Aces Up

by Lauren Barnholdt

  Recap of the night so far:

  Number of times yelled at by Mackenzie: Seventeen

  Number of drinks served: eight million

  Number of drinks spilled: eight drinks at one time

  Number of times butt was pinched by drunk poker-playing men: two

  Number of times was asked to procure fake birth certificate, possibly causing me to get fired, have to find dark alley, and/or be arrested: one

  For all this trouble, at the end of my five-hour shift, I will have made fifty dollars. After taxes, that works out to about forty dollars maybe? All this work for forty dollars. What a travesty. College textbooks can cost around a hundred and fifty bucks each. So I’ll have made about a quarter of a textbook. Not even, when you factor in the cost of the uniform I ripped. I’ll probably still owe them money.

  Adrienne walks out of the room, toward the bar area, mumbling something about food costs, so I turn around to ask Mackenzie nonchalantly if everyone has to have their birth certificate on file (has spilling drinks made me seem suspicious?), but she’s already left and is back out on the floor! Rude!

  Number of new friends made at work: zero. Sigh.

  ? ? ? ?

  By the end of my shift, my back is aching, I’m not getting any better at walking in heels, and although I manage not to spill any more drinks on people, I do spill a drink all over the floor in the bar area and almost cause one of the other waitresses, a girl named Tansy, to slip and fall and kill herself. (George, the bartender, catches her just in time, right before she goes down. She screams, “OHMIGOD, I ALMOST BROKE MY ANKLE!” and I apologize for ten minutes, but she won’t forgive me. At all. I know this because she tells me. She says, “Sorry, but I won’t forgive you. At all.”) Mackenzie is so annoyed with me that she decides we’re going to punch out three minutes early.

  “You know, you’ll get much better tips if you get a new attitude,” she says as she slides her card through the punch-out machine.

  “I don’t know,” I tell her, sliding my own card through. “Remember earlier when I tried to flirt? You yelled at me and then I spilled a big tray of drinks all over that man.”

  “You could learn,” she says. She pulls her tips out of her tip cup, sits down at one of the tables in the break room, and starts to count them. The chips make a clinking noise as she stacks them up. “And if you don’t want to flirt, just ask them about their poker playing, they love that.”

  “I don’t know the first thing about poker.” I sigh. I’m looking at the page in my notebook that has my Wellesley calculations on it. I subtract the forty dollars I made tonight, leaving the grand total of money still needed for my first year at $27,360. I tell myself that it’s okay, that I’ll start making more once I can keep my tips.

  But how am I going to do this Every. Single. Night? Is this what people mean when they talk about the real world? If so, I’m definitely not ready for it.

  “Whatever,” Mackenzie says, checking her BlackBerry for texts and then sliding it back into her bag. “I have to go. Lance is meeting me and we’re going to the concert upstairs.”

  At first I don’t bother asking who Lance is. Probably her boyfriend. Then I realize this might be why I’m horrible at making friends. Because I don’t take an interest in other people’s lives. “Who’s Lance?” I ask politely. “And what concert is it?”

  “The Killers,” she says, ignoring the question about Lance. She seems like she’s about to say something else, but she just shakes her head and gives me another look, like “OMG wow you’re hopeless,” and then turns on her heel and leaves. I decide to worry about her later, since I’m exhausted and have two hours of homework waiting for me.

  I force myself up from the table and over to my locker on the other side of the room, where I place my borrowed shoes gently on the floor, lining the toes up against the wall. I hope their owner finds them. I cannot afford to buy her new ones after a fifty-dollar (forty-dollar) payday.

  I seem to have lost the paper Adrienne gave me with my locker combination on it, and I’m definitely not about to go ask her for another one, so the combination takes me six tries, and when the door finally opens, a smooth cream envelope falls out. “Shannon” is written on the front in red cursive script. It’s sealed, and the back is stamped with a picture of two playing cards, the ace of spades and the ace of hearts. I turn it over in my hand, praying it’s some kind of employee-orientation thing or info on how to cash my paycheck. Then I have an awful thought: A pink slip?

  I slide the paper out—one sheet—and am relieved that it’s white. I think maybe pink slips are actually pink.

  Dear Shannon,

  Please come to room 2123 in the Grand Mahnan Tower Hotel of the Collosio Casino immediately to discuss an extremely important matter. If you choose to ignore this request, FURTHER ACTION WILL BE TAKEN.

  I look around, half expecting to catch one of the waitresses hiding behind a table, a hand over her mouth to cover the giggles. But I’m all alone. I look at the letter again, hoping I’m not in trouble. There’s no way they already could have found out I was working here illegally, is there? I mean, this letter isn’t even signed and they spelled my name wrong. If they found out I was underage, wouldn’t it be all official-looking and signed by someone with a scary-sounding title, like Head of Casino or Security Manager?

  I’m tempted to just ignore it, because I really am completely exhausted and desperate to get home. But if it is something important, I don’t want to be accused of skipping out on meetings on my first day. I already haven’t made the best impression, what with the spilled drinks and my hips destroying one of their uniforms. So I sigh, shove my street clothes into my bag, and then head toward the elevator and the Grand Mahnan Tower Hotel.

  There’s a hot guy in the elevator, so I almost wait for the next one, mostly because I’m not that great around guys, especially hot ones. I haven’t had much practice with them, and the ones I have had practice with haven’t exactly left me with the best track record.

  But then the elevator doors start to close and Hot Guy reaches his arm out to make them stop. Which is kind of sexy. I mean, his arm could have gotten cut in half. I totally saw something like that on Discovery Health. And then he says, “Are you getting on?” and I have no choice but to step in, because to say no would make me look like a complete loser and/or a lunatic, because why wouldn’t I want to get on the elevator when I was clearly and obviously waiting for it?

  “Thanks,” I say.

  “No prob,” he says. He has his cell phone out, and he’s scrolling through his texts.

  I sneak a look at him out of the corner of my eye. Floppy dark hair, baggy jeans, a leather jacket over a faded gray T-shirt with some band name on it I’ve never heard of. His face is scruffy, and he’s holding a pair of dark sunglasses in one hand, his cell in the other.

  We don’t say anything at first, which is kind of awkward. At least, it is for me. Probably not for him—he doesn’t look like the kind of guy who feels awkward about things. I’m contemplating whether I should say something, or at least maybe pretend to look at my own texts, but then, right around the seventh floor, he laughs loudly at something on his phone.

  “Funny text?” I say, because it seems like maybe he wants me to remark on it, and also because, you know, anything is better than silence.

  “You have no idea,” he says, still scrolling. He doesn’t offer any more information. Alrighty then. The numbers in the elevator are going up super-slowly, inching their way to twenty-one. Ten, eleven … Seriously, what is up with this elevator? I hope it’s not broken. I don’t think I’d do very well being stuck in here. “I’m Cole,” the guy finally says, holding his hand out.

  “Shannon,” I say, taking it. Wow. He has big hands. Mine gets totally enveloped in his, and I say a quick prayer that I don’t have sweaty or disgusting palms from all the drinks I served tonight.

  “So what are you up to tonight, Shannon?” he asks. But he’s already gone back to looking at
his phone, now scrolling through what look like his e-mails.

  Something tells me that “Um, nothing” is probably not the coolest answer, nor is “I have to get home, because my parents don’t know I’m working at the casino.” And even though he’s just some hot guy in the elevator who I will probably never see again, I don’t want him to think I’m a loser, so I just smile and say, “On my way home.”

  “On my way home” could mean anything. It could mean that I’m going home so that I can change and go out to the clubs. It could mean “on my way home to call my hot boyfriend.” It could mean “on my way home to my fabulous apartment, where I live alone and throw tons of fab parties” or it could mean “on my way home to …”

  “Then why are you going up in the elevator?” he asks. He slides his phone into the pocket of his jacket and looks at me.

  Oh. Right. “I have a, uh, business meeting,” I say, a little more defensively than I intended. But honestly, what’s with the twenty questions? I mean, what is he, the Elevator Police?

  “In room 2123?” he asks. “Yeah, that’s where I’m going, too.”

  “You work here?” I ask, surprised. Most of the dealers I’ve seen tonight are older. The one guy I saw who was even remotely around my age was wearing pink socks, had a double ear piercing, and spoke little to no English. But maybe Cole isn’t a dealer. Maybe he’s a waiter in one of the restaurants, or maybe he works security.

  “You have no idea,” he says again, and smiles as if to say, “Isn’t this place crazy?” He has a nice smile. Nice teeth. White and straight. I smile back.

  Number of potential new friends at work: one. One very hot guy, which might actually count as two. At least one and a half, definitely. Yay!

  The elevator pings at floor twenty-one, and we both step out.

  “So where do you—” I start, but before I can finish, his hands are suddenly on my back, hard and strong, and he’s pushing me roughly toward the room across the hall. The door to the room is propped open by something, and he pushes it with his free hand, taking me with him.

  “What the hell?” I say, not sure what’s going on. He pushes me again, and I catch a glimpse of a plaque that says “2123” outside the door, and then I’m stumbling and tripping into the room, totally off balance.

  I look around, praying this is some kind of workplace prank, but as my eyes adjust to the darkness (and smokiness, eww) of the empty hotel room, it only takes me a second to realize this isn’t a joke, and that following an anonymous note left in my locker was definitely not one of my smartest ideas. And then I hear the sound of Cole shutting the door behind me. Okay, I think, don’t panic. My heart starts pumping in my chest and I turn around to try to get the hell out of there.

  But Cole’s blocking my way, and the click of the dead bolt latching echoes through the room. “Relax,” he says. “I just want to talk to you.”

  In movies, when someone just wants to talk to you, it means they just want to kidnap, kill, or rape you. Or maybe sell you into slavery. So I open my mouth, reach deep into my lungs, and scream.

  I surprise even myself with how loud it is.

  “Whoa, whoa,” Cole says. He reaches behind him, unlocks the door and holds up his hands. “Relax, relax, I’m not going to hurt you.”

  I reach into my bag and pull out a can of hair spray. I wrap my hand around the base and swing it at him. “Stop!” I say. “I have Mace.”

  “That’s hair spray,” Cole says, ducking as he moves past me, further into the room. My wild swing doesn’t even make contact.

  “It is not,” I say. “It’s Mace.” But my voice falters. Cole sits down on the bed, then takes his jacket off and throws it over the chair in the corner.

  “Chill,” he says. He pulls a cigarette out from behind his ear, picks a lighter up off the table by the bed, and lights it. He takes a long drag and then blows smoke rings into the air.

  I narrow my eyes at him and glance at my now-clear path to the door. I take my phone out and slide it open, just in case I need to dial 911, and look around the room for something I can use as a weapon. Why oh why didn’t I take a self-defense class instead of stupid Young Meditators? But now that the path to the door is open, my heart rate starts to slow down just a little bit.

  “Seriously, Shannon Card,” Cole says, studying me. “You need to learn how to relax.”

  “Relax?” I practically scream. “You pushed me into your hotel room and now you want me to relax?” Does he not watch 48 Hours Mystery? They always start somewhere sketchy, like a casino or a hotel room. A hotel room in a casino is like a double whammy. “And how do you know my last name?” I cross my arms at him in what I hope is a threatening manner.

  “I didn’t push you in here,” he says. He rolls his eyes like he thinks I’m being super-dramatic. You know, like I’m some crazy girl freaking out over her boyfriend wanting to hang out with his friends on a Saturday night or something instead of the fact that some crazy guy is attempting to kidnap her. “You came in of your own accord.”

  “No, I didn’t,” I say. “You grabbed me in the hallway and pushed me in here.” I open the door and check the little sign outside. Yup. Room 2123. “You,” I say, “were waiting for me in that elevator.”

  “No one forced you to follow my note,” he says. He leans back further on the bed and blows another smoke ring toward the ceiling.

  “I thought it was some kind of employee meeting!” I say. “I didn’t know you were a psycho who wants to kill me!”

  “I don’t want to kill you,” he says.

  “You want to sell me into slavery, then,” I say.

  “Is that what you think?” he asks. “That I want you to be a slave?” He stabs his cigarette out in the ashtray on the table next to him and gives me a cocky grin like “Oh my God, you are so naïve and funny.”

  “Whatever,” I say, turning the doorknob again and pulling the door back open.

  “Hey, wait, wait,” he says, standing up. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” I stop but keep one hand on the doorknob.

  “Do not,” I say, “come any closer!” I hold the hair spray out. It may not be Mace, but I could definitely whack him in the head with it. Or at least spray it in his eyes until he was writhing around on the floor in pain.

  “Okay, okay,” he says, holding his hands up. He takes a step back. “Listen, I don’t want to kill you or hurt you or sell you into slavery.”

  “Then what do you want?” I ask.

  “This is you, right?” He pulls a crumpled-up piece of paper out of his pocket. He’s still a few feet away, but I can tell what it is. An Internet printout of an article from our local newspaper, the Whitinsville Eagle. HIGH SCHOOL JUNIOR WINS BIG AT MATH DECATHLON, it says. It’s accompanied by a picture of me smiling into the camera and looking a little cross-eyed. Also, I’m wearing a white shirt, which has the unfortunate effect of making it look like my head is floating in midair.

  Uh-oh. Is this some kind of trick? Is Cole actually casino security, trying to fool me into admitting I’m only seventeen? I square my shoulders and pretend I have no idea what he’s talking about.

  “No,” I say, squinting at the picture and hoping I look super-confused. “I’ve never seen that girl in my life.”

  “It says your name underneath it,” Cole points out. Damn.

  “What do you want?” I ask again, letting the door go. It closes behind me. “If you’re trying to blackmail me, good luck with that. I have seventeen dollars to my name, so if you want to go through all this trouble for that, then be my guest!” I pull open my purse and shake my money onto the ground in a pathetic storm of fives and ones. I was trying to sound haughty, but it didn’t come out that well. “And where did you get that printout, anyway?”

  “Googled you,” he says.

  “Why were you Googling me?” I ask suspiciously.

  “We do a standard background check on all the new employees.”

  “We?”

  “Aces Up.”

  “What�
��s ‘ay says up’?” I ask. Definitely sounds shady.

  “It’s a poker society,” he says. “And we want you to join.”

  I frown. “A poker society? I don’t know anything about poker.”

  “We want to teach you.” He looks at me intently, his dark eyes serious. “We think with your math skills, you might be able to win a lot of money.”

  “How much?” I ask in spite of myself. I mean, I would never gamble for money. a) I can’t risk losing everything. b) Gambling is shady. And c) I’m underage. Lying to get a job is one thing. Lying to gamble is another thing completely. But still. Now that Cole doesn’t seem as dangerous, and my path to the door is clear, I’m slightly intrigued.

  “Lots.” In this light, he looks a little bit like Casey Affleck. But I will not be swayed by mopsy hair and dimples. Especially when I’m smart enough to know that nothing comes for free, especially money.

  “Yeah, well, assaulting me outside the elevator? Not the way to get me to join your stupid society,” I say.

  “Aces Up is secret,” he says, waving his hand like it makes perfect sense. “We have to be careful who sees us together.”

  “I don’t want to be a poker player,” I say. I open the door again, and my feet sink into the soft carpet of the hallway. “I don’t want to be a gambler of any kind. And so I’m leaving.” I take one step outside, waiting for him to call after me or at least threaten to tell I’m underage. “Aren’t you going to try to stop me?” I ask, turning back around.

  “Nope,” he says. And then he looks me up and down, like he’s sizing me up. But not the way guys usually do, like they’re trying to figure out if they want to hook up with you. It’s more like he’s giving me a try-out of some sort. In fact, it’s kind of … sexy. Way sexier than the other kind of sizing up. But then I remember there’s nothing sexy about accosting me in an elevator and trapping me in a hotel room.

  And then I figure it out. He’s pretending he doesn’t need me, so that I’ll be all, “I want to be a famous poker player, oh, please please please!” Ha! He obviously doesn’t know who he’s messing with. “I’m leaving,” I say again, forcefully this time.