.
when he was hungover. I had come a long way since he had thrown Pink Dot bagels at me. All the food runs he sent me on, all of the cheese plates he ordered for the office, had impacted my awareness of the finer things.
Houston ambled in and gave me a warm hug.
I had his diet raspberry Snapple ready.
Bruce Parker was next, with Todd Phillips close behind him. He and Todd were laughing as they entered.
“What are you sickos laughing about?” Reardon said, fist-bumping. Reardon was a germophobe who opted to fist-bump instead of shake hands for sanitary reasons. Of course, his fear of germs seemed to fly out the window when it came to his sexual exploits.
“Parker just got a handy in the parking lot,” Phillips explained.
“She was cute and only wanted five hundred, I figured it would be good luck.” Bruce laughed.
“Roguish.” Reardon nodded in approval.
Just then they noticed me trying to disappear into the corner.
“Sorry, sweetheart,” Todd said.
“Molly’s heard it all, she works for me.” Reardon brushed off the apologies while I nodded and forced an easy smile.
“How does your boyfriend feel about you wearing that dress and hanging out with a bunch of scumbags like us?” Todd asked.
“I don’t have a …” I began, but they had lost interest in me—Tobey and Leo had just walked in. The guys became a little shy, and awkward, except, of course, for Reardon, who fist-bumped Leo with a gruff, “What’s happening, player?”
While the guys clustered around Leo, Tobey went over to Diego and handed him his Shuffle Master. The Shuffle Master is a $17,000 machine that is supposed to deliver a fair, random shuffle every time and increases the speed and accuracy of each game. Last week, Tobey had told the guys he wouldn’t play without it.
The next player to arrive was Bob Safai. Last week I had watched Diego deal him what the others referred to as a “bad beat.” This meant that even though Bob had a much stronger hand, he still lost. I watched as Bob had thrown his cards angrily at Diego.
Statistically, Diego had explained to me later, Bob should have taken the round. It was a “two-outer,” which meant that there were only two cards in the deck that could make his opponent the winner. When Tobey hit it, Bob had gone berserk. He had given Diego a nasty look and said something about stacking the deck for Tobey. Incidents like that made me grateful that Tobey had brought a machine to shuffle this time, and that I wasn’t dealing the games.
“Hi, honey,” Bob said now as I took his coat. I saw his eyes flick around the room; even he got a little giddy when he saw that Leo was there.
Phillip Whitford walked in with his friend Mark Wideman. Mark was friends with Pete Sampras, who allegedly played high-stakes poker too. Wideman was a good player, but he had said he would try to bring Sampras, which would be a great draw for the game.
When he saw me, Whitford let out a low whistle and kissed my hand.
I blushed and looked at the floor, enjoying every surreal moment of being the only girl among such handsome, accomplished men.
And then above the buzz of voices came Reardon’s ringing voice.
“Let’s play!!”
THEY SETTLED INTO THEIR SEATS, and the air filled with the smooth sounds of my Frank Sinatra playlist, the whirring of the Shuffle Master, the shuffling of chips, and the happy playful banter of the players.
Once the game was well under way, it was hard to keep up. Guys were reloading their chips in rapid fire and everyone was betting all their chips at once, which Phillip told me during a rare pause was called “going all in.” Even though I was a novice at poker, I was captivated. The game felt frenzied and exciting. And I wasn’t the only one who felt the energy. Diego was dealing hands at lightning speed. The guys were also making side bets on the color of the flop (the first three communal cards dealt by Diego), and they even started wagering on sports.
I sat in the corner, always watching. Occasionally I would refill drinks. The guys were so focused on the game they almost forgot I was there, except for Phillip, who kept text-messaging me with poker insights. I typed furiously on my laptop, documenting everything I was learning.
Meanwhile, Bob was giving sound bites on the real-estate market, Wideman was talking about Sampras, Tobey was analyzing poker hands with Houston, Reardon was trying to get everyone on tilt by insulting them, Phillips was dropping one-liners, Leo had his headphones on to help him focus. Bruce talked for a while about the girl who had given him a $500 hand job, and then moved on to how he had made his money, beginning with his start as a weed dealer in Hollywood.
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