The Adventures of an Illegal Alien part3

I never mentioned him but do you remember the other guy with the man in his space suit?
Let's just call him Ricardo, I don't recall his real name, he was an older Italian guy with a big heart.
We told him what happened at the photo shoot and he cautioned us to be more careful and congratulated us on taking off.
He invited us over to his apartment where the two of them lived. He cooked us a real Italian dish and I brushed up on my English vocabulary, learning all my vegetables and fruits. It was like seeing an old family member, very cozy, warm and friendly.
He told us all sorts of fascinating stories about people the film industry from Frank Sinatra to Marilyn Monroe. One of his best friends was Joe Franklin.
The radio guy who had his studio on 43rd & 8th. He wanted to take us up to his office, introduce us and see what Joe can do for us. Honestly we didn't really know what to expect but we knew that Ricardo was a great guy. I knew I wanted to get serious about my singing career, the thought of becoming an actress seemed appealing, like a lot of fun but my English was still pretty bad, plus I've never taking an acting class in my life.
I knew nothing about the business. But you know being adventurous, let's go meet that Joe Franklin guy.

His office was a mess. I've never seen anything like it. I mean stacks and stacks of paper and magazines, left over food and roaches which he killed with his bare hand, a few chairs were many of his colleagues, friends and supporters resided during his broadcast.
He was very friendly, asked us a few questions, many of them I didn't understand, thankfully Sarah's English was way better than mine. He mumbled something to himself with a big smile on his face, I kept thinking, what is this? Is this a joke? This is a well known and respected guy? Why does his office look like this? What am I doing here?
We sat around for while just smiling. He told us "come back tomorrow"; he'll have some great news for us.
After leaving his office, we started laughing. We were both totally confused and amused while curious and somewhat excited about our new friend Joe.

We went back the next day; he was in the middle of listening to his own show with all of his friends around (a bunch of other old guys who looked like retired movie executives). He pulled out a $20 bill and told us to go downstairs and get ourselves some lunch.
Strange, but ok, we went back downstairs to the deli and got some food from the hot food buffet. I loved that about NYC.
We went back upstairs and they were all laughing, having a good time, celebrating Joes broadcast, his jokes, patting him on the back for doing such a great job. It was a really funny sight. Again; a scene out of a movie. We even looked around to see if someone is filming all of this.
We sat around, along with his buddies, once in a while Joe would crack a joke, and do some small talk, kill a roach, and mumble something to himself. We kept looking at each other (Sarah and I) wondering how long we are going to sit there waiting for the "great news". Finally we asked Joe about the news.
"Oh, yes, yes" you are great kids, beautiful and talented. I've got some great news coming, come back tomorrow" I don’t know how he’d know we are talented but I guess beauty is talent too ;)

Well, Joe became our lunch ticket for the next couple of weeks, besides lunch he’d feed us the same line. One day while we sat up in his office, a girl with rollerblades came up and dropped off her headshot; she shook Joe’s hand and told him she’ll be back tomorrow. We saw several actors and models come up to his office.
I'm not sure what did for them, for us, nothing ever came of it, other than a great story and the joke "Great news coming! Come back tomorrow".
I'll never forget. Joe is a character that’s for sure.

Cheers to Joe.