Lawn Boy(33)

But then, don’t dreams do the same thing?

So, yeah, on the surface, walking to the casino last night was probably not a wise decision, not for a guy with two hundred seventeen bucks to his name. It was a dry seventy degrees with a slight breeze, so the trees whispered all around me. There were hardly any cars on the road. The old Milky Way was spray-painted across the sky, and when I stopped on the gravel shoulder to look up at it, it didn’t seem hostile, just vast. It was almost a relief to see the casino squatting on the bluff, a garish display of throbbing light.

At first, I only withdrew sixty bucks from the ATM, so it’s not like I wasn’t showing some restraint. And I was up eighteen bucks by midnight, which is two salmon dinners, if you’re doing the math, so it’s not like I was losing. In fact, I was feeling downright impervious to the odds, convinced I could recoup all the money I’d blown if I just played it smart. I guess you could say I was thinking big when I staked myself to another sixty bucks and took to the blackjack tables.

I recognized the dealer by the little scar running down her cheek. She used to work at the Masi, an Indian lady about my mom’s age, and like my mom, she looked tired and worry-worn in her rumpled work uniform. She didn’t seem to recognize me, or maybe she was trained not to be too familiar with patrons. Not that she wasn’t friendly. Even when I was up thirty-eight bucks, there seemed to be pity in her eyes. Her name tag said GEORGIA. Sweet Georgia, with the little pink scar on her cheek and the pity in her eyes. She was my lucky charm for the next hour and a half.

Before long, I was up eighty bucks. Then a hundred four. Then one twenty-six. Then one seventy! No, not life-changing money, not even enough to impress anyone at the table, but with every chip I collected, something was redeemed—a fishing pole, a DVD, a singing bass. And sweet Georgia was my redeemer, my dealer of good fortune. It was like she wanted me to win. If I ever found a stray cat or managed to buy another truck, I vowed to name it Georgia.

I was up two twenty-five when Georgia’s shift ended. That’s when the guy next to me, who was down big, cut his losses and called it quits. I probably should’ve done the same, but I was thinking big. I asked myself WWCD, as in, What would Chaz do? And I knew without a shadow of a doubt, Chaz would keep laying down his chips.

The new dealer was fresh. Clean and pressed, like he just woke up and took a shower and shampooed his beard. His name tag said PHILLIP. He had a sharp nose and a wolfish grin, and unlike Georgia, there was no pity in his small eyes. The first hand he dealt me was an eight up and an eight down, then he hit me with a queen. The next three hands looked about the same. Before I knew it, I found myself back at the ATM for sixty more bucks and paying another three-dollar surcharge, determined to win my money back.

Well, you can guess how it all ended, kiddos. Old Mike Mu?oz shit the money bed. Yep, I lost everything—and mostly on decent hands, too. I don’t blame Phillip, but if I ever find out which car is his, I’ll slash his goddamn tires anyway.

“The casino offers a free door-to-door shuttle,” he offered, sweeping up the last of my chips.

“Blow me,” I said.

I left the casino on foot. With fifty-eight cents in my pocket, and twenty-eight dollars left in my checking account, I began the long, dark walk home. The stars were still out, and once I got away from the highway, I found a little peace. Things were only slightly worse than when the night began. What was two hundred bucks in the big picture? Nothing like the breadth of the night sky to make your worldly troubles seem insignificant.





Miguel Is El Mejor After leaving the casino, I was about a mile down Suquamish Way when headlights washed over me, and a beat-up pickup slowed to a crawl as it passed. The driver promptly hit the brakes and swerved to the shoulder, stopping altogether. The way my luck was running, it gave me the creeps.


The pickup sat idling hoarsely on the dirt shoulder for a few seconds as I froze in place, aglow in the red taillights, spooked by the prospect of getting brutalized and left in a ditch. I don’t know why, but I felt a little better once the passenger’s door opened, and salsa music spilled out of the cab.

“?Queeeé ooooonda, eseeee?”

It was my old compatriot Tino, obviously drunk.

“Hop in, vato!”

Approaching the truck, I deduced in the glow of the brake lights that there were already three bodies in the cab.

“What, you mean in back?”

“Naw, man. ?Muévate, puto!” he said, shoving the guy next to him. All three of them squished over, even the driver. Still, there were only about six inches to fit my ass on, and I could barely close the door.

“Rocindo,” Tino said. “This is Miguel, the one I told you about.”

“Hey,” I said.

“Where you going, man?” said Tino. “Where’s your truck?”

“At home,” I said.

“You mean at your mom’s house?”

“It’s both our house.”

“Sí,” said Tino. “Su casa es la casa de tu madre.”

The others laughed.

“Fuck you, puto,” I said just as Rocindo pulled back onto the pavement and started heading toward town.

“You wanna go to a party in Kingston, vato?” Tino said.

“Nah, man. Just drop me off.”

“C’mon, ese. We have a good time.”