(no subject)
With a cross-eyed stare, Martirio sparks a light at the back of the pool hall. The stop-light-red light in the corner of the hall colors his everything in a red mist. He’s smoking Mexican Marlboro’s with a hint of a wheeze reaching for a cue stick. Martirio’s worst annoyance with smoking is smoke being in his nose. He molests the triangle out of the pool shelf and tosses it on to the green felt of the table. Reaching into his pocket amongst balls of foil, he retrieves a quarter and slides into the pool table. The balls inside thunder like a herd of billiard wildebeest down to his end of the table and he deeply breathes smoke.
The game is pool.
Setting up the billiard balls inside in the triangle, he remembers his lessons in pool ettiquete. Incorrectly racking usually led to some sort of repremand involving getting hit with a cue-stick. The easiest way to remember how to correctly rack the table is to never forget the pattern. Never forget the pattern or you’ll be forced to remember. The apex or forward ball is to be spotted on the foot spot, which is the tiny dot on the opposite end of the cue ball. All the balls must be lined up behind the apex ball like perfect little soldiers, shoulder to shoulder with no space in between. Everything must be perfect.
And then there’s the first strike, the first and all important stab, the games first breath, the…
The door leading in slides open quick with a creak, dispelling for a moment the darkness of the pool hall drenched in dim crimson light. Martirio’s eyes squint at the ground at the door about 30 feet away. The floor of the place exposed by the sunlight is tile from the 1970’s, cracked and stained from decades of life bleeding upon it. As the door opens, the sunlight exposes a hole in the floor as wide as a bowling ball. One pair of black shoes steps in, standing in the hole momentarily. The shoes look patiently polished to perfection. To either side of these shoes stand two other pairs of feet. On the right stand a pair of similar shoes, not nearly as shined as the first pair but close. On the left a pair of black Converse Chuck Taylor’s reside. The shoelaces are black with Misfit skulls laced loosely through and permanent marker inks random scribbles on the whites of the shoe.
In tandem, the four pairs of feet walk in as the door shuts the light out behind them. The leading pair of black shoes reside beneath a pair of black slacks, ironed tight to perfection. To the right of this stands a pair of legs draped in dark pants, slightly faded, especially at the knees. Two pairs of legs over, jeans hang slightly above the Converse, torn and cut like acid-wash rejects.
Under the red light, Martirio looks like a devil as he chalks his pool-stick and takes another drag, careful not to get any smoke in his nose.
Tucked into the leading black slacks is a white pinned-striped button up shirt. The muscles behind the t-shirt ripple behind the black vertical lines. A silver necklace dangles just below the collar, catching the neon glow of the room. A black polo t-shirt hangs un-tucked to the right, unbuttoned and stained brown near the collar. To the left, is a plain white-t with Popeye arms protruding from the cut sleeves.
Martirio’s eyes meet with the first of the three, the leading man. They catch eyes and this is the first time Martirio and Rick Ruiz exist under the same roof together. Staring at each other like they’ve met each other somewhere else, sometime else, like déjà vu but not at all.
Rick’s eyes are deep and dark, and even from a distance they find a way to capture you. Stepping forward, his compatriots and he go green with the light hanging to their right from above the bar.
To Rick’s immediate right is Matt Rieser, but everyone new him as “Bones”. He’s a lesser version of Rick, a sad excuse for an imitation. His hair shorter and spikey, standing much like a bad cow-lick. He’s slightly chubby and breathes hard through his nose, though his mom would often put clothespins on his nose to try and stop him. To Rick’s left is Vegas who’s mother wanted to name him Las Vegas but was coaxed out of doing so by a nurse a week before giving birth.
Martirio puts out his cigarette and thinks about his shot for a moment, methodical as all hell when it comes to breaking the rack.
The boys are drunk from a bar or two down the road and now they’ve come to gamble. They pull up chairs to an empty table and as they sit the room spins above their heads. "Vegas, get us something to drink," his voice leaves his mouth sounding soft but commanding.
In his dirty Converse and torn jeans, Vegas looks over at Rick with an open hand. Bones slaps a 10 dollar bill into his open palm. Vegas’ blue eyes give him a doll-face look that is far beyond the opposite of his true demeanor.
“Yessah massah,” he says turning towards the bar.
The Barkeep is skinny, and slightly balding. His glasses magnify his eyes to a laughable size. He’s got a strange obsession for alphabetized order as today’s beer drink specials read:
Amberbauch
Budweiser
Carta Blanca
Dos Equis
Estrella
When he was 13-years-old, he beat a man to death for trying to break into his home.
As Martirio steps to strike the break, the bathroom door to his left opens, distracting him.
He slams the cue ball and completely misses the triangle at the end of the table.
A man wearing huge sunglasses with thick white frames emerges. His face is painted with satisfaction and radiates a brilliant red under the light above the two in the back of the pool-hall. To Martirio, he appears to be in his 30’s, somewhat young but professional looking. He wears a white, long-sleeved-button-up with black pants down to his wing-tipped shoes. He smiles at Martirio and chuckles as the cue-ball rolls out of play and into a corner pocket, before he walks his way toward the table.
“You boys, ready to lose your money?” he asks
Their cigarettes smoke pools into a green mist above their heads as they sit in a crescent facing him.
“I have no intention of losing you to you old man,” Rick says smiling.
“Lose to me again, son. I do remember three Jacks helping me take your money from you. And despite your intention, I’m going to be taking your money. People don’t intend to do a lot of things in life. Pregnancies, homicides, car-crashes, cancer, etcetera etcetera,” the older man says, smiling as he speaks with his hands. He’s dripping with overconfidence and style.
Martirio takes another shot at the break and knocks in the one ball and the thirteen in as well. He can see the angles; he’d always been able to. Optometrists and other doctors would always mention how his vision was better than perfect. The geometry of the game, he understood it the way a cellist understands music, the way South-African children understand hunger. The game was always his, until he lost focused.
Meanwhile, the man in the sunglasses looks over at the bar and nods his head at the bartender; his bug eyes and his green skin start immediately to a bottle of tequila hidden in the freezer at his knees.
Pulling up his chair slowly, he unbuttons his coat before sitting himself to the table.
The game is Texas Hold ‘Em.
It’s a $100 buy in, but that’s change to all of the party present.
He drops a Benjamin in the pile at the center of the table and Bones places the money in a glass case.
Rick shuffles the card swiftly and with ease, they flow from hand to hand almost part of himself. Vegas has a finger knuckle deep in his ear, picking at wax and Bones returns to his bottle, drinking steady.
“The Three Stooges, The Three Wise Men, a tripod trifecta of torpid tools,” he says so smug that Martirio coughs a cackle staring at the pool table.
“Let me guess, you’ve been rehearsing all week to spit some half-dicked shit us.”
“All week long? No. Your mother’s been keeping me away from any extracurriculars.”
Rick’s eyes tighten angrily, “All talk, this old bastard.”
“Just deal the cards, boy. We’ll see if the week permitted you to grow a pair.”
Rick flips a card to his left and continues handing out cards in a clockwise motion. Two cards apiece, Rick looks down at a pocket pair of Aces and quickly checks. Bones folds a 4, 9 off-suit, as Vegas hesitates before dropping a 2,8.
Martirio stares over at the table, the man in sunglasses sits with his back to him. Squinting his eyes and staring through the smoke, he sees the man has pocket sevens.
“I raise 30,” the man says, the bartender places a low-ball glass in front of him before walking over to the jukebox and dropping in some change.
“Red House” by Jimi Hendrix blows out the busted speakers.
“I call, old man,” Rick says smiling through his teeth.
The flop drops three cards all in Rick’s favor; King, Jack, and a two. Vegas whispers “Shit,” under his breath, then shrugs his shoulders in apathy.
The man in sunglasses doesn’t even flinch, sips his liquor and watches as Rick taps the table to check.
From behind his white-framed sunglasses and radiating green like some radioactive mobster, the man smiles as he checks.
The turn card throws up a six of spades. Rick raises 20, and the man calls. Bones, chugs a bottle in boredom, he’s drank three in the time its taken Rick and Vegas to drink two.
Martirio in the meanwhile, has killed the table on his own, and to wonder if he should play another game. Staring at the felt, the lines across the table remind of the Nazca Lines in Peru and he smiles at the thought.
The river card is next, and you can smell the confidence coming from Rick. He thinks he can’t be beat.
The card drops and it’s a seven. The man’s got triple seven against Rick’s pair of Aces, King high. I raise 10, the man says with no emotion, he’s cold like a stone.
And here is where Rick gets himself in trouble. A normal person would realize there’s something on the table that’s going to sink them. But Rick’s got pride running through his veins and there’s no way in hell he’s going to back out now.
“Call,” he says, trying to hesitate.
“Show ‘em, boys,” Vegas says, Bones opens another bottle.
Without a smile, without a change of breath, the man drops his pocket sevens for all to see. Ricky’s face goes white and wide with shock, as his futile Aces land with the weight of the world.
“I don’t know which dream you beat me in, but I’m intent on wakin’ you up from it, boy.”
Hendrix is killing the solo through the jukebox speakers and the game continues.
“Good thing I’m driving home because I sure as hell can’t walk.”
“I bathe myself in your mother’s sweat and cum.”