CHAPTER 8: THE SATANS

Mildred: Hey Johnny, what are you rebelling against?

Johnny: What’ve you got?

The Wild One, 1953

After a fitful night on the couch, my back was aching, and my mind was filled with apparitions. I remembered my father saying to us kids, “If you start seeing ghosts, don’t blame my side of the family.” According to Pop, there were Stregoneria, witchcraft on our mother’s side of the family. Pop would remind us that our mom’s great aunt, Maddalena, communicated with the dead. The old man got a kick needling our mom about her strange family. Our mother was very patient with him. Sometimes if he got too loquacious, she’d slap him across the head. Then, he’d chase her around the room, and she’d let him catch her, and they’d hug and kiss. What can I say? Even today they’re still a couple of old romantics. They’re Italians. What else could they be? What if I had inherited seeing ghosts from my mother? It was not a thought I wanted to contemplate. I put apparitions out of my mind.

It was Monday, April 1st. If the end of March was any kind of a predictor, it wasn’t looking good for April. This was not a good thought to start the month. Stay positive, Victor, I thought to myself.

Before going to work, I drove to the YMCA, worked out in the weight-room and took a steam bath. Refreshed, I headed for the lot, all thoughts of Winona’s ghostly appearance gone from my head. Given what was happening, I figured I was allowed a bad dream.

Renee had suggested I listen to jazz more and told me to tune in to KVIE MORNING JAZZ. I gave it a try, but couldn’t handle the improvisation. I switched channels. Soon, Dione Warwick was showing me the way to San Jose. When I pulled into the driveway, Sylvia and Vincent were already hard at it, and the reduced-price signs on the cars we’d determined could be sold cheaply were on their respective windshields. I hadn’t figured out how I was going to tell Vincent that Sweets had blackmailed me into helping him find out who murdered Winona. To avoid getting a broken jaw, I’d have to be at my persuasive best. I was at my desk thinking about it, when Vincent hurried into the office, a startled expression on his face.

“Victor, it’s the Satans. I can’t deal with this. It’s on you.”

“Don’t give me any April Fools crap,” I said.

“No, no, I’m not fooling.”

That’s when I heard the rumble of motorcycles. “Ah, minchia,” I said. “What the fuck. The sun’s barely up. Those bad asses should be sleeping off hangovers.”

Sylvia didn’t look too happy either. The Satans’ notorious leader, Sunny Badger, had been sending her flowers. She looked up from the invoices. “Maybe one of those bozos wants to buy a car.”

She thought they were here to buy a car. I thought they were here to dismember Victor Brovelli and feed the lions at the zoo with my parts. I’d have to convince them Vincent had nothing to do with it.

I took a peek out the window and shook my head, “They don’t look like prospective customers to me.” Sunny Badger was the first off his motorcycle. Sunny spelled his first name as if he brought light into the world, an irony his parents probably couldn’t have anticipated.

“Here comes Sunny,” Vincent whispered.

“Why are you whispering?” Sylvia asked

“Looks like bad weather to me,” I said. “You take this sale.”

“Bad joke, bro,” Vincent said. “I’m sure he wants to talk to you.”

“Sunny wants to ask Sylvia out on a date,” I said, hoping for that to be the case.

“He knows better. He’s got the look of a customer. Get your butts out there.”

“You’re a better salesman than me.” I said to Vincent.

“You look tougher, Vittorio. These guys respect tough.”

“You two are pathetic,” Sylvia said. “I’ll sell them a car, and I’ll take the commission.”

“The commission’s all yours,” I said. “I’m going to the john.”

“I’m right behind you,” Vincent said.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do with you Brovelli boys,” Sylvia said as she walked outside. “And if that bozo Sunny Badger says anything about my breasts I’ll kick his butt all the way back to their clubhouse.”

“He loves you Sylvia,” I crooned as Vincent and I hurried to the toilet.

In the bathroom, I told Vincent about Sweets and what I promised to do. Luckily, he was peeing in the stall when I broke the news; otherwise, we might have duked it out right then and there. It’s sort of low class fighting in the toilet. I suggested we go back to the office.

“Not until the Satans are gone,” he said.

“Look, the Brovelli Boys have never backed down from trouble in our lives. Why should we start now?” I was starting to feel more courageous. “Besides, we can’t leave Sylvia out there on her own.”

“Right, but we never involved a bunch of frigging killers in a murder investigation. I knew this was not going to work out. I knew it. I knew it.”

Vincent’s face was flushed like he was about to have a stroke.

“If you’d only listened to me in the first place,” he yelled. “You and Pop and all that onore bull pucky. Honor, my behind.”

Vincent never swears, but he throws a mean punch.

I didn’t see it coming. Next thing I knew I was sitting on my fanny under the sink. I tried to get up, but hit my head on the basin. My stomach hurt where he punched me. It took a moment for me to catch my breath. I closed my eyes, thinking of what I was going to do to Vincent. By the time I staggered to my feet, Vincent was long gone. I stumbled out of the bathroom. Dead meat, that’s what he was. Through the office window I saw Vincent, transformed from angry brother to confidant salesman, hands in his pockets, a smile on his face, standing next to Sylvia talking to Sunny Badger. Oddio. Oh God, Badger’s henchmen were off to the side by their bikes, smoking cigarettes, looking like they’d just walked off the set of The Wild Ones. Badger, himself was no Marlon Brando’s Johnny who was sort of a violent idealist. Sunny boy was idealistically addicted to spreading fear and drugs. The office window was open, and I heard Vincent tell Badger how sorry he was about all the trouble they were having with the police.

“Preciate it,” Badger replied. “I’ll tell you something, if we ever find out who put that little lady in our clubhouse, sumbitch better leave the country; otherwise, we’ll cut his ass up and feed him to the crocodiles in the zoo.”

Great, I thought. I’d better see if my passport has expired. The hell with Sweets. People call him the birdman. Bene. When Sunny throws him off the bridge, he can prove it.

Vincent pointed in the direction of the office, motioning Badger to follow him. I was poised to split back to bathroom when I saw that my brother and Sylvia had veered off and were escorting Sunny to the rear of the building. What the hell was Vincent up to, I wondered. The answer came back in an image of lost profits, and I was out of the office like a flash. Satans or no Satans, Vincent was not going to do this. What was that saying, nothing to fear but fear itself? I leaped down the stairs, but the trio were already around the corner. I got there in time to hear Badger.

“Well, I’ll be damned. You weren’t kidding. These are two bitchin looking vee-hee-cles.

Up close, Sunny looked even more dangerous than his reputation because his back was noticeably curved forward. It gives him the appearance of a cougar or some kind of wild cat about to pounce. He was wearing his usual leathers, his huge, tattooed biceps poking out of his sleeveless vest. A red and black bandana encircled his forehead. His face was weathered from too much wind. His eyes were hidden beneath wrap-around shades. Word was he slept with his shades on.

Sunny was talking about a 1963 Studebaker Avanti and a 1963 Powder blue Buick Riviera that I’d managed to convince a dealer in Lodi to sell me at a price we could afford. I was keeping them in the back away from the main lot for the right customer, one who would pay top dollar. I had in mind a couple of my college classmates with lots of family money and the will to spend it. I didn’t think Sunny Badger was interested in top dollar.

“These cars are not for sale,” I announced as I approached.

They turned around. Sunny cocked his head and gave me the stare, like You talking to me, that kind of look

“Why not?” he asked with nothing close to friendly in his voice.

“Yeah,” my brother said. “Why not? If Mr. Badger finds one of these two automobiles to his liking, I’m sure we can offer him a reasonable price, him being a good neighbor and all.”

What kind of good neighbor? Badger was the only Satan that had ever set foot on our lot, and he’d come to hit on Sylvia, not buy a car. They’d never shown up even for our Barbeque Saturdays. They were probing. That was it. This was a recon maneuver. They were on to us. Anyway, I knew what my brother was doing, and it wasn’t going to work. It didn’t matter what the Satans thought they knew, giving Sunny a discount was not going to happen.

“Tell me about the Avanti,” Badger said, turning his attention away from me as if I didn’t count and back to my brother, but not before scowling at me. Was that a growl, I heard?

Vincent started in, “It’s got a 289 cu in engine with a Paxton supercharger. 240 horses. It’s a 4-speed manual. That’s custom, not standard. Take a look at the interior; it’s wood and leather. I bet you’ve never seen a front-end design like that. Looks like an airplane, right?”

Sunny’s head was bobbing. I edged around Sylvia, so Vincent could see me shaking my head.

“What are you asking for these wheels?” Sunny asked tapping the hood of the Avanti.

“For you, Mr. Badger,” my twin said, “$3,000.00 dollars even. Tax and license not included.”

My heart missed a couple of beats. I’d never heard my twin being so obsequious. “No, no, sorry,” I said. “My brother has that price confused with the Riviera. We can’t let the Avanti go for less than five grand. Now, five thousand in the condition it’s in, is very fair.” It wasn’t the top dollar, I’d envisioned, but I could live with it.

Sunny turned to my brother, “This guy looks just like you, but I like you a lot better.”

Sylvia said, “They’re twins.”

“I can see that little missy,” Sunny said, looking at her breasts and smiling. “You are looking fine today, Miss Sylvia. I hope you don’t mind my saying.”

Sylvia growled.

Badger touched his heart, like she’d just said something endearing in the language of animals. Then he turned to me. “How’d you get that scar buddy-boy?”

The lie popped into my head like salvation. “Nam,” I said. “A slope got me with a bayonet, but I got the bastard in the end.”

Vincent and Sylvia looked at me as if I’d just entered the continent of insanity?

“Good for you soldier,” Sunny said, slapping me on the shoulder. “The government ought to round up all those chicken-livered anti-war radical-muthfucking-Commie bastards that was marching yesterday and ship all their asses over to Nam. See how long they’d last.”

“Hoowah!” I yelled.

Sylvia mouthed, “Are you nuts?” But Vincent’s quick smile told me he knew the game I was playing. It’s called thinking fast on your feet, a Brovelli family talent. I figured Sunny was too dumb to pick up on it.

“What unit were you in?” Sunny asked.

“101st Airborne,” I said, naming the one my older brother, Captain Mario Brovelli, West Point graduate, had served in before he’d had his right hand blown off a year ago, which earned him a Purple Heart and an exit visa out of the war. I was flying by the seat of my pants. It was obvious Sunny was a real gung-ho, pro war kind of guy. I was betting that Badger had never been to Vietnam, so I could bullshit him. Get him on my side, so to speak, you know, mano a mano, make a higher price on the Avanti easier for him to swallow. From the letters Mario wrote to us, I knew enough about the war to sound convincing. “Got this baby,” I said, pointing to my scar “during Operation Hump. You know just north of Bien Ho. You were in Nam, right?”

“Oh, yeah,” Sunny said. “At the beginning. I’m a little older than you.”

He was a lying, but that was good because he knew I knew he was lying, which gave me an advantage. “Brothers in arms,” I said. We smiled at each other.

“No doubt,” he said. “You done good, soldier. Now how much you say this Avanti is worth?”

So, I thought, this was not a fact-finding mission. He was really here to buy a car. I took a deep breath. There was no way the brothers-in-arms-strategy would wash completely. I looked Sunny Badger in the eyes and said. “For a vet like you, Sunny. I’ll let it go for $4,500 and I’ll pay the tax. License is your responsibility, but that’s pretty standard.”

“How about for cash?”

“For cash, I’ll take $4,000 even, and you pay tax and license.” I felt like a father giving away his lovely daughter to a felon with a record of spousal abuse. I wanted to cry, but at least the car would be going out the door for a little profit, be it ever so goddamn humble. And, perhaps, the Satans would think kindly of the Brovelli Boys.

Sunny Badger bent at the waist and drew up his leather pant leg. Out of the top of his boot, he withdrew an envelope from which he pulled a bunch of greenbacks. It had been a long time since I’d seen five-hundred-dollar bills. According to our bank, they were going to be discontinued next year. I accepted the William McKinley’s suspiciously, raising them up to check to see if they were counterfeits.

“They’re good,” Sunny said. “Just got them off a couple of Banditos that owed us. They know what would happen to them if they tried to pass off funny money.”

“I understand,” I said. The Banditos was a Mexican motorcycle gang.

“Let me get you the keys to the car,” Vincent said.

We walked to the office and Sylvia led Sunny Badger in so he could sign the paperwork. Badger was walking real close to Sylvia, talking up a storm. He looked like a man in love, and I wasn’t talking about the car. An hour later Sylvia, Vincent and I were waving goodbye as Sunny Badger and his men motored off the lot. He’d left the car, that was to be a gift for his father with us and said he’d be back for it. His return was not something I was looking forward to.

“Can you believe that guy,” Sylvia said. “He keeps asking me out on dates, like I’d date a dirt-bag like him. All the time I’m making out the papers, he’s staring down my blouse.”

“Hey, good looking fellow and a Vietnam vet. Why not?”

“Vet, my buttinski,” Sylvia said. “Those cruds are nothing but trouble.”