by Lori L. Otto
“Good!” our drummer says, walking over and putting his arm around her. “You any good at blackjack?”
“No,” she says.
“Then I bet you’re good luck. Come stand next to me.” He finds an empty seat across from Damon and sits down. I watch them play until another stranger runs out of chips and walks away.
“Join us, Will,” my best friend says. I trade my cash in for chips and take a deep breath before putting two red ones onto the table. One-twentieth of my cash. Everyone else is already much riskier. If this were pool, I’d be all about high-stakes, because I know what I’m capable of. But this isn’t skill-based. This is luck of the draw. I know we’re all making decent money on performance royalties, and I’ve got more coming in on older songs I’ve written–not to mention the check I just got–but I know what it’s like to have nothing, and I doubt it’d be difficult to find my way back there.
“Live a little, Will.”
It’s like Damon can read my mind. He’s most likely reading the expression I’m not even trying to hide, though.
The dealer lays down two cards. When I pick them up, they’re two eights. Of course. Now I get to put down a tenth of my cash on my first hand. When he comes back around to me, I look up, unsure what to do next. “I want to split my cards.”
“Put them down on the table.” I look at Tavo, setting the cards down. “Face up.”
“Have you never even watched poker?” Damon asks.
“No, I haven’t,” I say, flipping the cards over.
“We play all the time on the bus. You’re sitting right there,” Tavo says.
“I’m zoned out,” I explain. “You know my mind’s somewhere else.”
“I need two more red chips.” The dealer’s a little impatient with my lack of knowledge of his game, and I’m frustrated because I don’t like not knowing things. I lay two more fives down so he can show me my fate. A ten and an ace.
“Those are good, Will,” Peron says. “You just have to wait to see if he beats you.”
“I know that much.” I stare at the dealer’s six and king, remembering that Tavo said he had to hit on sixteen, regardless. With a two or three, I break even. With a four or five, I lose. With a one, six or higher, I win both. My odds are pretty good. Already, I find I don’t have a good poker face as a smile breaks through.
He deals himself an eight, and I feel the rush of excitement in my belly. I just doubled my money! Aside from the grin, I keep my cool, collecting the chips and stacking them neatly in front of me.
“Put your chips in if you want to play the next game,” Maribeth’s friend says to me as she puts her hand on my shoulder. “He’ll skip right past you if you’re not ready.”
“Cool, thanks.” I push fifteen in.
“You ordered a Coke?” the waitress says over my other shoulder.
“Thank you,” I reach around to get my wallet, touching the stranger in a very inappropriate spot as I reach behind me. “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay,” she says, laughing and blushing.
I hand the waitress a tip.
“That was completely inadvertent. You know that, right?”
“I know. You were going for your wallet.”
“I was. I didn’t realize you were so close.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I’m sorry,” I repeat.
I win that hand, too, and then start to keep track of cards that have been used. It’s not intentional at all. I can't help but remember them. We’re playing with four decks, so it’s not a sure thing every time, but I’m winning more hands then I’m losing and getting more and more confident with my bets. My friends are on to me, cheering me on to bet more, and I suspect the dealer is, too, with the looks he keeps giving me.
I get up more than once to get cash out of the ATM, and I decide to call Shea after seeing that she’s texted me a few times. I take the phone outside where it’s quiet.
“Hi!”
“Hello to you… you sound like you’re in a great mood,” I say to her.
“Have you talked to Livvy?”
“My talk-time with Liv is rationed through my brother,” I explain off-handedly.
“What?”
“Nothing,” I tell her, laughing to myself. “What does Livvy have to say?”
“She thinks that I might be able to do something with the baby food.”
“Yeah? Like what?”
“Well, she made too much one day and took it with her to some mommy group she goes to with some other women she met at some place… the Tiga House?”
“TiBa House. It’s a frou-frou society place in Manhattan for rich people.”
“Oh, then that makes even more sense. Anyway, she passed out containers to the moms, and they all wanted more from her. She told her she got it from a friend–she didn’t tell them she made it, or that she had a recipe. She sort-of saw an opportunity and gave me a call.”
“So, you’d sell the recipe?”
“No, Will. She wants me to come to New York and make it… daily. All of these women said they’d pay a lot to have someone make fresh, organic food for their babies. So she suggested I fly out and give it a shot for a few weeks. See if I could grow the business by word of mouth.”
“Wow! What do you think?”
“I’m finishing up my laundry now. My flight leaves in the morning.”
I try to hold in my excitement as best as I can, but it’s a great feeling knowing she’s considering the move to Manhattan. “Where will you stay?”
“Livvy and Jon said I could stay in their guest room where we stayed over that one night, just until we decide whether or not it’s going to work. Then I can move on from there.”
“That’s great, Shea. Incredible! I’m literally jumping up and down right now. People on the strip are looking at me like I’m crazy.”
She giggles into the phone. “You’re still sticking to your two-hundred-dollar limit?”
“Yep,” I tell her. Since I still have that and much more, I may as well not tell her I’ve taken considerably more out of my account now.
“Anyway… I thought you’d be happy.”
“More than happy. And if this doesn’t pan out, please don’t give up on New York as a whole, okay? I’ll be home in a few weeks. We have a few months together before I leave. We can find a place to live. If you need to look for another job, I’ll help.”
“I’m giving this a chance, Will. I’ll need to come back and move my stuff for real, but I was hoping you could help me with that after the tour.”
“I will load your things and drive the truck. I bet I could even recruit Damon.”
“Thank you.”
“If you want to get a head start looking for a place, go ahead. Just don’t get your heart set on anything. Ever. The second you do, someone else will rent the place right out from under your nose. That’s how it works in New York.”
“That sounds horrible.”
“It is horrible. You’re more than welcome to wait. It’s been awhile since I’ve had to do it, but I have a little experience.”
“I think I’ll wait.”
“I’ve been meaning to ask you. Do you like dogs? I’ve always wanted a dog. I’ve never had one.”
“I love dogs.”
“That’s cool. Very cool. Maybe we’ll get a dog someday.”
“Oh, Will!” she exclaims. “Could we?”
“Let’s see how things go,” I answer vaguely.
“Okay.” I can tell she’s smiling, still happy at the idea of it. “I need to run! I have so much to do!”
“Call me in the morning. Before you leave, after you land. When you get home,” I suggest, loving the sound of that.
“I will. Love you so much, Will. I can’t wait for you to join me there.”
“I can’t wait, either. I love you, Shea.” After she hangs up, I go back to the table where Tavo’s in the middle of a hand. I tap him on the shoulder.
“Yeah?”
“Do
es your uncle still raise those big terriers?”
“The Airedales? Yeah.”
“I want one. A puppy.”
“I think they just had a litter a few weeks ago… let me see if they have any left.”
“I don’t need a show dog. I need a guard dog. Hey, everyone!” I say to all of my friends. “Shea’s moving to New York tomorrow!”
“Holy fuck…” Damon’s shaking his head as he looks up at me from the hand he just lost. “You’re gonna move in together?” I nod my head, still smiling. He looks around the casino, up in the air at all the chandeliers, then grabs his biceps. “This is what it looks like? I thought it’d be much colder…”
“Any flying pigs?” Peron adds to my best friend’s completely obvious suggestion that Hell froze over.
“Not a fucking one of ‘em. Come here,” he says, grabbing me into a hug. “I’m happy for you, Will. Truly, I am. I’ll miss my partner in crime, but I knew it couldn’t last forever.”
“Thanks. You guys have to check in on her when you’re in town and I’m gone,” I tell them.
“Gladly,” he taunts me.
“I’ll go with him,” Peron says, approaching me with outstretched arms.
“I knew I could count on you.”
“Maybe I have a room of my own now, too… huh, Damon?”
“We’ll talk,” he says. “You gotta break the chains with Mommy and Daddy before we’re becoming roomies. That shit’s ridiculous.”
I laugh at his terms, agreeing with them as I take my seat at the table. I know Peron will be so much happier living his life the way he wants to, being open and honest with his parents–even if they don’t approve of all of his decisions. He’s a great guy. They should be proud of him for who he is and not the few faults he has, or the minor mistakes he makes in their eyes.
“High stakes?” I ask Damon, nodding to the glassed-in section of the casino that he had been eyeing all night.
“Yeah?” I nod. “I’m in. Guys, we’re heading to the room.”
“I’m staying out here,” Tavo says.
“Me, too,” Bradley confirms. Peron nods his head, too.
“I didn’t know you’d won that much,” he says to me on the way in.
“Well,” I say, not admitting that I’d taken out more cash. He could end up finding out soon anyway.
Two hours later, I stare into the bottom of an empty coffee mug, wondering if I should pour myself another cup and sit here or just head up to my room where I’ll lie awake and stare at the ceiling until the sun comes up.
“You’re freaking me out, Will. Just talk to me,” Damon says. “You’ve never been this silent for this long.”
Addict. What the fuck made me think that gambling was a good use of my time? I obviously can’t do things like normal people can do. Something is fucked up in my head that makes it impossible for me to say no; to draw a line when enough is enough. I have no limits. No boundaries. When things start feeling good–when I start feeling that high–I just can’t stop. I just can’t fucking say no.
“Sixty-seven-hundred dollars.”
“What?”
I decide to pour myself another cup when I feel the urge to throw the dish at the wall across from me. If I were to go up to the suite, I honestly think I’d start tearing the place apart, which would lead to damages, and more fucking money thrown away on a night I’m already regretting.
“Give me a packet of sugar.” He tosses me two. “Thanks.”
“I know you’re not telling me that’s how much money you lost tonight.”
“I’m not telling you that. I can’t form that sentence. I’m smarter than that, Damon. My IQ proves that I’m smarter than someone who blows that kind of money on a game of chance.”
“Fuck…”
I’m too ashamed to look him in the eye.
“Will, this has nothing to do with intelligence. It was a bad decision. That’s all.”
“No shit, Damon.”
He’s silent for about a minute. “Wait, are you telling me you were just up that much money, and you lost it?” I glare at him, giving him his answer. “I thought you only brought two-hundred with you.”
“The cash machine’s right by the men’s room.”
“You’re not supposed to bring down your debit card.”
“That would have been good precautionary advice to give me before I left my room. But I’m sure you were betting on the IQ, and the fact that I’m smarter than this, yeah?”
“Dude, if I had any iota you were getting money out–”
“Where’d you think the cash was coming from?”
“I thought you must have traded some of your chips in for some reason… like you were trying to hold it back when you won it earlier.”
“What a smart man would do.”
“Stop beating yourself up, Will.”
“I have a healthy respect for money, Damon.” My heart starts palpitating quickly, and I feel like I’m hyperventilating when I realize how much money that was. What I could have bought with that. “What the fuck?”
“Calm down.” He starts breathing in and out slowly, trying to get me to follow along. “It was a mistake, okay? That’s all this was. I didn’t even think about… your issues, okay?”
“It is that, right?” I ask him.
He nods his head and smiles at me sympathetically. “You wouldn’t listen to me at all, Will. It was like once you had a taste for winning, there was no stopping you–even when you couldn’t stop losing.”
“I lost my focus,” I tell him. “When we were out at the main tables,” I start, looking around to make sure we’re alone, “you know I was keeping track of the cards, right?”
“I figured as much.”
“It wasn’t conscious. They were just like any numbers in my head that stick around and plague me. But once we started playing for more money, I couldn’t concentrate on the cards anymore. I kept thinking about winning the hand; how much more money it would yield. Those were the numbers sticking around. Normally, I could juggle both and much more, but I just wanted more money and that feeling of winning. It was a good feeling, you know? To win that hand. To beat that smug dealer. It felt fucking good every time he pushed more chips in my direction. It’s a high like I feel when people scream for us after each song on stage, or when I’m learning someone’s kiss that I’ve never kissed before. It’s a quick and temporary fix. It doesn’t last long, but I know how to make it happen again… and I just wanted to do it over and over, you know?”
“Yeah, that sounds a lot like an addict, Will.”
“Fuck me.”
“It’s sixty-seven-hundred dollars, Will. It could have been a lot worse, knowing how much you just got paid, right?”
“Not much,” I mutter.
“So you figured out another thing you need to stay away from. Gambling. Big fucking deal. We walk away. We’re leaving Vegas tomorrow anyway.”
“I’m such an idiot.” I start pulling on my hair.
“Fucking stop that, Will.” He smacks my forearms to get me to stop. “You’re the farthest thing from an idiot. You know what you are? Imperfect. Flawed. You’re flawed. That’s it. And you know what? I’m glad it’s something bigger than your fucking mustache that doesn’t grow evenly. Because you were starting to make me feel a little insecure, and I, Damon Littlefield, should not be feeling insecure around you.”
I laugh lightly.
“You knew you had those addict qualities. Were you not one-hundred-percent convinced you were an addict before now? I mean… I kinda was.”
“Walking away from the sex was too easy,” I tell him, “So I wasn’t convinced.”
“You have Shea. You have the promise of sex anytime she’s around. It’s not like you had to quit. People in recovery programs, Will, they have to quit. You’re not in recovery. You’ve just paced yourself and picked one exquisite bottle to quaff exclusively.”
“So, are you an addict?” I ask him, knowing he’s always partaken in sex
just as much as I have.
He shakes his head. “I don’t need it, Will. I just like it. It’s just fun for me.”
Fun. The fact that he just described sex as fun makes me realize he’s likely not an addict at all. To me, I would never describe it as fun. Before Shea came around, there was always an urgency about it for me. There weren’t heavy emotions tied to sex, but there was substantial need to fulfill something that was missing in me, and it wasn’t a desire to simply have fun.
With Shea, I was naturally drawn to her–in a chemical, physical, spiritual sense. She alone and wholly became my desideratum. Not for sex. For more than just sex. For everything. Maybe she was that missing thing in me, and without knowing it–without knowing I could be that to someone else–I provided something of value to her, too.
Is she my new addiction? I saw briefly what life was like without her. The earth still spun on its axis. Stars still shone. The moon would still wax and wane as it always had. My life would go on if she wasn’t in it. But sleep would elude me like it had before. That was my withdrawal. How I coped with it was key. And now I know how. She’s shown me how incredible it is to be with her, and to be in love with her, but she’s also given me the one thing I need to live without her, and that’s hope.
I don’t think there will ever be another woman like Shea, but if we were to go our separate ways some day, I now know what it’s like to love and be loved, and I’m sure it’s something I want for myself. I would always have hope for love to find me again. So while my restless mind might keep me awake at night, I know that concentrating on the prospect of finding someone else would calm me, would quiet the constant barrage of thoughts. I would sleep. I would find a way. It’s not so different than what I do on these lonely nights on tour, and what I’ll do when I’m thousands of miles away from her in Abu Dhabi.
I am not addicted to Shea.
I’m simply in love with her. And right now, I don’t need to worry about a life without her in it.
“What do you want to do, Will? You wanna go write?”
Tonight was a mistake, but an honest one. A costly, honest mistake. All I can do is learn from it, at this point. Learn from it, stop beating myself up over it, and recognize that this probably won’t be the last time my addictive tendencies take control and cause some sort of temporary insanity. Fortunately, no one got hurt in the process. Hopefully, no one will the next time, either. But this is part of who I am, and I have to forgive myself just like I’ve forgiven my mother. Just like I’m considering doing for my father.
