Descriptive Piece: Pizzeria Aroma

CHICAGO - The mustard enamel and cheerful red tiles that garnish each wall offer immediate relief from the dreary storefront and overcast skies. From the backroom, bottles of oregano and garlic emit the gentle perfume of an Italian mother’s kitchen.

Visitors are greeted by a chalkboard easel on which an elegant hand has listed the day’s specials in a polished script. A bulky black jukebox sits idle near the door with a record rotating on its top, as if aching to be played. Past the jukebox, several small tables are draped with simple yet homey green-checkered cloths. Orange lights hang from the ceiling that radiate each table with a delicate European glow.

The soft, mechanical reverberations of ovens and dishwashers are briefly interrupted by the rude jingling of bells as a customer opens the door. Sporting a postal uniform, the man stops to wipe a few drops of drizzle off his forehead and drags his feet to the cut-in cashier counter. He sighs and stares at the menu without any expression, as if he sees it a bit too regularly.

“Chicken parm, right boss?” asks the employee leaning over the fake-marble counter, if only as a formality. Pans clash with aluminum behind him in the once tranquil kitchen as the cooks scuffle about and shout for ingredients.

The spirited walls of the restaurant are lined with legends and icons of Italian culture. Joe DiMaggio and Al Capone gaze over the tables through their glass frames, and Frank Sinatra sings from a paperback biography propped up above the counter. The Godfather’s unnerving grimace is eased by breathtaking views of Venice and the Coliseum.

Two balding men sit at a table near the Tower of Pisa. They lean back comfortably in their glossy wooden chairs and discuss political rumors with thick Italian accents. “And that’s exactly what he said it was – an attempted murder…”

One of the men – in his scuffed leather shoes, frayed jeans, and pit-stained white t-shirt – stares at the huge heart-shaped relief of a tomato that rests under the counter as the other man speaks. He seems frozen by the juicy red plaster, like a boy coming out of a ballpark tunnel for the first time.

Across the room, the postal worker sits and looks wearily out the street-side window. The plops of raindrops on the glass become bigger and more frequent, and the man turns to look at his watch. Without a change in expression, he shifts his eyes to the huge protruding tomato and sighs.