A Gamble

It was a Thursday. I know that because every Thursday for a few months my landlord / upstairs neighbor, Bill, had the day off, and while his wife was off at work, he would screw Gloria, the Colombian girl from down the street. I liked Bill’s wife, June, so naturally I felt bad, but who was I to interfere? They never bothered me when I had people over late, and whenever Chino came to collect, Bill would cover for me and say I wasn’t there. That ballsy son-of-a-bitch. He knew about the gambling thing.

One time, a month after a bad run at the track, with Chino’s money mind you, Bill told him I had gone to visit some family in Boston. It was a lie—I was sitting on my couch watching TV, and Chino could see that through my window. But Chino always tried to avoid Bill. Bill looked like he could handle himself—he was a stout Portuguese guy with broad shoulders, but I don’t think that was it. Bill was buddy-buddy with a few of the local cops, and Chino had a much different relationship with those guys. Whatever it was, it worked out well for me. Man, I owed that crazy Puerto Rican two bills at the time, plus interest and penalty kicks to the ribs. To make sure I didn’t end up taking a beating later on, or worse, Bill let me slide on two weeks’ rent so I could square up with Chino before things got bad. Now that was a while ago, but I still owed Bill a favor, and keeping my mouth shut was just about the only debt I could pay.

Gloria had come over early that morning—passed by me as I sat on the porch drinking my coffee brandy. She was dolled up with her eyes painted like an Asian’s and her black hair pinned up with chopsticks. Her top left her tanned back bare, except for a couple of spaghetti straps that crossed midway up. The blue skirt she wore glittered silver and matched her heels. They clacked across the wooden decking as she stole inside—not without my weekly “Hola, papi chulo.”

It was true that I waited for her on those mornings. Any other day of the week I’d sleep till at least noon. The dog track didn’t open till 2 o’clock, and I didn’t have to be at work until the sun went down. I was working part-time as a night security guard for a textile mill, and the long summer days left my hours short. It didn’t help that I got paid the union minimum—I still wasn’t licensed for a handgun. I took a long drink, finishing my mug, leaned back in the rickety wooden chair, and stared out into the street without having a damn thing to do. I have to admit it, I was disappointed that Gloria came by so early—she normally didn’t come before 10, and the anticipation of seeing her would have made the August heat bearable.

Now I didn’t usually, but this morning I couldn’t help but want to masturbate while they went at it. Bill’s bedroom was over my sister’s old room, back when she had lived there and paid the rent. Since she had moved out, it became my smoke-room, and I busied myself with rolling a blunt while I sat on my futon, waiting for them to get ready upstairs. I had a little TV in that room, and I turned the volume down real low just so I’d be able to hear them, although I didn’t need to. I would know when it started. It wasn’t like married sex—I hardly ever heard Bill take his wife, and I know that he did cause she’d talk about it. He would screw Gloria as if he were trying to kill her, though. The hanging light above me would swing with the pounding.

I put the remade cigar to my lips and lit the far end, got half way through it before I was too stoned to want anymore, and clipped it in the ashtray. They hadn’t started yet, or were trying to be discreet. I sat and watched the silent TV—a man and a woman were lying on a floor in front of a fire, their lips forming words with exaggerated seductiveness. It was a soap, but I didn’t know which one. Their faces exuded a violent attraction, and I imagined the conversation they were having. She had caught him in the act, with two women no less, and was upset about having not been included. He talked his way out of it—told her he wouldn’t share her with anyone, not even another woman. They’d fly to Cancun for a weekend of champagne and sex on the beach and all would be well for the time being.

Outside, my kitchen door slammed shut.

I jumped up and tried to find the air freshener. I found the damn thing under the futon, and gave the room a couple sprays, expecting Chino to storm in at any moment. No one else was in the practice of walking into my apartment unannounced, and if he smelled pot he would be pissed. I still owed him close to $400, and he had been waiting so long he’d want plenty of interest on it. He always carried a switchblade, and a little .22 in a holster by his side.

I figured it would be better to meet him outside of the room—you could still smell the pot underneath the cool breeze scent of the spray. I lit a cigarette and headed out into the kitchen, just soon enough to catch sight of my bathroom door coming to a close. I grabbed a steak knife off of the counter and tiptoed to a window to check for strange cars. Bill’s wife’s car was in the driveway, yet no one was yelling.

It took a second, but a twinge in my penis told me that it was Gloria in my bathroom. It had to be. June wasn’t a calm woman, and had she caught Bill, I would’ve already known. I moved towards the bathroom and the scent of her perfume flooded my nose. I put the knife down so as to not scare my welcomed intruder, and crept to the door in order to barge in. Say what you will, I was justified. I swung open the door and found her there, wearing panties. Her arms covered her bare breasts, and she looked at me with the pleading face of a tender young woman.

I did the right thing—I closed the door and fetched some clothes. When I got back, I found her peeking through the slightly ajar door. She took the flannel button-up shirt, but said that the pants were too big. “It’s alright, I don’t need pants—this shirt’s huge.” She came out with partially exposed thighs and her hair down and pulled back behind her ears. “You got socks?” she whispered.

“Oh, yeah,” I said and walked away, staring at the floor. It was a thing I did when I was stoned and a little freaked out. She had me more than a little freaked out. I grabbed a pair of socks and some slippers that my older sister had left when she moved out. Gloria squinted when she took them. She had light blue toenails and little feet.

“Your girl gonna mind?”

“I don’t have a girl.”

She looked me up and down. “Oh, I didn’t know you were like that. It’s a relief,” she said.

“Like what?” I demanded.

“You know, a marica.”

“Now wait a minute,” I said, finally able to look at her. Her elaborately painted eyes met mine. They were younger than I had known them to be. “I ain’t a mah-deeka, or whatever that is. Those are my sister’s slippers.”

“Oh. I guess that’s a relief, too. You live with her?”

“I did. Don’t anymore. Sorry those are all she left.” I realized I was staring. “Would you like to sit down?” She hurried to a seat at the kitchen table. “You got caught, huh?” I whispered.

“Not caught, but close. Bill said this would be cool. Is it?”

“Yeah, no, it's fine. I'm glad I could help.”

“But I’m not out of this yet.” She misunderstood. “All my shit—my clothes, my purse with my keys—it’s all upstairs. He must have hid it somewhere cause she ain’t flippin, yet. You can hear them if they yell, right?” I nodded. “But now I can’t get in my apartment cause the door’s locked.”

“You can stay here a while,” I said. She was curling her toes and it made waves in the fuzz.

“You’re high,” she noticed.

“I am. You want to smoke?”

“Please, I could use it right about now.”

“In there,” I pointed to the living room. Then I locked my apartment door.

She got high pretty fast, but kept on smoking just the same. We sat on the futon, and watched the small television, even though the sound was turned down. When I remembered why I couldn’t hear it, my penis twitched. “What did that mean, that thing you called me?”

“What thing?” she denied.

“That thing. The mah-thing. You thought I was gay, didn’t you?”

“I wasn’t sure.”

“That’s fucked up.”

“Not really. Look it don’t mean nothing. I got this cousin that is, but you wouldn’t know that unless you saw the shit he slept in, you know what I’m saying?”

I smiled. “You said it was a relief.”

“I only said that because under the circumstances…” she trailed off and turned her away.

“Oh man, you got to finish that up. Under the circumstances…” I didn’t mean to, but I grabbed her shoulder.

She didn’t move it, but only looked at me in a way that tickled that my stomach. “I don’t really want to,” she said softly. A loud thump sounded through the ceiling and was followed by several smaller ones that made a rhythm. Bill’s Bed started bouncing and the light hanging from the center of the ceiling began to dance. “Oh, my God,” she giggled. “We’re under Bill’s bedroom. They’re going at it, aren’t they?”

“Seems so.”

“That’s fucking funny.” The thumps got louder and more rapid. “Wow,” she paused to smoke. “He’s really giving it to her.”

“Probably cause he’s thinking bout you,” I said. A wave of body-heat scorched up my neck and flushed my face.

“Did you ever hear us?” She started to whisper.

I whispered back. “Not really. Well, a couple of times when I was smoking. I tried not to listen.”

“That’s sweet,” she said. “But you don’t have to lie. If you were fucking upstairs, I’d listen, too.”

It got quiet for a minute, except for the pounding, as we focused on getting high. “Why Bill, if you don’t mind me asking? You must be cool with the fact that he’s married.”

“Well that’s just it,” she continued to whisper. It seemed like she was really interested in listening to Bill and June. “He’s married, so he’s desperate for it. I get $500 every Thursday.” I shot straight up from my slouch. “And since he’s married, I’m not worried that he’s gonna stalk me or anything like that.”

“He pays you $500 dollars a week?” She nodded. “That’s amazing.”

“You surprised I’m worth that much?”

“Well, no, that’s not it. I’m surprised he’s got the money.”

“To tell you the truth, I was, too. I never took him for money.”

“But now you take his money?”

"Close to $5,000. I should finally be able to start taking classes somewhere.”

"How does his wife not know?”

“He inherited some money that she don’t know about, yet. He’s trying to hide it from her for a little while. He’s going to tell her he got less than he did. Got a cashier’s check all made out in a sealed envelope and everything so that it looks official. I don’t know how much for.”

“No kidding,” I said. “Who would’ve known?” I took a pull on the blunt and passed it to her. “I bet he’s got a fucking hairy back,” I said, letting the smoke out.

She started laughing. “Like a carpet. If he gets too rough I just yank out a handful.” She paused to take another hit. “I don’t want to talk about Bill anymore.”

The blunt was done, but Bill was still at it. The two of us sat and watched the TV, although neither of us turned up the volume. There was a different soap on now, and she leaned into me as I created a storyline for her. A man and woman had stolen up the stairs, separately, at a party and met in a guestroom.

“Her fiancé’s downstairs, but he’s drunk and not paying attention. These two have been having an affair for months now, but she wants to cut it off because people are starting to talk. The only problem is that he loves her and doesn’t care if her fiancé finds out. This guy wants to take her away somewhere with him, probably Paris, and she wants to go, but won’t cause she’s pregnant and doesn’t know who the father is.”

“That’s scandalous,” she yawned and laid her head on my shoulder. “Spanish soaps are better. The women are always so beautiful.”

“I know,” I said. “They all look like you.”

She pinched at my waist. The pot started to weigh down her eyelids, and over the course of a little while, her head slid along the futon and came to rest on my shoulder. She was knocked out, and I felt pleased that she could be so comfortable around me that she could sleep by my side. After a while Bill gave it a rest, and in the blink of an hour later, there was a loud thump on my door. It startled Gloria, and she clung to my arm in a half-aware sort of way.

“Should I be worried?” she asked. “His wife, maybe?”

“I doubt it. It’s probably Bill, I hope.” Gloria made a face. “No, no, that’s not what I mean. It’s just that I’m expecting someone to come by that I’d rather not see.”

“It better not be your girl. I don’t need that shit.”

“What are you talking about? I thought you were my girl?” I threw it out there to see how it fit.

“Sorry, papi,” she said, but she was smiling. It felt good to make her smile—almost made me forget about the unpleasant prospect of seeing Chino on the other side of the door. It had been a couple of days, and he always came unannounced. I crept out to the kitchen quietly with Gloria pulling on the back of my shirt. The door thumped again.

“Hey, man,” someone yelled from the hallway. “It’s Bill. I got to ask you something.” Gloria ran to the door and let him in, her belongings in his arms. He wore a wife-beater and both of his exposed shoulders were boasting more hair than his head. He put Gloria’s stuff on my kitchen table and then pulled at her. He lifted the flannel shirt and stuffed a wad of cash in the elastic band of her panties. “You’ve been great, baby,” he said, grabbing a handful of her ass. “But we can’t do it no more. The fucking ditz lost her job, so she’ll be home all the time. I got to get back to her now.” He shoved his tongue into her mouth, and I turned away. I had never actually seen him touch her, and to see it for the first time sickened me. He came over to me when he was done, slid a hundred into my shirt pocket, patted my back, and headed back into the hall and upstairs.

Gloria got dressed. She came over and kissed my cheek. I waved the hundred around, but she just smiled and showed me the little wad of cash that Bill had given her. “Work on it, papi,” she said. “Looks like I’m free on Thursdays.”

...

I was down to my last $40, and it was all on this race. It was my favorite—the one when they raced the female greyhounds. I put $20 on a 2-1, and the other 20 on the long shot. It was a scrappy hound with 30-1 odds. I knew the dog. It always started strong, but never finished in the top five. The gates opened early, too early for the rabbit. My scrapper was on it quick, and nearly bit the fucking thing. She kept right with it round the first corner and down the backstretch. I was worried she’d catch it and force a restart, but she didn’t. She was within inches of it as she turned the last corner, and then started to die down. She was leading by three lengths, but the pack was overtaking her.
And then my 2-1, holding the third position, lost its legs and chopped down the whole pack, except for number 5, a spotted hound that was gaining inches on my jackpot. They were neck to neck at the finish, and a man on the loudspeaker called for a photo decision. I ran to the monitor by the ticket redeemer. The blue screen changed to a still picture showing the two dogs: the spotted hound with its head down, and then mine, exhausted, with her tongue sticking out onto the finish line. $600. I took it all in hundreds and got the fuck out of there before I blew a single dime.

...

I sat out on the porch every morning, hoping Gloria would pass by. She never did. I hadn’t been back to the track since I hit, and it was making me tense. Bill came out one Thursday morning to work on his car, and saw me sitting there with my mug.

“Irish coffee?” he asked.

“Coffee brandy.”

He nodded. “Close enough.” He started off a few steps, and turned back to me. “Chino was by yesterday round three. Told me to tell you he’s looking for ya.” I nodded, wondering if Chino had heard about my win at the track. He seemed to know a lot about what went on there. It was worrisome. “You in trouble?”

“Always,” I said.

“Well if you can’t deal with it, maybe I could help you out.”

I didn’t want his money. I’d have just lost it. “I appreciate it, but you know I couldn’t ask you to do that.” He understood what I meant. I didn’t need another guy banging on my door for money. It was bad enough that I had to pay Bill rent. He walked off to his Buick while I paced the length of a cigarette. I tossed the butt into the drive and strolled over to him, his head under the hood. “You think I could get Gloria’s phone number?” I poked at his distributor cap. It was loose, so I picked up his Phillip’s-head and tightened a few screws.

He didn’t say anything—just looked up to his windows to make sure his wife wasn’t there. Then he took a little scrap of paper out of his wallet and gave it to me, leaving his greasy fingerprint on the yellow strip. “Got some money, huh?”

“A little.”

“Ain’t it Chino’s?”

“Got a little for him, too.”

“But not all of it?”

“Well, I can’t have him thinking I’ve got money all of a sudden.” Bill shrugged and went back under the hood. I took the little scrap of paper inside and smoked half a pack of cigarettes by the phone. 729-7000. The zeros were smiley-faces. Well, two were. The first two smiled, and third had a penis in its mouth. It was sort of elaborately drawn with the veins carefully sketched.

I called once, but no one answered, so I hung up on the machine. I decided that wouldn’t work—I’d be sitting around all day waiting for her to answer the phone. I called back and left a message saying it was me and that I wanted to see her. I left my number. She called back right away.

“Hey,” she said. “It’s me Gloria.”

“Oh shit, hey!”

“You said you wanted to see me.”

“Yeah. I-uh was hoping you’d come by and chill with me. Maybe hit a blunt?”

“Just chill? No business?”

“Well, yeah, maybe that too.”

“Give me an hour,” she said and hung the phone up on me.

I raced around the house checking to make sure everything was in order. The dishes were done and I had already taken out the trash. My bed was made and I had washed the sheets. The house was clean, surprisingly, and I found that there was nothing to do that would calm me. I rolled a blunt to be ready when she came. Then I rolled another because I couldn’t wait. I got high and tried to work the money out. I had just about $550 left. I could give her what she’d want, give $50 to Chino to buy some time, maybe, and I’d only have to go broke for a day while I waited for my paycheck. It all seemed to work out nice, except that my paycheck would only cover rent and groceries for the week, and maybe a couple packs of cigarettes, unless I won again at the track. I seemed to be in a streak of luck, and it killed me to stay away.

I put the blunt out and lit a cigarette. The door knocked, and it was Gloria. I let her in and locked the door behind us. She wasn’t wearing make-up, but that didn’t matter. Her hair was put back in a ponytail. She had on jeans and a shirt that exposed the gentle slope of her shoulders. Her ass waved to me as she headed straight for the smoke room.

“I’m glad you called,” she said. “I really wanted to smoke today.” She sat on the futon and took up the blunt that I had rolled for us. “Bill gave you the number, huh?”

“Yeah. I hope that’s alright.”

“I’m cool with it. Don’t know if he is. I saw him outside when I came in. He had a funny look on his face.”

“Probably just day-dreaming,” I said. She smiled. We didn’t talk anymore after that—just sat and smoked on the futon with our arms making the slightest connections whenever one of us shifted in our seat. I was quite shifty, I imagine.

I put the blunt out and she looked at me rather shyly. “You got the money?” I nodded. “OK,” she said. She stood up, took my wrist, and led me into my bedroom. Now, I like to think that I can be a gentleman sometimes, so I won’t say much, but she was incredible. There was a way she could move her hips that made it seem like she was dancing to salsa while she made love. We did it twice, and then smoked some more while lying in bed. She initiated a third time, but I was spent, and she took that as her cue to leave. I gave her the money, and although I was out 500 bucks, I felt as if I could still win big.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little worried about giving her that money. If Chino came calling, I’d be fucked. But I wasn’t giving as much thought to that as I should’ve. I had her, even though I had to pay for her. If it meant paying for it again, I would have, if I had the money. But she had the money now, and I was still hoping for a big payoff. A Keith Murray rap ran through my head when she took the five bills—“Could You Love Me for Free?”

She dressed, squeezing her tight ass into tighter jeans. I threw on my boxers and walked her to the door. “I hope we can do this again sometime,” I said, “but I don’t think I’ll have another $500 anytime soon.”

She gave me a sweet kiss and said, “I’ll think about it.” Then she walked out, saying, “Hasta luego, papi.”

I heard a car pull into the driveway as my kitchen door shut. I locked the door and peered through the window blinds. It was an old Town Car. Chino stepped out of it and stopped Gloria as she tried to head by him.

“Hola, mami,” he said. “You know the pendejo that lives here?”

“What pendejo?” she asked.

They spoke in Spanish for a minute and only broke back into English when she asked, “How much?”

“Cinco-ciento pesos!” Chino exclaimed.

“You said cuatro-ciento,” she fought. I really appreciated the effort she was putting in, but I was almost certain she had tipped him off that I was there. It really didn’t matter whether it was 400 or 500—I didn’t have it anymore. All I had was 50, and he didn’t look like he was going to accept that this time. Chino opened his shirt, showing his .22. “Aie, no!” she screamed. She reached into her pocket and pulled out the five hundred dollars that I had just given her. “Toma,” she said, stuffing the money in his hand. “Now he don’t owe you shit!”

She walked off furiously. Chino got in his car and followed her as she headed down the sidewalk towards whatever house she lived in. He hung out of the driver’s side window, yelling at her while he drove. She screamed back as she walked along, and I lost sight of the two of them as my neighbor’s house got between us.

I don’t know what day it was. A weekday—I know that because Bill was at work. It was almost a week later, and his wife was in the yard, planting a flowerbed in a small strip of dirt against the fence. Gloria hadn’t come by. I tried calling her a few times, but always got her machine. She never called back. I was sitting on the porch that morning, stoned and drinking my breakfast as June went about bending over in front of me. For a woman her age, she was pleasant to look at. She was telling me about how she had lost her job and the way Bill made it all better with an amazing lay.

“It was incredible,” she said. “He hasn’t had that stamina since we were first married.”

I smiled at her and then looked down the street—the glint of a newly painted car caught my eye. It was a Lincoln, and I realized that it was Chino. He must have seen Bill’s wife, cause he parked in the street. There was a young woman sitting in the passenger’s seat. I knew it was Gloria because I recognized the way her hair was done up in the back with chopsticks. She never bothered to look at me.

“Sup, man,” Chino said as he strolled down the drive towards me. I gave him a nervous nod. “Just came to see if you needed some money for the track.”

I smiled and shook my head. “I’m all set,” I said. “I can't afford to gamble any more.”

image source: https://pixabay.com/en/dog-racing-dog-animal-race-fun-2878713/