’d heard and the timing, Patsy thought it was possible that I was the victim and he felt duty bound as my friend to find out I it was me.

  My doorbell buzzed, looking through the peephole I saw it was Patsy. At the sight of him I forgot about my aches and pains and the dark cloud smothering me blew away.

  I opened the door, and shouted, “Patsy, boy am I’m really, glad to see you, come on in.”

  Patsy saw the bandages and my bruises and said, “I had a feeling it was you that got jumped last night, I came over to find out, are you OK?”

  “Yea, I think so but it hurts when I move, I’m sorry I didn’t get to your party.”

  To that Patsy said, “I I was really pissed-off at you and Angie for not showing up. My mom was disappointed too, she made lots of good stuff for us to eat, she did it because she likes that you and Angie are my friends.”

  Patsy took two cigarettes from his shirt pocket, lit them both and then gave one to me. I got a bowl from the kitchen to use as an ashtray and made a mental note to wash it and air the apartment out, my parents had no I smoked. We sat quietly for a while smoking and not saying anything.

  Then Patsy said, “This morning I found out that Tony’s gang jumped someone about the time you and Angie were supposed to show up for my party.

  A neighbor whose windows face the park told me he’d seen the gang beating up someone and that Angie stopped them cold. I thought it possible from what I’d heard you might’ve been the person that was jumped. There was a lot of other bullshit too about what happened last night going around the Project this morning. I couldn’t get in to see Angie this morning he was out with his mom so I came here. So, tell me what the fuck happened last night?”

  I told Patsy a little more than what I’d told my parents, saying nothing about Angie’s mom other than that she’d cleaned, bandaged, and then fed me. Not a word about the Cantera’s amazing apartment, or Angie’s fortune in silver coins or that I’d shit myself.

  Then I said, “Patsy you’ve known Angie longer than me and live next to him, tell me how was he able to stop those bastards from putting me in the hospital? What he did was crazy. First, he cursed all of them out and then slapped the leader of the gang Tony in the face. After that he tells them he’s going tell his father Don to kick them and their families kicked out of their apartments in the Project. The bunch of them just stood there and kissed Angie’s ass begging him not to tell his father. Angie tells them they’re finished as a gang and warns them, if he sees them together, or hears they’re still a gang they’re out on the street. Finally, he orders them to get the-fuck out of there and they split up and leave. Every one of those guys in the gang was bigger and stronger than Angie. Any one of them could’ve beaten him to a pulp, how is it they didn’t? How is it possible, that Angie could to do all of that and get away with it?”

  Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Patsy knew we were alone in the apartment, still, he looked around as if to make sure no one could hear what he was about to say. Then, in almost a whisper he said one word, “Mafia.”

  I had no idea what the word meant and asked him, “What? What’s Mafia?”

  Patsy said, “Josh, your shit-tin me, I know your Jewish, but you live in an Italian neighborhood, how could you not know what the Mafia is?”

  “I don’t know, tell me what is-it?” I asked.

  Patsy looked around again and then said, “The Mafia, is an Italian gang, some call them the Mob. They control almost everything crooked go-in on in New York and maybe America. They’re gangsters, they run gambling, unions, the docks, whore houses, shylocking, protection, you name it, there in it. They own regular businesses too like, Jake’s candy store, laundries, bakeries, restaurants, garbage trucks and construction companies. They get away with murder cause, they pay off the Cops, Politicians, Judges, and they have the best lawyers working for them and regular people are afraid of them.

  Angie’s Dad’s first name isn’t Don, it’s Joe, Don in Italian means boss. Don Cantera is a big boss in the Mafia and has more power than the mayor or governor. He looks and dresses like a movie star, he’s smart and dangerous. My dad told me the word is that he murdered his way to the top of the Heap. Now he doesn’t have to dirty his hands anymore he has men in his gang who do it for him. They’re his soldiers, on his orders they’ll break windows or heads, slash tires, burn down a building or kill someone. Shop owners, shit- their pants when the Don goes into their shops for something. Usually he offers to pay, store owners are so scared of him they give him what he wants as a present to stay on his good side. No one messes with the Don or his family if they want to stay alive and healthy. Angie was able to save your ass because Tony Scipio and his gang of scum bags are scared shit-less of him and his soldiers. If they had hurt Angie, the Don would’ve had his soldiers round them up, whack them and then dump their bodies into the East River.

  The Don isn’t all bad he does good things too, he moved us from the shit hole we were living in to our nice apartment in the Project. And he got my dad his union job on the docks and just got him promoted to Union Rep in the Teamsters Union. Christmas time the Don and his soldiers hand out hams, bags of groceries and money to the poor people in Little Italy and the Village. If someone needs a job or has a problem like with a landlord or City Hall, they go see the Don: he fixes the problem. A lot of people in the neighborhood love him, some of the older folks from Italy even kiss his hand like he’s the Pope, they’d do almost anything for him.

  He’s a good Catholic too, gives lots of money to the Church. The priests know he’s a Mafia boss and a killer but say nothing about that. When him and his family go to Church and the collection plate comes around to him, he puts a hundred bucks in it, his body guards add more money to that I seen it myself. That’s more money than the Church takes in from the whole congregation at their biggest Mass on Easter Sunday. The Priests give him Communion and bless him even though they’re not supposed: they do it to because he gives them the money they need to run the Church. Angie’s father Don Cantera answers to no one but Jesus Christ himself.

  Patsy had just opened my eyes to a world I didn’t know existed, and had answered most of the questions that had so troubled me.