The house had not been hard to find, not too far from my house
actually. I barely squeezed the Mercedes into the driveway and walked
up to the door and rang the doorbell. I was greeted by three different
guys, all from work, who welcomed me into the house. I came in and sat
down in a sofa as Binky, they guy whose shift I picked up the other
day, brought me a beer.
"Thanks," I responded as I cracked open the can.
"Don't thank me yet, I stillhave to take your money later," he said as
he winked at me. "I'm goingto make you want to get your own beer
pretty soon." I smiled at him.
Soon enough, the poker games began. I teamed up with Mark, the host of
the party, until I learned how to play. I picked it up easy enough. We
weren't playing for cash for the first few rounds anyways.
"You guys ready to play?"Mark asked.
"Yeah, let's go."
"Do you wanna play or just watch?" Mark asked me.
"I'll play I suppose."
"Okay, everyone buy in!"
Everyone threw twenty dollars into the center of the table. I grabbed
a twenty out of my wallet and tossed it in, telling myself I was going
to stop as soon as I started losing money.
Mark dealt a stack of chips to everyone. I started as small blind so I
was already being forcedto throw chips into the middle of the table,
next to the cash. Twenty bucksdidn't seem like much, but we had two
tables going and there were about seven to eight guys per table. Binky
passed around another round of beers for everyone.
"Aww thanks, Binky," I said as he set mine down next to my right hand.
"What did I tell you aboutthanking me?" he asked, smiling.
"Hey, the way I look at it, you still owe me from taking your shift
the other day," I joked back. He laughed and sat downafter everyone
was served.
The first game went fairlyquick. I was playing conservatively and
waiting for opportune times to gamble. I was slowly bleeding chips,
but I stayed in while other people started to get weeded out and went
to go watch Mark's four-hundred plus channels on cable.
Eventually two tables became one, and one became half a table. There
were five of us left and even though I wasn'tleading, I was still
holding on.
Five left, four, three, two... I was one of two left in the game.
Then I took my opportunity and struck.
I definitely had the betterhand, and I pushed all in, acting as if I
just wanted to join the rest of the guys and watch cable. Binky was
buying into my act, and matched my gamble.
"Holy crap, you just beat me. You have a full house."
"Is that what it is called? Ididn't know I just figuredit might be
something," I lied. I had easily figured this game out. I was just
playing an act."Beginner's luck."
"Yeah, beginner's luck," Binky replied. "Hey, I'm kind of sick of
playing; we've been going at it for over three hours. Since you did so
good foryour first time, wanna split the pot? The game ison and I
really wanted to watch."
"Yeah, that's fine by me. Ikind of wanted to watch the game too."
"Alright, let me count up the cash and I'll split it down the middle."
"Sounds good to me."
And with that, I ended the night with one-hundred thirty more dollars
that I had spent that night. It was free. It was easy.
I walked back to grab another beer and headedover to the sofa to watch
the game with the guys: University of Illinois versus University of
Wisconsin- Big Ten game.I casually posed my question to Mark.
"Hey Mark, when are you planning on hosting another poker night? This
was kind of fun tonight."
"There is usually one every Saturday night. We switch houses though.
This Saturday it was my turn. Next week we will be over at Mike's."
"Cool. Well I'm going to take off and get home before the wife gets
too worried about me."
"Alright. See you at Mike's and at work!"
"Yup. See you later."
And with that, I drove home, wondering what I could do with the money.
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