A-Cup Angst Ch. 12

Jamie laughed and held up his empty hands. "I don't have any appliances with me," he said. "See?"

The shopkeeper stood on the tips of his toes and tried to peer over Jamie's shoulder and the clutter in the window at the street outside. "No scooter parked outside," he asked. "No sidecar mounted washing machine?"

"No," Jamie said, nearly laughing at the man's exasperation with unclaimed appliances. "No scooter, no machine, just me."

The shopkeeper squinted at Jamie and gave him a thorough once over. "Well," he asked, "what do you need fixed, young man?"

Jamie ignored the way the shopkeeper had inflected the word you and pointed to the antique telephone in the window. "Does that telephone work," he asked.

"No, it doesn't," said the shopkeeper. Jamie felt disappointed. "It just sits there and waits to be sold."

"What," Jamie asked. "Wait, wait, wait! Does it work, or doesn't it?"

"It doesn't work here," the shopkeeper said, "it just waits to be sold. Does it look like it's working here? I'm the only one that works here!"

Jamie chuckled politely at the man's idea of a joke. There was something odd about a shopkeeper that treated his potential customers sarcastically. "So, it's a functioning telephone, I take it," Jamie asked.

"Yes," said the shopkeeper. "What else would it be? Does this look like a knick-knack shop where useless odds and ends are sold? Do you see any doilies around?" The shopkeeper gestured around the place. "No, this is a repair shop, where they are expertly fixed!" He lowered his head and mumbled into his chin, "And then never picked up."

"Well," Jamie said, "I would like to test this telephone and maybe buy it. If its owners aren't going to come back to get it, that is," he added.

"Come back and get it," mumbled the shopkeeper as he went over to retrieve the phone. "Not very likely. They're in Japan by now." He brought the phone over to the counter, set it down next to a blender, and plugged it in. "There, you can try it out!"

Jamie asked for the number of the shop and dialed it. The phone rang and he picked up. The shopkeeper watched him with a mildly amused expression on his face as Jamie tested the clarity of the phone line by alternately speaking into his cellphone and the antique phone. "How much for it," Jamie asked after he had hung it up.

"One hundred Euros," the shopkeeper said.

Jamie raised his eyebrows at the low price and handed the money over. The shopkeeper wrote him up a receipt and put the phone into a bag. Jamie thanked him and then asked, "Why don't you try to sell this stuff off, if no one's going to come and claim it?"

"Sell it," asked the shopkeeper sarcastically. "How? Do you mean that I should get a shop and display it all in its window?"

Jamie smiled at the man's sarcastic humor. "I meant, why don't you put it all on e-bay?"

"Put it all in the bay," the shopkeeper exclaimed. "That's littering! They'd have my pension fund for that! And more! Are you nuts? Tossing it all in the bay! As if I could find the time to drive it all down there and toss it. As if I could find the car."

"No, I meant," Jamie started to say and then gave up. He waved his hand. "Goodbye!"

Jamie strolled through the town some more and then made his way back to trattoria Rossi. He sat down on the terrace and was quickly reminded why he didn't like to go there, despite being worshipped by the lovely owner and her daughter. The staff immediately noticed him and began to call for Laura, setting all sorts of things before him. Laura then showed up and kissed him on the cheeks and hugged him tight, squashing her ample breasts against him. Jamie didn't like all that loud attention on himself, even though the hug was quite enjoyable.

He managed to keep his erection from showing, thanking his lucky stars that he had worn thick denim jeans that day. Finally, Laura had let go of him and loudly insisted he sit down, even though she had just pulled him to his feet. She then called for many dishes to be brought to him, without even bothering to consult with him. Jamie flashed her a polite grin, hoping to hide his discomfort. Although he was treated like royalty, or the Pope, whenever he came to the place, all he really wanted was to enjoy a meal inconspicuously.

Laura stood next to him and urged him to try one of the dishes she had brought to him. Jamie sampled it and nodded his approval. It was very good. He noted a waitress come around the corner that led to the stairs and give Laura a slight nod. It was peculiar because he had learned during his stay at the house that, for the staff, just coming near the stairs was grounds for immediate dismissal. There was something brewing. A waiter came out of the kitchen and whispered to Laura about a problem with the calamari, but Laura dismissed him. She stayed near Jamie for a few more minutes, until he dug into the pasta, and then apologized and went off to the kitchen.

Jamie had just managed to relax and enjoy his food when Alessandra came down the stairs. She bounced over to him and planted a big, wet kiss on his cheek. She hugged him from behind, pressing her firm globes against his back. Jamie took a deep breath and let it out slowly. His erection had just gone down before she did that. She sat down next to him and sampled some of his food before she said, "Are you free this Sunday?"

"Um, no," Jamie lied to her, as usual, "I have some work to do around the house."

"What work," Alessandra asked, cocking her head. "I was there the other day and Suzie showed me the whole place. It looks spectacular. And finished." Jamie grimaced internally. He was busted. "So, now that we've established that you have nothing to do this Sunday, you are going to come here and attend my patron saint's name day feast. I won't take no for an answer." She leaned forward and pointed a finger right between his eyes. "And no excuses! If you don't come, I shall be very, very angry with you. The feast starts at two o'clock."

Alessandra stood up and left for the stairs without even glancing back. Jamie shrugged and had some more pasta. At least he knew the food at the feast would be good.

After his dinner, Laura broke her usual custom of refusing payment by citing a price. He was to attend her daughter's eighteenth name day feast that Sunday. Jamie politely agreed and again thanked his host for a delicious meal. Laura hugged him tightly for half a minute, inspiring yet another boner in his jeans. On his way home, Jamie made a mental note to always wear thick jeans when going to casa Rossi. The surprisingly crisp autumn weather allowed for it.

The next day, Jamie tried to think up of a gift for Alessandra. He did start to feel a bit bad for having been so distant to the Rossi girls. They had been perfectly polite and very helpful to him and his family. Laura helped Lori find the house and a job, Alessandra showed Suzie how to get along with her new peers at school and they had done a great job of smoothly pitching in with whatever hiccup had appeared on the horizon for the family formerly known as Jacobs. Jamie was starting to feel like an ass for having always been so tight-lipped around them. He decided to start amending for his behavior by giving the girl a great birthday gift, but couldn't quite come up with one. For all the jabbering she had done in his ear this past month, Jamie had hardly retained any information about her likes and dislikes. He finally settled on buying her a new laptop computer. The one she now had kept overheating and switching off for a few minutes, at random, making her grumble in frustration at lost data.

Jamie went to the computer store and found a depressingly similar bunch of laptops on offer. A drive around the neighboring towns didn't reveal anything much better. Finally, Jamie decided to make a laptop for her. One that wouldn't overheat every hour or so. He drove home with a grin on his lips. It was a simple and silly thing to do; making a laptop computer, but it thoroughly occupied his mind and gave him an excuse to shelve all thoughts of the future, at least for the time being.

He spent the evening at home, making up the new design. He decided to add a heat sink made of aluminium and have fans blow air over it to stop the overheating. That left him pondering how to direct the hot exhaust until he came up with the final design in one fell swoop. He decided to make Alessandra a briefcase computer. It would be made of an impact-resilient composite material and then covered with leather to make it look like a fashionable briefcase. The heat exhausts would be diverted behind the screen and come out of the top, disguised as locks that popped open whenever the case was opened.

The more Jamie thought of the new design, the more he got lost in it. He decided to go all out with it and swap the standard keyboard with one from a typewriter. After that, he went whole hog and turned the whole briefcase computer into a steampunk work of art. By the time he finished with the design and compiled a big pile of schematics, it was already past midnight. He went to sleep tired, but still thinking of reducing the weight of his creation.

The next day, Jamie got up early and drove Suzie to school, as the weather was no longer suitable for her bicycle. After he had dropped her off, he did a tour of all the electronics' and hobby shops in the area, even going as far as Pisa to get what he needed. He was still missing the new keyboard and some other things, but he was beginning to feel confident that he could make a computer for Alessandra by Sunday.

His last planned stop was the A-D Repairs & Restorations shop he had bought his mother's new landline phone in. Jamie remembered seeing a disassembled typewriter on the counter when he had been there. He walked in and called, "Hello!" The typewriter was nowhere to be found.

"Oh, it's you," said the shopkeeper, obviously disappointed to see Jamie.

"Yes," Jamie said. "How glad you must be. I am looking for a typewriter."

"A typewriter," the shopkeeper inquired in surprise. "I thought you young people only wanted your fancy word processors from Japan, nowadays?"

Jamie was surprised to hear the shopkeeper say "word processor", instead of just a derogatory "computers", as it implied the man knew the first thing about electronics, which most members of his generation did not. "I remember seeing a typewriter on your counter the other day," he said.

"Yes," the shopkeeper replied, "what of it?"

"I'd like to buy it," Jamie said.

"It's not finished."

"That's ok," Jamie said, smiling, "I don't need a working typewriter."

"My name is Aldo Domenico," the shopkeeper grandiosely declared, "and I have never sold a single machine that did not function properly in all my life!"

"It's ok, mister Domenico," Jamie said, "I don't need it to work."

The shopkeeper looked nonplussed. "You don't need it to work," he asked. "Well, what do you need it for, then? A paperweight?"

"No, no, no," Jamie said, chuckling, "I just want to take the keys from it and fit them on this computer I'm building to make it look prettier and old-timey."

Aldo's face darkened and his thin mustache twitched twice before he said, in a low voice, "That is out of the question, young man. This is a repair workshop, in case you haven't noticed." He crossed his arms across his chest. "And my repair business is not licensed to be a spare parts distributor!"

Jamie blinked at the odd turn this conversation had taken. "Um, I, uh, I don't understand what that means..."

"That means," Aldo said, almost yelling, "that I can not sell you anything that is not a fully functioning and completed machine! If I were to sell you a part of a machine, I would be in violation of several legal acts that regulate commerce and taxation in this great country! The Financial Guard would be on my case!"

Jamie just stared at the old man. "Look," he said at last, "I want the typewriter. Will you sell it to me or not?"

"No," Aldo said. "It's not finished."

"But I don't need it to work!"

"I don't sell junk that doesn't work," Aldo said. "I have a reputation to uphold!"

"I won't tell anyone," Jamie said.

"You insult me, young man," Aldo said.

"You drive me nuts, old man," Jamie said, under his breath, in English.

"What was that?"

"Nothing, nothing," Jamie said in Italian. "So, let me get this straight, if I can! You won't sell me the broken machine because..." Jamie honestly floundered for a way to complete the sentence. "Why, exactly?"

Aldo rolled his eyes and sighed in exasperation. "If I were to sell you the broken machine as if it was fixed, then my reputation would be ruined," he said. "People would hear of it and start to think that I don't do a good job of fixing things! And then I'd be ruined!"

"And you can't sell it to me as a broken machine, because...?"

"There are laws on these matters, young man," Aldo said. "I am not licensed to sell spare parts and you are not licensed to purchase scrap materials."

"I think I understand now," Jamie said. Aldo nodded in satisfaction. Jamie muttered into his chin in English, saying, "I took a wrong turn somewhere and wound up in a Monty Python routine."

"Young man," Aldo said, "this is neither a cheese shop, or a pet store, so I'd appreciate it if you took your eels and went back to your hovercraft!"

Jamie's brow went up in shock. "You speak English," he asked.

Aldo put his fists down on the counter and leaned forward threateningly to say, in accentuated English, "Very little."

Jamie couldn't help but laugh at the man's quirky antics. "Alright, mister Domenico," he said, "I have a proposal for you! I would like to buy a functioning typewriter. I offer five hundred Euros for it, but my offer is only good until the end of business today. What do you say to that?"

Aldo looked Jamie up and down with a suspicious squint and then said, "I only do repairs when I'm paid in full, in advance. It's my new policy."

Jamie counted ten fifty Euro notes and put them down on the counter. "I'll come round for it at six this afternoon," he said. "It had better be finished by then, or I'll expect a full refund." He turned around and walked out of the shop without bothering to look at Aldo. He strolled back to his car and decided to drive home to have an early dinner with his family. Laura Rossi's trattoria was just ten minutes on foot from Aldo's store, but Jamie was no longer spending calories doing construction on the house and her bountiful and tasty cooking represented a clear and present danger to his waistline.

Because Jamie had been out all day foraging for the materials and tools he'd need for his project, Lori was the one that made dinner. Halfway through the meal, she casually said, "You kids are alone tonight." Suzie and Jamie hardly paid it any mind until she said, "I've got a date." Jamie looked up at his mother in shock, while Suzie actually choked on her food.

Jamie clapped his sister on the back while she coughed. He had no idea what to think about his mother dating.

"But, you're married," Suzie managed to wheeze out between coughs.

Lori shrugged. "So what? That never stopped your dad, did it? Fuck it. If he can do it, so can I. Besides, if it bothers your father so much that I've got a date, why doesn't he say something about it?" Lori looked around, as if noticing something for the first time. "Oh, that's right! He isn't here, is he? He left us!" Suzie got up and ran away from the table. The door to her room slammed so hard, it made Lori jump. "Honestly, that girl... I don't know what gets into her at times. I mean, did she harbor a dream that your father and I would get back together some day?" Lori snorted. "Not very likely."

Jamie decided to keep his mouth stuffed. As repugnant as the thought of his mother getting pawed by some greasy Italian was, he could recognize the horrible hypocrisy he'd be guilty of if he engaged in any kind of attempt to sabotage her relationship. If she was even starting one. A car pulled into the driveway and Lori left. Jamie took the opportunity to probe the mind of the person behind the wheel. It was a man and he was glad to see Lori. Jamie couldn't sense any malice in the man's mind so he settled for taking a photo of the car. He digitally processed it until he got the man's license plate number. The car's headlights had prevented him from seeing it with his bare eyes. He was going to find out everything there was to know about the man.

"But that's going to have to wait until tomorrow," Jamie thought to himself. He had to go to town and collect the typewriter from Aldo. He went to Suzie's door first and knocked on it. "Suzie," he called. "You alright in there?" He got no response, but he could sense her mind on the other side of the door. He read a little of her emotions. "Look, sweetie, I know you must feel betrayed and ashamed for feeling betrayed and just plain lost. I get it. It's a lot to process and you don't even know what you're supposed to feel. I feel that, too." He listened but heard nothing coming from the room. "Look, I've gotta make a quick run into down. Are you gonna be alright by yourself for forty minutes, or so? Do you need anything?" More silence came from the room. "Ok, I'm going now. Try to stay cool, Bones!"

He walked down the stairs and put on his jacket. He left the house, locking the door behind himself and sensed his sister watching him. "Why'd you call me Bones," she asked from her window.

Jamie unlocked the car and said, "Cause you're nothing but skin and bones, Bones. And Skin is the name of a singer." Jamie got in the SUV and drove to town.

Aldo was standing by the counter when Jamie arrived, looking like the cat that got the canary. Before Jamie could even say hello, he bent down and began typing. Jamie stepped closer and tried to read over Aldo's shoulder, while the old man typed away at a fast rate. Nearly half a page of text was typed up by the time Aldo said, "It's rude to read over people's shoulders, you know."

"And it's rude to use other people's things without permission, too," Jamie replied. Aldo stood up straight and glared at Jamie. "That's my typewriter, I believe." Jamie pulled the paper from the machine and looked it over. "According to this anti-electronics manifest you have begun to type up, it's in proper working order. And since I've already paid for it, in full, it's mine."

Aldo bristled at Jamie's impatient tone and then said, "I was merely demonstrating that the typewriter is functional." Jamie raised an eyebrow and opened his mouth to say something, but Aldo said, "And I have not yet given you a receipt! It's not yours until I give you a receipt!"

Jamie rolled his eyes and put one hand on the typewriter, pulling it across the counter towards himself, and held the other one towards Aldo, palm up. Aldo wrote up a receipt and put it in Jamie's open hand.

"Good night," Jamie said, leaving the shop with the typewriter under his arm.

"What are you going to do with that keyboard," Aldo called after him. "Make a computer?"

"Something like that," Jamie said, opening the door.

"Well, if you think your work's any good, you might want to come round and show it to me. If you've got the-" Jamie didn't hear the rest of Aldo's sentence over the noise of the door closing behind him. He trotted down the pedestrian-only street to his car that was parked around the corner and drove back home as quick as he could. He felt bad for having left Suzie alone.

His concern had turned out to be completely unfounded. She had calmed down by the time he came home and the two of them spent the evening playing computer games. Suzie would never have normally stooped so low as to actually play a game with her older brother, but she wanted to stay up until her mom came home and gaming with her brother provided her with both an excuse and a means to do it.