( COULD GAMBLE MY LIFE AWAY ) // OPEN

[megan2]

Phinneas Dodge isn’t your typical bad guy turned good… it took going to prison for him to even consider changing anything in his life. Counting cards came easy to him – he thanked his long-lost mother for those talents, for having no sitters when it was time for her to go to work at the black jack tables in Vegas. He learned a lot in Vegas – how to count cards, cheat the system, and win money when people least expect you to come back in the game to win. Most of all, he learned how to hustle the dealers and to keep them from turning him in for counting cards. He always paid the dealers off with a huge part of his winnings on the nights he allowed himself the chance to win.

He’d been at the black jack table for about two hours now and he was getting tired of letting people win. He was debating with himself in his mind whether or not to let himself win a round or two. As he was mindlessly playing the game and not paying attention to what cards in the deck had been played already, he let his mind drift to his past. To his time in prison and the long days that not even his little brother made contact with him. He wondered where his brother was nowadays, what he was doing or where he was living.

It always broke his heart to think about this family. He currently has no contact with his brother or his mother. He would like to again one day, but after changing his name and moving away he figured that they would want nothing to do with him now anyways. So he set those thoughts aside and started to pay closer attention to the game. He won a few rounds and then started people watching in the casino. He always thought it was funny, the array of people who could gamble their lives away. He used to be that greedy.

He won a couple more rounds and decided to call it a night. He slipped the dealer a hundred dollar tip and made his way to the casino restaurant. His pockets were full of chips that totaled to about three grand. That was his rent money for the month. He let the hostess seat him at a table near the back where things were a little quieter. He smiled at her and winked as he took a seat at the small two-person table. He had eaten here numerous times since moving to Fantasia City. He was glad that this spot was discreet for meetings and dates. Dodger ordered a beer and a steak and baked potato when the waitress came over to talk to him. He slapped her on the butt as she walked away from him with his order in her hand. She smiled back at him; he winked.

He typically didn’t eat alone – but on this night he preferred it. It was his personal anniversary of the day he moved to Fantasia City and he hated to spend that night with anyone but himself. He didn’t know why, but remembering coming here and leaving his family behind was a sad emotion that he kept close to himself. He didn’t want to share it with anyone and no one would understand. His food arrived about fifteen minutes after the waitress had brought his beer over. He started eating and was content to be alone.

[marchhare]

"The owner of this place is a good friend of mine!" Harry slurred, pointing at the barman with a long and remarkably unstable index finger. He was in the Wonderland Casino bar and restaurant after having had a particularly unsuccessful bout as a stand-in for another stand-up who didn't show up. It was only a fifteen minute set, but fifteen minutes can still seem a lifetime when you're constantly falling on your face, metaphorically speaking of course. Apparently the audience were expecting a fast talking New Yorker, a dude with witty quips and saucy one liners, and they didn't seem too pleased when they received a blathering English expatriate, whose jokes consisted mainly of long-winded anecdotes (Harry really had to work on his act), instead.

"I know he's not, Harry," the barman replied, continuing with his work and remaining unperturbed by Harry's accusing finger. With a sigh, Harry dropped his hand and took another swig from his drink. He had been working on-and-off in the casino for nearly a decade now, though it barely seemed half than that. Now most of the staff knew him, if not by name but at least by face... or maybe by reputation.

"You never believe my lies!" Harry retorted, waving his arms melodramatically in the air and almost falling off his bar stool as he did so. With a pout he took another final swig from his drink and slammed the glass back down on the polished wood of the bar, following the action with the proclamation: "I demand the finest wine in all of China!"

"Sure, sure," the barman said, "Another pint of beer then?"

Harry answered the barman's question with a somewhat dejected nod and grunt. "You know what?" he began as he waited for his drink (his fifth in the span of half an hour). "I don't know why I hang around with the you and your sordid kind. Maybe I should find people who will believe my lies and douse those people with gifts and petroleum."

The barman laughed as he handed Harry a newly poured pint. "I bet you can't find a single person in this room that would believe you," he said, grinning.

Suddenly Harry perked up on his seat, looking almost uncannily alert and being almost the picture of a personified meerkat (or perhaps a hare). "I smell a wager!" he exclaimed. "I place ten shillings and my wife on the table that I can get someone to believe my wonderfully contrived fabrications!"

"Let's make that twenty bucks and you got yourself a deal," the barman said, raising his eyebrows and holding out his hand, which Harry took in a far too vigorous handshake.

"Pleasure doing business with you my good man!" Harry said, jumping from his bar stool with a wobbly grace. He felt an extreme urge to tip his hat at that moment; however, since he wasn't wearing a hat of any kind (he must try and pilfer one from his roommate), Harry instead decided to bow. Taking his drink with him, he turned to survey the scene. There were a few clusters of people here, chatting away and eating their overpriced meals, but he had his eyes set on the lonely diners. One in particular caught his attention: a young man, perhaps on the legal side of twenty in age, sitting at a small table near the back. With a gallop and a skip (yes, somehow Harry could manage to intertwine those two movements), he made his way towards the guy.

"Do you know whose table you're sitting on?" he said, mock outrage lacing the tone of his voice.

[megan2]

Dodger had noticed that there were not that many people in the casino restaurant and bar beside him. He was sure that no one was going to mess with him or try to talk to him… little did he know that there were two men making a bet at the bar. He had noticed the tall, yet rumbled and drunk looking guy at the bar when he walked in. He’d seen him around the casino and hotel many times before. He wasn’t sure what the name was, but knew of him by reputation as being a drunk and a comedian. Dodge had never seen the man on a stage, but figured he looked like he could be funny.

Dodge could hear the English accented man talking very loudly to the bartender, and he seemed more than sloshed already. Dodge rolled his eyes and went back to eating the food he had previously ordered. The waitress came by again to chat with him. ‘It’s such a slow night’ she said to him. He nodded to her, wary of saying anything because there was food still in his mouth.

When he was done chewing he asked, ‘Guess you don’t make many tips on a week night, huh?’ He looked around the room again, only three or for other tables were occupied and there was only two men at the bar. One who was quiet, and one who was talking loudly and was obviously anything but sober.

Dodger was finishing his steak meal when her noticed the drunk and the bartender shaking hands. He wondered what was going on. He sat back in his chair to watch and then he noticed that this drunk was off his bar stool in two seconds flat. He thought to himself, how could he move that fast after so many drinks? The waitress came by and dropped his bill in a billfold on the table. He opened it and pulled out his own wallet to pay his tab. Put the card in the slot on the left side of the billfold and handed it back to her after glancing to see that everything on the bill was correct. He noticed a kiss on the check in a lovely shade of pink lipstick. He noticed it was the same that his waitress was wearing. That made him smile.

He looked back up towards the rest of the room at the same time he noticed that the drunk was now standing at the other end of his two-person table. He tilted his head sideways to look up at him as the man asked him a question.

‘First of all, I’m not sitting on a table’ he smirked back at the drunk man. ‘And second of all, who the hell do you think you are asking me such an undirected question?’ Dodger crossed his arms over his chest, after he cracked his knuckles. He was hoping that the gesture told the drunk that he’s not afraid to pick a fight.

[marchhare]

Harry was not perturbed by the man's nonchalance nor by the way he cracked his knuckles. Harry was drunk, and being drunk meant that one was never perturbed by anything, either that or perturbed immensely by everything. Harry momentarily assured himself that it was the former. Plus he knew how to handle himself if things ever did resort to fisticuffs. He had grown up in the east end of London after all, in perhaps one of the roughest neighbourhoods. But he wasn't here to pick a fight, he was here to take twenty dollars from the hairy fingers of the casino barman (whose name escaped him at that moment, but Harry had always been bad with names, and with faces in fact).

"Oh I see," Harry slurred, sloshing his beer around in his pint glass as if he were twirling a fine wine (but of course, that was what he had asked for, wasn't it?). 'You're one of those nitpickers! Nitpicking at my choice of words like some... nitpicker, you!" His voice was accusing and so was his expression, his dark brow furrowed in an almost comical manner.

"As for who I am?" At those words Harry pulled out the empty chair opposite the man and plonked himself upon it as if he owned the place, which he was sort of pretended he did (or at least pretending he knew the person who did). "I am in fact the one who donated this table to this fine facility specifically for myself to sit at whenever I felt the urge. I am a man of great importance! Don't let my unruly hair fool you into thinking otherwise, 'tis but a folly there to distract away from my exceptional importance."

"And so..." Harry continued on with his miniature monologue, his gestures getting more extravagant as he did so, "I own this table, this chair and that chair you're sitting on," he pointed at each object in succession and with increasing flamboyance, "so you're actually on my property."

Smiling Harry leaned back into his chair and took another swig from his drink. "But don't worry," he said. "I'm a man of excellent taste and extraordinary benevolence and so I'll let you remain there for now. Did you know I know the owner of this place? Good friends we are. Met in Oxford. Played bridge."

[megan2]

Dodger hoped that his knuckle cracking and head tilt made him look a little tougher, and a little perturbed. He didn’t get why this guy wanted to interrupt his time alone at the dinner table. He found it kind of rude. Dodge knew this guy was drunk, but that was really no excuse. He figured there was no way he should take this guy very seriously. He decided to slip back in his chair and see what this guy wanted to say…

‘Wow, you just used the word nitpicker three times in one sentence. Brave.’ Dodger started clapping at the drunk. He was actually not surprised seeing as how this guy was sloshed and sloppy. He let out a small giggle at the furrowed brow the drunk was giving him – he was being absolutely serious. Dodge thought this guy was a riot.

He watched as the man took a seat across from him at the table. The drunk was trying to assume a powerful position over Dodge. Dodge sat up tall in his seat, crossing his arms over his chest, as if protecting himself. He listened as this drunk ranted about owning the table and being important or some other bullshit. He couldn’t believe any of this… this guys was way past the drunk legal limit and Dodge wondered if he should keep sitting here pretending to listen, or get up and call security. He knew this guy was blowing smoke up his ass. He’s a comedian here at the casino; Dodge had been here long enough to recognize people he saw on a regular basis.

‘That’s bullshit’ Dodge said to the drunken man across the table from him. ‘How do you expect me to believe you when you are sloshing beer all over this damn table?’ He uncrossed his arms and leaned forward across the table, so that only the drunk could hear his words. ‘I’ll play your little game… but only if you share your winnings.’ He smiled.

‘I saw that little display of gambling over at the bar before you headed my way. I will go along with whatever you need to me to if you share that money you plan on getting from that bar tender.’ Dodge smiled at his own audacity in this situation. He was sure he had read the situation right. He had seen many business deals go down before, in and after going to prison. He knew what a ‘deal’ was and how it looked to make one with another person. He figured that the bartender knew how drunk this guy was, and didn’t think he had a chance of losing his money. Dodge decided to help the drunk out. ‘What do you say boss?’

[marchhare]

Harry was not an actor, he was a comedian; although some might not even call him that, especially not that pretentious comedy critic of The Fantasian Post who had written a supremely scathing blurb about Harry's stand-up routine a few weeks back. Nevertheless, despite his lack of acting credentials, the haywire-haired and momentary drunkard had always thought of himself as a skilled liar. Of course narcissists had a tendency to think they were skilled at most everything and in fact, perhaps, the only person Harry was skilled at lying to was himself. Not that he was even aware of his own self-aggrandising, but then he was rarely aware of much--particularly not now in his current state of intense inebriation.

Another thing Harry wasn't aware of was the fact that had seen the man in front of him before, not ever face to face but at least from a distance. Nor was he aware that the man knew of his occupation (comédien extraordinaire), and was therefore completely able to deduce Harry's bald-faced lying with little or no difficultly. Harry was at a loss right from the very start, which was a shame because he was previously under the impression that he was doing quite well.

"Well... aren't you a man with an eye for fiction," Harry mumbled, letting out a disgruntled breath and leaning back against chair. He was down twenty bucks now and not at all happy about it, knowing he would have to dip into his savings (if one could call a couple notes in a sock one's savings) in order to procure the appropriate payment for the barman (who would undoubtedly be disgustingly smug, which was terribly unfair because Harry wanted to be the one who was disgustingly smug). However, there soon shone a silver lining in his gambler's cloud when the man before him began hatching up a plan.

"Fine!" Harry exclaimed before realising how loud he was speaking. He quietened his voice to a drunken whisper before continuing on. "Fine," he repeated, leaning over the table to bring himself closer to the man in an undeniably suspicious manner. "We can divide fifty-fifty. You get ten bucks and I get ten bucks and we walk outta here all calm and conservative, like." By the end of that sentence Harry had adopted a 1950's New York gangster accent without noticing. Clearing his throat loudly, he sat himself upright in his seat again.

"Well my good man," Harry said, with a nod and a wink. "I'm glad you believe everything I have said thus far with almost no qualms. Shall we head to the bar for a drink? You can tell me more of how you accept my outlandish statements unwaveringly." At those words he stood up and downed the remainder of his pint.