Storymania - Prime Of Life by Teresa Ann Frazee

Prime Of Life
Teresa Ann Frazee

Franco scratched at the back door of the 29th street deli with the same gusto of a cat half his age. He waited under the weathered awning, hidden from the morning sun. Retired now, he daily visited the deli where he had once held a high position as the best mouse catcher in New York. But Zia, his young replacement hadn’t seen him in two days. She was overjoyed Franco was back. Zia closed her baby blue eyes momentarily as if to silently thank fate for having stepped in to reunite them. Weaving past patrons through the deli’s narrow aisles of sharp aged cheese and vined ripened tomatoes, over the sawdusted floor, Zia scurried, her tail slicing through the air. She slowed down just enough to check herself in her water bowl’s reflection. Resembling a believer at a holy water font, she dipped her paw in the water. Then she swiped the water and slicked back her creamsicle shade of hair for an upswept sophisticated effect. She adjusted a heart shaped nametag dangling from her rhinestone studded collar the pink of cotton candy. At the back door, she slid her lithe body through the hatch to greet Franco.
“What’s cookin’, Zia?” Franco asked.
Despite the natural impulse to print cherry lip gloss kisses on Franco’s face, she reminded herself to be cool. “I heard a dry scratching noise coming from aisle two yesterday afternoon, Franco. I thought it might be a mouse but it was a false alarm, seems the noise was just the rattling overhead fan. Both sounds are somewhat similar.”
“You’ll get the hang of it, Zia; you’re new at this business yet. It’s ninety five percent instinct and five percent experience. Give it a chance”.
As he spoke, Zia never averted her eyes from his. Franco’s eyes, rimmed like the kohl lined eyes of an Egyptian Pharaoh, emphasized a mosaic of constantly shifting shades of emerald green flecked with gold, glittered in the sun. Clean digging nails were evidence of a true gentleman. His coat had the heart achingly handsome colors of a woolly bear. A perfectly groomed mane, with a mature graying around the muzzle rose up above his timeworn leather collar.
Zia barely recovered from the sight of Franco, when he began apologizing for his missing visits. His makeshift excuse was something about going fresh water fishing in Brooklyn’s Aquarium for the weekend. He had a way of drifting when he was stretching the truth. Zia decided to find that charming long ago. Everyone did. The truth was Franco couldn’t set paws back into the Aquarium. There were too many memories of his old pal Maxie, known among friends as “Big Guy”, the walrus.
As a young cat just starting out in the mouse catching occupation, Franco worked part- time at the Aquarium. It was a great summer gig. During poolside breaks Franco and Maxie, would openly share the hopes and dreams that filled their young heads. Their friendship status was beyond simply work friends. They were buddy buddy. Then on a hot June day, without warning, something happened. Apparently some unattended, out of state, overzealous kid overfed the ever hungry Maxie. Maxie’s eyes were bigger than his stomach. Unquestionably, his frame was huge having the capacity to consume enormous amounts of food. His blubber engulfed swallowing apparatus alone was the girth of a hoola hoop. Even he had his limits. Unfortunately, Maxie had the dining etiquette of a Viking and wolfed every last morsel down. He never made it through the night. Maxie puddled to the floor of the bathroom with an audible thud. The headlines read: Aquariums Beloved Maxie, “Big Guy”, the Walrus ODs on a Bucket o Chum. The news shocked the entire aquatic community. It was ions ago but it still stung.
Franco, via the N train, did leave the city and entered a leafy neighborhood over the weekend to visit his cousin and her litter of six kittens. The time had come to stop chasing inanimate objects, let go of his old plastic squeak toys and give them to the easily entertained catlings. Franco didn’t want to let on he was an old softy getting on in age. After all he had to protect his well earned reputation as the Empire State’s fastest cat alive.
Somewhere between Franco habitually scanning the property line and going on with his tall tale, Mr. Prichard the proprietor of the deli came outside.
“What’s all the commotion?” Mr. Prichard asked, looking at the eye level space around him.
“Hey Mr. P, down here it’s me, Franco”, Franco said quickly reassuring him.
“Good to see you old timer, where’ve you been?” Mr. Prichard asked as he bent down to rub a favorite spot between the snow white ringlets of Franco’s underbelly. Feeling the strong sense of comradeship between them, Zia nuzzled up against Mr. Prichard’s ankle to be included.
Rehashing the entire weekend’s fish story to Mr. Prichard without allowing anyone to intervene, Franco was on and wasn’t about to let them share the spotlight. Even though Zia heard his fish story, this time with a few minor details altered, his baritone voice was as sweet a melody as ever.
“Price check Mr. Prichard,” a loud voice said over the PA system coming from inside the deli.
“I’ve got to go. Don’t you be a stranger now, Franco. Oh, by the way Zia,” Mr. Prichard asked as he headed toward the back door, “Why’s your scalp wet?”
“Forget it Mr. Prichard, she said, you really wouldn’t understand.”
After discussing everything from hearsay to shoptalk, Zia agreed to the usual deli rendezvous Franco proposed for the next morning. Franco waved goodbye exposing the fleshy pink pad under his paw and walked away with the strut of John Wayne’s exit in the movie El Dorado.
Next store was old Winchell leaning on the street side of the fire hydrant outside the newsstand reading a properly folded New York Times like that of a businessman commuter of thirty years. He was gnawing on a dried heel of Italian bread.
“Hey Franco, I never did thank you for vouching for me by putting the word out to keep paws off”, Winchell said turning around, with two crumb encrusted Chicklet like front teeth revealing the orthodontic mechanics that produced a slight lisp.
“Oh sure, Winchell, I did it out of respect, you’re the oldest mouse on the East side and we go way back together”.
It made Franco smile to remember the first time they met. Franco had spotted him in the shadow filling the far end corner of the deli. Back then, Winchell wore a red beret with a militaristic tilt baring one jeweled twitchy ear. Knotted around an easily choked neck hung a black bandana. The sort of garb mice wear when they want to look tough. He was reading Sun Tzu’s “Art of War”, while drawing a peace sign with his steady big toe on the sawdusted floor. Two piercing emerald eyes met two beady black eyes. Cohabiting was not an option. With the enthusiastic pursuit of a panther, Franco left a cloud of sawdust behind and slid up to Winchell. Their hearts beat at an incredible rate. Opposing partners sniffing, circling forth and back entwined in the primal rhythm of Apache dancers. Despite the size difference between them, Winchell stood up perfectly balanced on his hind quarters, contoured his thin upper lip to a defiant snarl and gave a numbing slap upon Franco’s nose. Franco had to hand it to the little squirt and earmarked the incident as a first. Since then their relationship has been shrouded with harmonium. Seeing them together now, it is difficult to believe their initial encounter was so filled with mutual hostility.
“What have you been doing with yourself since your retirement?” Winchell asked.
“I paint and I’m writing my memoirs, you know I am the long hair of the family. Recently I took a Thai cooking class at the community college. Did you ever see pigeon eggs?” Franco asked, drifting again, not really expecting an answer. “Oh yeah and I volunteer at the Bide-A-Wee vet clinic.”
Winchell quickly interjected, “I know, I know, don’t tell anybody, your reputation to protect.”
“Remember the day we went to the dog kennel on Second Avenue, the guys, Studs, Kenya his tagalong baby brother and even Smokey the Cha cha king was there? We woke those dogs with mock snorin’, gave them the Bronx cheer and mooned them right outside their window. Those dogs were so furious with us they barked and barked for hours till their voices cracked. Pardon the pun,” giggled Winchell, poking Franco’s ribs. “You know our motto, never let sleeping dogs lie. Anyway, the game warden came and we hightailed it out of there, all except Studs. Some skittish whippet fingered him. Wanting to see if Studs was high, the game warden rolled a ball towards Studs. He was testing his reaction time. I remember, as Studs let the ball roll past him, he looked the game warden right in the eye and brazenly said “Cats don’t fetch”, that was it. Ya know Stud’s a spiked- tooth rough looking cat and had been in that gang “The Young Scavengers”. Turns out the whippet had been in a rival dog gang called “Play Dead”. Studs also had been accused of once calling the whippet’s cute girlfriend, Martha of the “Vendettas,” who had led the Tribecan female dog gang, a bow wow. Studs swears he meant it literally. It’s just his way of saying canine. Martha took the so called blunt remark as an insult. So the whippet had this ongoing bone to pick with Studs. Anyway, they dragged Studs in the paddy wagon and brought him downtown on trumped up charges. He spent the night in the slammer cause the game warden suspected Studs of having had an ounce of catnip on him. He got a bum rap. He ain’t never goin back. He said next time they’ll never take him alive. He’s got such an untrusting reputation now, even when buying just a can of sardines, clerks will accept cash but only with two forms of I.D.”
Lately Franco interrupted more often with an Eh? Basically his sense of hearing was diminishing. His motor functions and eyes were failing too. Time was losing its patience with Franco. It was as if old man time flooring it in a tailgating Mac Truck without breaks was barreling behind him hoping he’d come to a dead end and stop short. As the days wore on he could sense the end of his nine lives nearing. Being acute as ever though was his sense of smell. His hunting instincts automatically put an all points bulletin to his brain. Franco’s voice hushed down an octave.” Hold it, hold it, I smell people.” Winchell being understandably overly cautious about mice- hating people tiptoed back around the street side of the fire hydrant. Franco recognized the two men coming out of the newsstand. Winchell overheard Franco telling the two men something about going fresh water fishing for the weekend. He couldn’t hear the remainder of their conversation because of the siren of a passing ambulette headed eastbound to Bellevue.
“You can come back around now Winchell, they’re gone. It was Jimbo and Big Mike, you know, they owned Two Brother’s fish market way back when. When I worked, no offense, as a mouse catcher, I lapped warm honeyed milk from a chintz saucer. Jimbo served me fresh prime filet albacore tuna for lunch not those kibbling doused in imitation salmon flavored sauce that comes in a squeezable pouch you find nowadays. When I got lucky, they’d offer me dessert. I’d get whatever was left of their Spumoni. You know, when it’s melted a bit, it’s the perfect consistency. I’d lick that delicious Spamoni, stretching my tongue as far as it could reach into the crevices of the pleated paper cup slurping the last of the cold sweet cream. Oh yeah, and Big Mike’s diligent brushings were a few perks of the job.”
“Hey Franco whataya running for mayor? You know everybody in this city.” said Winchill.
Franco had memory lapses now and again but seeing the two brothers reminded him of a doozy. “Hey, Winchell, did I ever tell you the time my tail was too near the furnace and was commencing to spark? It woke me from a deep warm honeyed milk induced sleep. It was the kind of sleep where I had gone to my bedding to become flat. I lied down on my belly, arms and legs sticking outstretched straight, unconsciously mimicking a contented feral bunny. When I woke from the intense heat I jumped so high I swear I bounced off the ceiling, putting out the fire on my smoldering tail.”
“I know all about it. I was hangin’ at the fish market that day. I saw the whole thing, Franco. My eyes were tearing from laughter the entire time.”
“Hey come on you little rat, you didn’t warn me? Drop and roll, what the heck did my grandpa used to say anyway? Who remembers,” said Franco in jest, passing a paw through once singed fur.
“Let me ask you something, Winchell, you think Zia likes me? I mean older males? You know December/May relationships? She’s always all dolled up and she’s not yakking all the time. I love whatever it is she does with her hair; it must take her hours to get it like that. A real class act, that Zia. Lately, she’s been slinking into my dreams.” Franco pined for the comfort of her body heat.
With an abrupt little laugh, Winchell asked, “Are you for real, Franco? You may be street wise but you don’t know jack when it comes to females. She’s crazy about you; you’re the only one that doesn’t know that.”
“Eh?” Franco asked this time not as much from his lack of hearing difficulties as from surprise. He shot back, “Yeah but I had other girlfriends before, Winchell. Granted they were mostly flings, still I always landed on all fours. Well one broke my heart. Remember the day, Ruby that gold-digger found her purebred papers in a box under her caretaker’s bed among the dust and mothballs? After that she put her shiny black patent leather like nose in the air and pranced around with show cat sass. Well she left me. She moved to a pedigree friendly section of Hollywood and got hitched to Big Red that broken down commercial extra. Heard she eventually dumped Big Red for a Morris the cat impersonator in Vegas. There’s a catty rumor circulating; Ruby became a plus size and lunchtime you can find her zombieing around the food court in a local mall.”
Franco slowly shook his head, “Anyway, that’s old news; I want to ask for Zia’s paw in marriage. Mr. P could give her away. We could have the reception in the alley across the street where I was born and bred. We could begin the reception round noon when the sun snakes through hitting the alley at an angle shadowing every shimmering window, brick, dumpster and city litter funneled in, gum wrappers, take-out menus, sublet fliers, you name it, that get caught in the grip of the sewer drain.”
Talking about the alley’s shadows stirred his memory and some dormant recollections came alive. “That alley used to be brimming with life; us kittens would think the noon shadows were charcoal sketches drawn by some talented unearthly being beyond the realm of our thinking. In those early days, there was a readiness to believe in the impossibilities of the unknown. My brothers and I would pounce on the shadows naively assuming we could rub the phantom sketches off. They were the darkest shadows I’ve ever seen. We’d play like that until the lighting changed erasing the sun’s artwork. We’d be pooped at that point. Mamma would bring back lunch. The pizza guy who used to sit on a wooden crate during cigarette breaks in the alley behind the Italian restaurant used to give her scraps. By then we’d eat and forget all about the strange art exhibition until the next afternoon. So if we have the reception round noon, I know Zia would get a real bang out of the shadow play. She could come down the catwalk towards an informal altar on the fire escape landing. It would be like seeing two of her. What do you think? Would you be my best mouse, Winchell?”
“I’m honored Franco. I’ll bring my entire extended family. I’ve got just the perfect wedding gift, a 30 day unlimited ride MetroCard, imagine that, no more bumming quarters for tokens. I’ll bring the cheese wheel. Studs can bring the catnip.”
Franco interrupted, “Take it easy, he’s on parole for urinating in public. Poor Studs, prison has turned him into an animal.”
Winchell rattled on with excitement, “Angel, the cat that lives in the Carmelite church, well for a small fee he became a minister on the internet, he could perform the ceremony. Let’s not tell Mr. P, Jimbo and Big Mike about the wedding yet. They’ll just get all hopped up and want to dress the wedding party in ill- fitting tuxedos, spit shined wing tipped shoes and oversized pinky rings. Accessorize us to the hilt with Martinis and Lucky Strikes. Probably want to top it all off with Brill Creamed hairdos combed into pompadours. I’m sure they’d be totally convinced the getup would make an adorable Rat Pack theme. Not for nothing, I hate the way people tend to humanize us.”
Through the years, Winchell had become embittered by humanities treatment of his kind. He had come from a long line of maze inhabiting wheel treaders who even before birth were marked for sacrifice. He was the direct descendant of white mice who involuntarily were poked, prodded, patch tested and ultimately dissected on sterile cold metal trays all in the name of science. You could tell he was resentful of people thinking he was a disposable being. He struggled to control those feelings by using sarcasm. Until today the touchy subject hadn’t come up in a long time.
I’ll keep a lid on it till tomorrow. Don’t worry; I’ll arrange everything,” Winchell said in an upbeat way, trying to change his negative tone.
“I’ll propose tomorrow and let you know the answer. It’s funny I feel like I’ve known Zia all my life,” Franco said.
“Come on, don’t you know Franco the answer is yes, it’s always been yes. Don’t you see how she’s been purring over Modern Bride magazines? She has a gift registry on hold at Petland.” Winchell spoke like a psychic with no doubt. “You have known her all of her life. Zia is Ruby’s kitten sister. You never noticed her before cause she was so young. She has been waiting to catch up to you in age so you would finally notice her. There is definitely going to be a wedding. Trust me; all you have to do is pop the question. Face it my old friend, you have the disease called love.”
Franco’s chest ached from the impact of Winchell’s prescribed double dose of reality. Winchell was no doctor, surely like his ancestors, in a research medical lab he would be in the undignified position of being held by his tail and his would be the squirming experimental butt facing the serum spitting painful side of a needle; nonetheless, Winchell knew things.
While twitching his ear, Winchell continued, “I could tell you till the morning side of midnight, believe what you’ve heard. You’ve been living the cloistered life of a legend. You’ve got to feel how young and spry you are around Zia. You think the deli is your Shangri-La, giving back your youth; it’s not, its love. Yet you continue to proof read your feelings. When you get 50 feet from her your gaits becomes the slow crawl of a constipated snail. Ya know, when it comes to matters of the heart, you remind me of Patience and Fortitude, those 42nd street library lions, greeting the day trapped in a lonely marbleized existence. Whataya waiting for? How much time must elapse before you stop pussyfooting around? You’ve subconsciously wrapped barb wire around your heart and with every beat you inflict little invisible wounds that slowly bleed. All I’m sayin is not to ask her soon would be a sacrilege against nature, a spit in God’s eye. You’d be sidestepping the natural order of things. This may sound like rodent rhetoric but you’re biding your time right now. Time will collect, it always does. If you want to deny age its due, marry Zia. Time won’t dare trespass on love.”
“Wow! Winchell, you never were the silent type.”
Franco’s love life was put into the hands of a mouse. Certainly, his X belonged in the last box of the age category on a health insurance application. And at last year’s birthday bash in Franco’s honor, the guys jokingly put a sign on his back that said, “Retired, Go Around”. The sad thing about it was Franco noticed it a full twenty minutes into the festivities of the soiree. There was a time Franco would have been in charge of the sign making and would come up with rank out jokes ten times wittier than that one. He thought, enough with reminiscing about the past. Now is the time to create new memories. Franco did want to go out with a lion’s roar. Even though anatomically having no opposing thumbs, Franco couldn’t tie anything but he was definitely going to tie the knot. Franco shifted his wait from paw to paw, stretching the way an Olympic athlete stretches before going for the gold. He reacquainted his heart with youthful promises of romance. Wordlessly he sprinted back to the deli to his long awaiting bride to be. Every leap was an opportunity for love. His shadow with the same sense of urgency bounced like a Slinky across the sidewalk. Franco slipped through the deli’s back door hatch; there was no more time to waste. He had been so completely immersed in aging he never noticed Zia’s personal area before. He felt as if he woke from the sedated ignorance of 100 year sleep in a catnip patch. Her décor was femininely feline .Her water bowl was new; it still had a Petland price tag on it. A blue picture frame edged a photo of her entire family. In the background of the photo was Ruby looking utterly bored, filing her lacquered nails to a fine point. Franco recognized Smokey’s Cha-cha records still in mint condition near Mr. Pritchard’s Hi-Fi. Some of the vintage vinyl was still in the Sam Goody bag from where they came. Zia, most likely had borrowed them because Smokey would never permanently part with his cherished rare dance tunes. An old 1960’s Paisley hankie draped over a turned on nightlight was giving off the scent of hot perfume. Franco thought the ways of a female are beautifully strange. Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue. There were flashed hints of a wedding all around. He turned and Zia was there. Sweetly she said, “I’ve been waiting for you. I knew you would come back for me someday”. Franco saw her as a focused cinematographer zooming in for a close up sees a starlet’s face reflecting the light in a film noir way.
Franco wanted to tell her of the images that past through his head; how he wanted to spend lengthy summer nights under the stars with her. Priding themselves for not being stereotypical, they’d have a Sunday truce with the pigeons and share shrimp roll tidbits while curbside dining on Mott Street. And hang out under Coney Island’s cyclone and make extra scratch by collecting loose change that fell from the overhead unsuspecting thrill seeking rider’s pockets. He wanted to give Zia the world. She’d close her eyes and he’d take her to Meadows Park in Queens; there she’d open them to the Unisphere. In his mind he saw a day trip planned to the Bronx Zoo, there they’d fill the lions in on current events of the outside world. They’d ride the Staten Island Ferry; Zia being more practical then he, would bring a kerchief. She’d laugh when he’d allow the New York Bay breeze to have its way with his hair, thrashing it into a hundred parts, styling it not unlike the comical tousled coiffure of Professor Irwin Corey. Finally they’d nap and run in their sleep together. Sleep the sweet curled sleep of tranquility, of fulfillment, of gladness of the heart; for they would know love.
Somehow seeing her face bathed in the ambient glow radiating from the scented veiled nightlight, Franco was sure Zia already knew his thoughts.
It was time. “Zia will you marry me?” Franco asked on one knee.
From her eye Zia wiped a joyful tear with the tip of her tail. “Yes, yes yes. Please get up, the Franco I know doesn’t bow to anyone, not even me.”
There was applause from about twenty patrons in the deli. A loud voice rang through the aisles, “Go get um tiger”. Remembering what Winchell just told him, for a split second he thought maybe it was God voicing his approval, giving his blessing so to speak. Anything seemed possible again. Then he thought it was probably Mr.P congratulating him over the PA system. He didn’t ask.
Franco felt old no longer. If time was the luxury of youth then like a newborn kitten Franco had all the time in the world.