The Supreme Macaroni Company (19 page)

“We priced out new equipment, and it’s prohibitive,” Bret said. “Valentine doesn’t want the new stuff, she wants the old equipment her family used.”

“I get that. So I really need to zero in on another building,” Don deduced.

Gianluca put on his glasses and looked down at the spreadsheet. “Don, what about the old movie theater?”

“The Wilson Theater? It’s pricey. But I could go over there and chisel.”

“How do you feel about the Wilson Theater?” Gianluca asked me.

“I worry there’s not enough space. And the floor has to be repitched.”

“Don’t worry about floors—I can redo them,” Don said.

“I think I’ll come out and do the tour with you, Don,” Alfred said.

“I can go with you,” Bret said to Alfred.

“I have an order to get out. Why don’t you guys move on this quickly, and we’ll send Charlie down to Buenos Aires to get a sense of how long it will take to ship the equipment and how we’re going to get it here,” I offered.

“Sounds good,” Don said as he signed off.

“That’s a blow.” I closed the lid of the laptop.

“There are plenty of empty buildings out there, Val,” Alfred assured me.

“That Bears Den factory was perfect.”

“We’ll find another place.” Gianluca rubbed my shoulders.

“In the meantime, I think we should look at New Jersey again. And Pennsylvania. We shouldn’t put all our hopes on Youngstown.” Alfred looked at me.

“Hey, I’m open to all possibilities,” I told my brother.

“It’ll work out,” Charlie said. “It always does.”

Charlie tried to reassure me, but I wasn’t buying it. I had a feeling of dread about the entire operation. Maybe I was taking on something that was bigger than I could handle. I’d been confident before the trip to Youngstown, when the factory lived in my imagination in a dream state. But just as in building a pair of shoes, I had to be practical and find the best components to make what I saw in my mind’s eye. I had serious doubts that we could pull off our first American factory.

8

T
he view from my mother’s kitchen window in Forest Hills is pure enchantment. She and my father took their patch of grass and turned it into the most ornate English garden this side of the Atlantic. There was a gazebo, a rock garden, a trellis, and wrought iron furniture to go with the English country feel of the Tudor. Mom decorated every shrub, surface, and branch. There were tiny lights in the Japanese maples and a new, moving wall of water where the fence met the property line. If you kept looking at my mother’s backyard, you’d find things, like a ceramic turtle or a gnome. You would hear things, too, since she also collected wind chimes.

“Look. It’s clear you need me,” my mother said as she sliced me a giant piece of her chocolate cake.

“Ma, it’s fine. Don’t worry,” I assured her as I poured cream into my coffee. If I was going to eat the cake, and I was, I might as well spring for the heavy cream.

“I studied to get my real estate license back in the eighties. Granted, I never got my certificate, but I still have a nose for property.”

“Ma, you studied in Queens. You don’t know anything about Ohio.”

“How hard could it be? I learn a few things, drive around, get acquainted with the locals, and ba-boom, you have a new factory.”

“If it were so easy, we would’ve already done it.”

“Let’s see what Bret and Alfred come up with. And I’m sure Gianluca has an opinion.”

“I have to get Gianluca back to Italy before the baby is due. He’s like a blowfish. He can only take so much New York City before he hits a wall and explodes.”

“He hasn’t adjusted to the city, has he?”

“Well, he doesn’t love it. But he loves me, so he puts up with it.”

“It’s not like you can pull up stakes and move to Italy,” Mom said nervously.

“Not until we put up a factory and make a mint.”

“I can find you a factory!” Mom insisted.

“Cousin Don is all over it. And it’s not just about finding the factory. It’s about training the workforce.”

“Who’s going to do that?”

“We’re sending Charlie down to Roberta’s, and he’s going to learn the ropes. Then he can be in charge of training the workers.”

“You did a good thing hiring your brother-in-law.”

“It was a no-brainer. He’s mechanical. He’s easy to work with, and he speaks Spanish.”

“I have long supported learning a second language. And I had no idea that our Charlie had command of one.”

“What’s yours?”

“French, of course, for retail shopping purposes.”

“Gianluca is going to speak Italian to the baby, and I’ll speak English.”

“I love a bilingual child! How was your doctor’s appointment?”

“Fine. Except the doctor wrote
elderly primigravida
on my chart.”

“How rude!”

“I’m over thirty-five so they consider me an older mother.”

“No kidding.”

“They have all these tests now. And Dr. DeBrady asked Gianluca a bunch of questions, since he’s an older dad.”

“Oh, they make such a big deal out of age in the medical community.”

“Ma, it’s all they’ve got. It’s like raising cattle. You cordon them off by age and weight.” I rubbed my growing stomach.

“What’s Gianluca supposed to do? A stress test for fatherhood?”

“No, they worry about chromosome damage—that sort of thing.”

“How pleasant. Ruin the happiest days of a woman’s life with what-ifs.”

“I’m not going to let anything ruin my happiness. Including
me
.”

“There’s nothing wrong with our gene pool.”

“Not anything a little therapy can’t fix.”

“We’ve been reproducing for centuries. Look at us. I’d take our bunch over anybody else’s!”

“Loyalty is your middle name.”

“You got that right. I’d kill for my children. And you will too.”

“Do you think I’ll be a good mother?”

“Honey, what a thing to say. You’ll be the best mother you can be.”

“That didn’t answer my question.”

“Oh, the dirty little secret of motherhood—our children love us no matter what. So don’t agonize. It will be just fine. You turned your marriage around. Give yourself some credit. You were a mess at first, and now, a few months later, you’re in a groove.”

My next thought was interrupted by my phone vibrating.

“Hi, Alfred,” I said, picking up. “Say hello to Ma.” I put the phone on speaker. There’s nothing worse than repeating everything Alfred says to our mother, so I just looped her in, instead.

“Hi, Ma.”

“How’s Youngstown?”

“Promising.”

“Where are you staying?”

“I think it’s always a good sign when the first scent you get in a hotel lobby is bleach.”

“It must be clean.”

“Oh, it’s clean.”

“Did you find something?”

“There’s a building in Smokey Hollow. The old Italian section, oddly enough.”

“That sounds promising.”

“We need you to come out and see it. Don is doing a number on the owner. A lease-to-buy deal. I think we should go for it.”

“Gianluca and I will jump in the car.”

“You should fly out. And bring Dad.”

“Why?”

“Cousin Don thinks he’s a good-luck charm.”

“What about me?” Mom asked. “I’m good for some luck.”

“You can come too, Ma.”

“What’s the weather like in Youngstown this time of year?”

“Just like it is in New York.”

“Not a challenge. I can be ready in half an hour.”

G
ianluca loaded the luggage into the back of Tess’s Suburban on the way to pick up our parents in Queens before going to the airport. Tess threw my husband the keys.

“Do you mind?”

“Of course not.”

“It’ll give us a chance to visit,” Tess explained. “I’m a nervous driver.”

Tess and I pulled our seat belts around us. “Precious cargo.” Tess patted my stomach. “How much have you gained?”

“I don’t know. Five pounds.”

“Good for you. Three months in, I’d already gained fifteen pounds. Of course I was eating green olive and cream cheese sandwiches four times a day.”

“Not me. I like caramel popcorn. How many calories could it have?”

“Oh, popcorn is light,” she lied. “Charlie is all set for Argentina.”

“I’m glad it’s worked out. You’ll be okay without him for a few weeks?”

“As long as he’s working and he’s happy. Thank you for taking him on.”

“We’re lucky to have him.”

“You would say that.”

“It’s true. And we’re lucky to have you and Jaclyn.”

“As soon as you give us something to ship, we’re all over it.”

When we pulled up in front of my parents’ house in Queens, it looked like a farewell scene at a train station from
Downton Abbey
, complete with steamer trunks and a hatbox. My mother packed for a trip around the world when all she needed was a pair of pajamas and a change of underwear. She came out of the house first, wearing a leopard trench coat and a pencil skirt, followed by my father, who wore an expression of exasperation.

I rolled down the window. “Ma, why all the suitcases?”

“I’m unsure about the weather.”

“She thinks there’s a nightlife in Youngstown,” my father chimed in.

“There is. Three fingers of scotch and a sleeping pill,” I joked.

“See, I needed a cocktail dress,” Mom said as Dad hauled the luggage down the sidewalk with Gianluca’s help.

“Why did you invite her?” Tess asked softly.

“She wanted to come. I think she’s a little bored.”

“You think?” Tess rolled her eyes. “She’s been bored since ‘Ice Ice Baby’ was number one on the charts. She needs a job.”

“She
has
a job. Daddy Incorporated.”

“Girls . . .” Mom rolled back the door and climbed in between Tess and me. The car filled with the scent of Coco, her traveling cologne. “What are you whispering about?”

“How we hope we look as good as you when we’re your age,” Tess piped up.

“And how old is that?” my mother asked.

“Younger than Goldie Hawn and older than Brooke Shields.”

“Thank you,” Mom chirped.

Dad climbed into the front seat. “Mike, I don’t know what I’m going to do with you.”

“Dutch, not now. I have to be focused to travel.”

Gianluca winked at me in the rearview mirror.

D
on picked us up at the airport in Pittsburgh. We had to sit with Mom’s luggage on our laps on the drive to Youngstown because the rest of our bags had filled the trunk. I imagined that this was how our immigrant forefathers and mothers felt in steerage when they made the crossing with everything they owned.

Bret and Alfred were waiting on the street in Smokey Hollow, which had an old-fashioned main street hemmed by modern apartments and townhouses.

Don led us down the street to an old storefront in the old Italian section. I stepped back and could see that the building was deep and about three stories high. There was one entrance door on the front and no windows. I looked at Alfred.

“Wait,” he said.

We went inside. There was a small foyer, with an open electrical grid on the wall where there had once been a clock-punching machine. Bret and Alfred pushed the doors open.

The first thing I noticed was the scent of flour. This must have been a bakery of some kind, because there was a dusty sheen of powder on the floorboards. The ceilings were twenty feet high.

“It’s awfully dark,” my mother said as she pulled the belt on her trench coat tight. “It’s drafty, too.”

“There’s no power on,” my father told her. “That’s typical in a building for sale.”

“Dutch, I didn’t get that far in my real estate studies.”

Gianluca and Alfred cranked a large wheel at the far side of the room. Light began to pour in from the ceiling as a canvas tarp pulled back to reveal a series of skylights.

The double doors burst open. The light from the vestibule threw a bright beam of sunlight down the center of the room. A tall man in a cowboy hat stood in the blaze of light.

“What’s happening?” I asked Cousin Don.

“Say hello to Carl McAfee. He’s my lawyer.”

“How we doin’, Don?” Carl asked.

“Better now that you’re here. We need a negotiator.”

“Well, you got you one.”

“Where are you from? That’s a charming accent,” my mother said.

“Norton, Virginia.”

“Where is that?”

“It’s in the mountains of southwest Virginia, close to East Tennessee.”

“Oh. There.” Mom pretended to know where that was.

“I brought Carl in because we need a big gun. I lost the Bears Den building because I approached the owner with sweetness instead of fear. Carl knows exactly how to handle the owner of this place.”

“And why is that?” I asked.

“I’ve done business with him. He owns most of the buildings in Smokey Hollow. He has interest in steel mills in Pittsburgh, and I got to know him because he bought up a few coal mines in my area. He’s what you call a speculator.”

“Couldn’t you have picked up the phone and called him?” I suggested.

“That’s no fun, darling.” Carl laughed. “You got to work the dirt to make the corn grow.”

“Should we make an offer?”

“The owner doesn’t want to break this building out of the bundle to sell. He wants us to buy everything on Pine Street,” Alfred explained.

“We can’t afford that.”

“Unless the bank is willing to take a chance on us,” Bret said.

“We could lease this building and, in time, expand,” Alfred explained.

“I’m not sure that’s what we should do,” I said. I looked at Gianluca.

“Here are the pluses of leasing this building. It’s in the center of things. It’s the right size. There’s an incentive program with the state to revitalize this area. We need that. And there are incentives for hiring local people.”

“And Don, don’t forget the most important element of all,” Carl added.

“And what would that be?”

“I may be able to get the first year for free. Now, I’m saying ‘may’ because it’s a maybe. But I think I can do that for you.”

“If we can get the first year free, it would give us the head start we need,” Alfred said.

“Free anything is always good,” my mother, a true scion of family business, said.

“We’re going to need all the upfront money to move the equipment from Argentina. Once it’s here, we can get started.”

“How do we get in touch with this man?” I asked.

“You just did,” Carl said.

“You’re the man?”

“I’m the man.”

“I thought you were the negotiator.”

“I am. I represent myself.”

“Why would you want to get into the shoe business?”

“I like shoes. I especially like them sleek high heels on a woman with long legs.”

“That’s as good a reason as any to invest.” Don nodded.

“And I like Don,” Carl added.

“What are we going to call it?” Bret asked.

“The Angelini Shoe Factory.”

“I advise against that,” Don said. “As a general rule. It’s best never to name a business after yourself, in case of . . . you know, failure. You can’t go back and buy your good name once it’s gone.”

“What kind of factory was this?” I asked.

“They made pasta. It was called the Supreme Macaroni Company.”

“I like it,” I said.

“But you’re not making macaroni, Valentine.”

“It doesn’t matter. It’s a place, not a product. Besides, I like macaroni.”

O
rsola was due to give birth in Florence sometime in the middle of July. I tried not to think about my stepdaughter having my grandchild while I was pregnant with my first baby. Gianluca and I made plans to be in Italy, making it a family vacation as well as a buying trip. It seemed like this was our way. We didn’t travel to relax. We always had a greater purpose, whether it was to find a piece of equipment or to negotiate a better price on leather goods. It was as if our work and our marriage were one, and hopefully they were, as this was by design and part of The Plan
.

Don was busy renovating the Supreme Macaroni Company to prep it for the equipment that would arrive by the time we returned from Italy. Bret and Alfred were working on the loans from the bank and cutting a deal with “cowboy” Carl McAfee of Norton, Virginia. Alfred was hoping to cut a better deal than we would have had on Bear Den Road.