(For the full effect this should be read in a bad Brooklyn accent.)
As he stood outside the restaurant on the corner of 200 and 5th Joe Smart finished his fifth cigarette and made his way across the street to the back door of the shoddy Brooklyn restaurant. He could feel the sweat from his palms make the handle of the briefcase slide through his hand as he was crossing the street, as he walked through the door he was met by the largest Italian man he had ever seen.
“I- I’m here to see Marty.”
Joe stammered. As the Italian stared back at him with dead eyes he said “The fuck are you?”
As Joe didn’t have an adequate response due to his completely unassociated identity with these people he felt compelled to add a,
“…please?”
The man turned from him and called into the din behind him.
“Marty!”
Suddenly Joe heard a
“Yeah, I got some time.”
And was sent through.
Now Joe had heard stories of Marty Troll, what seemed like myths or legends even, he had always assumed they had been the construct of exaggerated gossip, as Italian housewives are prone to create. But what Joe saw before him now slackened his jaw and made all the stories seem that much more horrifying. Standing before Joe in the smoky back room was the ugliest man he had ever seen. Marty Troll seemed to be coated in grease, it started at the top of his head, combing over the few strands of dyed black hair into a cow lick all across his shinning round head, dripping down into the sweat drops that crawled over his face which one could hardly see due to the giant bulb of a nose that was jutting out of it, Joe thought he could smell the sweat seeping into Marty’s XXXL black t-shirt, it seemed like the fabric was stuck to his skin, forming into the deep folds in Marty’s belly. Joe could feel those beady black eyes staring at him but for the life of him he couldn’t shut his mouth, it felt like all the courage he had was seeping out of his gaping mouth leaving him with nothing but the accelerated beating of his heart pounding in his ears.
“There somethin’ in particular you lookin at?”
“N- n- no sir. I- I’m sorry.”
Joe stammered.
The room shook as Marty let out a deep-bellied howl of laughter. This both frightened and eased poor Joe who began to hesitantly laugh along with Marty, although Joe knew now what he hadn’t before, he was unsure of whether he could really go through with this, if this was really what he even wanted. But now he knew, after seeing Marty fuckin Troll he knew he was in way over his head and didn’t want anything to do with this kind of company. As he was trying to think of some excuse to leave the place Marty interrupted his thoughts with–
“So what is it you’re lookin’ for? I see you’ve got quite a nice briefcase in your hands there.”
Marty continued to chuckle through his words, Joe didn’t know what to say so he just nodded vigourosly.
“So tell me, I’m a reasonable man, you’ve obviously come here lookin’ for something, let’s do some business.”
Marty seemed truly genuine with these words, it eased Joe up and loosened his tongue,
“Well- well thank you, really, because you see the thing is, I- I thought I wanted
something, and so I came here, thinking I was looking for something”
“uh-hu”
“But you see that thing, that’s just not me.”
“I see”
Marty responded with a smile, which relaxed Joe even more
“yeah, yeah. It’s just, not. Who I am”
“I understand”
“You do? Really? That’s, that’s really fantastic, because I’m just not- y’know I’m not like this, I’m just-“
“Yeah, you’re a good kid, right? I can see that”
“y- um yeah.”
“I can see that, you. You’re good. I can see you. You think you’re good. You think you’re better-“
“wha- NO!”
“Do NOT interrupt me.”
Marty was glaring at Joe with those beady eyes, Joe unconsciously started backing away until he bumped into the wall. Cornered.
“You come in here, with your weasel fucking face and your god damned briefcase lookin like some punk out of a movie and you’re trying to come to ME. You? You insignificant little fuck come to me in my place of business and try to tell me that you’re better than me? Is that fucking it? What, because you got a damn desk job? Does that make you’re money better than mine? You think I don’t work as hard as you? What, you feel like “this isn’t you” like you got somethin’ fuckin’ better to do? What’s the difference between you and me, huh? I was born into my life and you were born into yours, I grew up this way, this if my family, while you were at college what exactly the fuck do you think I was doing? Even if I fuckin—“
And for a moment, Joe thought he saw something flicker past Marty’s eyes, just for a moment.
“Yeah… Yeah, well you know what. Not today kid. Today is not the day I forgive or forget, you came here for business, so let’s do some business.”
—P. Sehat
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