The short story below is based on the actual Mattioli Brother’s Bakery that was established by my paternal grandfather and his brothers circa 1920. Although I never met my grandfather, I heard stories of him from my father. This story is pure fiction although based on actual people. It takes place at Christmas time, perfect for the holiday season that’s upon us.
The Delivery of a Lifetime
“Call me Eli,” Elio said to the blonde-headed woman through a jaw-straining smile.
She barely responded, her eyes fixed on the bakery counter in front of her. She just picked up the loaf of sliced bread she’d purchased and walked out the front door of the Mattioli Brothers Bakery. Elio soured at her response, but as the aroma of fresh baked bread filled his nostrils, his bad mood changed into one of unexpected delight. If only they could figure out a way to bottle that smell. They could sell it as perfume and make a fortune. But who would buy perfume that smelled like bread? Who would buy any perfume during the Depression?
“We’re almost out of ice,” Elio’s brother, Ugo, said to him.
“The ice delivery. It comes today,” Eduardo said. He was the oldest brother and the self-appointed president of the Bakery.
“I’ll receive it,” Ugo said.
“No. I have to receive the ice today,” Eduardo said.
“Why can’t I do it?” Elio asked Eduardo although he knew the answer. Eduardo didn’t trust anyone with anything. He said he needed to talk to the delivery guy about something and didn’t think any of his younger incompetent brothers could do this.
“Well then I make the delivery to the Landisville Social Club.” Ugo stretched his arms out over his head.
“Oh merda!” Eduardo said. “I forgot about that.” He poured his face into his hands.
“I can go take the delivery,” Ugo said. He stood straight as a breadstick, trying to project the utmost competence.
“That’s an important delivery, you know. I’m a member there. You got to be at your best with these people. They’re important in the community.”
“I better take it,” Elio said.
“What makes you think you’d be better than me, Lanky?” Ugo said. He called his brother by his nickname to show he was upset with him.
“Nothing, but we got to make a good impression, and…” Elio said.
“And what?” Ugo said.
“And I’m like the second in command as the second oldest, so it’s only right that I make the delivery.”
Nick, the youngest brother, poked his head out of the back and said, “What’s this about a delivery?” He looked just like his other three brothers–tall, dark, thin with the same boyish look in his eyes.
“There’s a big delivery that has to be made today to the Landisville Social Club,” Eduardo said to Nick. “It’s for their Christmas party. I wish I could go but I got to be here for the ice delivery. These are very important people in the community. You know I’m a member there.”
“Then I should go because I’m the only one who doesn’t speak broken English.”
This last comment propelled the three brothers into a squabble over who was best fit to make the delivery, with Nick suggesting that they toss a coin.
“Madone!” Eduardo said, raising his voice above the others. “You think it was the delivery of a lifetime! I tell you what. Why don’t you all go and give me some peace!”
“Alright, alright,” Ugo said. “We all go then.”
“What do we have to bring?” Elio said to Eduardo.
Eduardo walked over to where the cash register sat and picked up his pad of paper where he wrote down all the orders, all the while looking at his brothers with great doubt in his eyes. “It’s a big one but everything’s already made.” He read out loud the contents of the order: Ten loaves of sliced bread, two apple pies, a large tray of cookies, and fifteen chocolate eclairs.
“There’s also a couple of stops you have to make on the way,” Eduardo added. “You need to take a couple loaves of bread to Mrs. Benson and one to Mrs. Jones.” He took a long deep breath and said, “Now you have to make a good impression at the social club. I don’t want them to think we’re just a bunch of dumb dagos.”
As the second eldest, Elio felt the weight of responsibility on him, and stood tall to show he could handle it. One of his black curls flopped in his right eye. Ugo and Nick stood on either side of him, heads slanted, dull eyes like this wasn’t the first time they’d heard this kind of thing from Eduardo.
“Is everything all together in the kitchen?” Elio asked Eduardo.
“Yes, it’s right by the door,” Eduardo said.
Elio took the lead in packing the truck with the order; his two younger brothers followed along. The truck was all black with Mattioli Brother’s Bakery written on the left side panel. It was parked right outside the two-story red brick building shaped like a giant perfect square. It stood proud in front of a white, almost colorless sky. December winds had blown off most of the leaves on the trees, the remaining ones brown, withered, and trembling on the bare branches. Other than the bakery, there were a few houses on the street, distanced far apart from each other, two story colonial houses painted white. Nothing but space and trees in between.
Eduardo stood right near the truck watching everything, putting his two cents in whenever necessary. “Watch where you put those eclairs,” he said. “They’re fragile, you know.”
“Alright, alright,” Nick said.
“Who’s going to drive?” Eduardo said.
“I will,” Elio said quickly.
“No, I will,” Nick said.
“We toss a coin,” Ugo said.
“Again with the coin?” Elio said. “Let me see that coin.”
Ugo showed him the coin begrudgingly, saying, “What do you think? I got a trick coin or something?”
Elio ignored his brother’s complaint, inspected the coin, and called heads.
“What about me?” Nick said. “The coin only has two sides.”
“You toss for the drive back with whoever loses this one,” Ugo said.
Nick rolled his eyes back in his head but offered no objection to Ugo’s suggestion. Elio won the toss and took his place in the driver’s seat with great pride. Nick sat in the middle and Ugo sat near the window looking back at the bakery as they drove off. They weren’t a block down the road when Elio asked where the social club was located.
“I don’t know,” Ugo said. “I thought you knew. You were the one talking to Eduardo about it.”
“We have to go back,” Nick said.
Elio took his right hand off the steering wheel for a second to wave it in the air. He sneered while he made a u-turn on the wide dirt road.
“I go in and get the directions,” Ugo said.
Elio said nothing. He just sat there with the car running.
“Aren’t you going to turn the motor off?” Ugo said as he got out of the car. “Gas isn’t cheap, you know.”
“Yes, yes,” Elio said, turning the keys in the ignition. “Just hurry. Will you? We don’t have all day.”
Ugo got out, slammed the car door shut, and ran up to the front door of the bakery. Elio could see him talking to Eduardo who was moving his hands through the air like he was conducting an orchestra as he gave his brother directions. When Ugo returned to the car, Nick asked if they had to go to do any other deliveries.
“We got Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Benson,” Elio said as he started the car and began driving away.
“Well, I don’t remember packing their orders,” Nick said.
“Me neither,” Ugo said.
Without saying anything, Elio once again made a U-turn and went back to the shop. They all got out of the car this time and went inside to get the remaining orders, which were a few loaves of bread.
“Now, we got everything, and we know where to go?” Elio said, looking for reassurance from his brothers.
“Yeah, right,” Ugo said.
“Let’s go,” Nick said.
They drove off, their back wheels kicking up dirt. In only a few blocks, they were at Mrs. Benson’s. Ugo got out of the car, grabbed a loaf of bread from the back, and knocked on the door, where a slight woman in a purple dress appeared. Ugo gave her the bread and she gave him some money. He’d barely opened the car door to get in when Elio was asking him about the money.
“What do you think?” Ugo’s voice rose above the roar of the motor. “I’m going to run off with it or something?”
“You could use it at the track,” Elio said.
Nick laughed. Ugo snickered and told Elio to speed up.
“He who goes fast goes slow,” Elio said, his eyes fixed on the road.
“That doesn’t even make any sense.” Ugo smirked and crossed his arms.
Mrs. Jones’ house was just a few blocks away. When the car stopped, Nick said he’d bring her the bread. He got back to the car and Ugo got out so Nick could sit in the middle.
“Why don’t you sit in the middle?” Nick said to Ugo.
“I’m too tall and plus you’re the youngest.”
“You’re only one year older than me,” Nick said. “And I’m just as tall as you.”
“C’mon! Get in,” Elio yelled. “We gotta get going.”
Nick got in first, letting Ugo have his way.
“Turn at the next street,” Elio said to Ugo.
“Did you see the holiday stuff we’re giving out yet?” Nick said. “We got a calendar for the New Year and a ruler that says ‘Seasons Greetings’ on it.”
“Yeah, the medigans, they like that kind of stuff.” Ugo said, gazing out the window.
“Don’t say medigans,” Elio said. “We’re never going to fit in if we act like that.”
“I don’t say it to their faces,” Ugo said. “Anyway, it’s true. They like stuff they get for free. They think like they’re getting something for nothing.”
“Eduardo says it’s a way of promoting the bakery,” Nick said. “It says ‘Mattioli Brothers’ on it so maybe they think of us when they see the thing–the ruler or the calendar–and then they come and buy something.”
“Maybe then we get some respect,” Ugo said. “They stop treating us like cafones.”
“That’s right,” Elio said, happy the two could agree on something.
“I think people respect us here,” Nick said.
“That’s because you’re too young to know better,” Elio said.
“Oh no,” Ugo said. “I think you were supposed to turn back there.”
“Why didn’t you say something?” Elio said, turning the truck around.
Elio decided to ask Ugo every step of the way from now on. The car was quiet for a few whole minutes, only the sound of the brisk wind outside. Then it happened. The truck made some dying rumbling sounds and came to a sudden stop. Ugo and Nick almost went through the window shield. Elio raised his hands up in the air and declared that they were out of gas.
“Shit!” Nick said.
“You forgot to check?!” Ugo said to Elio. “I would have been looking at the meter if I was the driver.”
“Well, good for you,” Elio said. “I don’t need any of your crap now. What are we going to do?”
“They got a filling station only a little way down the road. I go get–” Nick said.
“No, I go,” Elio said as he got out of the car and started down the road. He remembered that they sold bottles of whiskey and beer in the basement of the filling station.
“Wait,” Ugo shouted after him. “You got to bring the can in the back.” He got the can they used for gas out of the back of the truck, walked to where Elio stood, and handed it to him with suspicious eyes.
Elio wondered if he should get a bottle of beer followed by a bottle of whiskey or the other way around? Beer should come first, he decided. It’s more like upper while whiskey is dessert. He could taste it as he walked through the bitter cold air. He looked up at the gray, sunless sky and marched on.
When he got to the station, he wasted no time filling up the can with gas. He then headed down to the basement with the urgency of a doctor saving a life. The transaction was mostly silent with Elio giving some old man in worn overalls change and saying the word ‘beer.’ The old man wobbled over to a closed door, opened it, retrieved a round amber bottle, and gave it to Elio, who took the cap off and gulped it down.
He heard his wife’s deep, bitter voice telling him he drank too much. Anna was a short woman with huge breasts and an angry stare in her eyes. Not at all like his first wife, who had died of the plague when she was very young. He still loved her and secretly hoped for an early death so he could be with her again. He married Anna because she was there. She had given him two wonderful sons but any joy they could give him was overshadowed by her presence, like an enormous shadow that followed him everywhere.
He finished the bottle of beer and grinned as he went over to the old man to give him change for a bottle of whiskey. By the second sip, he’d nearly forgotten Anna’s name. By the last sip, he was a little boy in Bologna, walking with his father Luigi through the city streets, his astonished eyes looking at all the tall buildings.
Just then, Nick came through the basement door and told Elio that Ugo had sent him.
“I don’t know why,” Elio slurred.
“Because you’re taking too much time and now, I see why,” Nick said, grabbing the can of gas and starting up the steps.
Elio followed his brother out of the station and down the road, proud that he could still walk a straight line. At least, it felt straight to him. Unbothered by the cold and gray. Inside, he was all warmth and light and the walk back to the truck seemed much shorter than the walk to the station even though they were the same distance.
When they got close enough, Ugo shouted, “Oh, I knew you were up to something!”
Elio wondered how his brother could tell he was inebriated and then he felt his stupid drunk grin plastered on his face.
Nick poured the can of gas into the tank of the truck. Ugo got in the driving seat and started down the road as Elio was closing the car door.
“You always have to drink, Lanky,” Ugo said to Elio.
“At least I don’t spend all my money at the track,” Elio said. “Besides, if you had my wife, you’d drink too.”
“Can’t argue with that,” Ugo said through a laugh.
In a short time, they arrived at the social club, a one-story, white, stone building that looked small from the front but that extended back far. Christmas lights lined all the windows. Inside, it looked dark and empty.
“It looks like nobody’s home,” Nick said.
Elio got out of the car, but both his brothers stopped him from approaching the door.
“No, no, we got to make a good appearance,” Ugo said to Elio. “We can’t have a drunk going to the door. Me and Nick, we go. You wait in the car.”
Elio grunted and walked back to the car. Ugo straightened his clothes and rang the doorbell. No answer. Nick looked in the window, hoping to see a sign of life, but there was nothing.
“Did they know we were coming?” Nick asked.
“Of course, they must have known. You think Eduardo would send us out for nothing?”
“Maybe he didn’t get the time straight with them.” Nick scratched his head.
“What are we going to do?”
“We can leave the stuff on the doorstep.”
“The deer will eat it all. We got to wait.” Ugo looked up at the sky that was quickly darkening.
“I’ll go tell Elio.”
“No, it looks like he’s sleeping. Let him sleep it off. Maybe when they get here, he won’t be drunk anymore.”
Nick sat down on the step and rubbed his hands together. “It’s cold out. How long do you want to wait?”
“As long as we have to.” Ugo sat down beside his brother.
“I wonder how they’re selling booze at the filling station.”
“Probably got a basement where they keep it.”
“But where do they get it from?”
“Where does anybody get it from? Some bootleggers.”
“I wish I had a drink now. That’d make me warm at least.”
***
The little bit of light had vanished from the sky when a car pulled up to the social club. All three brothers were waiting inside the truck, huddled together like a family of bears. Unfortunately for Elio, he had sobered up. They were all starving and thought of breaking into the food once or twice but resisted.
A large woman in a red coat got out of the car. The three brothers came out of the truck, with Ugo taking the lead.
“Oh, I hope you weren’t waiting long,” the woman said to the three in a jolly voice.
“Well, we–” Elio began to speak.
“Not at all,” Ugo said, sharply.
“I’m Mrs. Pierce,” she said.
“I’m Hugo, this is Eli, and Nick.” Ugo was sure to Americanize all their names.
“Now you’re all brothers?” she asked.
“Yes. We are all brothers.” Nick said.
“It’s so nice to see such family togetherness.” She smiled and looked at them with endearing eyes.
All three put on their best fake grins. Elio and Nick started to unpack the order while Ugo dealt with the money part of the transaction.
“Our party is going to be tonight,” Mrs. Pierce said. “I think your brother, Eddie, is coming. You should all come.”
“Oh, thank you, but we have to see what our wives say.” Ugo answered for all three of them.
“Well, we don’t know what we’d do without the Mattioli Brothers Bakery during these tough times.”
They all thanked her and were off.
“Wait till we tell Eduardo what she said about the bakery,” Ugo said when they were a safe distance from Mrs. Pierce.
“I’ll tell him,” Elio said.
“We’ll see about that,” Ugo said.
“We sure will,” Nick said.
They all walked towards the car, still babbling amongst themselves, their words fading in the cold night air.
