The Writing On The Wall
Ever since sitting in the movie theater together and watching the movie “Goodfellas”, the four knew what direction their lives would take. Now I’m not saying that the flick had such a momentous impact on them. I mean, they were going there even without watching Scorsese’s film. It’s just that they saw themselves in the character’s up there on the big screen. It was like staring into a giant crystal ball and watching their inevitable future’s being played out before them.
As they emerged from the theater, the teenagers joked around, repeating now classic lines they had just seen and heard. Nico, the group’s leader, got serious for a moment.
“I’ll tell you guys one thing. That’s based on a true story. We’re not ending up like that, you hear me? We are a family. We end up going down, we go down together. I mean that. This is gonna be a ‘all for one and one for all’ deal. You guys agree?”
Angelo, fifteen at the time and treated by the others as the baby of the group, says “hey, why don’t we do that blood thing. You know, cut our fingers and mix the blood together?”
Gino and Sal start making fun of him, playfully roughing him up a bit, until Nico breaks it up.
“You know, it sounds silly as shit, but I think it’s not a bad idea. We’ve just seen this movie that none of us are ever gonna forget. I think doing the blood thing right after is something that will stick in our memories. Kind of like a reminder not to end up like those guys, turning on each other” .
Gino and Sal start cracking up. “What are we? Frigging babies?”, Sal says.
Nino, now seemingly deadly serious, does his best Joe Pesci imitation. “You guys think I’m funny? You think I’m some kind of God damn comedian?”
The three others are taken aback for a split second, until they realize what he’s doing. They’re all laughing hard now, Nino included.
“Okay, we all had a good laugh. I was fooling around, but I meant it when I said I think it’s a good idea”.
So the four of them, in Gino’s basement, cut the inner tips of the middle fingers of their right hands, and mixed their blood together on that ice cold Winter’s day.
Now I’m going to pick this story up some fifteen years later. And as unlikely as it might seem, the four of them actually followed up on their youthful fantasies. They all married and settled down within a couple of miles from each other, in the vicinity of Hoboken, New Jersey. They were wiseguys, and operated as a family.
Unlike the characters depicted in the movie, the group kept quite a low profile. They were making good money, mostly running various gambling operations. But truth be told, a few of them weren’t satisfied, itching big time for something more. It was around then that Nino approached the other three with his idea for a new business venture.
“How’s you guys like to run a real hi class strip joint?”. They were eating lunch at their favorite Italian restaurant.
Angelo, who had developed into what one might call ‘the brains’ of the gang, wasn’t quite thrilled with the idea.
“We’re doing great, guys. It’s like nobody knows we even exist. I say it’s just too high profile. There’s no need for it. If it’s about money, there’s tons of opportunities out there we haven’t even tapped into yet”.
Gino and Sal didn’t hear a word he said. They were totally enthralled with the idea.
“Tommy’s”, Gino says. “That’s what we’ll call it. After Tommy Devito. You know, from the movie”.
Nico, Gino and Sal are talking seriously now, about the logistics of setting up such an operation. Then the three start on about who’s gonna take care of hiring the girls who would work in the strip joint.
Every-one’s smiling now, kidding around, doing impersonations. It’s like they were teenagers again.
That is, everyone except Angelo. He was the only one who had the ability to see the bloody handwriting that was now in the process of being written on the four wall’s of their favorite Italian Restaurant.
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