Inside, the place smelled like a chocolate egg cream laced with cigar smoke and filtered through the hole of a stale doughnut. From beneath a pervasive layer of dust, one could dig out Green Lantern comics and Daredevil: The Man Without Fear. In the back, next to the phone booth with flypaper glass, were wooden shelves holding plastic models of planes, monsters, and the awe-inspiring car designs of Big Daddy Roth. There were spinning racks of paperback books, rows of greeting cards, crinkly bags of plastic soldiers, paper and pens and crayons. At the soda fountain, they made cherry Cokes, black-and-whites, and malteds that were hooked up to a green machine and cycloned into existence. My father bought his Lucky Strikes there. My grandfather bought his horse paper there. My mother would go in once a year, stir the dust, and come out with a notebook to keep her thoughts in. The owners, Leo and Phil, carried on a subdued argument day in, day out, which occasionally erupted into shouts of “Shmuck”
