Read Online Losing in Gainesville (9781940430331) by Brian Costello - Free Book Online Page B

Florida at least five times a day coming over the paneled ceiling’s speakers, the red and white checkerboard-topped tables in the middle, the red vinyl booths—ducttape covering the tears and containing the inner foam—lined along either side of the room, the walls, like everything here, the colors of pepperoni and extra cheese, Polaroids of kids celebrating their birthdays with candles in pizza slices pinned in rows of twenty above friendly posters of “Grandfather Fredo,” the jolly cartoon mascot for all three hundred and seventeen Grandfather’s Olde Tyme Goode Tyme Pizza Parlour locations, offering litigious-proof advice like “MAMA MIA! BE CAREFUL EVERYBODY! THAT PIZZA! SHE GETSA SO HOT WHEN OUTTA THE OVEN IT COULDA BURN YOUR FACE OR THE ROOFA OF YOUR MOUTHA! OOF MADON!” while spinning flattened circular pizza dough on his index finger like a basketball. The placemats offer the sole nod to the Old Country—between mazes challenging children to “Help Grandfather Fredo ride his gondola through the Venice canals to his Olde Tyme Fun Tyme Pizza Parlour!”—and drawings of mozzarella stix that need coloring—some Italian fun facts underneath the heading “Did You Know?”, e.g., “Italy is a country in Europe,” “Rome is the capital of Italy,” “Dante, an Italian, sent all of his fellow countrymen to Hell in his book The Inferno !” and so on. Through the front windows, through the credit card stickers, the “Now Hiring Dishwashers” sign and two-of-these-for-only-one-of-those sales, beyond the compact parking lot, 34th Street leads to Newberry Road which turns into University Street and that leads to Waldo Road to 301 North to Interstate 95 North which gets you to New York. For two perfect seconds, Jeremy Moreland dreams of that day in August when he’s clocked out of here for good and walking out that front door, never again having lousy tasks like these pawned off on his scrawny teenage back. Doar had seven years seniority and career ambitions far beyond afterschool/summertime employment, and that’s all he had. Doar was a lifer. Jeremy Moreland scored a 1590 on the SAT (only temporarily forgetting that cadaverous: sarcophagus :: billingsgate : Oakland Raiders, a mistake which haunted him for weeks), had effortlessly ascended Grandfather’s ranks in just eighteen months—from Dish Machine Operator to Yummytizer Preparation Specialist to Smiley Service Liaison to Assistant Director of Partytime Pizzatime Anytime Affairs. During this part of the lunch shift, when Dale leaves, Jeremy often feels like a virtuous Caesar—the benevolent rulers Gibbon immortalized—as he overlooks what he thinks of as his store and the aftermath of another busy All-You-Care-to-Load-Up-On-Your-Plate-And-Eat-And-Try-To-Enjoy-Because-It’s-Yummy-Five-Dollar-Lunch-Buffet, as the Table Removal and Replenishment Coordinators—his Table Removal and Replenishment Coordinators—clean off the tables, and the Smiley Service Liaisons—his Smiley Service Liaisons, are sent home at his behest. Only one customer left. Stevie, who’s hunched over stacks of plates, pizza slice in right hand, marinara-tipped breadstick in the other, alternating bites from one to the next. Unshaven and doughy, in a black bulbous Misfits t-shirt covered in crumbs and sauce, working the food like a cud-chewing cow, always in the same booth in the corner, every weekday lunch. And now, evidently, he wants to work here. Jeremy inhales, exhales, indulges in one brief vision of putting all of this in the rear view mirror, grabs fistfuls of the bottom of his red regulation polo shirt with the yellow “GRANDFATHER’S OLDE TYME GOODE TYME PIZZA PARLOR: WHERE EVERY PARTY IS A PIZZA PARTY,” with Grandfather Fredo kissing the tips of his fingers, tucks it into his black regulation work slacks, steps up to Stevie’s usual booth.
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