Three Bunches of Grapes, The Duke and The Queen of Hearts
He owed everybody and their mother in law so his eyes could not quite comprehend it when the whirling little pictures came to a stop with not one or two which would pay something but three, three little pictures of a bunch of blue almost purplish grapes all in a row. There was a moment of complete silence as his eyes focused on the three little pictures of the grapes. He knew what it meant even though he almost never played these machines. Everyone knew even if they never gambled, three sevens, three eights, three peaches, three anything equaled jackpot!
He knew what had just happened. But then these things just never happened to him, never. Then the noise erupted. There were buzzers buzzing and belles dinging and even a slight little tune going off in addition to all the lights blinking and flashing. He knew everyone in the huge plush carpeted rich ornately decorated room had turned to look. He knew what it all meant. He just couldn’t quite comprehend it. It was him Mark Bravermann broke, forever in debt, working two jobs with a nagging wife who wanted more, more and more. He could not have hit the jackpot!
But the bells and the dings and the little tune kept playing over and over again. The lights kept flashing until a huge, muscular but impeccably dressed man in a thousand dollar suit and a hundred dollar haircut with manicured fingernails came over and smiled at him. Then the man pulled out a key stuck it in the side and the bells and the buzzers and the little tune and the lights all came to a halt. Everything seemed normal again. Mark knew there had to have been a mistake and the big, impeccably dressed man would explain it all to him. Except for one thing, one thing kept flashing it was right above the three pictures of the little grapes. It was a line of numbers in red lights. It was right under the word Jackpot. It would not stop flashing. It said $7,832.00.
The big, impeccably dressed man pulled out another key. He called over two security men and they helped him push the big machine away from the wall. Then the big man took the second key and opened the back.
Mark could see him inspect a little plastic tag inside and he thought for a moment that the man was going to have him arrested. The two security guards would haul him away. But the big man smiled again and said. “It’s okay.” Then he punched some numbers inside and the machine kicked out a ticket. The big man then nodded to the two security guards. As the two guards took up a position on either side of Mark he was hit with a moment of sheer panic. He was sure they were going to take him into the back of the Casino and break his fingers or his legs like they did to cheaters in the movies. But then the big man handed him the ticket and said.
“They will escort you to the window.”
Mark almost passed out as a wave of relief flooded through him. Then as he walked towards the window he became aware of a huge crowd that had surrounded him. He actually needed the guards to make a path for him. As he looked at all the smiling faces and smiled back the crowd broke out in applause. Applause, applause he hadn’t heard anything like that in twenty, twenty-five or was it thirty years? The last time he played football. Yeah it was the last game of high school football. They had walked off the field leading by fourteen points with only 15 seconds left on the clock. Their coach had called time out so he could get the seniors off the field and let them have that. He was the right defensive end. He hadn’t heard anything like that since and yes it was thirty years just about. It was late November just a little more than two months from now and thirty years ago.
He could feel his chest swell with pride. He pulled himself all the way up to his full six foot two inch height. He sucked in his gut a bit not to hide anything but to let out a breath of pure exhilaration. He was a big man. He had no idea what he weighed anymore. He never stood on a scale. He hadn’t really gained over the years. He was always this size. But in spite of his size he felt as if he floated over the plush carpet and even though it was a long way to the window the applause just made it seem like a few moments before he was in front of a smiling beautiful young woman whose rather large breasts were carefully constrained by a tight golden gambler’s vest. She asked him if he would like chips or a cashier’s check.
Chips! Chips he knew would all disappear, as soon as his wife got a hold of them. Cash the word cash jumped in his head. He could hide the cash stuff it in his pockets, his socks or his golf bag.
“Cash.” He said and he loved the sound of it.
The beautiful woman carefully constrained behind the golden vest said. “Sorry but the Federal government demands that we account for every dollar.”
Mark smiled back and said. “Check then. I’ll take the check.”
The beautiful woman smiled and handed him a slip of paper. He quickly filled it out. His name, his address, his social security number and handed it back to her.
She smiled again and asked. “Would you like us to deduct twenty-five percent for taxes right now?”
Mark shook not just his head but his whole body no.
“Just give us a few minutes.” She said as she turned from the window.
Mark drummed his fingers on the counter. His momentary happiness was beginning to fade as he realized that he owed the Federal government four thousand two hundred and some dollars. He owed the State of New York three thousand and forty something dollars. He owed American Express seven thousand and some dollars. He owed Master Card six thousand and some odd dollars. He owed Visa five thousand and some dollars. He had no credit and he could not so much as borrow a dime from anyone. The only card he had left was from Citibank and it was good for a thousand dollars so long as he had that much in his account. The seven thousand eight hundred and thirty two dollars he had just won would not make a dent.
When the woman came back she asked. “Would you like us to keep this in our safe until you leave?”
Mark’s head snapped. What a brilliant idea! No one could get at it. He wouldn’t even have to mention it. But then he realized how could he not mention it? But if it stayed in the safe then no one could get at it.
“Yes.” He said. “Just one minute.” He took the check from her and then pulled his card from his wallet. It had the same numbers as his bank account. On the back of the check he carefully endorsed it to his Citibank account putting the numbers down carefully and then wrote ‘for deposit only.’ Then he asked her. “Can I have a copy?”
“Of course sir.” She said. Then she disappeared for a moment and she returned with his copy and a receipt that showed it was in Trump’s Golden Casino Atlantic City’s safe.
Mark smiled and folded up both the copy of the check and the receipt put it in the inside coat pocket of his only sport coat and walked away feeling ten feet tall.
He went to his room and lay down on the bed. His wife was with her sister and her brother in law. They were shopping or playing black jack. He felt sleepy. He took out the picture of the check and laid it on the bed next to him. He was in his bed in their room in their rather plush suite complements of his brother in law, the Attorney.
The Attorney according to his wife was a great success unlike him, Mark Bravermann. Mark Bravermann was a big failure. Mark Braverman never quite made enough money, never made much of himself, never did anything oh did she mention that he never made enough money. That was why they were forever in debt. It was his fault. He was only a high school history teacher. Of course she was only a secretary. She had never finished college. He had a Master’s degree in American History. Something he had pointed out early on during one of her tirades but it didn’t make a dent. The bottom line was he did not make enough money. He did make over seventy thousand dollars a year more than he ever thought he would make but it wasn’t enough. The Attorney used to make over two hundred thousand a year. The Attorney and his wife used to go on vacation to Monaco, Rome and Paris. Of course that was when the Attorney had worked for a private firm. Something had happened a few years back and The Attorney had to leave the private firm. He took a position with the City of New York. The Attorney said he wanted to give something back to society. The Attorney had a nice cushy job where he made over a hundred thousand a year but gone were the vacations to Monaco and that’s why they were all together now in Atlantic City. The Attorney liked to argue all the time something Mark abhorred. On the ride down in the Attorney’s Coup DeVille the Attorney had gone on about abortion. The Attorney didn’t think a man any man should have a vote on whether or not women should be able to have abortions. Men would never get pregnant. They didn’t have to carry a child. They had nothing to do with it so they shouldn’t be allowed to vote on it. To Mark it made little or no sense to argue this. The Attorney had three kids and they were all married and had kids of their own. It wasn’t like he had a fifteen your old daughter who might get pregnant. Mark knew the Attorney had no iron in the fire, no, the Attorney’s arguments were always something not personal to him and they always were made to make him sound very high minded and very moral. Mark also knew the Attorney wanted him to disagree. Mark knew this would lead to a long winded, well plotted out case as if there was a jury present somewhere either in the car or on a feed to some cable network.
Mark did not need nor could he imagine he, and his wife ever needing an abortion. They had spent many years trying to have children, gone to various fertility doctors but nothing had worked. His sperm didn’t swim all that much and her eggs were not functioning every month. This was another of his great failures that she could and would articulate at the drop of a hat. And this one hit home more so than the money thing.
She had bought just about everything she could think of, furniture, clothes, and jewelry that’s why they owed so much. But children, there were none.
He turned on the T.V. and flipped through the many cable channels. He settled on a film he’d seen many times Gettysburg about the battle of Gettysburg. It was near the climax. Pickett’s men were forming their battalions and heading for the Union line. They were about to be decimated. But then the Union would be saved and Mark feeling reassured drifted off to sleep.
He was awoken with a shriek.
“What is this? Is this some kind of a joke?”
It was his wife standing over him. Her hair was black, blacker than when he had first met her. She died it now to keep out the little gray that was sneaking in. She was a year older than him and she had not aged well. Not that she looked old, just chunkier and her once pretty face pinched, mean and angry looking.
He rubbed his eyes and sat up on the bed. Behind his wife was his sister in law and the Attorney. They looked puzzled. She hadn’t shown them yet.
Mark couldn’t help it he smiled from ear to ear as he said.
“I went to one of those machines, slot machines. I put in a few dollars…” He paused for a moment and realized it was five dollars. “Well then all of a sudden all these bells and buzzers and lights went off. Seems…” He couldn’t help but drag it out a bit as he now had everyone’s attention including the Attorney. “I hit what they call a Jackpot.”
“This is real money.” The wife said.
“Yes.” He answered.
The wife handed it back to the Attorney who looked at the copy and let out a low whistle.
Mark was amazed that the Attorney was impressed. He hoped this did not initiate the Attorney attempting another argument. Mark had long lost any reason to argue with anyone. What was he going to win anyway? He had given up winning or being top dog long ago, sometime after football. Sometime after his younger brother went out and out, performed him at every sport he had ever played. His five years younger, head smaller, hundred pounds lighter, little brother could just do everything, pitch in baseball, and play centerfield. In football he was the quarterback. The little brother was no taller than five foot nine and he weighed no more than a hundred and fifty pounds. Their father who had watched Mark’s games with support watched the younger brother’s games with unabashed glee.
Maybe he’d call his Dad and tell him about the Jackpot. But then his father didn’t really gamble. His Dad would just go to the track a few times a year with no more than a hundred dollars. His Dad loved to handicap and loved when he was right but really didn’t go much and never really gambled. No one in the family did including himself. He just went on these trips to watch the shows and enjoy the meals. Unlike the Attorney who would play black jack for days. The Attorney had a system. The system seemed to prevent him from losing but then he never seemed to win much either. He’d walk away after two days with a hundred or two hundred dollars. The Attorney also had a system to play roulette but claimed he needed real seed money to utilize it.
The Attorney spoke up now, in the face of real winnings. “Like the man said. I’d rather be lucky than good.”
There it was the put down. Mark knew it was coming. It always came. Mark usually took it in stride but right now he felt like taking his fist and smashing the little man over the head. The Attorney was short and going bald fast with just a few hairs in the middle of his head that he combed straight back. He was slightly older than Mark. He always wore suits like he was now. Mark had long ago just resigned himself to putting up with him. Mark was surprised at his own feelings right now and he could not help but notice that the little buttoned down Attorney’s suit was nowhere near as good as the muscular guy’s who given him the ticket the ticket, that had turned into a check in the amount of $7,832.00 the copy of which his wife was just staring at. It really didn’t matter how he had gotten the money. It was there wasn’t it?
The Attorney spoke up. “We’re going to dinner if you care to come.”
Mark mulled it over looking at his sister in law. She was a taller, slimmer version of his wife. They looked alike but the sister somehow always looked glamorous. Usually he would demure from this invitation and take the time to just be alone. But this time he said.
“Why not?”
Mark grabbed his sport coat and found a tie in his yet unpacked luggage.
There was a first class dining room on the ground floor and Mark wasn’t worried about the check. The Attorney wanting to show off would always make a big show of picking up the tab. This usually bothered Mark but not tonight.
Let the man pay. He thought. Let the man pay.
Mark had ordered the T-bone steak with all the trimmings. Right now they were having the salad and the Attorney was pointing his salad fork at Mark while he proclaimed. “Barbaric. Absolutely barbaric.”
Mark wasn’t really paying attention because over the Attorney’s shoulder was a light flashing at him. It was a top another of those slot machines. There was a well lit up picture of a cowboy swinging a lariat above his head and the yellow light was flashing ‘BIG ROUND UP ONE DOLLAR!”
Mark couldn’t really focus on what the Attorney was going on about. He knew it had something to do with Capital Punishment. He forgot if the Attorney was for or against it but he was very vehement about it either way.
Mark put his hand inside his coat pocket and felt the receipt. He’d been doing that every few minutes. It made him feel good.
“But somebody just killed some little girl in Florida. What should we do?”
It was the Attorney’s wife. She seldom entered into these things but since neither Mark nor his wife Sherrill had spoken up she felt compelled to say something just so her husband would have someone to converse with.
“Well there are mitigating circumstances but… The State the State should never take a life. What if we make a mistake?”
This kind of stuff was argued all the time nowadays. Somehow Mark didn’t remember people arguing so much, years ago. Now it was the rage. It was all over the cable T.V. and the radio. Sometimes you couldn’t even get the ballgames. Part of Mark’s aversion stemmed from his deep knowledge of history and the fact that people, even very well educated people like the Attorney, had little knowledge of history. What was the sense of arguing about current politics with people who had no idea who Nathaniel Greene was? Or his favorite when he wanted to shut someone up, why did the Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor? He liked that the best. When he asked that he would always get a vacant stare. It wasn’t a look like someone trying to remember something they had forgotten. It was the total vacant look that came when someone had no idea. He had seen enough students fumble through questions over the last twenty- five years to be an expert. He had never done that to the Attorney. He knew his wife would give him a hard time if he did. But somehow he felt like doing that right now.
Mark reached into his pocket again and touched the receipt. As his hand came away this time something came with it. For a moment Mark panicked and thought it was the ticket. He reached his hand back in and took out the receipt and it was there along with the copy. Then he looked down at what had come out and sitting right up in the middle of his salad was the old wrinkled face of George Washington. It was an old crumpled up dollar bill with dusty old pieces of lint around it. It must have been in his coat pocket since God knew when. Mark’s eyes looked up and there again calling him over the right shoulder of the Attorney was the cowboy and the big yellow sign.
‘BIG ROUND UP ONE DOLLAR!’
“Looks like you ruined your salad.” The Attorney said.
Mark smiled and asked. “Why did the Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor?”
He saw a puzzled look on the Attorney’s face and then came the blank stare. Sherrill’s mouth was wide open in horror.
Mark took the dollar out of the salad and left the table.
They all three stared at him as he walked away.
“Is he all right?” The Attorney asked. “Listen I don’t want to say anything bad about your husband but he does seem to be acting rather odd on this trip. Not that he ever seems quite right to tell you the truth. But is there…”
They all watched as walked out of the dining area across the lobby and stopped in front of a large slot machine.
Mark had walked across the richly carpeted floor with the dollar outstretched in his hand. It seemed to guide him across the floor and pull itself into the slot for dollar bills. The machine quickly sucked it up like a vacuum.
Mark thought he had lost his mind for an instant as he watched the dollar disappear but then his eyes were caught by the whirling little figures. There were four on this one. An increase in the impossible to begin with odds he knew without wanting to even guess but then the first one stopped on a cowboy hat. Then the second one did the same as did the third. Mark began to smile from ear to ear. He knew what was going to happen now just as sure as God made little green apples. When the fourth column came to a halt with the cowboy hat in place Mark just smiled as if he was looking into the face of a long lost friend.
The lights flashed and blinked. The bells and buzzers went off again and then he could distinctly hear the long loud Neeeehhhhh of a horse and then the unmistakable recorded voice of John Wayne exclaim.
“Fill your hands you Son of a Bitch!”
“Chips!” The Attorney was crying. “You should have taken chips! I have an almost fool proof system for playing roulette.”
Mark just stared down at the latest copy of his newfound jackpot.
$15,243.00.
“Don’t I always win at black jack?” The Attorney was asking.
Mark didn’t answer. He simply took off his jacket hung it up, slipped out of his shoes and lay back on the bed.
“Think of what I could do at roulette? There are real payoffs at roulette!” He exclaimed.
Yeah Mark thought with my money you wouldn’t lose a dime.
But then there were other things. His wife declared. “A vacation to Barbados! Or Rome! Clothes! New furniture!”
He noticed she didn’t mention jewelry. Something his wife had learned over the years after pissing away thousands and thousands on jewelry that it did not have much of a resale value. His sister in law didn’t make any suggestions. Mark knew it was not out of any sense of decency but just that she didn’t dare suggest anything that conflicted with her husband’s roulette plans.
Mark began to drift off to sleep. What did he want to do? What did he like to do? He liked to teach. That was the one thing that really loved. He would always start the opening session of class off with the Declaration of Independence. He always started a term off with blank faces staring back at him. But then somewhere over the course of the term the light would go on in their eyes. This nation had been founded by unique and great people, some known others unknown, none perfect but all great; Washington, Jefferson, Adams, Nathaniel Greene, and followed by other great people, Jackson, Lincoln, the Roosevelt’s and Marine Sergeant Manila John Basillone. The man’s story would always bring tears to his eyes, when he would tell it in class. On and on it went generation after generation. It was right there in the pages of history and sometime during the term they would all get it. He would see the light come on in their eyes one by one. He himself had never done anything great. He probably never would. Even this money was just dumb luck. But it was special. And like the Attorney who had knowingly or unknowingly quoted Casey Stengel once said. “I’d rather be lucky than good.” And of course there was the hope that sitting there in one his classes was another now newly inspired young American hero someone who would do something great.
His wife, her sister and the Attorney were still making plans as he fell asleep.
They had even more plans the next day as they sat through breakfast and then made their way to leave early that morning, as they wanted to beat all the traffic back to New York.
Not only were there Barbados and Rome but Paris, Hawaii and even the Fiji Islands beckoned. Not only that there were new cars, redecorating and all manner of things you could do with money. So many things he could not quite keep track of them. But what finally shut them up was Mark on his way out the door stopped by another machine. He only had twenties so he broke two and started in on a machine that was Gambler’s Rhapsody that had a guy who looked like Wyatt Earp sitting behind a poker table. As he was playing it a dollar at a time he could hear his wife mumbling.
“He’s going to lose it all back.”
And the Attorney moaned. “Why didn’t he let me play roulette?”
As Kings and Queens and Jacks tumbled before his eyes Mark’s mind was recalling the old adage. Lucky in cards unlucky in… when on the 21st dollar he watched as the Queen of Hearts, the Queen of Hearts and the Queen of Hearts all stopped in a row for him.
On the ride back there was nothing but quiet. They were all so stunned. But after two hours the wives sitting together in the back began to make small talk. No one dared bring it up. The last payout was less than the others but then $5,487.00 was nothing to sneeze at either.
The only thing the Attorney said to him on the long ride back was.
“Oil.”
Mark smiled. He had gotten through to him. The Attorney must have gone on the Internet with the computer they had in the suite. Well it wasn’t a formal history book but at least the Attorney had made the effort and learned how President Franklin Roosevelt had put an embargo on all oil shipments to Japan. FDR was trying to stop Japan’s expansion and war in China. The only oil the Japanese could get was in the Dutch East Indies. The only thing stopping them from going down there and getting it was the American 7th Fleet anchored at Pearl Harbor. On December 7th, 1941 the Japanese had gone into the oil business.
Mark sat under a tree the next afternoon. He was on a hill that was near the Queens Courthouse on Queens Blvd not far from their apartment. He could see all the way across Queens Valley as it had once been referred to. He had grown up here too. The sun was going down and throwing long shadows across the Valley that was crisscrossed with highways but you still had plenty of trees, bushes and deep green grass. It was still summer and the green was deep and lush. He could imagine easily how it looked before the highways, even before the people had shown up.
In his hands was his checkbook. He flipped through the carbons that were attached to the back of the checks he had sent out. The IRS, the State of New York, Visa, Master Card and American Express even some furniture company he had forgotten about. He figured after all the checks cleared he would have $572.47 left. In a sense he hadn’t really won. If life was a game you won and lost well he had been down so long that he hadn’t even been playing.
He smiled to himself. He didn’t have much left but then he owed absolutely nothing and no one. And he was going to savior this moment. It was so rare. It was almost like starting over again. He felt like a kid maybe one of his students. He had no idea how long it would last. He knew his wife. He knew her tendencies. The past repeated, he well knew. But now, right now, he was going to enjoy one of those truly rare things. He was even.
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