hair.
"How do they keep the Japanese out?"
"Are you really that naive?" Sal Eleven asked, his brow furrowed in feigned concern. "The Japanese? The Japanese take over everything. First they move in with their sushi, then sesame, then sezayou—before long, it's a Japanese neighborhood. And the Koreans work for them. They worked this all out ahead of time over there in their old country. The Japanese send in the Koreans to work for them. You see all these Korean stores with the soy sauce and the little dried peas. The Japanese put them in business. Yuppies and Japanese. Why do you think that German is pushing this?"
"German?"
Sal looked impatient. "That German, Herr Achtung Swinebraten."
"Mr. Edelweiss?"
"Mr. Edelweiss. Whatever. I'll tell you something. Nobody knows his real name, but it's not Edelweiss."
"I know. I just always called him that. It's Moellen."
"Yeah, nobody knows his name," Sal reasserted as though Nathan had not really spoken. "The Germans, the Japanese." He held out his hands as though comparing the weight of the two nationalities. "They are always in it together, remember that. The Germans. The Japanese."
"And the Italians."
"Get out of here. You want a mozarrell'?"
From Sal's they turned the corner to First Avenue, which had its own Friday competition. Rosa's Pizzeria made bacala pomidora for the weekend. Rosa was from Naples, and her shining long hair, the color of chrome, and deep-set chocolate eyes and carefully placed cheekbones gave her a beauty that stayed with age. There were still people left in Naples who ate salt cod and tomato sauce on Fridays, but none on First Avenue, where the dish was remembered as one of the reasons for leaving. Joey Parma, who grew up eating it, would not sample Rosa's, even though she offered him a taste for free.
Yet she went all the way to New Jersey, to a Portuguese neighborhood, to buy the best salt cod she could find, fish dried stiff as a quarter-inch plank of plywood. She soaked it in her apartment because customers complained of the smell in her shop. At home, where her husband claimed to like the smell and their children had left years ago "for reasons such as this," according to her oldest son, the fish occupied a basin in her bathtub until Friday morning, when it was thick and soft as a flaky fresh fish. It was fried in olive oil, and a sauce made from summer tomatoes and oregano grown on her windowsills was added. She made only a small amount and by Sunday afternoon managed to sell most of it. This caught the attention of Sal First, who felt that his mother's bacala in the Sicilian way with olives and capers would sell better than Rosa's Neapolitana salt fish and tomatoes. But it didn't until he started adding hot pepper to entice the Puerto Ricans. Now he was living in fear that his mother would come into the store on a weekend and find out what he had done to her bacala.
Nathan liked to try out Sal First with his Sal Eleven information. And today of all days, he wanted many opinions before he decided on anything. Sal First was short and dark like the soon-to-be-elected President Dukakis. Sal First's hair stuck up and pointed the wrong way, as though it were misdirected by static electricity. For a few years, Sal's hair had been vanishing, and then one day he added rows of dark tufts so that his head took on the appearance of a freshly planted rice paddy. Soon his hair was growing back, but some mistake had been made and it was growing in the wrong direction, making him permanently appear as though he had just gotten out of bed.
"So what do you think of the block committee, Sal?"
"What do I think?" Sal said, seemingly outraged. He looked around the store to see who was listening and then leaned forward furtively "I think I don't give a good flying shit. Oh, sorry," he apologized, looking up at Sarah and covering his mouth. "Here," and he delicately handed her a half artichoke bottom. More olive oil for Nathan's hair.
"I hope they arrest that
"How do they keep the Japanese out?"
"Are you really that naive?" Sal Eleven asked, his brow furrowed in feigned concern. "The Japanese? The Japanese take over everything. First they move in with their sushi, then sesame, then sezayou—before long, it's a Japanese neighborhood. And the Koreans work for them. They worked this all out ahead of time over there in their old country. The Japanese send in the Koreans to work for them. You see all these Korean stores with the soy sauce and the little dried peas. The Japanese put them in business. Yuppies and Japanese. Why do you think that German is pushing this?"
"German?"
Sal looked impatient. "That German, Herr Achtung Swinebraten."
"Mr. Edelweiss?"
"Mr. Edelweiss. Whatever. I'll tell you something. Nobody knows his real name, but it's not Edelweiss."
"I know. I just always called him that. It's Moellen."
"Yeah, nobody knows his name," Sal reasserted as though Nathan had not really spoken. "The Germans, the Japanese." He held out his hands as though comparing the weight of the two nationalities. "They are always in it together, remember that. The Germans. The Japanese."
"And the Italians."
"Get out of here. You want a mozarrell'?"
From Sal's they turned the corner to First Avenue, which had its own Friday competition. Rosa's Pizzeria made bacala pomidora for the weekend. Rosa was from Naples, and her shining long hair, the color of chrome, and deep-set chocolate eyes and carefully placed cheekbones gave her a beauty that stayed with age. There were still people left in Naples who ate salt cod and tomato sauce on Fridays, but none on First Avenue, where the dish was remembered as one of the reasons for leaving. Joey Parma, who grew up eating it, would not sample Rosa's, even though she offered him a taste for free.
Yet she went all the way to New Jersey, to a Portuguese neighborhood, to buy the best salt cod she could find, fish dried stiff as a quarter-inch plank of plywood. She soaked it in her apartment because customers complained of the smell in her shop. At home, where her husband claimed to like the smell and their children had left years ago "for reasons such as this," according to her oldest son, the fish occupied a basin in her bathtub until Friday morning, when it was thick and soft as a flaky fresh fish. It was fried in olive oil, and a sauce made from summer tomatoes and oregano grown on her windowsills was added. She made only a small amount and by Sunday afternoon managed to sell most of it. This caught the attention of Sal First, who felt that his mother's bacala in the Sicilian way with olives and capers would sell better than Rosa's Neapolitana salt fish and tomatoes. But it didn't until he started adding hot pepper to entice the Puerto Ricans. Now he was living in fear that his mother would come into the store on a weekend and find out what he had done to her bacala.
Nathan liked to try out Sal First with his Sal Eleven information. And today of all days, he wanted many opinions before he decided on anything. Sal First was short and dark like the soon-to-be-elected President Dukakis. Sal First's hair stuck up and pointed the wrong way, as though it were misdirected by static electricity. For a few years, Sal's hair had been vanishing, and then one day he added rows of dark tufts so that his head took on the appearance of a freshly planted rice paddy. Soon his hair was growing back, but some mistake had been made and it was growing in the wrong direction, making him permanently appear as though he had just gotten out of bed.
"So what do you think of the block committee, Sal?"
"What do I think?" Sal said, seemingly outraged. He looked around the store to see who was listening and then leaned forward furtively "I think I don't give a good flying shit. Oh, sorry," he apologized, looking up at Sarah and covering his mouth. "Here," and he delicately handed her a half artichoke bottom. More olive oil for Nathan's hair.
"I hope they arrest that
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