Cash Out

by Marshall Thornton

  “It was in the newspaper this morning,” he added.

  “Oh, Daddy, they’ll work that out,” Becky said. “They always do.”

  “That’s not the question. The question is, should they? Maybe we should let the whole system go. Let people go back to taking care of themselves.”

  “I don’t know that we want old people dying in the street,” Louis said. “Noah, do you have your cough drops with you?”

  “In—my—room,” I struggled to say.

  “Let’s not talk about politics,” my mother said quickly, obviously having some sense that we weren’t going to like Cotton’s ideas. But then I didn’t think she liked his ideas either. What could she be thinking? That she’d spend the rest of her life changing the subject?

  I reached for water again. While I was taking a long gulp, my mother passed me a handful of cough drops, and said, “I think after dinner you should go lie down for a while.”

  I was twenty-nine-years-old, and my mother kept sending me to my room.

  “We need to talk,” I managed to squeak. But my mother ignored me and asked everyone what their plans were after lunch, dinner, drunch, whatever it was we were doing.

  Marc and Louis said they wanted to learn how to play craps and, hopefully, find Leon. Tina wanted to read by the pool. Reba offered to join her. Sonny and Becky—or rather just Becky—planned to go to an outlet mall she’d heard about. That made me wonder if they weren’t actually missing some clothes, after all. Becky joked that they’d have to buy an extra suitcase to make it home.

  Aunt Katie, though, wanted to spend the chips that had been left in her room. “For some reason, I feel lucky.”

  After that, the conversation continued in fits and starts. The waitress finally asked for our order. After she’d gone around the table, I made some quick calculations in my head and figured out the ten of us had ordered about fifteen pounds of food. It did arrive rather quickly, which gave us a subject of conversation—mostly positive—that lasted until it was time to turn down dessert. When the check came, Louis did have the courtesy to ask, “Are you sure we can’t pick this up?”

  Sonny said, “No, this is on our firm. Please don’t worry about a thing. It’s very important to me and my family that you all have a wonderful visit and that the wedding be something we’ll all remember for the rest of our lives.”

  And that made me wonder if there should have been toasts at dinner. No, that would be tomorrow night’s dinner. The rehearsal dinner—though what we’d be rehearsing, I wasn’t sure. Then I wondered if I’d have to make a toast. Probably. But what kind of toast should I make?

  Don’t do it, Mom! might not go over well. Really, the only smart thing I could think of to do was squeeze everyone back into Marc’s Infiniti—including my mom and run for the hills. Actually, we could leave Leon. He could stay as long as he wanted to and then fly back.

  As we left the restaurant, I managed to pull my mother aside. Quietly, I asked, “You know before, when we were talking about the casino being run by the mob? That’s all true.”

  “Yes, I think you’re right.”

  “You think… Mom, that would mean Sonny is a mob lawyer.”

  “I know. It’s kind of glamorous, don’t you think?”

  “Not really.”

  “I brought it up with Cotton—without mentioning the money—the way he explained it is that The Chicago Outfit—that’s their correct name—The Outfit bought the casino in order to launder money, but then they realized that they were making so much legal money running the casino it was silly to break the law.”

  I almost said, “And you bought that?” but decided against it. Instead, I politely said, “You have a suitcase full of money in your room. Probably mob money. Could that maybe—”

  “Don’t worry, dear, it will work out. You’ll see.”

  “Mom, is this really a good idea?”

  “This what?”

  “This wedding.”

  “Oh, you don’t like Cotton, do you?” She frowned when she said that, though I wondered if it was real sadness or polite sadness. Did it matter if I liked him?

  “I don’t know Cotton. But I do know something’s not right.”

  “I know, dear. But the thing is… getting married at my age is like buying a used car. It’s not going to come without problems.”

  And then Cotton was there, red-faced and smiling. He put an arm around my mother, she looked up at him and I swear she seemed happy. Was I being terrible? Would this all work out despite the suitcase full of money and the mob connections?

  After we all said ‘good-bye,’ I went up to my room. When I walked in, Leon was sitting on the sofa surrounded by a lot of cash. His bleached hair was plastered to his head and there was sweat beading on his upper lip. He looked up at me with bloodshot eyes and said, “I won.”

  “I thought you ran out of money?”

  “The pit bull gave me some.”

  After a beat I figured out what he meant, “The pit boss gave you credit?”

  He nodded, and then said again. “I won. The pit bull is really nice.”

  “Pit boss.”

  “That’s what I said—”

  “No, it’s—never mind. How much did you win?”

  “Almost two thousand dollars.”

  The day was beginning to have a theme.

  “My mother found a million dollars in her suitcase. Well, not her suitcase, obviously, a suitcase.”

  He frowned. I imagine I’d ruined his buzz. It was hard to be excited about two thousand when someone else got a million dollars without even playing the tables.

  “You’re lying.”

  “Why would I lie about that? There was a mix-up with the suitcases. She got the wrong one and we don’t know—”

  “Is it someone we know or a complete stranger?”

  That was a point I hadn’t considered. The gray suitcase could belong to a complete stranger. And if that was the case, how would we ever return the money and get my mother’s wedding dress back? Or explain why we’d been so quiet about the whole thing?

  On the other hand, with all that money she could certainly afford—

  “So, is that it? Is that all I missed?” he asked sarcastically.

  “I did kind of tell my mother marrying Cotton was not a good idea.”

  “You did?”

  “Well, it’s not a good idea.”

  “Yes, but you don’t tell her. What did she say?”

  “That Cotton was like a used car.”

  “Huh?”

  “She knows there are problems and she’s prepared to deal with them.”

  “This is all our fault,” Leon said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “She came to L.A. and what did we do? A little light breaking and entering. She’s developed a taste for crime.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. She was truly shocked to find that much money in a suitcase.”

  “But she didn’t tell anyone.”

  “Well, I suspect she thinks it might be Cotton’s.”

  “And she’s not calling off the wedding? She has developed a taste for crime.”

  “Stop saying that.”

  He frowned, then asked, “Where are Marc and Louis?”

  “They’re looking for you. And if they can’t find you, they’re going to learn to play craps.”

  “I want to learn how to play craps.”

  “Don’t you think you’ve done enough gambling?” I asked.

  He screwed up his face, seeming to consider the question. “Um, no. I’ve probably been gambling for about six hours. And the rest of the year I don’t gamble at all. I’d say I haven’t done nearly enough gambling.” He chewed his lip for a moment. “You’re right, I should go down and let Marc and Louis find me.”

  “I didn’t—You can’t just leave! My mother’s in trouble.” Of all my friends, Leon seemed to be the closest to my mother—God knows why. If anyone could sort out this mess—

  “It sounds like An
gie’s doing exactly what she wants.”

  “Embarking on a life of crime?”

  He shrugged and said, “To each his own?”

  An hour later, I was lying down listening to Louise Hay, affirming, affirming, affirming, and reading a book on creative visualization by Shakti Gawain at the same time. This, of course, was not how you’re supposed to do New Age. One at a time was probably much better, but I was trying to block out real life so I could drift off.

  After Leon callously walked out of our suite, I went into the bathroom to take my meds. I should have taken them with my meal so they didn’t upset my stomach, plus, I was supposed to take them three times a day. And I couldn’t figure out if I had. Everything was all screwed up because I was up most of the night and then slept through the morning. I had to try and get back on a schedule.

  As I lay on the bed all I could think—despite the book I was reading and the tape I was listening to—was how much this all sucked. I wasn’t even thirty and I had trouble figuring out how to take my medicine and I was laying down for a nap in the middle of the afternoon. I should be doing crazy things like drinking too much, gambling and chasing men. But that wasn’t how things were working out for me. The only excitement I ever had was finding dead bodies and worrying about my mother. Neither of which qualified as the fun kind of excitement.

  I knew I wasn’t going to sleep, even though the drapes were thick enough to make the room dark and the bed was snuggly and the pillows weren’t too—

  I was running down a long hallway. I kept looking over my shoulder to see who was chasing me, but I couldn’t see anyone. I could hear them, though. Footsteps slapping against a very hard floor. Getting closer. Frantically, I looked around for somewhere I could escape to, but there was nothing. Nothing but the long hallway in front of me, nowhere to turn, nowhere to hide. The footsteps sounded like they kept getting closer and closer. I told myself to scream. Maybe someone who’d be able to help me would hear. I opened my mouth—

  7

  The phone was ringing. Again.

  My eyes flew open. I was back in my hotel room. I pulled my earphones out, clicked Louise Hay off, and let Shakti Gawain fall onto the floor. I snatched up the phone sitting next to the bed. I was experiencing a heavy dose of déjà vu.

  “Hello?”

  “Noah?” It was my mother. “Come to my room.”

  “What? Again?”

  I waited to see if she was going to say she’d found another suitcase full of money, but she’d only say, “Please, come.”

  Major déjà vu. And it was only getting worse. Sitting up in bed, I glanced at the clock and saw that it was almost nine o’clock. I had actually slept for quite a while. I slipped into the bathroom and peed, brushed my teeth, and tentatively poked at my hair. Then I walked out into the living room. It was empty. Leon was still off playing craps or whatever. I stepped out into the hallway and knocked on my mother’s door. Aunt Katie opened it and said, “This is so bizarre.”

  “What is?” I asked, stepping into the suite. I glanced over to my mother’s bedroom and saw her standing next to the bed staring into an open suitcase. As I walked in, I saw that the suitcase was full of clothing.

  “Are those your clothes?”

  My mother nodded. On top was what looked like the silver suit she’d talked about getting married in.

  “And the suitcase with money is gone?”

  “Yes.”

  The idea that someone outside of our little group might have been responsible for the money flew out the window. The suitcase had to have been returned by someone who knew my mother. Or at least knew she was the bride.

  There was a knock on the door. Aunt Katie went to answer it. Meanwhile, I tried to figure out what the new suitcase—I mean, the old suitcase—might mean. Obviously, someone had come into the suite and exchanged them. But who?

  “You locked the suite, didn’t you?” I asked.

  “Yes, of course.”

  Aunt Katie returned with Marc and Louis. Marc held the camcorder in one hand.

  “Please don’t film this,” I said.

  “I won’t. That’s not why I brought the camera.”

  Okay, that made no sense. What else did you do with a video camera other than to tape—

  “The suitcases were swapped, right?” Louis said. “And the money’s gone?”

  “How did you—”

  “We couldn’t think of any other reason for Angie to call us like that.”

  “Oh.” That was actually reasonable.

  “So,” Marc said. “Since the suitcases had to have been swapped while we were at dinner, it makes sense that we should look through the video. Maybe we’ll see something that will tell us—”

  “Oh, that is a good idea,” my mother said.

  “Angie what time did you leave your suite?”

  She looked at Aunt Katie and said, “It must have been around three fifteen?”

  “Yes, I think it was around then,” Aunt Katie agreed.

  “We left a few minutes later,” Louis said. “We didn’t see anyone lurking around your door.”

  “I was running late. I didn’t see anyone either,” I said.

  “Sonny came late. Last, I think,” Louis said.

  “How did they even get in here to swap the suitcases?” my mother asked. She was hugging herself, obviously upset that someone had been in the room.

  “The maid might have let them in,” Aunt Katie suggested. “They’ll do that if they think it’s your room. You just tell them you locked yourself out.”

  “Or the manager,” Louis supplied.

  “Okay, I have the video queued up,” Marc said. He held the camcorder at arms-length. I hadn’t realized it before, but there was a tiny screen in the back of the camcorder that could display what had been taped. “Here we all are in the lobby.”

  In both hands, Marc held the camera as far away as he could. We squeezed around him to watch. The screen couldn’t have been more than four inches across. Still, there I was walking up to the group and putting my hand up to stop Marc’s filming me.

  “Turn the sound up,” my mother said.

  Marc did so and we could hear the conversation about the honeymoon in the Cayman Islands.

  “Fast-forward,” I said, impatient.

  “So, who’s missing at this point?” Louis asked.

  “Cotton, Reba, Sonny…” Aunt Katie said. “Reggie, of course, but she didn’t come at all.”

  “Leon never shows up either,” I said. “Where is he by the way?”

  “We left him at the craps table.”

  “Oh look, there’s Cotton and Reba,” my mother said.

  “Stop for a second,” I told Marc. He stopped the tape.

  “There’s a time code isn’t there?”

  “I think so, but I haven’t figured out how to turn it on.”

  “It’s probably not real time,” Louis pointed out. “It would be where you are on the tape. You need a synchronization program for that. This isn’t a professional camera.”

  “What do you know about cameras?” Marc asked, defensively.

  “I don’t. But in order to have a time code you have to have a computer chip, and the cheaper the camera the more primitive the chip.”

  Marc scowled at him, the way you do when people are right.

  “So, how long do we think it is before Cotton and Reba showed up?” I asked, since we were going to have guess.

  “It can’t have been long,” my mother said. “Five minutes at most.”

  “Which is not enough time to go to your room, find a maid to let him in, swap the suitcases, and then go back to his room,” I said.

  “He’d have had to already had a key,” Louis pointed out.

  “Yes, I think that’s true,” I said. “Mom, if it’s not Cotton, then you probably should talk to him. There could be a logical explanation and he might know it.”

  She pursed her lips and shook her head in a way that told me not to pursue this.

&nb
sp; “Can I start the tape again?” Marc asked.

  “Yes, please.”

  He hit fast-forward and the girls squabbled over Reba’s clothing choices in warp speed, then we all moved to the restaurant. The picture got jerky as Marc walked with us. We got to the Horseshoe Grill—Marc took a bit of time to video the entire entrance to the restaurant.

  The hostess led us to our table. Marc filmed it all but then became distracted by the life size brown-and-white pony. He devoted a lot of time to that. Too much. And then, he spun the camera around and picked us all up chatting and reading the menus.

  Really it seemed like nothing was happening—and then Sonny showed up.

  “Stop,” Louis said. “How long has it been since Angie and Katie left their suite?”

  “At least twenty minutes,” Aunt Katie said.

  “Possibly twenty-five,” my mother said.

  “That’s enough time,” Louis said.

  “How did he find us?” I asked. We hadn’t known for sure where we were having… drunch. That’s why we met in the lobby. “There’s more than one restaurant.”

  “You mean, he might have gone to more than one,” my mother guessed. “Which would mean he couldn’t have swapped the suitcases.”

  “Or, well, Cotton is the one who decided. Had he already—”

  Probably sensing that my mother wouldn’t like the direction I was going in, Louis said, “Keep going, Marc.”

  “But everyone’s arrived.”

  “We think the suitcase was swapped out before we ate, but what if it was swapped during dinner. Did anyone leave the table long enough to make the switch?”

  Marc hit the fast-forward button again. In warp speed, we chatted, ordered, and chatted some more. Sonny gave Cotton and my mother matching Rolex watches, then we went back to chatting.

  Then Cotton got up and went to the restroom.

  “Okay, slow down,” I said. “We need to figure out how long he was gone.”

  “Oh Noah, he didn’t,” my mother said. “He couldn’t have.”

  “We need to be sure. We need to exclude him,” I said, feeling like this was a real investigation.

  Speeding through the tape, Marc had focused on Becky and Sonny much of the time. I tried to remember what they were talking about. Were we already talking about the things we wanted to do in Las Vegas? Or had the conversation drifted back to politics? Right before getting up, Cotton had said something about how much he missed the Reagan years. I bit my tongue. I hadn’t been old enough to vote in 1980—nor was I that interested—but by 1984 I was already very aware that Reagan was doing basically nothing about AIDS and so I made a point to vote against him. Unlike Cotton—and Aunt Katie, who’d actually agreed with him—I did not miss Ronald Reagan.