Hipster Holocaust Chapter Twenty-Seven- Don't Bust My Rice Balls

McCarthy and Torrez sat at a table in front of Ferdinando’s panelle store. It was a fixture in the neighborhood since 1904 and was known for serving the best sandwich in Brooklyn. That sandwich was the potato-panelle special. Three chickpea pancakes are called a panelle. Deep-fried in a vat of oil that had not been changed since the 1950s. Two potato croquettes on top with some fresh ricotta served in a crusty toasted roll. They were washing them down with a couple of Manhattan Special sodas served in an iced mug with the espresso soda poured straight from the tap. Bliss.

Torrez picked up his sandwich and took a big bite. “We seem to be spinning our wheels here, Dummy,” he said with his mouth full of sandwich. “Everyone we look at has an alibi of one sort or another. I am coming to the conclusion that she didn’t know the doer.” McCarthy sipped his coffee soda. “I hate to agree with you, but it is starting to look like you’re right. This is a cluster fuck, man.”

“What are we gonna do? I mean, what’s our move? We can take a run at her boyfriend again or maybe the guy she went on a date with, but I don’t think anything will change,” Torrez said as he finished off the last of his sandwich. When a sandwich was this good, it didn’t last on the plate very long. “Our only move is to roust all of the neighborhood perverts and peepers to see if they graduated.” McCarthy agreed with the thought, “Yeah, I think you’re right. I want to take another run at those retarded flower shop assholes. We already eliminated the UPS jerkoff. At least we will when we find out whose wife he was banging. I want you to go through the files to see who else might pop up. Ask Holland again to help. She can work the computer.” McCarthy was looking at the door.  “In the meantime, I have to ask the people who know.” Torrez looked at him and said, “What the fuck does that mean?” “Watch and learn Beaner.”

The door opened, and the old man walked in. He stopped short when he saw the two cops. He nodded at them and then proceeded to the back of the store, followed by Geno. He sat in his favorite spot under the framed, faded news clipping of the election of Mussolini. Old man Aiello sat with his back to the wall as always, with Geno in his customary side seat with a view of the kitchen and the front door. They were predictable in that, if in nothing else.

Hipster Holocaust- Chapter Twenty Four- Special Delivery

 

Hipster Holocaust Chapter Twenty-Four- Special Delivery

McCarthy and Torrez sat on a bench at Valentino Park across from the Statue of Liberty. When you sat there, you felt like you could reach out and finger Lady Liberty as she seemed to be right in front of you. It never failed to soothe McCarthy’s spirit. He had gone to school with the fireman that the park was named after, and he would go there often to veg out and think. The kid had died in a fire long before 911, and his old man was a big shot in the longshoremen’s union and had a lot of political pull. He got a park named after his kid when all the firemen who died on 911 just got a plaque on the side of the railing facing where the World Trade Center used to be. It is all about who you know in this world. McCarthy liked to come here to remind himself of that fact.

The park was quiet today. Just a few sunbathers and a couple of old men fishing off the side of the pier. Two kids riding back and forth on skateboards. They should be in school, but who gives a shit? After all, they were homicide detectives, not the truant police. These kids were probably homeschooled entitled little shits who would make a beef with the rat squad if you ever questioned why they were out on a school day. McCarthy tried to look on the bright side.

Maybe they would roll out into the street and get hit by a bus. You can always hope.

Hipster Holocaust- Slice of Life

 

Hipster Holocaust Chapter Sixteen- Slice Of Life

Fat Louie sat in Nino’s pizzeria with a large Nonna pie in front of him. It was a favorite. With no tomato sauce. The acidity gave him agita. He liked the plain mozzarella and ricotta pie. With extra ricotta just the way his Nonna used to make it when he was growing up on Henry Street. He would come over to stay with his Nonna while his mother went to work. He loved spending time with his Nonna. It was his favorite childhood memory.

Not like his memories of his father. That cocksucker. He wasn’t home all that often. He was either whoring around or in the can. A low-level enforcer for the Gallo’s his father was always getting pinched because they would leave him holding the bag. Never anything more than a lowly wannabee, his father made him ashamed. He didn’t have the balls to move up. To do a hit and become a made guy. The best he could do was be the muscle in collecting the vig from the longshoremen that the gang preyed on in the neighborhood. He only got paid peanuts, and the family lived on his mother's meager paycheck as a maid for a rich family in the city.

Fat Louie was on his own. He had always been on his own.  His father hated him and batted him around until he was big enough to punch back. His mother must of loved him, but she was so exhausted all the time that she couldn’t muster the strength to care what he did. When his Nonna died, he was twelve, and he just didn’t give a shit no more. He made his life out on the streets. He wasn’t popular at Sacred Hearts, his grammar school. All the kids mocked his stained and wrinkled clothes. The nuns didn’t give a shit about him either. By 1968, most of the Cabrini Sisters had left the convent, and the new secular teachers didn’t give two shits. He dropped out in the seventh grade. You would think that the government would have known he was a truant, but he just slipped through the cracks.

Hipster Holocaust

 Hipster Holocaust Chapter Fourteen

Lydia woke up feeling groggy and sick to her stomach. She had no idea where she was. She felt her head, and when she brought her hand back, it had blood on it. She had a big bump and a terrible headache. Then she realized something even more terrifying. She was naked.

She was lying on the mattress on a dank, cold floor. When she moved her leg, she realized that she was attached to a chain that led to a ring on the wall. She didn’t have a blanket or a sheet, and she shivered a little in the cold air. She must be in a cellar, as there were no windows that she could see. Just a room that had concrete walls and a floor that was made of the same unforgiving material.

Lydia tugged on the chain to see if she could rip it off the wall. It was too solid, and all of her exertions were for naught. She decided to call out. “HEEELLLLPPPPP!!!!!” she screamed. She screamed over and over, hoping that someone would hear her. Someone other than whoever had put her here. It was every woman’s nightmare. It was specifically her nightmare. To be kidnapped and chained up to be the victim of someone cruel enough to throw her down a freezing cellar and leave her for dead. It was a cliché that you see in every TV show, and now it had happened to her.

After screaming until her throat was raw, Lydia stopped and tried to think for a moment. She carefully looked around the room. She had seen thousands of TV shows and movies where people had been held captive and had found a way to free themselves. She looked at the chain on her arm. It was very tight and was locked with a lock that she would not be able to pick if she had the skills to do that. The ring in the wall was even more secure, as the ring and the plate in the wall were all one piece. There was no escape. Nothing else was visible in the room. No food. No water. Not even a bucket if she had to pee. Why did she think that? Now she had to pee.

Hipster Holocaust

 

Hipster Holocaust Chapter Ten- A Rat In The Mouth is Worth Two In The Bush

Anna Feola poured an espresso and took the small white cup and saucer to the dapper elderly grey-haired man at the corner table. He looked up at her and smiled a shy smile that was out of place on his pale, elegant face. His resting face was a hard one, like he had seen bad things. Done bad things. Things you didn’t want to know about.  

It intrigued her to no end.  

“Here you go, sir,” she chirped cheerily. His smile deepened if that was possible. “You don’t have to call me, sir sweetie. Vincenzo is fine. Or V if you want. That’s what my friends call me.” “Okay, V it is. Say, I wanted to ask if my landlady ever called you V,” she teased him. He looked at her with a deadpan expression that almost scared her. “Whose your landlady?” “Celestine. Celestine DiMartino. I think you know her.”  

The old man leaned back until his back was against the wall. He smiled a little in remembrance. A fond remembrance, it would seem. “Yeah, I know her. From a long time ago. She is your landlady? Good, that’s good. You give her my regards, ok?” “I will V when I see her when I get home. I am sure she will be happy to get them.” He gave a little shake of his head. “Maybe, maybe not. But give them to her all the same.” 

Anna gave him a quick smile and scurried back behind the counter. The line had already formed in the few moments she had spent at the table. She had to hurry to get out of the weeds. 

Vincenzo looked at the street as he did every other minute. He had lived a long time by being careful. With his wits and with his fist. Occasionally, with a pistol. Once and a while with a bomb. Those days were gone, and still not that far away if that made any sense.  

He had great eyesight. Sniper’s eyes, they used to call it. He saw a guy leaning against a Con Edison junction box in front of the barbershop. He was out of place in the new neighborhood. A guinea in a Member’s Only jacket circa 1986. That wouldn’t have been a surprise in this neighborhood twenty years ago. More like forty years ago. Still, there were a few holdouts. It was not as prevalent as the 1980’s but not anything unusual for some of the cheap ginzos who still lived around here. They never threw anything out. Some of them still had their communion suits and the envelopes that came with them. What was unusual was that he was studiously avoiding looking at the coffee shop. He was nervously peeping all around. Except at this front window. Vincenzo had super strong radar. When something was out of place, he noticed it. And he acted.  

Hipster Holocaust Chapter Thirty Eight

 

O’Malley and Johnson walked into the interrogation room and sat across from Fat Louie DeMaio. Fat Louie sat all calm and collected like a guinea Buddha. He didn’t look calm at first glance because he was sweating like a pig. But that was because of his thermostat, not his energy. He was stoic, almost meditative as he waited. Louie was cuffed to the table and had to lean slightly forward because he was too fat to sit back as his stomach kept him away from the edge of the table.

O’Malley gestured to Johnson. “Why don’t you unhook this fine gentleman, Detective Johnson, so we can have a little chat?” Johnson grimaced but went across the table and unlocked the cuffs. Fat Louie sat back and rubbed his wrist that had been severely chaffed by the cuffs, as usual were too small for his meaty wrist. He looked at O’Malley expectantly as if he had to answer as to why he was sitting there in a too-small chair in a too-small room.

“Well, boyo, it looks like we need some answers from you. Detective Johnson has some questions, and it would behoove you to answer.” Fat Louie smiled and said, “I would be happy to help if I can, Detective. Who are you, by the way? I didn’t catch the name.” O’Malley smiled. This one was sharp. “Detective Sergeant O’Malley, to be sure, Mr. DeMaio. I am in charge of this little merry band, and I would appreciate it if you would answer us truthfully and clearly so we can get you out of here as expeditiously as possible.” “Fair enough, Sergeant, but I don’t see how I can help youse. I told Detective Johnson that I only knew the girl in passing as someone to buy flowers from and no more. We met maybe three times in all. You know who I am, I guess?” “I am aware,” O’Malley said. “None of the boys knew anything more. Certainly, Mr. Aiello didn’t. How can I help?” O’Malley turned to Johnson, “Yes, how can he help Detective?” Johnson silently fumed as he regretted bringing this fat fuck into the station. His temper was going to get him in deep shit someday. “I think you know something more than you are telling us. Is there any word on the street about these killings? The girl worked a block away from you. Didn’t any of your mooks hit on her and try to get over? I know how you guinea bastards operate. This is bullshit man because you have your ear to the street and you have to know something. Give me something, and you can walk out of here.” Fat Louie just gave him the dead eye. “I don’t have any idea what you are talking about. Nobody has been talking about these murders except as it being a shame. It has nothing to do with us. You know that is not what we do. The only other thing I can tell you is that she worked at the Ace Hardware on Court Street. Maybe she got in a beef there or something. The guys there were more likely to hit on her and try to get over. She wasn’t the type of girl my guys go for. They don’t stick it in hipsters. It’s beneath them. So, you see, I don’t know anything.”

Snippets

 

Some of the biggest authors around have websites where they publish snippets of their latest work. Especially sci-fi guys like Eric Flint or George RR Martin or Peter Rholdan. They publish a few chapters of their latest to whet the appetite of their fans. 

I am doing that with the book I have been working on called Hipster Holocaust which will appear on my old blog Trooper York.

Now I am not doing that because I don't have a bunch of fans like they do. I just do it as an exercise. Well, that was until I ran into a problem. 

My Microsoft 365 that I bought with my new computer has expired. A purchased a different one from this company Mashable which was a great bargain. The problem is as with all great bargains it is not easy, and it is not working yet. I downloaded it fast enough, but it is not working for some reason.

So, in the meantime I will publish some snippets here. I am up to Chapter Twenty-Nine so far as we will see where we are as we go.

Feedback would be greatly appreciated.

If there is anybody out there interested.

Hipster Holocaust- (Work in Progress)

 

Hipster Holocaust Chapter Eight

Lydia Vasquez closed out her window at TD bank. She was a teller now and she was enormously proud that she had advanced to that position. It had been a long struggle for the single mother.

She had worked at most of the stores on Court Street since she was a kid. She knew everyone and everyone knew her. She had been a head cashier and semi-manager at the Italian pork store on Degraw Street until they sold out to Koreans. Then she worked at Court Pastry until one of the bakers got too handsy and she went on to Key Food. Until they too sold out as it became a CVS. All the time she had been taking night classes at Brooklyn College and had finally gotten her associates degree.

Which had been perfect when the TD bank opened on Court St. If was about the twentieth bank in the neighborhood so they had to do something different to get people to try them. So they hired Lydia as a local girl made good and she urged people to get accounts at the new branch.

Lydia finished closing out her drawer and went and gathered her things. She was going home to her new apartment in Red Hook which had totally changed since she was a kid. It used to be a crack infested hell hole but now movie stars had moved in and hipster set up bars and restaurants. The giant supermarket had a lot to do with it as the jerk off who owned it had bought up a bunch of real estate and was instrumental in making it the new hot neighborhood. Luckily she had scored an apartment with one of the old timers on Coffey Street who didn’t trust the new people. 

The guard let her out and she started to walk home.  She was tired and didn’t rush. It only cost about eight bucks for an Uber or a taxi but her habits of frugality were hard earned and she didn’t abandon them just because she had a dollar in her pocket. It was a long walk, but the weather was nice and why not.

Lydia crossed over to the other side of the street so she could pass the florist. It was owned by two brothers who had both been crushing on her for about twenty years. She was never a beauty, but she had never had trouble attracting attention even when she was a kid. Short and compact she still had curves ever since she was 12.  Long brown hair that she kept scrupulously clean and straight. Lydia always dressed well even when she didn’t have a lot of money.

The two florist brothers had been among her many neighborhood admirers.  Ever since she was a high school girl. A very, very young high school girl. Mike the older brother was a Vietnam vet who was very proud of his service. He loved to stick it in the face of all the ultra-liberal hipsters who infested the neighborhood these days. He would take off his shirt and sit in his beach chair in the middle of the sidewalk and take the sun. He was not a big guy. But he was wiry and strong. He had been a tunnel rat in Vietnam, and it had really affected him. He came home all fucked up and couldn’t hold a job. Not even on the docks where they had plenty of pyschos. He eventually took over his parent’s florist shop after they passed. What hadn’t changed is that he had flirted with Lydia ever since she was a schoolgirl. He had a whiff of danger to him and as an older guy he was sort of attractive to her when she was about fourteen. But then she met her first boyfriend and she stayed away from the flower shop for a while.

The other brother was a whole different story. Alphonse was a thin short wiry guy who was really weird. He always wore a maroon smock and had an attitude when he waited on customers. He lost more money for the shop then he made. He was very creepy to all the young girls and always talked to them and gave them flowers. He was just too creepy to ever close the deal. The only thing he had going for him was that he was fastidious. He kept the shop spotless, and his personal hygiene was impeccable even if he had a 1950’s slant to it. You didn’t see someone styling their hair with Brylcreem much these days. Alphonse rocked it with the small black comb he kept in his back pocket to periodically run through his greasy locks. Or at least he was convinced he rocked it. No one could tell him otherwise.

Lydia wanted to get a small bunch of flowers to brighten up her apartment. He son Julio loved flowers and he was always cheered up when she brought them home. He as in a wheelchair these days because of the degenerative disease he suffered from. He didn’t have much to do every day. He couldn’t go to school so all he did was stare out the window every day and wait for her to come home.

As she approached the florist she saw that only Alphonse was around. God only knows where Mike was at as he had the habit of disappearing for days on end. She walked up to him and smiled. “Hi Alphonse. I was thinking of getting a small bouquet. For my house.” Alphonse looked at her with slitted eyes and years of resentment. Pretty girls never wanted to talk to him. Even less when they turned into beautiful women.

“Why do you want our flowers. Why don’t you get them from that spic Nestor at his bodega. You’re a spic so you can get the spic discount.” “Why you so mean Alphonse? I bring you some business and you want to insult me. If Mike were here you wouldn’t do that.’ “If Mike were here he woulda been making the googoo eyes at you like he always did. I ain’t like that.” “Sure thing Alphonse sure thing. Never mind about the flowers.” “Go ahead and go fuck yourself you dirty strunz.”

Lydia just shook her head and walked down the street. She picked up a cheap bouquet at the new Gourmet deli which was a glorified bodega anyway. She decided to take the long way home since it was a nice night. She went down Second Place and went to Summit Street where she crossed over the footbridge to go over the BQE. She then turned down Carroll Street. She knew that was safe because the Mob was still on that block. The old man was outside his social club keeping an gimlet eye on things so she was safe. Lydia nodded at him as she passed by. She was always polite to him since she knew who he was.  She walked onward past Columbia to Van Brunt. She would walk along Van Brunt to Red Hook. She liked this route because it took her past the new shops and restaurants that seemed to spring up for a while then die and then get replaced by something new.

She turned down Van Brunt and approached the corner. Suddenly someone grabbed her by her hair and put their hand over her mouth and dragged her into a small alley between two buildings behind some garbage cans. She tried to struggle. She screamed and kicked and dropped the flowers on the floor. But no one heard her because his hand was clamped on her mouth. She tried to bite but it didn’t seem to have any effect. She felt a warm wetness on her face and on her throat as she fell to the ground. She tried to scream but nothing came out but gasps. She wet herself and started to cry. She was so embarrassed. Her son would be so embarrassed. It was her last thought as she died.

The figure standing over watched her slip away and smiled. He dragged her further back into the alley where there was a small dip or hole in what passed as yard. It was filled with refuse and debris. He tossed her in and turned away. He saw the flowers on the floor. They were slightly crumpled but good enough to reuse. He picked them up. He turned to look back at his handiwork.

“Three.”

Hipster Holocaust

Hipster Holocaust Chapter Seven

Vincenzo “Slappy” Aiello sat in a lawn chair in front of his club on Carroll Street between Columbia and Van Brunt. Just as he had for the past sixty years. The location of the club had changed over the years. It had originally been on President Street when he ran with the Gallos. They had come and gone. Shot across the sky like a comet. The Kid was still around but he stayed in Manhattan these days. Albert was a capo just like him and they were sort of co-equals in their crew. Of course they were both sort of semi-retired. Which happens when you get into your seventies. Your late seventies. Still life was good. 

Vincenzo had a routine. He liked to have his breakfast at the little coffee shop on Court St. One of the various cash businesses he owned in the neighborhood. He had the coffee shop. A wine and cheese bar. A laundromat. A couple of bodegas. The bagel store. He was the owner of all of them. Or at least a partner. A silent partner who spoke loudly when it conflicted with his interests.

The sun was warm today. He sat back in his chair. Nothing much was happening today. Just the usual. He sipped on his sixth cup of espresso. Put it back on the small table that sat next to his chair.  He nibbled on a biscotti fresh from his bakery. One of the young kids came out from the club. Kids. Ha. He was thirty if he was a day.

“Do you need a refill Mr. Aiello?” “No thank you Geno.” “Got a question?” He nodded for him to go on. “The Arab down at the body shop didn’t make his vig this week. I wanna know what you want me to do?” Vincenzo looked up at him. Squinted actually as the kid had the sun over his back. He shook his head at him. The stunard didn’t know that he never talked about any of these details. Especially with a low level mook like Geno. Not out on the street where the feds could have a mike set up to wire tap him. There was reason why he was not in the joint like most of his peers. He handed him his cup and motioned with his thumb over his shoulder pointing at the inside of the club. Geno looked at him. Nodded. Took the empty espresso cup and walked back in the club to get him a refill.

Vincenzo looked out at the traffic on the street. What little of it that there were these days. The neighborhood had become very quiet. Not like the old days when he was kid before they built the expressway and cut off the waterfront from the rest of the people. Then it was all pushcarts and commerce. All of the old Italian businesses had moved away. The pork store. The vegetable stores. Even the bank. Now it was all brownstones owned by people with money. There had been a tough time in the seventies and early eighties with a lot of crime. The moolies had come out of the Red Hook Projects. His manpower was limited so he could only protect a couple of streets. It took that asshole Giuliani to clean it all up. The only good thing that worthless fuck ever did.

A nanny was pushing a stroller across the street. None of the rich women took care of their children. They left them in the care of a Mexican or Haitian all day long. Good only knows how those poor bastards would turn out.  The Chinese mailman was putting letters in the mailboxes at the top of the stairs in the condo across the street. Now a day’s most of the buildings were condos. Or rentals to Wall Street wannabees who couldn’t afford a brownstone yet. The longshoreman and their families who had lived there when he was a kid were long gone. The docks were all closed. All of the shipping had moved to Howland Hook and Jersey. All of the money and opportunity and moved on with it. There was still money to be made in South Brooklyn. Gambling. Loans. Drugs. He had a finger in all of it. It wasn’t what it used to be, but it still was a nice sum at the end of the month.                                                                                                                             

People passing by would say hello or acknowledge him in one way or another. Not the homage that he used to receive back in the seventies but still the old timers knew who he was. A couple of elderly widows passed by pushing their carts on the way to Court St to do some shopping at Esposito’s pork store or the IGA on Henry Street. It was a long walk but they were hardy individuals which is why they had outlived their entire families. Both widows nodded at him and said “Hello Vincenzo” in soft voices as though they were telling a secret. He nodded and said, “Good morning Ladies.”

A young girl in a stylish outfit strode confidently down the street. She was a beauty, and she knew it. She smiled at the dapper old man in the chair and said hello. He smiled at her and she smiled right back at him. Back in the day he would have pursued it. But he was past all that. Still he enjoyed the nostalgia of it all. 

The UPS guy walked by and said “Hello Mr. Aiello.” He looked at the girl who was up the block. “That’s a nice piece of ass eh?” Vincenzo looked at him with his eyes hooded and his grim face on. The big cuich's bowels turned to water. “Sorry Mr. Aiello. No disrespect.” “Get lost.” “Yessir Mr. Aiello.” 

The idiot kid next door was bringing his wagon down the stoop. He was a fixture in the neighborhood for as long as he had been alive. He was a half a retard and was always with his mother. That bitch on wheels had tortured the poor dummy all his life. She took him out of grammar school and kept him out of school since the seventh grade. They had money. She owned a couple of the brownstones on the block so they were well set up with the rents. He rolled his cart up to the club.

“Do you need anything Mr. Aiello? I am going up to the store and I can pick up anything you need.” “No kid thanks anyway.” “Sure thing Mr. Aiello.” 

He looked at him as he pushed his cart up to Hicks Street huffing and puffing since he was so out of shape and unhealthy. It was like looking at one of the last vestiges of the neighborhood walking down the street. The idiot must be sixty if he was a day. Probably be dead soon. Just like everyone else he had known. It was just getting old being old.

Hipster Holocaust

Hipster Holocaust Chapter Six

Anna walked down Court St from her job at Brooklyn Leaf and nodded to some of her acquaintances as she maneuvered between the platoons of super-sized strollers that dominated the sidewalks of the brownstone neighborhood. Where once old ladies pushed carts full of groceries and kids ran and played there were only trust fund hipsters or the impatient Karen’s married to hedge fund Wall Street assholes. You used to have to worry about stepping in dog shit and now it pushed past you in designer sweat pants.

She had a small bag of Italian cookies and a coffee in her hands as she ambled slowly down the street. She didn’t have anything particular to do that day so she was in no hurry. She said hello to Nestor who was sweeping out in front of his bodega. She often went there late at night to pick up something or other. He was always very nice as was two out of his three daughters. One of them was a real bitch but that was understandable as she took after her Mom who was the Uber bitch and that wasn’t just because she drove for a livery service on the side. It was because she was just downright nasty.

Just as she got to the corner of President she noticed something odd. It looked like two cops were going into the plus size boutique on the corner. She didn’t know for sure that they were cops but she was willing to bet that they were based on their cheap suits and their attitude. That attitude was not something you forgot if it was ever turned toward you. She shivered. That was in her past. Let it stay on Long Island with the rest of her past life. She had come here to be reinvented and she wasn’t going to look back. Not for one instant.

As soon as she had turned the key in the lock and walked into her apartment on the parlor floor she head her land lady call out to her. “Is that you Anna?” she said in her quavering old lady voice. Oh well she needed some attention and Anna was glad to give it to her. She was her surrogate grandma. Anna never knew her real grandma and liked to image Celeste as her own little old Italian grannie. “Yes it’s me Celestine” she shouted as she leaned over the banister that led to the garden apartment where her landlady lived. “I will be down to see you in a minute. I brought cookies.” “You are too good Anna you didn’t have to do that. Come a down when you can I have something for you too.” “Ok be down in a minute.”

Anna put her keys and coffee down and put the bag of cookies where she would remember to take downstairs. She stripped off her work clothes and changed into sweat pants and an oversized t-shirt. Wearing her new Ugg slippers she walked downstairs carrying her bag of biscotti.

Anna knocked on the open Kitchen door frame. “Can I come in” she asked. “Of course, Bella, of course you come-ma right in. How are you?” “Great Celestine. I brought you some biscotti. Oh and I brought in your garbage pails.” “Thank you Bella. That Georgie is getting so muschada. Anyway I cooked up some eggplant the way you a like. You take some upstairs OK.” “Oh thank you so much. But I can stay with you and talk for a while if you want.” “That’s a nice. Let’s a do that. Come we a eat now.”

Celestine was a wizened Italian lady who met the cliché to a T. She wore a black dress and had a prominent mustache. She was only four feet six inches tall and round as zeppole that had been too long in the deep fryer. With all of that she was the perfect landlady. She always understood if she was a little late with the rent or had to pay in installments. So in recompense Anna would do little jobs around the house. Bring in her mail. Sweep outside. Take in the garbage pails. Go shopping to pick up the odds and ends or the specialty items that Celestine needed to whip up her delicious Italian food. In return Celestine would invite her over for dinner or give her a plate to take upstairs. She just had to be careful to watch her figure as she could seriously plump up if she ate too much pasta from her kitchen.

Not that anyone else was watching her figure. The downside of having her landlady so involved in her life is that she could never bring anybody home. There was anyone in her life and there had not been anyone for quite some time. Most of the guys she met at her job were no goes. They were either arrogant hipsters or clueless neighborhood mooks who were living in the 1950’s as far as their attitudes to women were concerned. She didn’t socialize much and really didn’t have any close female friends. Even the girls she met at auditions didn’t warm up to her. She thought it was it was because she was too talented but it could also be because she was too shy to strike up a friendship so she was considered stuck up and aloof.  Her only friend was a 70 year old woman in a black dress.

Celestine walked over to the stove using her cane to lean on as she had very bad knees due to her age and the weight she had put on these last few years. She lifted the top off of the pan on the stove and stirred the contents with a wooden spoon. She dipped the spoon in and took a little of the red sauce and brought it up to her mouth. She tasted it and smiled. “Bene it’s a ready. Get a plate and come over here.” Anna picked up the plate that had been sitting in front of her and walked over to the stove. Celestine took a ladle and scooped up a healthy portion of eggplant caponata. Rich tomato sauce with diced eggplant and black olives and her patented seasoning. After getting her plate Anna brought over the other plate to fill up for the cook and put it at her place setting. They both sat down. Celestine took the crusty loaf of Italian bread and broke off a piece and handed it to Anna. She sighed. This was like crack to her. She couldn’t say no. The rich spicy flavor sopped up by the semolina bread was heaven on earth. She wouldn’t eat lunch tomorrow. Or breakfast. A small price to pay for such a delicious meal.

“How was work today Anna.” “Fine. Nothing unusual. Very busy actually which I like a lot better since I get bored if nobody is around. Oh your friend was in again just the way he has been all week. In fact I don’t think he missed a day all month.” “My friend?  Who Vincenzo?” “Yes. He was sitting in his usual spot sipping espresso and holding court. How do you know him anyway?” “We went to school together. Sacred Hearts. It was a long time ago. I haven’t spoken to him in years.” “What does he do anyway? I mean I know he is retired but was he on the docks?” “It’s a better you don’t ask Bella. How is the eggplant? I added extra celery for you the way you a like.” “It’s great thank you Celestine.” “You a welcome Bella you a welcome.”

Anna sighed to herself. She guessed this was another of the little mysteries that were the stock in trade of old school South Brooklyn. She went back to the eggplant. At least this was the truth. In a saucy kind of way. She went back to the eggplant. At least this was the truth. In a saucy kind of way.

 

Hipster Holocaust

 

Hipster Holocaust Chapter Five

 

Buffy Winship poured last of the water from her watering can onto the Impatient in the front of the nursey. She had finally finished watering and pruning and cosseting all of the flowers in the independent nursey on Van Brunt Street down in Red Hook. Buffy loved flowers. She had always loved them ever since she was growing up as a child of privilege in Connecticut. When she was known as Elizabeth before she got the nickname of Buffy from the neighborhood knuckleheads who worked with her in the hardware store. She wore their contempt as a badge of honor.

As a young girl she would love to work in the gardens. In fact her best friend as a child was the elderly Italian immigrant gardener who tended the gardens on her family’s thirty acre estate. At least until her mother found out and fired him because she was scandalized that she had become friends with the help. That actually was one of the main factors in her leaving her family and cutting off all contact with them.

She had moved down to Brooklyn with the then boyfriend to become an artist. They got a small apartment on Coffee Street in Red Hook and posed as Bohemian lovers. Sort of Scott Fucked Up Fitzgerald and Zelda. It didn’t last. Her boyfriend went back home to become a Wall Street drone and she replaced him with ever increasing cast of lovers both male and female and some who were somewhere in-between.  After six tattoos, seven piercings, nine different hair colors and four bouts of   chlamydia she decided to go it alone. She had sort of fallen into working in the nursery because of her love of flowers. She had a gift. Not for art but for agriculture.

Hipster Holocaust

 “Hipster Holocaust Chapter Four

Dummy McCarthy and Julio Torrez were standing at the autopsy while the Medical Examiner made an incision down the breastbone of the almost albino body on the table. Pale and thin she was big boned girl who must have kept the weight off by subsisting on the hipster diet of premium coffee and cigarettes. The stark evidence of her white privilege made her numerous tattoos stand out like a dog shit on freshly fallen snow. She had the usual tribal band on her arm and the ubiquitous tramp stamp. A large cartoon mushroom was growing out of her pubes. Or where her pubes would have been if she had not been freshly shaved.

“So how did she die Doc? I take it she didn’t drown? Unless the big hole where her throat should have been made her swallow too much of that Canal Water?” asked McCarthy while he idly scratched his balls. Torrez did not complain because he had his finger shoved up his nose as if he was mining for a nugget. They were both famous for their couth.

“Cause of death was exsanguination Dummy. She bled out almost before she hit the water. There was no water in her lungs so she must have been dead when she hit the water.” “Shit Doc that ain’t water in the Canal” Torrez joked. “Did she have any oil slick scum in her lungs?” “No it was the throat cutting that did the deed. The perp might have some knowledge of anatomy because he hit the exact right spot on the jugular that meant almost instant death. There was no slashing or hesitation marks. Just one slit nice and neat.”

Hipster Holocaust

 

Hipster Holocaust Chapter Three

Anna Feola walked into the Brooklyn Loaf to start her shift at 6 am. She was one of the first employees there because she liked the first shift. First of all it was always busy and she hated having to wait around with nothing to do. Best of all she got off early at 2 o’clock so she had the rest of the day to do whatever she wanted. She could take a class or go to an audition. Or even just help out the nice old Italian lady that was her landlord. She was like her Mom. Or more like her Grand Mom. Her family came from this neighborhood even though they had move out to Long Island in the sixties. Even so she felt a prosperity interest in the culture that was fading away in the face of all the hedge fund managers and Wall Street aholes who were buying up the neighborhood. There were still a few pockets of the old Italian American Immigrant culture left and this coffee shop was one of them even though it was only a few years old. It featured bagels and rolls and prepared sandwiches with coffee and tea. Not fancy like Starbucks but not as declassee as the Dunkin Donuts on the corner of First Place. It was sort of in-between. Just like Anna.

She started the coffee and Pepe brought up a couple of paper sacks filled with fresh hot bagels. She sorted them out and put them in the wire bins designated for each flavor with a little ceramic name plate attached to the front. Plain. Salt. Poppy. Sesame. Onion. Everything. A bin for everyone and a pile of hot steaming goodness.

Hipster Holocaust Chapter Two

Hipster Holocaust Chapter 2

Detective Charlie McCarthy looked over the rail on the Carroll Street Bridge over the Gowanus Canal and spit while a thin drizzle fell on everything and bounced off the surface. A police diver fell backwards of the side of the police launch. And bounced. He had to cut a hole through the surface scum as though he was an ice fisherman freezing his balls off on a lake in Minnesota. How he was going to find anything was a mystery but they still had to try. They had a report that there had been a jumper last night and some blood evidence on the rail that was enough for the shit heel captain to demand that they investigate.

 His partner Julio Torrez walked up carrying two cups of coffee with the plastic tops attached. “Hey Dummy what’s happening?” He handed over a coffee and they both ripped off a small tap so they could sip the coffee while keeping the cover on to protect it from the rain. “Did they find anything or are we just jerking ourselves off here?” 

“Nothing yet Beaner but they just started. How the fuck they gonna find anything in this shit is beyond my freaking understanding. I think that twat captain is just busting our balls with this shit.” 

“I don’t know jefe. They said they had a witness. Some old biddy looking through her window. Said she saw some dude in a hoodie push a girl over the side.” 

Hipster Holocaust

 Hipster Holocaust

She loved Brooklyn like a fat kid loved cake. She loved the feel of it.  The smell of it. The taste of it. Every single thing about it. It was everything to her.

She had always wanted to live in the city. When she was a kid upstate she would see movies and TV shows about young people living in the City and want to move there to get out of her hick town that was more of a prison than a home. She would watch reruns of shows like “Friends” and “Caroline in the City” and she would dream of coming to New York to be an artist. The problem was she wasn’t particularly talented. She couldn’t sing or dance or draw. A mediocre student she just didn’t have the skills. But she didn’t let that stand in her way.

Instead of Manhattan like Rachel and Monica she found her way to Brooklyn. It was much cooler than Manhattan. Cheaper too. Not by much but enough to get by. She had a lot of determination and she wasn’t going to let a lack of talent stop her from living the dream.

When the time came she moved down to Bushwick with a couple of her friends from high school. They all got bullshit jobs to pay the rent on the shoebox apartment they had in a dilapidated brownstone. Jobs in retail. Waitressing. Temp work. Make work. Just enough to get by while they searched for what they were looking for. If they could figure out what the fuck they were looking for.

They all wore a uniform. Not the fast food uniforms that she wore in McDonalds up in the little shithole town outside of Utica where she grew up. A different kind of uniform. The hipster uniform. After all she had to display her tribal markings. You had to have the look. It was the only way to belong in the big city.