Aunt Pearl

This is another story that I read in the Tompkins County Public Library on Sunday, October 14th. I wrote it so I could spend some time imagining a truly awful person at work. My family frequented delis, very often!, but none of my relatives ever owned one or worked in one.  



In my family, we used to say Aunt Pearl was a woman of strong character. That was just a polite way of calling her a lunatic.
   
Pearl and her husband Philly ran Moskowitz Deli on Tremont Avenue. Philly stayed back in the kitchen with the chopped liver and the blintzes. Pearl did everything else.
   
She was the kind of waitress who expected you to know what you wanted to eat  before you walked in the door. She didn’t smile and she didn’t make small talk. There were men who’d been regulars at the deli for years and she still called them Bud. In Aunt Pearl’s mouth, “Bud” was not a term of endearment.
   
Pearl cared more about the dirt under her fingernails than she did about a person’s feelings. Her heart might break over a chipped cup; it would not break for you.
   
I’ll give you a for-instance. Imagine you’re preparing to sit yourself down at one of the tables by the window and you accidentally scrape the chair — just a little  — across the linoleum floor. Pearl would tack an extra quarter onto your bill: 5 cents for each chair leg that you abused and 5 cents for wear and tear on the linoleum.
   
Or maybe you drop the salt shaker and a few grains spill out. That would mean an extra dime on your bill. If you had used the salt she wouldn’t charge you (though believe me, she would have liked to). But since you wasted the salt, you better pay up.
   
Pearl was famous for her edicts. She didn't allow baby strollers in Moskowitz Deli. Shari Kornblum fancied herself a match for Aunt Pearl. She came in with a stroller and a baby as well. Pearl didn’t say a word about the carriage wheels smearing dirt on the floor. She didn’t say a word about little Barry Kornblum and his rattle. But when Mrs. Kornblum finished her pastrami on rye she discovered an extra two dollars added to the bill. The fight went out of her and we never saw Barry in the deli again until he was a teenager.
   
Some people like to read while they eat. But even if you brought your own newspaper with you from home Pearl would charge you an extra nickel for reading at the table. “Is this a library?” she asked, and people knew better than to answer.
   
God forbid you should be unlucky enough to sneeze over your roast beef sandwich. You’d get no “Gezuntheit” from Pearl. Fifteen cents that sneeze would cost you. “You I let in for free,” she’d say, “your sneeze is an uninvited guest, let it pay its own way.”
   
Maybe you’re wondering how she had any customers left. I used to ask myself that question, too. At first I thought maybe it was Philly’s delicious blintzes, so sweet they could make you cry. But blintzes almost as good you could also find two blocks over at Kaplan’s. So why did the people keep coming back, year after year?
   
I’ll tell you a little story; maybe it will explain something.
   
I used to help out in the deli on Saturdays. One day when it was pouring rain and business was slow, Aunt Pearl busied herself  by tearing paper napkins in half (“Who needs a whole napkin?”) and I entertained myself reading Nausea, by that French philosopher, in a back booth.We were both surprised when the door opened and a man walked in. He was soaking wet. No raincoat, no umbrella, no hat even. He stood there in the doorway and shook himself off like a dog. Uh oh, I thought, the guy’s in for it now. You can just imagine what Aunt Pearl thought of people who dripped rain on her floor. This was not a neighborhood man. Maybe he was visiting someone, or maybe he was lost, I never knew. But anyway, there he was, a little paunchy, a little bald, a little mustached. And a whole lot wet.
   
He sat himself down at the counter and ordered a cup of black coffee. Aunt Pearl obliged him. He asked for a spoon. This, too, she delivered. And here is where he made his fatal mistake. The poor schmuck did not pour any sugar into his cup, but he did stir the coffee with a spoon. I hope you get the significance of that act. He was doomed.
   
A spoon that stirs in sugar is a spoon doing its job. A spoon that just stirs — that is a wasted spoon. When the guy was ready to go Aunt Pearl brought him his bill. It was for 10 dollars and 50 cents.
   
“I think you made a mistake,” the man said.
   
“I made no mistake,” Aunt Pearl told him. He should have listened to her tone. It was not a tone that invited discussion.
   
“You overcharged me, Madam,” the man persisted. My mouth fell open. Where did he find the nerve?
   
“Mister,” Aunt Pearl said, leaning over the counter until she was so close she could count the hairs in his mustache. And vice versa. “I charged you for the coffee — that’s 50 cents. And I also charged you for the rain you brought in with you and left there” (she pointed with a plump finger to the door) “that my niece” (now she pointed to me) “will have to mop up. Then I charged you for the spoon, which you know and I know you did not need. My husband, Philly, is going to have to wash that spoon. It will cost him a certain amount of effort. Just like it’s going to cost you a certain amount of money.”
   
Aunt Pearl stuck her hand out, palm up, in front of the customer’s face. He didn’t move. Maybe he was thinking. My guess is he was weighing his options — between life and death. He chose wisely. The man reached into his back pocket and pulled out a small leather wallet. He counted out 2 five dollar bills and gave them to Pearl. Then he reached into his side pocket and pulled out a handful of change. He selected 2 quarters and gave those over as well.
   
Pearl looked at the remaining change in his hand. “I see there you have another quarter,” she said, “also a nickel. That would make a nice tip for my niece, she works very hard, she’s saving up to go to college one day.” The man put 30 cents down on the counter and gave a little sigh. Then he pulled his shirt collar up around his ears and walked back out into the freezing rain. We never saw him again at Moskowitz Deli. Not surprising, right? 
   
But I never forgot him. Because that was the day I had my first inkling of how Pearl got away with everything she got away with. People like to be told what to do. That’s my theory. There are so many uncertainties in life, and it exhausts us. Sometimes we just need a person to come along and say “I see you’re looking at the wallpaper. This ain’t an art gallery. Fork over 20 cents.” And you do it. I’m not saying it’s right. I’m just saying it happens.
   
There’s something else I discovered that day. My Aunt Pearl was a thief. Remember the 30 cents the spoon man left me? I never saw a penny of it. The whole tip went into Pearl’s apron pocket, along with the 2 five dollar bills. Fifty cents, for the coffee, went into the cash register. That’s how she did it. A dime here, a quarter there. It all ended up in Aunt Pearl’s apron pocket.
   
Which is how come one morning Uncle Philly woke up and discovered Pearl wasn’t lying there next to him in the bed. We never did find out where she took herself off to. With all the loot she’d been collecting over the years she could be living on the Riviera right now. But probably not. More likely she got herself an efficiency apartment in a converted hotel near the beach in Miami. Wherever she is, and whatever she’s doing, I’m sure she’s making people miserable.
   
As for Uncle Philly, he took up with a very nice woman by the name of Cookie DaSilva. She used to be a customer. Now she’s a partner in Moskowitz Deli. She greets everyone by name, and is generous with the smiles. She has Tootsie Rolls at the counter for the kids and gives free refills for iced tea and soda. Everyone likes her.
   
But there are still some old-timers who whisper the name “Pearl,” with something very close to longing, as they bite into their potato knishes. They don’t seem to remember that she charged extra for whispering at the table.