by Lamar Giles
Davis said, “Can we follow them back to Nikki’s?”
“Sure, bro. It’s your night.”
Real cool, I said, “Awesome. Molly and me are in that SUV over there. Just follow us back.”
“See you there.” He gave me a quick hug. Casual. He broke off with his brother, Molly and me climbed into her SUV. Once the doors were properly sealed, and we made sure the Carlinos couldn’t see us …
WE. FREAKED.
Squeals. Stomping the floor and rocking the suspension. Bumping fists into the ceiling. I glanced at a family walking by in the rearview. They gave us a wide berth.
“He’s soooo into you!” Molly said.
“You really think?” I was fishing for more of her analysis, even though I agreed.
She started the engine and put us in motion. “Oh my god. Every time you bowled, he was checking you out.”
Well, that was mutual.
It went like that the whole way home. Us breaking down everything Davis said, did, and emoted with pheromones. I felt bad monopolizing the conversation, so I asked her what she thought about Cedric. She shrugged it off. “He doesn’t seem much older than us, but this has gotta be like babysitting for him. It’s cool, though.”
We turned in, pulling up to the curb. Mr. Héctor was on shift tonight, grinning at our approach. Only when we stopped did I hear the animal purr of the engine behind us. I’d been so consumed with my romantic progress, I hadn’t noticed what a beast of a car Cedric handled. A polished silver Maserati. Its grille shaped and positioned like an animal’s snarling mouth.
Mr. Héctor passed us, performing his duties, intending to offer Cedric the full-service treatment. I climbed from Molly’s vehicle, waiting for Davis to emerge while Mr. Héctor went through his normal pleasantries. Only, Mr. Héctor’s demeanor didn’t seem pleasant at all when he stared at Cedric, and his service-with-a-smile expression went flat. He uttered a robotic “Can I park this for you?”
Cedric declined, asked if it was okay for him to leave it at the curb. Mr. Héctor nodded, then shuffled in the general direction of his valet stand.
Davis climbed from his seat, but I needed to redirect my attention for a second. “Mr. Héctor.”
The look he gave me, I nearly flinched.
He’d never looked at me like that. This was something else. I glanced between him and the Carlino brothers. “Is everything okay?”
He smiled then, as fake as clown makeup. “Fine, Nikki. Fine.”
He kept on to the stand and scooped up the house phone.
“That sign is sweet,” Davis said, his head tilted up at Andromeda rimmed in blue.
“Huh?” I followed his gaze. “Oh, yeah. She’s great.”
Cedric joined us, his eyes on the sliding glass door leading into the casino. “How are your craps tables?”
Now my mind was in a three-way split. Héctor and the phone … Who was he calling? Davis and the sign. Cedric inquiring about our gaming options.
My business mind overrode everything. “We have plenty. Never too crowded. Bets from five to fifty.”
“Fifty bucks?” Cedric said, his disgust a rung below what he showed those d-bags at Red Rock. “Nothing bigger? No high-roller room?”
Defensiveness washed over me, the last emotion I expected. “No, we don’t. We like to keep our games accessible to players of all budgets.”
It was marketing spiel, but I recited it like scripture to a nonbeliever.
Cedric gave me a meh shrug.
“You didn’t ask me about our card games,” I said, suddenly curious how far he wanted to take this high-roller thing. I could use some seed money to re-up my bankroll.
At that, he sighed heavily, exchanged some insider glance with Davis. Brother telepathy.
Molly picked up on it, too. “Did I miss something?”
Cedric said, “I’ll let you take this one, bro. It’s your date.”
All eyes on Davis. He said, “Our dad despises cards.”
“Weird, considering your poker room’s the biggest in town.”
“As a profit generator,” Davis said, “he loves it. But as a pastime for his boys …”
The brothers spoke in unison, an unkind bass-heavy rendition of words they’d obviously heard too many times, presumably from the Carlino patriarch. “Cardplayers are fools leaving their hopes and dreams to paper kings and queens.”
That singsongy rhyme had me bristling. The psychic wave pulsing off me must’ve felt like I was about to go Carrie-at-the-prom, because the brothers stopped abruptly. Davis said, “That’s how our dad is. It’s not how I feel.”
Cedric caught up. “Oh, that’s right. Davis told me you’re supposed to be nice at cards. My bad. No disrespect.”
“All’s forgiven,” I said.
Molly said, “So, if you two are done dumping on my girl’s favorite pastime, why don’t we go for a walk. Maybe over to Fremont.”
I was about to agree when I caught aggressive movement from the corner of my eye. My dad.
Mr. Héctor met him at the doors, spoke quickly, and motioned toward us, setting Dad on his course.
“Hey!” Dad yelled, drawing not only our attention but that of a few guests, who seemed skittish at the sight of the shouting, apparently angry black man. Angry about what?
“Dad?” The first I’d spoken to him all week.
“Nikki, Molly, get inside.” He moved past me and got in Davis’s face. “Does your father know you’re here?”
Davis glanced to his brother, asking the silent question. What the heck is this?
Cedric wedged himself between Dad and Davis, protective. “Dude.”
“I’m not your dude, Cedric. Tell me if your father sent you here.”
I reached for Dad’s hands and noticed his scraped knuckles, rough with raisin-colored scabs. Something I’d missed in my days of avoidance. Even as he yelled at my date and his brother, I missed details, because I thought this was about me.
I’m not your dude, Cedric.
Dad knew them.
Damage-control time.
“Davis, I’m sorry. Please go,” I said.
His lips twitched like he might argue. Cedric patted his chest. “She’s right. We should leave.”
“Don’t come back,” Dad said. “If Bertram Carlino has a problem with it, tell him to come see me himself. He knows the address.”
Hurt and confusion wafted off Davis, but he didn’t resist. The brothers climbed into the car, and its engine purred to life. I walked to Andromeda’s entrance, not watching the Carlinos leave. Molly kept pace, but Dad lagged. Probably glaring after my rejected guests.
“Nikki, are you okay?” Molly asked.
“Yeah. I’ll text you later.”
“What are you about to do?”
“I’ll. Text. You. Later.”
She was no longer beside me. Her feelings might’ve been hurt. As tough as she was, I knew that was a possibility. I’d apologize later.
A quick glance over my shoulder, I saw my dad tailing me.
I had other feelings to hurt.
I cut through the gaming floor and took an almost hidden path to the business offices. Separate from the cashier’s cage, where the money was counted and kept, and apart from the god’s eyes monitors in the security office, where our watchmen ensured no one took advantage of Andromeda, the business offices consisted of small quieter spaces, with gray carpet and beige cubicle walls. All empty this late on a Friday.
“Nikki, hold up,” Dad said.
My cubicle, where I occasionally did paperwork someone older and more qualified should’ve been doing, was in a back corner. I’d done a lot of grown-up things in that cubicle when my classmates were probably Snapping or planning formals. I’d cut the working hours of hotel and waitstaff because Andromeda’s wasn’t making enough to pay them for full shifts. Responded to letters from the Nevada Gaming Control Board—aka the Casino Police—when some bitter unlucky gambler accused us of rigging games. Everything adorned with Mom�
��s signature since I mastered forging it. This was the place I did so many of the hard things I shouldn’t have to.
“How do you know the Carlinos?” Dad asked.
“How do you?”
No answer. I flopped into my chair and didn’t care about the manic tone to his question. “I thought I could do this, Dad. But it’s not working.” It was the no-nonsense voice I used when firing the line cook who kept missing shifts to play gigs with his band.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said, “but I need to know about your connection to that family.”
“This isn’t prison.”
His mouth snapped shut.
“That’s where you’ve been. You haven’t been here. You don’t get to be my overbearing father when you haven’t been here. I’ve done fine without you.”
“Babygirl.”
“No!” It wasn’t me yelling, crying, and snotting over my lost money. What I felt wasn’t even anger, exactly. I was tired and needed a break from him. Five years away, and having him back for seven days felt worse than his absence. “I don’t need you here, Dad. Not right now. Okay?”
I spun my chair toward the computer in my cubicle, logged in. Spreadsheets and other Andromeda documents I’d been working on earlier were already open and waiting on my desktop. Concentrating on the work, I didn’t notice when he left.
Another weekend spent on a different planet from my parents. I caught glimpses of a passing comet named Mom, and we grudgingly acknowledged each other without crossing the expanse of space between us. If she knew about Dad hulking out on Davis and Cedric in the Loop, she didn’t let on.
I didn’t see Dad at all. He didn’t go back to his room after our conversation. Our fight, then gone. There was no cool-down period. Not one moment when I regretted it. No time for that. There were only chores and focus.
A Saturday morning soccer practice where Molly listened to my recap and hugged me. More hotel work because of a dentists’ convention in town. Between my Saturday night hostess duties and lending a hand with the Sunday breakfast crowd in Constellation Grill, Andromeda wasn’t the only girl who got paid over the weekend.
My mind whirred with the possibilities of getting my poker games started again. Rebuilding my bankroll. It was more urgent than ever to get the money to leave this place with my friends. I’d see the soccer season through, but I’d bail on softball in the spring. Couldn’t waste any more energy on things that didn’t generate funds.
I considered other games I knew of, the penny-ante hands out in Rancho or on the UNLV campus. I could maneuver my way into all those games, but it would take forever to earn.
An unexpected text lit my phone, interrupting my Sunday evening brooding.
Davis: you up?
I’d been flat on my back, staring at the ceiling and plotting my card comeback. Seeing his name on my phone put me on the edge of my bed, anxious. Should I launch a preemptive strike and apologize for how Dad treated him?
A bit of poker strategy came to me. Play conservative, read the table. Less is more.
Me: yep.
Davis: we never did take that walk on fremont. i’m out here now, if you want to join.
It was past eight o’clock on a school night. My feet hurt, and Dad wanted me nowhere near a Carlino for, I don’t know, reasons.
Me: see you in 15 minutes.
After the fastest shower in history, I hit the lobby and left Andromeda’s through the front doors, unconcerned about who’d seen me go. If Dad caught wind of my excursion, so be it. Time he learned his paranoia had no place outside of Ely State. The Nysos logo was a bright beacon way up in the sky, and I was sneaking off with the guy who lived on top of those blue neon mountains. My stomach churned with nervous possibility.
The Fremont Street Experience was a block over from Andromeda’s. You could feel its electric buzz when you neared. Blocked off from cars, the canopied walkway running between several downtown casinos was lit with, literally, millions of bulbs. You could zip-line there or chat up beautiful girls in bikinis and body paint (Gavin’s favorite) or buy any number of cheesy Las Vegas souvenirs. Plenty of people did all of the above, making it hard to spot my coconspirator. Shuffling away from the foot traffic by the Golden Nugget Hotel, I fired off a text.
Me: where are you?
Davis: behind you.
I spun around, startled. No one was there.
Davis: did you turn around? please tell me you turned around.
Me: i’m at the golden nugget, jerk. come find me.
I kept my back to the wall and spotted his slim frame parting the crowd as he neared. Dressed in all black and smiling for reasons I couldn’t comprehend, he stopped just shy of me. Hesitated. Then closed the gap and wrapped his arms around me.
Oh my god, he smelled amazing. It was a spicy boy smell: soap, wintergreen coolness of deodorant, and a hint of cologne, maybe.
When he let go of me, I said, “That was unexpected.”
“I was thinking ‘overdue.’”
“I meant … I thought you might be mad at me.”
“What did you do?”
That was sweet of him. I knew it wasn’t my actions that may have—should have—inspired his anger. So we weren’t talking about the incident. Super cool. A subject change seemed in order. “How did you get here?”
“Stole one of Cedric’s cars.”
“No, really?”
He fished a sleek plastic-and-silver fob thingy from his pocket and I knew it would start some vehicle worthy of James Bond.
“You’re a car thief?”
“Among other things.”
“Oh, oh!” I bounced on my toes and popped up a hand like the only kid who knew the answer to the teacher’s question. “Are you Clyde?”
“Sounds like someone wants to be Bonnie.”
After the week I had, it sounded way better than being Nikki. “For tonight?”
“Let the crime spree begin.”
Our rampage was legendary. In our wake were the mangled carcasses of used ketchup packets and shredded napkins. We committed caloric felonies involving double burgers and thick-cut steak fries with Cajun seasoning. Obviously, Metro avoided engaging us for fear of public safety.
We ended up on Sunset Road, the observation area by the airport. Crumbs, greasy wrappers, and sticky soda residue would’ve sullied the soft leather interior of Cedric’s car, and Davis didn’t want to incite his brother’s wrath any more than necessary. We ate our meal on the hood while planes pushed away from the earth and traced vapor trails in the sky.
There’s a radio station here, 101.1, that doesn’t play music. It’s a public access channel for transmissions between air traffic control and the pilots coming and going. The car’s custom sound system was cranked to max, and talk of “bearings” and “vectors” squawked through the open windows.
Davis said, “You know about this spot how?”
Roaring engines of a landing jet filled the silence between us, giving me an excuse to hesitate. When the plane passed, I spit it out. “My dad used to bring Mom and me here.”
A louder jet took off, ascending directly over us. Davis yelled to be heard above the noise. “It matches his quiet, peaceful demeanor.”
That got me laughing—a deep belly laugh. And right then, my first time being truly alone with Davis, I wanted to know him better and nothing else.
We talked sports (his favorite is basketball—reminding me of that painful night I spent in the presence of an NBA star … I changed the subject). We talked college (I told him about UVA and discovered he wanted to go to NYU and be closer to his mom in Manhattan).
“What do you want to study?” he asked.
Truth was, I hadn’t thought that far. No one ever says that, though. Right? “Maybe business. I do a lot of stuff—fix a lot of stuff—at Andromeda’s now. I guess I’d be good at it.”
“My dad would love you.”
I stirred and hoped the next jet sound blasted the topic of dads from
the atmosphere. Davis continued, “My dad is always on us about having a head for business. And the family business. And business is never personal. Cedric cares more about all that than me. Thus—” He swept his hands over the polished paint beneath us.
“What do you care about?” I said, then backpedaled, thinking it sounded too … intimate. “I mean, what do you want to study?”
“Computers, maybe. Or history.”
“Really?” I didn’t know anybody who liked history enough to pursue it voluntarily.
“Sure. Don’t know it, doomed to repeat it. That’s a thing.”
We talked Cedric’s car fetish (I still didn’t know what kind of exotic automobile we were sitting on).
“He’s going to be so pissed I took one from his fleet,” Davis said.
I’m glad he did. I almost said it, but wasn’t bold enough to admit how much I liked us getting away together.
“Why’d you transfer to VR?”
“Ahhh.” His pride was evident. “You want to hear the Fatal Flatulence story.”
“The what?”
He twisted so he stared directly at the side of my face, but I kept my eyes forward, away from his intense, radiating gaze. I read once that ice skaters focus on a single fixed point when they do those super-speed spins. It helps counter dizziness so they don’t swoon. Same principle here. I focused on the runways.
Davis said, “You know those safety alert systems schools have that send all the students, parents, and teachers a text or email when something dangerous is happening?”
“Okay.”
“I used Cardinal Graham’s system to inform everyone about a dangerous gas leak discovered inside the principal’s body.”
I reran that sentence in my head, nearly choked on a fry. “No! Why?”
“Everyone who’d been to his office knew the chairs smelled farty and he had stomach medicine like Mylanta and Beano lined up right on his desk. Every good prank has to graze the truth. It’s ineffective if it’s not personal.”