Santa Jack - a Repairman Jack story

Friday - Part 2

3 

Jack took a walk over to Amsterdam Avenue. 

Gentrification continued its relentless progression on the Upper West Side. New brownstone renovations, new condos, and of course, new eateries. In a few hours the streets and the host of new restaurants, trattorias, and bistros would be crowded with yuppies and dinks out for their Friday night fling to initiate the weekend's respite from buying and selling. 

As individuals, Jack didn't have anything against them. Yeah, they could be empty-headed when it came to one-upsmanship in the conspicuous consumption arena and the endless panting after trends, and as a group they tended to suck the color out the neighborhoods they invaded. But they weren't evil. At least most of them weren't. 

Jack checked his watch. Getting near three. Abe would be ready for a mid-afternoon snack just about now. He stopped in at Nick's Nook, a mom-and-pop grocery - a vanishing breed in these parts - and picked up a little treat.  

Next stop was the Isher Sports Shop. The iron grate was pulled back, exposing the blurry windows. Beyond them, an array of faded cardboard placards, dusty footballs, tennis balls, racquets, basketball hoops, backboards, Rollerblades, and other good-time sundries basked in the sunny display space.  

Inside was not much better organized. Bikes hanging from the ceiling, weight benches over here, SCUBA gear over there, narrow aisles winding past sagging shelves. ESPN meets Twister.  

As Jack entered, Abe Grossman was just finishing with a customer - or rather, a customer was finishing with him. 

Abe's age was on the far side of fifty and his weight was in calling distance of an eighth-of-a-ton, which wouldn't have been bad if he were on the right side of five-eight. He was dressed in his uniform - black pants and a white half-sleeved shirt. A frown marred his usually jovial round face, a face made all the rounder by the relentless retreat of his gray hair toward the top of his head. 

"Hooks?" Abe was saying. "Why should you want hooks? Can you imagine how that must hurt a fish when it bites into it? And those barbs. Oy! You've got to rip them out! Such damage to the tender mouth tissues. Stick a fish hook in your own tongue sometime and see how you like it." 

The customer, a sandy-haired thirty-something in a faded Izod stared at Abe in wonder. He made one false start at a reply, then tried again.  

"You're kidding, right?" 

Abe leaned over the counter - at least as far as his considerable gut would allow - and spoke in a fatherly fashion. 

"It's an ethical position. Baiting a hook, or using those flashing little spinners to catch fish, it's deceitful. Think about it. You're dressing up a nasty little hook to look like food, like sustenance. A fish comes along, thinks it's found lunch, and wham! It's hooked and pulled out of the water. Is that fair? You're proud of such a thing?" He straightened and fixed the guy with his dark brown eyes. "I should be a party to such a so-called sport based on treachery and deceit? No. I cannot." 

"You're serious!" the guy said, backing away. "You're really serious!" 

"I should be a comedian? This place looks like the Improv to you maybe? No. I sell sporting goods. Sporting. That means something to me. A net is sporting. You wait for the fish to come along and then scoop it up with a net. The fastest one wins. That's a sport. A net, I'll sell you. But hooks? Uh-Uh. You'll get no hooks from me."  

The guy turned away and headed for the door. "Get out while you can," he said as he hurried past Jack. "This fucker is nuts!" 

"Really?" Jack said. "What makes you think so?"