A Tale of St. Nicholas... Avenue
Al knew things had gone too far right after he set the Christmas tree on fire and threw it off the roof. It had been a long day for the young man. He had hoped to show the bosses he was ready for bigger things and now, well now things were not promising. He sat with his back to the roof door; the police were using some kind of battering ram on it, yet he could still hear someone's stereo playing "Silver Bells" a floor or two below. He got up and walked slowly over to where he had barricaded the front fire escape with the wooden deck chairs and looked out over the glittering city. "Ah," he sighed. "Last night, whoa, it seems like such a long time ago now."
That night was a night like this one, clear and as cold as a frozen Stoli's. He had been sipping his second one when Dom called. Tomorrow first thing Alberto was to go to Mr. D's and pick up some cards to mail from Mrs. D. Al's name wasn't Alberto, it was Alvin, but he hated the name Alvin so much that he didn't mind that everyone thought it was Alberto. Anyway, he went to sleep.
He woke up about 10:30am to the sound of his phone ringing. It was Dom's boss, a very important fellow named Chessie who inquired of Alvin as to his whereabouts, but not using such wincey words. It was more a description of what body parts Chessie was going to pull off of Alvin before stuffing them back into places they didn't belong. Alvin decided to go drive right over to Mr. D's.
He did. He doubled-parked in front, but he shut the engine off hoping that he would get invited in. Mrs. D.- he knew he shouldn't think such things- was a hottie, but today there would be no long lingering lookee, Chessie answered the door. A box was shoved into his arms. It was full of the D's family Christmas cards, handwritten and addressed family Christmas Cards that were very important, did he understand - important-, to be taken to the Main Post Office on 34th Street, stamped and mailed. Mrs. D. called out from inside that Alberto should get the little Santa stamps, the cute ones. Alvin tried to say something like 'Sure thing, Mrs. D.' to Mrs. D. but Chessie had already slammed the door.
This is where things started to go wrong for our young man. He had a thought. It's not a good thing to have in these circumstances, but he had one. He thought that rather than go the Main Post Office, where there was never any parking, he would go uptown to the Post Office on 180th which as it happens not only has more parking nearby but is also nearby to the building of residence of one Nannetta Jackson, a lady with whom he had made acquaintances.
He parked, left the box in the car and proceeded to go up to the seventh floor and make acquaintances with Ms. Jackson. Twice. Then they both fell asleep. Ms. Jackson reported later that Alvin woke up startled, leaped out of bed and dressed quickly while shouting questions at her about what time is it was and what time did the Post Office close and what time is was
now when she had just told him. Four-twenty, five o'clock and four-twenty. She said he seemed upset.
Alvin grabbed the box and headed for the Post Office at a fast clip. He crossed Broadway and was making good time, when, in one of those ironic twists Nature throws us, at the corner of 180th Street and St. Nicholas Avenue, he stubbed his toe on some frozen black slush and the box flew out of his hands with most of the cards pinwheeling their way onto the street and gutter. Alvin made several loud comments overheard by passersby. No one helped him retrieve the cards, many of which had become a little damaged, that is to say soaked in semi-frozen oily filth.
He banged through the Post Office doorway cutting around one postal worker who was trying to shoo people away, telling them to come back tomorrow that the place was closed. Alvin apparently gave the guy a look and he backed off. He cut over to the mail slot and pushed the cards in, one handful after another, until the box was empty. His job finished, he headed for the door and probably wouldn't have gotten in all the other trouble if he had just forgotten, but he remembered. He remembered that he had forgotten about the Santa stamps.
This is where things got a little confused. Witnesses say Al explained his problem to the postal worker in the doorway, but received what could be described as an unsympathetic response. That Al then began to shout about his connections and how his family could cause real trouble etc. The postal worker, a man we now know was Franco Depolito, a man who, unfortunately for Al, has been written up recently in a book entitled "Made. The Encyclopedia of the New York Mob, and someone who is not afraid of being threatened, did according to some accounts make derogatory remarks to Al regarding Al's parentage and what he could do with his problem, where upon Al removed a .38 caliber handgun from his rear waistband and shot him in the stomach. Surprisingly, especially to Al, Mr. Depolito did not fall over but instead produced a handgun of his own, a .22 silver beauty of a thing and proceeded to shower shots in the direction of Al's head, one shot taking off most of his right ear, another passing through the brim of his NY Yankees baseball cap but, sadly, missing his brain,
It was about this point that other postal workers arrived and while coming to Mr. Depolito's aid informed Al of 1) who he had just shot, 2) what a dumbass he was, 3) what a dead dumbass he was going to be. Al fled the scene.
He had hidden on the roof of Nanetta's building for a couple of hours and was almost sure that the crisis had passed when his cell phone rang. It was Dom. Dom wanted to know was he okay, that he had heard from certain parties about the unfortunate happenings at the Post Office and he wanted Al to know that Franco was in the hospital but was going to be okay after a surgery or two and that he, Franco, had developed an odd affliction, an inability to speak if any police officer was in the room asking smart questions about Al. Al was relieved and told Dom the whole thing, including the parts about dropping the box and Nannetta and the no Santa stamps. There was a long pause and then Dom told Al to stay right where he was and to do nothing.
So, of course, Al did something. He thought that if he could keep from getting arrested that somehow Dom or Chessie would pull him out of this mess. So he made the barricade in front of the door bigger by stacking big pieces of the roof deck-garden against it and he stacked the chairs onto the fire escape landing to block it. Some cop spotted him doing that and that was what brought them and their battering ram into Al's life. First they tried to climb the blocked fire escape and that was when Al set the big festive tree on fire and tossed it at them, then the battering started.
Everything seemed to be holding okay. The deck chairs had caught fire and were fully involved and the door wasn't budging when suddenly the banging stopped. There was a silence across the world. Something was about to happen. Al looked out at the city and wondered if he just shouldn't just jump off the roof before they got him. He worried that seven floors might not be enough to kill him.
Someone called his name from inside. Then someone else. It sounded like Nannetta. It sounded like her. Oh and Dom was with her too. Open the door. The cops are gone. Open the door, everything's fine. What a relief. Al pulled the decking away from the door and turned the handle.
It was a blur. The cops were gone and in their place was Dom and Chessie and, surprise surprise, Mrs. D. in a long black coat and knee high boots. She was yelling something about Santa stamps, and handwriting addresses. Al needn't have worried about the seven floors being enough; Mrs. D. put three slugs in his lungs before they tossed his dying body over the flames to the alley below.
TUNING UP
