Simple Hearts by Barry Rachin (early readers .TXT) 📕

"A a dark-haired girl with a nice figure waitresses over at Guido's Pizza." Luther Buttafuoco was standing in his pajamas, an unwaxed strand of dental floss dangling from his left hand.
"Marna Copparelli," his brother replied. Drake, who baked, did deliveries and sometimes managed the counter at Guido's House of Pizza, had been sleeping on the couch at Luther's apartment since his wife caught him cheating and threw him out. That was a week ago last Tuesday. Drake had called Lois every day since then, but she left the answering machine on and refused to return his whiny calls.
"Is Marna seeing anyone?"
"Sort of," he hedged, "but it's a long-distance relationship.
"How long-distance?"
"The chump got picked up by the feds for loan sharking." Drake chuckled at his own, dry humor. "It was a second offense, so he's at a minimum security facility in Upstate New York. Three to five."
"I want you to fix me up on a date with the woman." Luther stood five feet six. In his early thirties, he was a skinny wisp of a man with a pencil moustache that never quite filled out no matter how long he left it untrimmed. His brown hair hung limp like a third-rate toupee, a bad joke of a hairpiece. Luther wasn't so much ugly as nondescript; he had a reasonably pleasant personality that no one outside the immediate family ever benefited from due to crippling shyness. "I've got feelings for the woman," Luther confessed.
"What feelings?" Drake exploded. "You don't even know Marna, for god's sake!"
There was a tense silence. "I misspoke."
"You misspoke." The tone was derisive, ridiculing. "What the hell does that mean?" Drake didn't know which was worse: being separated from his wife or living with his nutty brother. He needed a drink, but Luther never kept anything stronger than that sicky-sweet Manishewitz concord wine.
"What I meant to say," Luther corrected, "was that I have a very strong feeling about the woman."
"For, about… what's the difference?"
Luther waved a hand, a placating gesture. "It's not important. What matters is that I know the difference. Will you talk to Marna… see if she'll go out with me?"
Drake reached for the TV clicker. The screen blipped on just as the New England Patriots were kicking off. Gillette Stadium up the road in Foxboro, Massachusetts was filled to the rafters. "You wanna watch the NFL game?"
"I want a date with Marna Copparelli."
"Why do I always feel like I'm playing Oskar Madison to your Felix Unger?" Drake rose from the sofa, went and stood by the window. His brother had bought the condo in an upscale section Johnston, a twenty minute drive from downtown Providence, Rhode Island. Unlike Drake’s ratty neighborhood, all the homeowners paid lawn care services to spray the grass with heavy-duty fertilizers and weed killer. Dandelions and crabgrass were considered extremely tacky. Drake wanted to take a ride to the city. Drop by one of the social clubs on Federal Hill to watch the Patriots take on the Colts. Or maybe stop by the Foxy Lady - throw down a few Heinekens in the VIP lounge. But then, he was trying to avoid temptation, mend his errant ways.
Drake could just as easily watch the football game here at Luther's apartment while his brother corrected term papers, wrote book reviews or whatever literary scholars did on a Monday night. But watching the game with his brother was no fun. Luther didn't know a nickel defense from a split end, a linebacker from a wide receiver. Grabbing his cell phone, he dialed a programmed number. After listening to the recorded massage, he mumbled, "Look, Lois, I know I'm an asshole. Just call me. We can work this out." Drake was still considering options when his brother's nasally monotone brought him up short.
"I want a date with Marna Copparelli."
First and ten. Tom Brady, the Patriot quarterback, was hunched over in the huddle. "I'll see what I can do."


At two in the morning, Drake woke from a fitful sleep. He checked his phone for messages. Nothing. He ate a bowl of granola infused with alfalfa and wheat germ - Luther didn't stock any 'normal' cereals – then went and sat on the lumpy sofa that was his bed now. His ankles hung off the far end and his back ached from early in the morning. His brother, who had never screwed anybody over and, subsequently, suffered no remorse, always slept peacefully through the night.
On the coffee table was a well-thumbed paperback, Under Western Skies by Joseph Conrad. Drake skimmed the introduction and slogged through a chapter and a half of turgid prose before abandoning the moldy text. Nothing made any sense - neither the book about bomb-throwing, Russian anarchists nor his pathetic life. And Luther, who devoured Joseph Conrad like a light repast, wanted Drake to fix him up with Marna Copparelli, the foul-mouthed, Italian love goddess from Guido's Pizza!

* * * * *

"How are the spinach calzones?" The businessman leaned his elbows on the counter studying the menu.
At eleven-thirty, diners were already straggling into Guido’s House of Pizza. "Real good," Marna shot back. "They're stuffed with fresh, hand-cut pepperoni, provolone cheese and vegetables, in a flaky crust."
"It's not too spicy, is it?"
"No not at all."
The middle-aged man, who wore an expensive looking tweed sports jacket and wire-rimmed glasses, rubbed his jaw. "Pigs in a blanket… that looks good, too." A line was forming behind the fellow who couldn't make up his mind.
"I'd go with the calzone," Marna replied curtly. Leaning over the counter, she whispered in the man's ear.
The fellow shook his head emphatically. "Yes, the calzone with a diet Coke.” Marna wrote the order on a slip and turned to the next customer.

If that's not the best goddamn spinach pie you ever ate, come back and see me personally, and I'll refund your money twice over!
Drake didn't bother asking Marna what she whispered to the customer. All procrastinators got the same preferential hogwash. Only one customer ever asked for a refund. "You ate the whole thing! I wouldn't give you the right time of day much less a refund," Marna hissed. Whipping around with a dramatic flourish, she disappeared into the rear of the restaurant. The disgruntled customer was too embarrassed to ask to see the manager.

Around two in the afternoon, a cell phone twittered and Drake reflexively reached into his pocket. "That's mine," Marna brought him up short. She placed a hand over her left ear and crooked her head to one side. "Yeah, six o'clock, Friday. It's no problem." Finishing the call, Marna announced, "I need a favor, Romeo."
"What favor?"
Friday night, my sister's going out with her devoted husband, who doesn't cheat on her and always honors the sanctity of the marriage bed, and she needs me to watch the kids."
Drake winced inwardly. Marna never let him forget what a troll he was. He glanced at her and looked away. Marna had a fleshy, compact body. The skin was flawless with dusky, Mediterranean features, the jet black hair trimmed short. She wasn't cute or pretty in the traditional sense. Several younger girls who worked at Guido's were noticeably more fashionable, sexier even. But Marna exuded a refined classiness of a deeper order, a haughty, maternal good looks that left the others, so to speak, in the dust. "Yeah, I'll cover, but I need a favor of my own." Drake pulled a single sheet of newspaper from his breast pocket and slid it across the counter to Marna.
"What's this?"
"It’s a page from the New York Times literary review." He tapped the middle column a third of the way down. "That's my brother. He's an author."
Imagism and post-modern literary trends by Luther Buttafuoco. "Swell." Marna folded the article neatly without bothering to read beyond the title.
"You remember when my car wouldn't start last Thursday?" Marna nodded. "That was my brother who stopped with the battery cables."
"Short guy with the weird hair?"
Drake's eyes brightened. "Yeah, that's Luther. He wants a date with you."
"Aw, for Christ's sakes! I swore off men since Donny got sent away… took a vow of celibacy." Marna's features cycled through a series of unflattering contortions. "All men are shits. I got my nieces and nephew… that's all I need."
I got my nieces and nephew… Marna's sister dropped by for lunch earlier in the week. "My little angels!" She ran to greet the children, smothering them with sloppy kisses. "Bobby, you want Auntie should get you a slice of mushroom pizza?" She always infantilized the chubby, rosy-cheeked little boy. "Pigs in a blanket for Gina…a spaghetti and meatballs dinner for Denise." Marna became manic every time her sister stopped by with the children. Still beaming like a crazy woman, she ran off to place the order.


"Look," Drake reached out and grabbed Marna's wrist, "I'm not asking for a lifetime commitment. Just one crummy date, that's all."
"I dunno." She blew out her cheeks and screwed her pretty lips in a pouty frown. "All men are shits," she repeated with renewed vigor.
Drake leaned closer. "I'm a shit - guilty as charged. I'm a selfish, two-timing, worthless louse. But Luther's kind... a real decent guy. He don’'t gamble, or drink to excess. He eats healthy." Drake squirmed uncomfortably. "He's just painfully shy… doesn't know how to act around women."
"And that's my problem?"
"His experience with the opposite sex," Drake pawed the air fitfully, "is rather limited."
"How limited?" When there was no reply, Marna exploded, "Aw, for crying out loud! Give me a break!" The woman extended her hands and fluttered the fingertips suggestively. "This highly-educated brother of yours, who writes hoity-toity books that get reviewed in the New York Times, has he ever …"
"I dunno."
"So he's a goddamn virgin?" The straightforward question was met with profound silence. "I hope you're not expecting - "
"One crummy date - that's all I'm asking."
"What do you hear from Lois," she said sourly, deflecting the conversation elsewhere.
"She won't return my calls," Drake replied morosely.
"That's because you're a shit. All men, with the exception of my nephew, Bobby, who is too young to know any better, are rotten shits."
"Thanks for reminding me. What about Luther?"
"Yeah, I'll go out with him. Once." She held up a finger - the middle one - in a rather impertinent gesture. "One fucking date."

* * * * *

Drake told Luther about Marna's decision later that evening. "Don't wear argyle socks or those stupid Rockford shoes."
"What's wrong with them?"
"They look like a pair of gondolas." Drake began rummaging in his brother's closet. "Got any snazzy, casual shirts - something with a little pizzazz… style?" "No, I guess not," he answered his own question after surveying the wardrobe. "Maybe we could make a quick run to the Emerald Square Mall and pick something up. Remember, Marna is one fashionable chick."
"We'll go to the mall then." Luther shifted uncomfortably on the balls of his feet. He seemed to grow smaller, more fragile and inconsequential, by the minute. "I'm not so good with small talk. Since you know the woman, I was wondering…"
Drake thought a moment. "Two things you gotta remember. First, Marna's a nonstop talkaholic; once she starts blabbering, the bitch never comes up for air." He put a reassuring hand on his brother's shoulder. "But you're the world's best listener, right?"