Heart's Desire

by Laura Pedersen

  “I’ll assist you,” offers Bernard. “And then magically disappear right before your beau arrives.”

  “If you’re going to go to all this trouble then why don’t you just stay for dinner?”

  “We don’t want to intrude,” says Olivia. “Or intimidate the young man by suggesting that we’re evaluating him in any way.”

  “Okay,” I agree.

  “But if you insist.” Bernard snatches back the list and increases all the portions so there will be enough for six instead of just two.

  Gil is chuckling over at the chess table. I guess he saw this one coming about five moves ago.

  “What about flowers?” asks Bernard. “Will he bring an arrangement?”

  “Doubtful,” I say. Though Ray could usually be counted on for a six-pack and a bucket of wings.

  “Then I’m thinking agapanthus, asters, or maybe red tea roses with baby’s breath,” says Bernard.

  “I’ve always preferred a bouquet of Four Roses, myself,” says Olivia. It’s no secret that she and Ottavio enjoy their five o’clock cocktail.

  Bernard shoots her a look as if to say this is no time to be fooling around. “Now what about the music?” He walks over to inspect the CD collection.

  “I hadn’t thought about it,” I say. “Ray likes Supreme Beings of Leisure, Soulstice, and Blue 6.”

  “No, no, and no.” Bernard waves his pencil like a laser pointer.

  “They sound like cults,” adds Olivia. “If music be the food of love, play on.” She uses her quotable quote voice.

  “Virginia Woolf?” I ask.

  “No, Mr. William Shakespeare, author of the greatest love sonnets ever written.”

  “And the greatest tragedies,” adds Bernard.

  “Ray likes rap music,” I volunteer.

  “It’s a calamity that the listening public doesn’t appreciate the fact that rap music was pioneered by Rex Harrison in My Fair Lady and Bea Arthur in Mame speaking their lines because they couldn’t sing.” Bernard says this as he flips through his collection of albums and tapes. Then he pulls out a CD as if it’s the winning number in a lottery. “Chopin’s nocturnes!”

  “That’s a little too sober, don’t you think?” asks Olivia, as if it’s perfectly natural that she and her son should discuss the correct music for losing my virginity. “How about the Brazilian jazz album I found at that little boutique in New York.”

  “Mother, Eve’s Playground is not a little boutique. It’s a sex shop.”

  “Andrea Bocelli,” Ottavio casts his vote. “Romanza.”

  “How about Tom Waits?” suggests Gil, our resident rock-and-roll aficionado. “Heartattack and Vine.”

  “If you play that philistine music for one moment, I’ll be the one having the heart attack,” threatens Bernard.

  Rocky gambols over to the stereo as if he has a suggestion to add to the playlist. He puts on the CD of jungle noises that Brandt gave him and we all laugh when the sounds of birds chirping and monkeys screeching begins to come from the speakers.

  Fortunately Rocky has stayed on the straight and narrow since his spree and the Dirk Van Erp lamp was successfully repaired, so Bernard has completely forgiven him. And Bernard even admitted that since he’d also gone on a bender over a broken love affair, he supposed that Rocky was entitled to one, too.

  “There is a certain primitive quality to it, rather like that of early-American pottery,” says Bernard. “I think you’ve made an excellent choice.” He solemnly shakes hands with Rocky.

  Chapter Seventy

  WHEN I NEXT LOOK UP AT THE CLOCK, IT’S A FEW MINUTES after nine. Only now I’m no longer counting down the hours to Ray’s arrival tomorrow night so much as calculating that if I leave right now I can sit in for one more game of Texas Hold ’Em. Not winning the prize money has left almost a six-thousand-dollar gap in my tuition payment plan that I wouldn’t mind filling by bluffing, rather than buffing floors in the school cafeteria and adding to my loan portfolio. Or worse, have to leave school after the fall semester and work full-time for a year.

  Just as I’m about to back out of the driveway, Bernard comes dashing out the front door. I roll down the window.

  “You’re going to that poker game where you won all the money a few weeks ago?” he asks excitedly.

  “Yeah. I wouldn’t mind one more win before school starts.”

  “Do you think, um . . .” He rubs his hands on the front of his pantlegs. “You said yourself I’m getting pretty good. . . .”

  “Ooooh noooo,” I say. “That would not be a good idea.”

  “Why not?” he practically pleads with me. “Gil is here in case the girls wake up.”

  There’s no point in talking about how rich the game is since Bernard always has a ton of cash lying around because of his business dealings. Or arguing that he doesn’t know how to play. I’ve taught him the basics of Texas Hold ’Em, though not nearly enough strategy. “Listen, sometimes you still bite your lip and hold your breath waiting for a card you really need. And . . . and . . .”

  “What?” he says.

  “Instead of cursing, you say ‘good gravy.’ ”

  “I promise not to do any of those things!” he says hopefully.

  I take a minute to decide exactly how to put this, but unfortunately Bernard thinks I’m on the brink of giving in and begins to smile with expectation.

  “If you were out sick, would you want me to negotiate for one of those silver tea services you buy at estate sales and then resell to that guy Conrad in Toronto for almost double the price?” I ask.

  “No, I suppose not,” he finally agrees, and wishes me good luck before heading back inside.

  For some reason it’s a commonly held misperception that high-stakes gambling is a lot of laughs. Quite the contrary. Cappy will be the first to tell you that real gambling, if done correctly by measuring all the probabilities and studying your opponents, isn’t fun, but a job you should get paid for. And if you really do it right it can eventually become darn boring.

  At the intersection I wait impatiently while an old man crosses against the light. What is a person with a walker doing starting to cross when his signal is already yellow, about to turn red? Then I feel bad for having such thoughts. The guy is obviously in some amount of pain as he slowly pulls himself along. Probably arthritis. It’s good to be young and healthy, I think while I wait. But don’t let anyone tell you that just because your body works well and you still have all your hair that being young can’t be painful, too.

  I arrive at Bob’s just in time to get in before the first hand is dealt. The patio furniture has been replaced by some comfortable chairs and a large round table newly covered in burgundy felt so the cards won’t slip off the edges. There’s another lamp in the corner, and a haze of gray tobacco smoke lingers above the table like a rain cloud.

  “I thought you took the money from last month and ran,” Cappy jokes as he quickly exchanges my five hundred-dollar bills for chips.

  It appears that Cappy’s new venture has caught on, since tonight there are seven players seated around the table, all with large stacks of chips nearby. Four are from the last game I was at—Rod Green, Ed Kunckle, Seymour the Aussie guy, and good old Al. I don’t let on about his being laid off, but it certainly goes a long way in explaining why he looks so worn-out and cheerless. Meantime, Kunckle gives me a scowl as if I were the one who foiled his scheme to block Bernard’s adoption.

  There are two additional cigar chompers, one wearing a frayed suit and the other in men’s sportswear from the early 1990s, both looking as if they’re on parole from an OTB parlor. And finally there’s a real-live woman, one wearing enough face paint to suggest that somewhere there’s a kindergarten class without a mural. She’s poured into a low-cut filmy blouse and tight jeans topped off with a big bright gold belt buckle spelling Texas that matches her big bright gold hair. “Hey, gal,” she says. “Come on over and sit next to me and we’ll show these cowboys a thing or two!” She flutters
her heavily mascaraed lashes and tosses her mane in the direction of the open space, like a horse shaking off flies.

  There’s no doubt in my mind that Cappy is going to keep a close eye on Texas, since a good way to cheat if you’re a woman is to take out a lipliner or other cosmetic and secretly mark a couple of cards.

  Kunckle and I nod warily at each other like two basketball players right before the tip-off. Seymour the Aussie offers a friendly wave and points to the empty seat on his left. Rod Green gives me a look of mild disgust, and the stogie smokers hardly glance up, probably marking me down as nothing more than extra money in their pockets. Meantime, Texas seems thrilled to have another “gal” in the game. Only it doesn’t take 20/20 vision to determine that I’m no competition for her, at least when it comes to our racks, and I don’t mean chips. She has organized her bosom so that the fuchsia silk blouse assigned the task of housing it ends up as more of a suggestion than an actual functioning garment. However, this distraction serves to keep all the men busy trying to steal glances, during which time Texas easily takes the first few hands. And I’m left wondering if that might have been her intention in the first place, as in showing the men a thing or two means exactly that—or rather, those.

  Cappy is doing his usual job of policing the perimeter, making himself available to answer questions, settle any disputes, and otherwise ensuring that all his high-rollers are feeling safe and satisfied. He’s even throwing a few bucks to Bob’s waitress Janine, for bringing drinks back to us every so often.

  It’s a serious game with thousands of dollars in chips moving swiftly back and forth across the table. Everyone is deep in concentration and the only person who keeps any sort of patter going is Texas. “Don’t that rip the rag right off your bush,” she hoots while taking a round with a low pair and a king high. Though once again I can’t help but wonder if this stream of chatter isn’t also a ploy to keep the rest of us a little off balance.

  By mid-game it’s pretty obvious that Kunckle is out to get me, either for beating him on the final hand last time I played or for living with the Stocktons, or, more likely, on both counts. He smirks every time I lose a hand. When I have the goods he tries to raise me to where he knows I can’t afford to stay in. And if I run a bluff and scare everyone else off, he’ll hang in there and be what’s known as a “telephone booth,” constantly calling me just because he can afford to. It’s not as if I’m getting any terrific hands to begin with, but I certainly feel as if his deliberate sabotage is what grinds me down almost two grand after four long hours.

  By three o’clock in the morning it’s just Kunckle, Texas, Al, and me. I’m only out about eight hundred now, thanks to some lucky cards. However, we’re all starting to look pale and bleary-eyed except for Texas, who’s drinking her fourth Rob Roy and says she’s feeling “more wide-awake than a calf in a thunderstorm.”

  Finally there’s a hand that looks to be The One, at least for me.

  Chapter Seventy-one

  WHEN THE LAST COMMUNITY CARD COMES UP AS THE FIVE OF hearts I have a “steel wheel”—a straight flush when the ace and three of hearts that are my hole cards are combined with the two and four of hearts that are included in the community cards. It’s unbeatable, unless someone were to have a higher straight flush; but with the other cards showing—a two of diamonds and a three of spades, that would be impossible.

  Kunckle initiates the final round of betting and pushes in two stacks of chips—a thousand dollars. What the heck is he doing? I study the cards and decide he must have a full house, a pair in his hand that combines with the community cards to make fives over twos, or vice versa.

  Meantime, Al is concentrating on the row of five cards in the middle of the table so hard that it looks as if he’s deciding whether to snip the red or black wire of a ticking bomb. Finally he counts his remaining chips, then goes over to Cappy and borrows a fresh stack. Not only does Al see Kunckle’s thousand, but he raises two thousand! Is it possible that Al has four of a kind? Texas pushes a mound of chips toward the center and gleefully booms, “I’m going to pay my money and see the rodeo!” Perhaps another full house—fours over twos? Or maybe she has four twos? It’s absolutely the craziest round I’ve ever seen! Cappy, who doesn’t even get excited when he lights his pants on fire with his cigar, is standing behind us wide-eyed and practically slack-jawed.

  I’m the only one left to bet. If I play this one out as it is, with my straight flush I’m sure to win the seven grand that’s now in the pot! And if I were to raise, I could probably string Al along if indeed he has four of a kind. He’ll think I only have a full house and go back to Cappy and borrow another thousand or so, and end up losing that plus the two thousand he already borrowed, along with the two grand he’s already down for the night. Yet it suddenly occurs to me that if I don’t meet the call and the raise, I’m only out a grand while Al beats Kunckle and Texas. But does he have the pair of fours in his hand that will give him four of a kind when put with the pair of fours in the middle of the table? After studying him for a moment I decide that indeed he can make the four fours and if it weren’t for my hand, this enormous pot would be Al’s.

  The air in the room is palpably tense with every nerve strung like tension wire, tightly connecting hope on one end to dread at the other.

  “You guys are too rich for me,” I finally say, and fold up my cards.

  The Turd cannot hide the pleasure he takes in this defeat and sends an arctic smile in my direction. I return the favor by glowering at him as if I’m imagining how he’d look with daylight streaming through a few well-placed holes in his body.

  Kunckle is the first to turn over his cards while cockily proclaiming, “A flock of ducks,” meaning that he has four twos when his pair is combined with the community cards.

  “That’s about as welcome as a skunk at a garden party!” hoots Texas as she unveils her full house of fives over twos, which in any other game would surely have been the big winner. “Apparently this barn ain’t big enough for tonight,” she says, employing the slang name for a full house.

  However, Al silently reveals his winning hand of four fours, leaving both Texas and Kunckle slack-jawed with amazement, as the huge mountain of chips shifts ownership for the final time. They’re all incredible hands! Even more so when you consider the one I folded. It’s just too bad for the losers that they had to happen simultaneously.

  Al appears more relieved than anything else and wipes his brow with his sleeve. Kunckle nods and massages his undertaker’s jaw with his fingers. I assume he’s happy enough to have been bested by Al instead of me or Texas. One gets the feeling that Edwin Carbunkle the Turd thinks that women should be decorating houses, not trying to make full houses.

  After Al settles up with Cappy, he’s expanded his bankroll by about four thousand dollars. And Texas still has all the money she took off the deputy mayor, Kunckle, Seymour, and the other guys.

  “C’mon, all y’all, let’s belly up to the bar,” bellows Texas as if we’ve just finished bringing in the cattle after a long hard ride. “My treat. We’ll drown some bourbon!”

  “You bet, Texas!” says Al.

  “Sounds good to me,” adds Kunckle, and actually cracks a crooked grin.

  Jeez, maybe I should start thinking more along the lines of breast implants and peekaboo blouses rather than a new computer.

  Cappy places his hand on my elbow as I’m leaving. “Hang on a second,” he says. “I looked in the muck pile.”

  “You’re not supposed to do that!” I say. It’s a well-respected rule in any poker game that if a player folds, then no one, not even the dealer, is supposed to find out what cards they did or did not have. And there’s a good reason for this. People take note of whether you bluff or not and it’s an integral part of the game, especially when you’re talking about Texas Hold ’Em.

  “Well, I did,” says Cappy. “I’m not a player and it’s my game.”

  Only now his tone of voice is actually scaring me because it
’s the way I’ve heard him talk to deadbeat debtors on the phone. “I can only think of one reason you’d throw a straight flush, the highest hand there is, out the window.” I look down at the floor. “All the sudden you and this Al Santora show up at two games, you take a big hand last time, he takes it this time. What kind of fool do you play me for, kiddo? I admit that Kunckle is a pompous ass and that the deputy mayor can be a pain as well, but I run a clean game and they bring their friends.”

  “Al and I aren’t in cahoots, Cappy, I swear!” I’m suddenly so nervous that my voice is quaking. Cappy is not a guy whose bad side you want to be on.

  “Well, you happen to be in luck, because I’m still not able to figure out what kind of scam you two were running. I didn’t see any signals and neither of you touched any cards but your own. No mirrors, no tapping, no peering next door, nothing. Don’t tell me you have one of those electronic gizmos in your shoes. Do you?”

  I quickly kick off my shoes. “Cappy, Al . . . Al lost his job. He . . . he goes to my church—well, my parents’ church anyway.”

  “So what? You’re telling me you threw a seven-thousand-dollar pot to some guy who lost his job?” Cappy seems to consider this for a moment and then he laughs, but not in an aren’t-we-all-having-fun way so much as a menacing way. “You know, you almost had me there, but how could you have known that he had the four fours and not the full house or the deuces? What if Kunckle or Texas had them? They sure were betting as if they did.”

  Oh gosh, this is going from bad to worse. I shove my feet back in my shoes so they’re ready to catch the pee that’s going to be running down my legs in another minute. Every time Olivia gets arrested she likes to say that no good deed goes unpunished. I can hear the shakiness in my own voice as I attempt to explain. “I’ve played poker with Al for years. . . . He . . . He’s always twitching and lighting up and rushing everyone.”

  “Okay, I’ve noticed he’s acts a lot like a Mexican jumping bean.” Cappy’s eyes narrow. “So you’re saying this is some sort of a tell.”