Thy Neighbors Wife
"My God, you're a lucky fucker!"
I had to ignore it, pretend it wasn't being said to me, but since Larry was sitting behind and looking over my shoulder, I knew it was. I'd just been dealt pocket bullets, and despite that I'd told Larry multiple times that poker isn't about the cards, it's about the players, at times he still couldn't keep his mouth shut.
Larry wasn't a very good player; essentially, he knew that a pair of aces would beat a pair of anything else. I knew he'd seen the pocket aces, but it was the Ace-King-King that showed up on the flop, giving me a full house, aces full of kings, that had elicited the untoward comment. I wanted to turn around and deck him, but instead I pretended I hadn't heard or that it didn't apply to me. It was my bet, so I hesitated. That I had the top hand, I was virtually certain of. Aces full of kings on the flop? What to do?
"Check." When in doubt, punt, right? That it was all a feint, trying to elicit a thought that I didn't have anything to the other two players was what I was now trying to sell. I passed it on to Pete, the third player, who was the only reason we were still playing.
The eight of us got together every month in my game room for a friendly poker game. We all threw in $100, enough that it stung if you lost, but not enough to kill any of us, and not enough to make the winner have much more than bragging rights. Not that any of us were filthy rich or anything, but none of us lost any sleep by losing a hundred.
Not that I lost all that often, it was pretty obvious that I was the best player -- if nothing else, just that I took home the "big pot" about half the time. There were two others that were pretty decent players, Pete and Dave, Pete being one of the two that were currently left. If I won half the time, Pete, and Dave won about half of the remaining times that I didn't, and the lesser players donated their money most of the time, the five of them sharing the wins that last quarter of the time.
"I'll open," Pete said. I knew he was just "keeping it honest" so that Danny, the last player left, couldn't just "buy" the pot with a huge bid that the rest of us didn't want to chance seeing. I knew I had a strong hand, but an opening weak bid, despite Larry's over the shoulder stab in my back, had to make them wonder.
"I'll see it and raise," Danny said. Danny was a weak player, but even weak players get good cards occasionally. I had to wonder what he had. A king and he'd have trips, but my trip aces beat him. Possibly, I'd have to watch him on the turn and the river -- if another king came out, that could be four of a kind -- the only hand that could beat me. But pocket aces and a full boat on the flop? I called. So did Pete.
Pete dealt the turn, a nine matching the Ace of the flop -- nothing to challenge my full boat. I checked again, Pete bet again, and this time Danny said "All in."
Shit. Nothing like a poor player going all in. Danny was one of those that regularly watched the World Series of Poker on TV, and didn't realize that the 10 guys on the table he was watching had been playing for four straight days and hadn't once in those four days called "all in," exactly why they were still playing They were the final 10 of literally hundreds who had started, and hearing "all in" from one of that group was a far cry from the penny-ante stuff that we played. But -- his bid made me pause. I looked down, my pot was easily twice his in size, but my hand was too good to just fold. I called. Pete folded, and we flipped our cards.
When do pocket kings beat pocket aces? When you get an Ace-King-King on the flop. Four of a kind and I watched Danny's pot go to the largest on the table, while Pete and I were now virtually even. Advantage, Danny.
"Hey Larry, get me another beer?" I asked, pointing at the sign over the bar, "Adam's Pool Hall: Liquor in the Front, Poker in the rear, the Bar is Always Open" trying to let my irritation at his faux pas slip away. The fact was, I wouldn't have won anyway -- Danny was one of those guys that stayed around when he should be dropping out - but tonight the cards had gone his way. Just one of those nights.
Larry slipped another cold one into my spot; I noticed he'd made himself another Jack and Coke. From past experience with Larry, along with his slurred speech and stumbling between the bar and the table, I suspected there was more Jack than Coke in his drink. No worries, but as had happened in the past I knew I'd be walking him home for Lara to put him to bed.
As it was, now with the large pot in front of him, it took another two hours for Danny to finally shoot himself in the foot so that Pete and I split the winnings. We'd long ago given up on the back and forth of guts when there were just two of us left -- which could go on for hours if we were both pretty evenly matched. Our "rule" was that once we got down to two of us left, unless one of us was about to clear out the other, we just threw in, counted the individual pots, and the big pot took $500 which we reasoned was about 2/3's, the smaller pot got $300 and we called it a night. It wasn't really 2/3's and 1/3, which would have been $533 and $266, but most of us threw in a hundred-dollar bill and since it was about the playing and bragging rights more than the actual money, we were all happy with that. Most of the time by then it was pretty much a moot point in that the "big" stash was about ten times the "small" stash -- but occasionally it came down to just a few chips difference. There had been a few times where someone had gone ahead with the "guts" play and won everything, but usually that mutually beneficial ending was about midnight. But with Danny's luck, tonight it was 2 am.
"Come on, buddy, let's walk you home," I said to Larry, stepping back over to the couch where he'd laid down and putting out a hand to help him.
"My god you're a fucky lucker," he said, sticking out his hand but making no effort to rise from where he was laying down, and broke into laughter as his word inversion. "Gimme a minute," he said.
"Nah, get up. If I give you a minute, you'll never get up and you'll still be here in the morning." I pulled on his hand and he sat up. Another pull and he stood, and then virtually fell against me. I draped his arm over my shoulder, and we started walking toward the stairs.
"You're such a lucky fucker," he said, managing to say it correctly this time. "I tell ya, buddy, I'd give my left nut to spend the night with her. You get to go upstairs and suck on those beautiful nipples... you'll do that won't you... go upstairs and suck those babies..."
"You're drunk, Larry."