The Italian restaurant—whose owners immigrated to the U.S. three quarters of a century ago, arriving by boat from France, where they conceived their first child, Giuseppe, who nightly regaled special customers with quaint but entertaining tales of his childhood in Queens—closed its doors for good on a rainy November evening, its empty tables devoid of cuisine, vacated by all the wines, absent of espresso. In three short years, it had gone from being a lively center of the citys Italian community and a commonwealth for all who appreciated a genuine, authentic, classical dining experience in the rich Italian tradition, to being an oubliette for dysfunctional couples. All thanks to the couples therapy people who set up shop across from the little restaurant. Night after night, couple after couple would arrive, and the staff would do their utmost best to please them, but to no avail. Harried, anxious, soul-weary, angry, broken couples, either trying to staunch the bloody wounds of their embittered battles or else straining to at last tear free of each other, the sound like gristle in a grinder, would occupy one table or another, usually in a corner, the pall of their despair turning wine to vinegar, reducing delicately prepared sauces to tinny tomato acid, evaporating the fresh coffee and leaving only bitterness in every tiny cup. The regulars, all from the Old Country, often attempted to intercede. Perhaps a tour of our lovely country…? But then only tears, acrimonious dispute, hurtful accusations and cruel suggestions. The regulars would sigh, depart early, foregoing the sweet dessert wine. Giuseppe stood in the doorway to the kitchen, his apron untied, his expression slack, and watch them go. In the passage of time, he saw fewer and fewer return, until at last the simple toll of diminishing returns became too much. Mama, he said, and from her hospital bed she gazed up at him with eyes bloodshot and shrouded by cataracts, mouthing her response, unable to speak. With one ghostlike, frail hand she touch his cheek. One hot tear rolled onto her finger and she smiled as if she remembered a future in heaven that he was not privy to. Mama, I have to close the restaurant. He listened to Verdi in the dark as he considered his fate. Around him, among the tables, he saw so many memories of meals, friends, life events. Weddings, Christenings, Sweet Sixteens, confirmations, funerals. How could it be, he wondered, that these broken people with their neuroses, their self-centered lives raveling out more messily than a dropped bowl of spaghetti,—how could it be that they could ruin everything so thoroughly, so irrevocably? Their own lives and his, entangled by misfortune. His therapist nodded with compassion and understanding. Giuseppe, it is not your fault. It is the hardship of lifes winding way. You may yet cook again. But he shook his head as he drove home. The moon shone through a chasm cutting through the silvered flanks of cumulus, its wan light trembling in the dampness of his eyes.
Posted on: Fri, 15 Nov 2013 01:48:29 +0000