July 21, 2020

The Hoodie

It is the Aria on a Saturday night. My friends and I had been hiking in Zion National Park in Utah and were now in Vegas for two days of chill before heading back to Toronto. But their idea of chill was Barry Manilow’s early show at the Mirage.

I wasn’t going to do that.

There is some back and forth, but I am not going to budge. We agree to meet later for dinner.

I now have two hours to kill.

I wander over to the poker room. It is packed. Am looking for a low-stakes game where I can kill a few hours and not lose my shirt. But the lists for those games are huge.

“I can get you on the $5–$10 no-limit,” says the hostess.

I shake my head no. Those are much higher stakes than I am used to. Also, the people who play in those games are generally pros or semi-pros. They aren’t tourists from Akron, Ohio. Or, in my case, from Toronto, Canada.

The players in those games just can’t wait for guys like me.

So I take a lap around the casino. It takes me 10 minutes. I look at my phone. I now still have an hour and 48 minutes to kill.

I could leave the Aria and find a lower-stake game at another casino. But that seems like a lot of work. I am a pretty good poker player. I can probably play with these guys. They put their pants on one proverbial leg at a time like I do. Even the women.

I go back to the hostess.

“That seat on $5–$10 still open?”

“Yes, hon. Go buy chips at the cashier.”

I go to the cashier and ask what the minimum buy-in is for the $5–$10 game. The cashier tells me it is $500 but nobody buys in for only $500.

I say, “Let me have $500 please.”

I sit at the table and unpack my chips from the chip rack.

It doesn’t take long.

The other players at the table have stacks of chips which look like rows of high-rise apartments. My chips look like a pup tent pitched in the backyard.

I have barely had time to sit down when I get dealt my first hand. It is a pretty good starting hand. A King and a Queen. A kid in a baseball cap next to me raises to $50. Jesus, this is a big game. I call. Everyone else folds. The baseball cap smiles at me.

The flop comes King, five, four. There are two hearts.

I have a pair of Kings. But I am worried about the flush. I bet $100. Am hoping it is enough to get him to fold.

But it’s not.

He calls.

The fourth card is not a heart. It is a harmless two of clubs. I don’t have much choice. I go all in. It is the right play. Now I know why $500 is not enough to start with.

My heart is pounding. I have played a lot of poker. Thousands and thousands of hands. But my heart is pounding.

I am hoping he is going to fold and I am going to win the very first hand I played. I might even pack up my chips and call it a night with a nice little win. Look what I did while you guys were listening to Mandy.

But he calls.

Shows the Q8 of hearts.

I feel sick. How can he call here? It isn't even the best flush draw.

I look up to see if he will flash a sheepish grin. Sorry, I know I wasn’t getting the odds but I just felt it kind of look.

But no.

He looks like he is thrilled to turn over his Q8 of hearts.

Of course he gets the two of hearts on the river and I have lost the entire $500 in the first hand. I reach into my pocket and pull out $500 more. I can’t leave after only one hand.

I look around the table to see if I can solicit an ounce of sympathy. A wry shake of the head which really means ‘what an idiot.’ Or a terse smile which says ‘no worries—you played it right.’

But no. Nothing. Everyone is on their phones and have moved to the next hand.

It is the Aria on a Saturday night and I am not the first person to have a flush run him down. A woman orders a drink from the buxom waitress and then gets up and leaves the table. When the waitress returns with her vodka martini straight up with a twist, the woman, who looked to be in her early 20s, with $10,000 in chips in front of her, is still not back. The drink is free but a tip is obligatory. I look around the table. She has been chatting amicably with a bunch of the others. But no one makes a move. I toss a $5 chip and barely get a nod of thanks.

The woman comes back. The drink is now in front of her. Will anyone at the table tell her I was the one who tipped the waitress? Apparently not. I keep my mouth shut. We are playing for thousands of dollars and I am not going to be the dick who pipes up for a measly five bucks. But it gnaws at me. So when she splashes the pot a few hands later with a big raise, I decide to defend my blind with the 9,10 of clubs.

The flop comes three hearts, I check and she comes out betting. I don’t have a heart. I have absolutely nothing. It is an easy fold.

But now I have a bug up my ass about the fucking tip which I didn’t get thanked for.

So, instead of folding, I declare all in. I’m going to make the big bluff and just steal the hand from her. Old school. She shrugs her shoulders, announces call, and turns over two hearts. She has the flush. All I have is egg on my face.

So now I’m reaching for my third buy-in, feeling especially sick, because the only thing worse than being a dick is being a tourist who looks like he has watched too much poker on TV.

I was now in for $1500.

I keep my head down, because I don’t want to see them trading knowing glances about what a complete piece-of-shit poker player I am.

I vow to play super tight and only consider premium hands.

I fold and fold and fold.

So when two red Aces fall into my hand in early position, I decide to play a little tricky and I just call, hoping someone will raise and I can re-raise.

But there is no raise.

I have been at the table for over an hour and can’t recall a single hand which wasn’t raised. It is a super aggressive table.

But now I get Aces and it’s call call call call call. What the fuck? And six people are in the hand.

So now I know I am about to bust. I know the Aces are about to get cracked. I just don’t know how.

But I don’t have to wait long.

A 2,4,6 rainbow flop, three different suits. My nemesis in the baseball cap bets $75 and gets rid of everyone before it comes back to me. There is enough money in the pot and I don’t want to see another card so I announce all in. The words are barely out of my mouth when the baseball cap calls, shoving his chips into the pot with one hand and turning over the 3,5 unsuited with the other.

He has flopped the straight.

He doesn’t owe me an excuse, but he shrugs his shoulders and announces anyway, “Dude, you didn’t raise those pocket rockets before the flop.”

The two miracle cards don’t come and I am out.

I stagger from the table. I am shellshocked. I have taken 10 steps when I remember I have left my Muskoka Life is Good sweatshirt draped over the chair. But there is no way I am going back for it. I think I hear someone call out. But they don’t know my name. And anyway, am not going back.

I splash some water in my face in the washroom and the guy next to me is doing the same.

I can sense he wants to tell me his bad beat. Some crazy only-one-card-in-the-deck kind of story. But I have heard them all. I have lived them all.

I step back out to the casino and the cold air conditioning gives me a chill.

I meet my friends in front of the designated restaurant. They said the show was amazing. What did I do all this time, they ask.

“Not much,” I say. “I just walked around. Oh”—I hold up my new Aria Casino hoodie—“and I bought a new hoodie.”

“Nice,” one friend says. “How much was it?”

And I say, “Don’t ask.”

The end.