Threads of Life

Chapter 2-3

My uncle looked very pleased.

“That story you told us yesterday about the two-hundred pairs of Spanish slacks that were all missing a button was hilarious,” Simon said. “You have so many funny stories Uncle John.”

“I’ve got hundreds of them.”

The thought of hearing even one more boring story, let alone a hundred of them, was causing me physical pain that ran through my whole body.

“We had some great times back then. Lots of great times. But only when the customers weren’t around, which wasn’t often. Your uncle Harry was a real character. He liked a good joke as much as the rest of us. When I think about some of the things we did, I don’t know how we got away with them.”

“Tell us your favourite story about Uncle Harry.”

I guess what bothered me the most, besides the gnawing hunger and the fact that Tony and my plate of fries were nowhere in sight, was Simon’s sincerity. He wasn’t simply placating an old fart; he was sincerely interested in hearing what Uncle John had to say.

sincerely“My favourite story about Harry.” Uncle John was thinking out loud. “I don’t think I can tell you that one. No, definitely not that one. Oh, I’ve got one you’re going to love.”

Our food finally arrived, along with a spinning metal condiment holder and a pile of extra napkins.

“Enjoy your food, young fellows.” Tony winked at my uncle.

Uncle John took a big bite of his sandwich and, while chewing, put a forkful of coleslaw in his mouth.

“Before Christmas one year, your uncle Harry decided that since we sold mostly size thirty-eight suits in dark grey, he was going to have the tailors in all the stores make fifty of them before the holidays started.” John was talking and eating at the same time and his mouth looked like one of those washing machines with a glass window in the front and a load of coloured clothes spinning around inside. “This wasn’t something that was ever done in the made-to-measure business. You were supposed to measure the customers first and then make the suits, not the other way around. But your uncle figured he could save time and money by having his tailors make a shitload of suits during the slower weeks in November, before the Christmas rush. He told them to make sure all the suits would fit men who were five foot eight, average weight, and with a bit of a belly. So, the suits were made. Fifty in each store. The problem was that that year, a very popular movie came out with Dean Martin or Frank Sinatra, or maybe both of them, and they were wearing very sharp blue, pinstriped suits with small lapels, and every Italian who came into the stores wanted that exact suit.”

I was doing my best to avert my eyes from my uncle’s mouth, which was filled with pastrami and coleslaw, without appearing rude. At a table across the restaurant, I saw two pretty teenaged girls, both with long blonde hair, and both wearing red dresses with swooping necklines that exposed the tops of their breasts. They were staring over at our table and seemed to be laughing. And when they saw me looking back at them, they turned their heads quickly and started laughing even harder, putting their hands over their mouths to muffle the sounds.

“What did he do with all the extra suits?”

Simon had taken the pastrami out of his sandwich and was eating it with a fork. He had an indoor track-and-field meet coming up and his coach at Westbury Secondary School discouraged kids from eating any bread or potatoes during the two weeks before a competition.

“I’m getting to that. Your uncle believed that there was no such thing as a suit that couldn’t be sold, only salesmen who didn’t know how to sell suits. And he was the best salesman I ever saw. He could sell a ring to a man without fingers. Here’s what he did: he put the suits on a rack right at the front of the store and put up a huge sign that said ‘Italian Wool Suits Half-Price’. Then he had all the managers write two-hundred dollars on each price tag, cross it out, and write one-hundred dollars underneath it. You see, the suits had already been priced at ninety dollars. He was advertising them as half-price but, really, they were priced ten dollars more than the regular price.”

Uncle John put the last bite of his sandwich and the last forkful of coleslaw in his mouth. It was as if he had employed a mathematical formula to finish the two foods at exactly the same time.

“Is that how he finally sold them?”

“No. He wasn’t going to take any chances. He went to see Sid Adelson, who made leather purses and wallets and luggage, and he told Sid he needed to buy five hundred of his cheapest wallets, the ones that were made from leftover scraps of leather and sold for five dollars. Then he brought the wallets back to his office and we stayed up all night putting five one-dollar bills in each one. Harry told us to make sure that the dollars were sticking out of the tops of the wallets. Then he told us to put the wallets in the jacket pockets of all the suits.”

The two girls were still giggling and glancing over at us. The restaurant had horrible lighting and clouds of steam dissipating all over the place, and it was hard to see them clearly, but I could see their long blonde hair and huge boobs, and I was sure they were the most beautiful girls I had ever seen.

“So, what your uncle did was spend twenty-five hundred dollars on the wallets and another twenty-five hundred dollars on the money he put into the wallets. But don’t forget, he really wasn’t going to lose any money because he had already raised the price of all the suits by ten dollars which covered the cost of the wallets and the dollar bills. What a genius.”

“But how did that help sell the suits?”

“This is the best part. He told each of us that, whenever a five-foot-eight customer came in the store and asked to look at a suit, no matter what colour or style the customer was looking for, we had to tell him that we needed to size him up by using one of the suits on the rack. Then we sent the customer into the change room with only the pants and that was key—only the pants—and when the customer came out, we slid the jacket on him and told him to feel the quality of the material by reaching into the pockets. Well, you should have seen each customer’s face when he felt the wallet, and not just the wallet, but a bunch of bills sticking out of it. Almost every one of them said they changed their mind about the style or colour of the suit they were looking for, and that they liked the suit they were wearing just fine. And lots of them wouldn’t even take their suits off when we offered to put them in garment bags; they wore them right out of the store. We sold every one of those suits that year and every one of them at a healthy profit.”

that“That’s an amazing story, Uncle John.”

“Yes it is. Your uncle knew that most people are greedy bastards who can’t resist a quick score.”

Tony came back to clear the dishes. When he saw that Simon hadn’t eaten his bread, he looked hurt, or pretended to look hurt.

Simon explained to Tony why he wasn’t eating bread or potatoes.

My uncle said, “Simon can run ten miles without taking a break.”

“Ten miles! Without taking a break! Just from not eating bread or potatoes. Who would have thought such a thing?”

“You have to practice a little too,” Simon said.

“Look at this boy,” said Tony. “He’s going to be the next Roger Bannister.”

Tony then looked at me and asked, “It must be hard keeping up with your brother, eh? Are you a runner too?”

I told him I hated running and threw us into a moment of uncomfortable silence. Without saying another word, Tony cleared the dishes, leaving a handwritten bill on the table.

Just as we were about to leave, I noticed that one of the girls from across the restaurant was making her way toward our table, holding a napkin in her hand. As she got nearer, I could make out her face more clearly in the dim light and I realized that she was older than I had thought. She was probably in her twenties, maybe even her late twenties. Then I took a closer look at the other girl, who was now standing at the counter by the cash register, still giggling, and watching her friend approach us. She was also older than I had first thought and was probably in her late twenties too. Both were wearing red coats, which they must have just put on, and which were still undone. When the one with the napkin got really close to us, I could see a gold Air Canada insignia on her lapel.

Without introducing herself, she reached across the table and put the napkin in front of Simon. It had two names, a phone number, an address, and two pink lipstick kisses on it.

“My friend and I are staying at my cousin’s house tonight. It’s around the corner from here, if you want to join us.”

Simon was about to say that he was sorry, he had a girlfriend, when my uncle started coughing, and both of us looked at him to see if he was all right. Simon’s girlfriend at the time was Bonnie Clemens. Simon told me one night that Bonnie had given him a b*****b while he was driving her home in my mother’s car, and that he couldn’t imagine anything more dangerous than trying to drive while Bonnie had his p***s in her mouth.

Between coughs, Uncle John was trying to catch his breath. Simon hadn’t taken his eyes off him. But I had. Because the woman standing beside our table looked like a Playboy model. She waited a few more seconds, until it was obvious that Simon had forgotten about her.

Playboy“We’re twins,” I said.

But she had already turned around and was on her way out of the restaurant, laughing with her friend.

* * *

It was my uncle, not Simon, who took the napkin. He put it in a frame and placed it on his desk, next to the small television set. Whenever someone asked him what it was, he would say, “You’re not going to believe this.” Then he told that person about the time when his handsome nephew was propositioned by two, not one, but two drop-dead gorgeous stewardesses. It was his favourite story.

two* * *

That Christmas, Simon and I each earned two hundred and forty dollars. We didn’t sell a single article of clothing.