Almost a Wise Guy

You wanna know what it was like darting in and out of a life a crime, where something so small creates a domino effect and before you know it you’re in so deep you can’t see the shore and you’re not sure you remember how to swim? Where you have a devil on your left shoulder and an angel on the right and they’re both whispering "I’ve got the money." I’ll tell you a story...sit down. Frankie Crooks the name, on account that I got a bent arm, but I guess the other meaning could fit too.

Growing up my mom, a short, thin, dark Italian woman who could manage with the English language but not read a word of it, God rest her soul, didn’t have a clue. Mom hated the name Crooks and I constantly had to reassure her that it was ‘cause of my arm. But mothers aren’t stupid; they selectively choose to be blind and clueless.

Now you gotta remember, this was sixty years ago. My mom, Mary, was a mail order bride. One day my dad wrote home to Italy that he couldn’t find a decent woman here in America, so he asked his family if they could they please send him a bride and some pastries. My mom arrived with a dowry and a box of authentic Italian pastries under her arm. What a deal. I guess it’s not much different than the personals today, except you don’t get cannolis. As she stepped onto American soil, she spotted her future, my dad, John. They exchanged greetings, then she was swept away to a friend’s house for a week till they got married by a justice of the peace. She moved in with Dad and became the Mrs., just like that.

I wish I could say it was love at first sight, but it wasn’t. They did make a good team, and in those days that was important. Shortly after they married, my mom began working in a factory on West Broadway, making artificial flowers. She’d come home everyday smelling like plastic roses – a smell I grew to love.

My dad, a tough looking Neapolitan who became a U.S. Citizen after he was drafted into the Army just a few weeks after stepping onto American soil, was stocky, had a big face with deep, inset lines, brown eyes, and was very serious. He would get up every morning at five o’clock and go through his morning body cleansing, which entailed clearing his throat a thousand times and then farting loudly. ¾ A smell I grew to hate, but an art I grew to perfect. Then he would take a train into New Jersey to work in a dye factory. Every night he’d come home with a different color dye embedded in the cracks of his leathery hands. Both my parents were Italian immigrants working hard to raise a family. I wanted to do better.

We lived in the Village at 141 Sullivan Street. We were on the fourth floor. The apartment was painted puke green with a ceramic tub in the kitchen – the type with claw legs – and a bathroom in the hallway outside the apartment that we had to share with our neighbors. Made for one strong bladder. We had a black pot belly stove that heated the house and also served as our room deodorizer. My dad used to throw orange peels on top of the stove, and as they slowly baked, the whole apartment would have that Airwick cardboard tree cutout smell. Many years later I used to buy those off of street vendors and stick them in my car. They reminded me of home.

It was one of those twenty-dollars-a-month, cold water, flat, railroad apartments where you have to go through every room to get to yours, especially if it happened to be the last one like mine was. Well, it really wasn’t "my" room; I shared it with three others. My older brothers, Vinny and Joey, and our mutt, Butch. My sister, Teresa, had her own room since she was the only girl. Them’s the breaks. I, of course, was the baby of the family.

Teresa was my protector and the one I got into the most trouble with as a kid. She was always plotting some Lucille Ball-type scheme with me as Ethel – the stooge. I remember one time in grammar school my sister wanted to see Frank Sinatra, and I was supposed to be her alibi.

"Come on, Frankie, tell your teacher you’re not feeling well. Then I’ll come pick you up since Ma’s at work and we’ll cut out and see the concert."

I was a little hesitant since I had been playing sick a lot lately to hangout with my friends. But it was my sister, so I agreed. I went into the classroom and started moaning.

"What is it now, Frankie?!" the teacher snapped.

"My stomach hurts real bad. I think I’m gonna puke." She looked at me suspiciously. I had to up the ante. So I started making those dry heave sounds, like a cat does when it’s spitting up a hairball. It worked, the teacher panicked.

"Go to the bathroom! I’ll call your sister," she screamed.

I ran to the bathroom laughing all the way. I waited a few minutes to let her summon my sister. The plan was going as scheduled. My teacher and sister stood in the hall talking. I casually strolled over, pretending I was unaware of their little discussion. Then the teacher laid it on me from left field.

"Teresa, it seems as if you’re little brother here has been feeling sick a lot lately. Take him to your family doctor. I want to see a note that explains what’s the matter," she said matter-of-factly. Teresa nodded, and we walked out of hearing range of the teacher. Sis then turned to me as if possessed. "You had to overact, didn’t you!?" Then she smacked me on the head. I just smirked and shrugged.

We hadn’t counted on this. My sister took me over to the doctor’s. I didn’t want to go, but we had to get that stupid note.

To make matters worse, while we were waiting in the doctor’s office, the nurse said we had to contact my mom, since Teresa was not my legal guardian. So the nurse rang up my mom, and the doctor took me into the examination room. My sister, embarrassingly enough, volunteered to come into the room with me, probably to make sure I didn’t blow our cover.