The whiskey was starting to tickle the part of his brain that was gonna make his wallet piss itself.
Jack pushed the glass six inches away as though that would be an insurmountable distance.
He had moved from the Labouchere system on the roulette wheel and was going full Martingale now, trying for a big bang recoup.
On the whale tables in Vegas the croupier would have known exactly what he was doing and probably been rooting for him, but he wasn’t in Vegas, he was off Gratiot in a basement after hours and the girl flipping the ball went by Dakota.
Dakota didn’t know it, but Jack had been at her baptism when she was still Christine and her dad was part of a loose-knit, tight-mouthed Hibernian mafia that controlled all the restaurant and hotel linen from Wyandotte to Birmingham.
It still stung where the doctor had pulled the chemo port, somehow the whiskey had decided to skip the topical pain portion of the program, and that was another distraction.
The doctor was pissed, but Jack had made a life out of pissing people off.
If the 300-year-old martingale math was right-and a whole lot of feltheads believed that it was- Jack was overdue to pop the 17/20 split line on this old, fading European-style single zero table that Bing and Techno admitted they got for 20 bucks at a Windsor estate sale.
He had five grand on both the 17 and the 20 and ten grand on the middle, chips slightly off-center and top leaning, because Jack was superstitious like that.
Dakota had a steady ball velocity for an after-hours club, retired stripper croupier, and Jack thought her dead daddy would be happy that ninety days at that Austrian high altitude opiate rehab had helped.
Dakota/Christine didn’t know Jack knew that either.
She spun the ball onto the wheel, and after a few revolutions, Jack’s veteran eye knew that the ball hung on the groove longer than he wanted it to. When it dropped, the single green told him that.
He could still get a friendly kick, but he wasn’t gonna stare and pray.
He had quit praying about the cancer, he wasn’t gonna relapse for a game of chance.
All he wanted, all he really wanted, was to show up at Shannon’s house tomorrow with a six-figure gift for her miracle baby.
The baby would grow up with some designer mayonnaise dispenser of a super basic financial analyst daddy, a mom who gave birth at 49, and “Uncle Jack” at best, would be a photo or some clippings out of the newspaper. Would the kid even understand what a newspaper was?
You owned the nightclub you wanted, Jack.
You married your dreamgirl, Jack.
You shot Maurice Fetzman in the face because he fucking deserved it and in some places you were a hero, Jack.
He looked back at the slowing wheel.
The ball had flirted with the 17 before settling in the 4 and winking at Jack and his chemo-weakened gut full of three whiskeys.
He was backed up on black to the tune of 10K, crazy money for this club, but Bing’s daddy had been the only black kid at Jack’s first communion back at St. Scholastica and Jack had cut a kid’s tie off with a pocket knife for calling Leonard the wrong thing. Friends for life. Jack had markers.
Jack watched as Dakota swept the 20 thousand worth of chips off the table, along with a few hundred from some audio engineers who only anecdotally knew he was Sunshine Jack Bishop.
Jack turned and nodded to Bing’s money man, who scooped the chips from the winning black into a Crown Royal bag, left the room and reentered, handing Jack a white pint container from Chung’s restaurant, complete with a soy sauce stain.
Opening the pint containers inside the club was expressly forbidden, so Jack excused himself to the men’s room, waited impatiently for some rock and roll cokehead who undoubtedly hung out at his old club, then went inside and pulled 2K from the 20K in the container.
He walked back out, pressed the 20 hundreds in Dakota’s hand, tried unsuccessfully to not look at her tits spilling out over her black lace bustier, then nodded to Bing and walked out into the alley.
Jack hesitated, wanted to walk back in and say something to Bing about Leonard, but decided that the whiskey was asking him to do something that his heart couldn’t handle.
There was 18k left in the carryout container that dangled from his right hand.
He could always come back tomorrow, try one more time to make his goal of 100k for Shannon’s miracle kid. 49 fucking years old and a new mommy. Unbelievable.
His knees ached, his back ached, the place on his chest where the chemo port used to be stung, he could still see the disgust in the doctor’s eyes, all the paperwork he had to sign, basically saying he was no longer a patient at the Georgilas Clinic.
There was a foot in the alley.
Jack knew that there was a 75% chance there would be on a Thursday night.
Could be a stranger, but probably not. Jack was good at making friends with guys who didn’t really know who he was.
“Hey, Jack.”
It was Jimmy Lemons.
Jack froze.
He would have bet he’d see a friendly face, but Jimmy was special to him.
He rocked back on his heels and a dizzy spell hit him.
“You ok, Jack? Jus’ drunk?”
“Maybe. A bit sick.”
Jimmy Lemons was a fucking prince of an unlucky guy and probably Jack’s favorite street guy.
You can go back to the club tomorrow, Jack, turn that 18K into real money. Go see Shannon. Hand her the money and tell her you’ll always love her.
“Whatchoo thinking about Jack? You be spacey tonight, my brother.”
Jimmy was only slightly younger than Jack, been on the streets most of his life, had himself a little squat over off Jefferson, ran a little power through the fence from an outside outlet at the 24 Hour Wendy’s.
Go see Shannon one last time, Jack. Fuck it. Give her the 18K for the kid. It will be like an Irish bris or something.
“I’m in a lot of pain, Jimmy.”
“Fuck me, bless you, Jack. I hate to hear that.”
“Ain’t nothing no one can do, Jimmy.”
Jimmy Lemons pulled a half-full half pint of the world’s cheapest gin from his windbreaker.
“Want some o’ this Jack?”
Jack shook his head.
That financial analyst guy makes 18K in an hour, that gift ain’t gonna mean nothing to Shannon or that kid.
“You got a place you can stash money, Jimmy? Like a real safe place? You got a sister, right, she got a bank account?”
“I got a place. Ain’t a bank. Sure ain’t my sister, I don’t trust her husband for shit.”
Jack handed Jimmy the carryout container.
Jimmy took it, didn’t question it, nodded.
“Thanks, Jack.”
Jimmy had to know it came from the tables at the after hours.
“It’s eighteen grand, Jimmy.”
Jimmy convulsed.
“Aww, shit Jack, you musta hit ‘em real good.”
Jack started to contradict Jimmy but then thought better of it. If Jimmy knew it was all Jack’s money, he wouldn’t take it.
“You think the city’d let you buy that house you’re in?”
Jimmy nodded again.
“It’s land bank, really anyone with money can buy it, but I hear people talking, they say it’s a teardown. Say someone would have to put at least 80 in it to make it livable.”
Jack felt a surge of pain in his ribs.
“How long you been living in there?”
“Seven years, give or take. You bought me a week at the Continental once, don’t know if you remember that. My sister used to let me stay with her when it got cold but…”
Jack leaned up against that dumpster that served the transmission shop someone was making into a vegan soup carryout.
He reached out his hand.
“Gimmie.”
Jimmy handed him the half-pint.
“Can you get more of this?”
“Yeah, Techno will sell me some if I go to the window. He won’t let me in the club because I don’t be dressin’ up to his standard.”
Jack gulped the rest of the gin.
Jimmy turned to the side and opened the rice container.
“Awww, shit Jack, this really is large. I thought you was fuckin’ with me.”
“Have I ever fucked with you?”
“Naw, my brother, but you ain’t yourself tonight, and I jus’...I don’t know what I thought.”
Jimmy handed the container back to Jack.
“I can’t take all this money, it’s too much.”
Jack shook his head.
“No, that’s yours. Don’t argue. Just promise me you’ll buy that house.”
“Shit, Jack, no credit, felony conviction. Even as a teardown, land bank gonna want twenty, plus getting it up to code. Ain’t no way, though bless you for thinking of me Jack, but it ain’t, they won’t…”
The carryout container hung between the two men.
Jack held up his hand, palm out.
His hand trembled and his arm started to lower, as though his watch was too heavy. He made a fist, out of frustration, defiance.
The watch.
The talisman.
Shannon hated the watch.
But he was too stubborn.
Jimmy still held the container full of money, trying to return it.
Jack looked at his friend.
He’s a fucking prince of this fucked up city, glamor just starting to bust its beak through the rusty egg.
Jack peeled off the watch.
“You own a suit, Jimmy?”
“Yeah, I got a funeral suit at my sister’s. Don’t go to church no more, less I’m paying my last respects.”
Jack handed Jimmy the watch.
“I want you to do something for me. Get yourself to Eight and Van Dyke to Fetzman Automotive. You gotta wear a suit, I don’t want them to fuck with you. Tell them you wanna see Maurice Fetzman. This is a 1961 Rolex Submariner.”
Jack flipped the watch over. Etched on the metal band was MFII.
“If they give you a hard time, tell them that you are there to return Mr. Fetzman’s father’s watch.”
“You can probably get sixty grand for it in a few places. But I promise you this: You tell Maurice Fetzman you got rid of Sunshine Jack, and you brought him his daddy’s watch, he’ll give you 200K. Easy. Maybe more.”
“Holy Moses, Jack.”
“Can you do that, Jimmy? You ain’t gotta be sober, but you can’t be drunk. Gotta wear a suit. If Maurice’s people give you a hard time, make sure you tell them you got a 61 Submariner. That fat one-eyed bastard will probably sprint out to the guard shack.”
“What this Fetzman guy gonna do to me when he find out I didn’t take out Sunshine Jack?”
“Cancer’s gonna do that for ya. Mo Fetzman’s fat ass will just be happy I’m dead. He gave up trying to kill me fifteen years ago, far as I can tell.”
Jimmy Lemons stood flat-footed in the alley.
He wasn’t sure if anything besides the money was real.
Jack hugged Jimmy and shuffled to his car.
Jimmy called after him, “I’ll see you soon, Jack, Bless you my brother.”
***
Even with a check from Fetzman Automotive for 161 thousand dollars that said vendor on it, the city refused to sell James Patrick “Jimmy Lemons” McMorris the house he had lived in for seven years.
He paid for two years in advance for a one-bedroom at the Franklin Arms on Alter Road, a short walk from the river.
Jimmy took a small DIY framing kit he got at the dollar store and framed the obituary.
“Rock Club Impresario, Reputed Mobster, Dead at 65”
Jimmy hung the obituary in the center of his living room, sat on his new blue rent-to-own sofa, and cried. He would love Jack forever, but he was mad there was no memorial service.
Two miles away, in Grosse Pointe Shores, Shannon Clapping discarded the congratulatory card she received from her ex-husband, along with the note that said: “for the miracle child’s college fund”.
Shannon took the twenty-dollar bill and shoved it in the Ball jar on the shelf by the front door, where they kept the spare car keys and cash to tip the food delivery people.
***
Photo by Adam Bignell on Unsplash
I loved this one. A riveting story. I’m not much of a plot person, but this was satisfying, yet left me wanting more. I was genuinely fearful it was going to end at 100 words and leave me hanging.
Wow. Great opening lines. Great turned tables at the end.