Imagine my internal reaction when, standing in the foyer of my girlfriend's house and clutching a bag whose contents totaled twice what I earn in a month, her mother suddenly said, "Now don't forget to pack all your valuables with you on the plane and not in your bags."
My heart leapt into my throat. "What?" I practically squeaked.
"Tony told me they installed those things at the gates you have to pass your carry-ons through before you can board," she continued. "If it doesn't fit, they make you check it." I didn't dare question her. Tony, her husband, had been working for the airlines for twenty-five years.
"Do you think I'll be OK with this, mom?" Brandi, my girlfriend, asked. She had a medium-size black nylon carry-on with a nifty retractable handle and wheels to ease the pesky lugging that always goes along with traveling. It was sure to fit. No problem.
I looked down at my bag, a capacious navy-blue juggernaut-of-a-thing. I'd probably have to fight just to fit it through the boarding gate.
"I've got to go to the bathroom," I blurted and schlepped my bag with me. Safely within those confines, I extracted the reason for my worries – a full carat princess-cut diamond, nestled atop a shiny four-prong setting of immaculate platinum. I hurriedly jammed it into the change purse of my right front pocket and returned to the foyer for the final "Have Fun" and "Be Careful" adieus.
We were off to Las Vegas – The City of Lights – Sin City – where the biggest sin of all was not bringing enough money. I hadn't booked a weekend getaway for two at the Tropicana Casino Resort just to frivolously squander money on gambling and entertainment. I had ulterior plans, which, after reading about my little pre-departure episode at my girlfriend's house, you've probably guessed – a marriage proposal.
After three years of skirting the issue of commitment, retelling every marriage joke I kept cocked and ready for when the issue did come up (my favorite being the one about the three "rings" of marriage – the engagement ring, wedding ring and suffering), I'd finally come to the terrifying realization that Brandi was the one I wanted to spend my life with.
I had it all planned out. The evening of our arrival, after checking in at the hotel, I'd sneak away to make reservations for dinner at a ritzy restaurant, request a private gondola ride on the recently-completed canal in the Venetian and pick up a bundle of roses for our room. And during the gondola ride, enveloped in the mellifluous serenades of the gondoliers, I'd slide down upon one knee, gracefully reveal the ring and pop the question. It would be as easy as one, two, three, I told myself.
It was a short plane ride from Portland to Las Vegas. As it turned out, my bag hadn't made it through the carry-on approval machine, despite my persistent shoving to coax it through. It had to be checked. Needless to say, I was incalculably grateful for my future mother-in-law's advice. Otherwise, I would have been forced to dig out the ring right there at the gate and expose my covert mission. Fortunately, I had everything under control. The ring was safe and sound in my pocket and I poked at it every so often on the flight to re-confirm its presence. The cliché about it "burning a hole" couldn't have been more applicable.
We touched down around six o'clock and took a taxi to the hotel. "Yep, ya gotta watch yourself around them lights and buzzers," our cab driver glibly warned. Brandi and I rode in the backseat. All we could see of our chauffeur were the rough bulges of fat clinging to the back of his neck. They hung over the moth-eaten collar of his sweat-stained T-shirt. He had a raspy voice and coughed in hideous fits like most long-time smokers do. "They can really pull you in."
We perfunctorily thanked him for the warning and went back to gawking out the window at the grand displays of depravity – the flashing lights of the casino-lined main strip, grandiose fountains spouting water and fire, towering resort hotels in the form of castles, pyramids, Eiffel Towers and New York skylines. It was eye-catching at its finest and it didn't fail in casting its mesmerizing spell on us. It was our first time in Las Vegas.
The Tropicana isn't the top of the line in Vegas. Twenty years earlier, before the dwarfing behemoths of The Bellagio or the MGM Grande were built, the Tropicana boasted superior status. But that was twenty (or, on Vegas time, two hundred) years ago. Even the most recent and expensive additions to the hotel hadn't sufficed in re-polishing its rusty reputation. No matter. It was the only decent place I could afford. And it was smack in the midst of the Strip, within walking distance of the Venetian and the canal where I planned to execute my "coup de proposal".
I went to check in and encountered only the first in what was to become a long line of "impediments". Apparently, my name had unaccountably disappeared from their computers. After insisting that indeed I had made on-line reservations and had the printed-out confirmation sheet to prove it, the woman at the desk, whose face looked more plastic than dinner-date Barbie, extended her apologies for the mix-up and offered a free upgrade to a room in the newly built Island Tower section. It was among the nicest rooms in the hotel, she assured me. I didn't hesitate to accept and, feeling that Lady Luck had already paid me an unexpected but pleasant visit, happily took the room key and shared the news with Brandi. She was delighted and planted a kiss on my cheek.
As we wended our way through the maze of slot machines to the elevators, I could feel the ring in my pocket starting to heat up again. At first, things could not have gone better. Feeling a bit fatigued from our flight, Brandi wanted to lie down for an hour before we hit the town. Harboring my own plans, I was gladly willing to give her an hour of rejuvenation. That would be more than enough time to tend to my secret design. And so, under the pretext of wanting to walk around the hotel, I left the room to coordinate everything.
I got as far as the lobby. That's where the craps tables caught my attention. I would like to say in my defense that I'd never gambled in my life… for entertainment, at least. Once, as a senior in college I'd done a project for a cultural anthology class on casinos and the unique culture they breed. For my fieldwork, I took daily jaunts to a nearby Indian casino and observed the scene. I tossed the dice or flipped some Black Jack a few times, but it was all for the sake of my project.
I'd met a woman, Sandy, who was an admitted slot-addict. She became my voluntary subject and, during my weeklong study, I watched her sacrifice over a thousand dollars to the abominable one-armed bandits. After witnessing that, I suppose that's why none of the thousands of slot machines crowding the lobby of our hotel so much as turned my head. I didn't trust them.
But the craps tables, thronged as they were by swarms of pink-cheeked risk-riders, seemed intriguing. I had to try it once, for fun. After all, after observing the game for a week, I knew the rules and basic strategies like the back of my hand. So when I lost two hundred dollars in less than twenty minutes, I decided that they played craps differently in Las Vegas. I couldn't explain it any other way!
The slots beeped and blinked around me, but my aversion for those distrustful mechanic monsters kept me from even looking at them directly. They were like medusas. They'd turn my bank account into stone, for sure. My wallet now as dried up as my luck, I decided it was time to get back on track and take care of my important plans. This time I made it as far as the exit.
That's when I heard an eruption of congratulatory cheers. It came from a chamber adjacent to the exits and separate from the main lobby. A sign illuminated in bright yellow read "The Poker Room" ushered me in. I entered and looked around. The scene was spellbinding, right out of a movie. A soup-thick haze of cigar and cigarette smoke hovered stagnant, hugging the ceiling without means of escape. Rows of stern, haggard faces, many capped with sprawling-brimmed felt Stetson cowboy hats, lined the tables. A few female faces, caked with makeup but intense, stood out among the rabble of testosterone-stuffed betters. Several other garishly-dressed women lingered behind the tables, nursing a drink and observing the games with a snooty demeanor of indifference.
This was the serious gambler's spot, I concluded, the alcove for the wildest of wildcard coveters. And something inside told me to come on in and test the water. I took out another couple hundred from a cash machine conveniently (all too conveniently) located at the entrance and sat down at the first table I came to. There were five players and the game was five-card draw. The ante was set at twenty-five dollars. I changed my cash for chips and tossed a yellow, green-ribbed "quarter" into the pile.
A droopy-faced curmudgeon of a man, whom everyone at the table called Pappy, held the deal. A black leather patch covered his left eye and he was missing half of his ear on the same side. He didn't smile or show any form of emotion. If not for his dealing and occasional Cyclops-style blink, I would have taken him for a cadaver, a wizened dead person someone propped up at the table as a sick jest. Pappy was far from dead.
Within fifteen minutes, I was reassured of my luck. One three-of-a-kind after another quickly supplied me with a stack of chips comparable to the small fortune under Pappy's wrinkled nose. A conflagration of excitement was at work inside me, fueling a competitive drive I didn't know I had. Best of all, I was winning. And with each pot I raked over to my side, Pappy's one eye narrowed into a spiteful gaze searing with envy.
By the time the deal came back around to me, I had less than ten minutes before I was supposed to wake up my girlfriend. I decided to make it my final hand. I'd taken in over five hundred dollars anyway. It was time to abscond with my winnings. It was Pappy and me, the others having folded after seeing the pot swell to over a thousand. Pappy's face was ironclad. I was nervous. But the full house I held in my hand provided me with the boost I needed to keep my cool. A mild-mannered guy with the unfortunate tendency to betray my emotions with a twitching of the upper lip or nervous dancing of the eyes, I never bluffed.
"Do you call?" I asked.
Pappy laid his cards face down on the table and shoved a large stack of chips into the pot. "I raise another thou," he said flatly.
I gulped, knowing that a possible cash reward of over three thousand smackers lay before my greed-swollen eyes. I was certain he was bluffing. If not, my full house was practically unbeatable. There was one problem. I didn't have enough money to see his raise.
"Ok," I said. "But I need to make a quick trip to the cash machine."
I started to get up when Pappy suddenly slammed his fist down, causing a minor earthquake at our table that threatened to knock over the stacks of chips.
"Leaving the table in the middle of a hand is not allowed!" he bellowed.
Others crowded around to see what the commotion was all about. His outburst shocked me and I froze in my tracks. I was positive that my hand was good enough to win. But I needed collateral in order to stay in the game and reap the heavy pot.
Maybe all those free drinks the high-cut, spandex-donning waitresses kept bringing me had affected my judgment. I reached into my pocket and pulled out the only object of value I had to wager with – the ring. For a moment I considered my action. Scouts honors I did! But I was positive about my hand. A full house is practically unbeatable!
Pappy took one look at the coruscating diamond and nodded his approval. "I call."
I produced my cards and sported a monster grin. Three thousand dollars were as good as mine! At least until that sly, wrinkle-faced cur Pappy slapped down his straight flush (which, for the record books, is the second hardest hand to draw in poker with something like 1-100,000 odds).
Quicker than any geezer his age ought to be able to move, Pappy snatched up the pot and my ring. A dolled-up woman embraced him hysterically from behind. I was left penniless, powerless and hopeless.
Utterly dispirited, I left the table and walked aimlessly around the casino. I didn't know what to do. I'd settled none of the plans I intended to and lost all my pocket money. And, most atrocious of all, the engagement ring for Brandi, the whole reason behind the trip, now belonged to some weltered-face, Viagra-popping fogey with a name that rhymed with "crappy"!
Twenty minutes after I was supposed to be back, I quietly entered our hotel room. I was relieved to find my girlfriend still asleep. Feigning complete normality, I woke her and said I'd found a restaurant she'd like. It was at the Mandalay Bay and we should hurry if we wanted to get a table.
The restaurant, called Rum Jungle, was actually more like a Pan-Asian club. Popular with the younger crowds, the atmosphere was hip and fun. Real bamboo trees sprouted in the corners under the black lights. Behind the bar, water ran down huge glass sheets into a tiled basin. Red lights illuminating this aqua-wall from behind made it look like a vertical blanket of slick, flowing lava. The food was spicy but good. I paid for everything on my credit card.
The evening passed without the planned gondola ride or engagement. And by the time midnight rolled around, I found myself lying wide awake in bed, reproaching myself over and over for what I'd done. I had to make up for it, I told myself. I could do it. All I needed was one break.
Careful not to wake my girlfriend, I slipped out of bed, threw on some clothes and went down to the lobby where things were still in full swing. It seemed that even more revelers and hedonists had come out of the woodwork. The late hour and flashing lights attracted the sybaritic crowds like a porch light does bugs on a sultry summer night. And there I stood, another lured-in insect amongst the buzzing swarm.
My first item of business was to get the cash. I remembered the cash advance option on my credit card and hit the machine. Another two hundred would be enough. I went straight to the craps tables. On the way I glanced at the slot machines for the first time. But I still refused to even consider them.
An hour later I watched the table suck away the last five of my original two hundred. That was it, I told myself. I was washed up. I felt like the dregs of all humanity, the refuse of mankind. I was despicable.
It was in this state of mind that I met Charlie. The first thing I noticed about Charlie was the jumbo wad of purple colored gum he chewed on with the rapidity of a famished water buffalo (and similar breath). His tongue was dyed the same artificial color and he tilted his head to the left each time, before he spoke.
He approached me unabashedly and asked, "In a slump?"
I was startled by his direct approach and shot him a quizzical look. He didn't look like much of a gambler. His get-up, jeans and a ragged T-shirt, was too slapdash for a vintage high roller.
"Maybe I can help," he said. "My name's Charlie." Charlie drew out a thick roll of bills and waved it before my eyes. "I need you to help me roll some dice with this cash."
My eyes grew saucer-size at the sight of all that dough. Like I said, Charlie didn't at all have the appearance of a big-time gambler. He resembled the white trash pedigree. No matter. He was going to give me free money to gamble with. This could be the break I needed! The only condition he maintained was that we always played together at the same table.
Maybe it was the free booze directing my instincts. That's why they serve complimentary drinks, to re-direct your instincts. I opted to take my chances with Charlie. What did I have to lose? It was his money. I'd already lost all of mine.
Charlie and I attacked the tables. The drinks kept coming and the dice were on fire. By two in the morning, Charlie and I each cradled well over a thousand in our arms. Things were finally turning back in my favor. One more hour with Charlie and I'd have enough to buy another engagement ring. I was right. Well, almost right.
When the clock struck three, my winnings totaled over two thousand – along with my alcohol content. I was drunk and my pockets bulged with plenty of chips to rescue my original plans. I couldn't believe what a magnet for luck Charlie was. I just bet exactly as he did and the chips piled up. It seemed too good to be true. That should have been my first red flag. But the drunken bull that I was didn't register it.
Without warning, two husky men in dark suits seized me by the arms. They came out of nowhere like expert ninjas. I didn't have a chance. To my right, I saw two similarly clad ogres swoop in on Charlie. He wriggled in resistance. The men easily overpowered him.
As we were being escorted into a back room of the casino by our captures, I noticed wires dangling from the left ear of each of them. Charlie was led away down a brightly lit corridor. He'd given up his struggle and shuffled listlessly down the hall. One of the mysterious men nudged him on from behind and the other pulled him along from the front.
I was brought into a room filled with television screens and panels peppered with myriad switches and knobs. Each screen showed a different view of the casino's lobby, from sweeping bird's-eye angles to close-ups of individual poker tables. The spying capabilities I saw in that room made Orwell's omniscient Big Brother seem primitive.
I was given a chair and told to sit. Another man in the same type of dark suit swiveled around in a chair and asked me how much I'd come away with. Like the other brutes in suits, he had a permanent stern expression tattooed on his face. I was still feeling the pinch of all those complimentary drinks, so I gave him a sassy answer. They'd already seized my chips. I didn't know why this guy was asking me how much I'd won when he already had my chips.
The man in the chair asked me if I knew the maximum penalty for casino theft. I told him I didn't but assured him it didn't matter because I wasn't a thief and I'd never stolen anything in my life, except once when I was six and it was only a package of Trojans I'd mistaken for candy.
"That's funny," he said without smiling. "Because the guy we just picked up, Charlie, the same guy you were gambling with, has about five warrants out for his arrest. Do you know what for? "Casino theft." I must have looked puzzled because he added, "Cheating."
But I didn't know the guy at all, I insisted. I'd only met him that night. And, in fact, he'd approached me and solicited my help. I didn't know anything! I was the victim here!
"Take him to the waiting dock."
The two brutes in suits deposited me in an empty office and locked the door. I broke down and cried myself to sleep on the cold linoleum floor.
The unlocking of the door woke me. It was almost five o'clock. I was again taken to the surveillance room, where to my surprise, the man in the swivel chair greeted me with a smile. He explained that he'd reviewed the tapes and decided that I was indeed innocent of my suspected involvement in Charlie's illicit scheme. I was free to go. He was sorry for the trouble. But, he continued, they'd have to confiscate my winnings since it had all been won in connection with Charlie's crime. I was back to square one – penniless, powerless and hopeless.
Shortly after five, I crept back into our hotel room and slipped into bed, unnoticed. I was a wreck the next day. My plans were shot. I didn't know what I was going to tell my family and friends back home whom I'd disclosed my intentions to. They were expecting me to pop the question.
Despite the extended walking tour of the city we undertook during our last day in Las Vegas, hitting every spectacular edifice and site in the brochures, I couldn't stop thinking about my failure. By dinnertime it had become unbearable. It was starting to seep out and infect my mood. After our daylong marathon march up and down the Strip, my girlfriend decided she wanted to take a nap again before going out. While she lay down, I told her I was going to go and explore more of the hotel. What I really wanted to do was walk off my infested mood and hopefully, get a hold of myself.
I spent the hour traipsing through the same labyrinth of illuminated allure that had robbed me of my good mood and scuttled my plans for betrothal. Every exclamation of triumph, each rustling of chips being pitched onto the field of a nearby craps table served as a reminder of my self-inflicted woes.
After an hour of ambling, I made my way back to the Island Tower section. Just before reaching the elevators, I passed a row of slot machines. They lined the wall leading to the elevator lobby. It struck me as odd that these machines were unoccupied. According to what I'd seen thus far on my trip, slot machines in Vegas were as busy as a McDonald's restaurant in downtown Hong Kong. And their customers just as wildly crazed to spend their dollars and cents, or was that sense).
I was desperate! Two quarters, leftovers from the last twenty bucks I had to my name, jingled in my pocket, the same place where, twenty-four hours and a few idiotic maneuvers earlier, that circular symbol of eternal happiness had been burning a hole. To kill time while the elevator lights beeped down from fifty floors to the Lobby, I tossed in the last fifty cents of my life's worth. It was a HOT seven machine with a jackpot of two thousand dollars. I watched lugubriously as those three tantalizing rollers whirled around. There was a funny, carnivalesque sound. Two quarters were added to my total credits. I now had a whole dollar to my name. The elevator was stopped at the thirty-second floor, so I figured I'd let it ride. When the flurry of rollers landed on three maroon Hot sevens and a siren sounded, I about peed in my pants. It took a moment for me to register that I'd won the jackpot – two thousand smackers!
Before the elevator dinged its lobby-level arrival, I slammed down on the "collect earnings" button, grabbed the printed-out winner's slip and beelined it to the cashier's desk. Within seconds the dark clouds drenching my spirits lifted and I saw a light of hope shining anew on the plans I'd thought to be extinguished.
With twenty crisp one hundred dollar bills tucked away in my wallet, I returned to the hotel room. Brandi was already up and getting ready. I was fifteen minutes late and she asked where I'd been. I jokingly told her that I was sorry, but I'd gotten mixed up in the whirling dervish of high roller gambling and lost track of time. She laughed at my "joke".
We returned to the Mandalay Bay and ate at an upbeat Cajun joint called the House of Blues. Half way into our meal, I excused myself to go to the bathroom. But I had bigger business to address. On the way to the restaurant, I'd taken note of a jewelry store just a few shops down. I hotfooted it to the store, picked out an eighteen hundred dollar ring (not the top of the line but what I could afford), paid for it in cash and dashed back to the restaurant.
While we waited for dessert, I used the same excuse to steal away to the pay phones where I rang up the gondola ride office to reserve a private ride. They wanted one hundred dollars for a private ride. To be on the safe side, I settled for a shared boat ride. I admit, I had some reservations about popping the question with two strangers watching from three feet away. But I figured it would probably be some sappy older couple that'd be touched to witness such a romantic proposal.
When I saw a young pair, about our age, board the gondola, I chalked up my miscalculation with the other dozen of the trip. But after all I'd gone through to realize my plans, I was determined to follow through. I didn't care if I felt embarrassed or awkward. Then I noticed the guy telling the gondolier that there might be a mistake because he'd ordered a private boat ride with his girlfriend. There had been some mix-up in the bookings office. Although he claimed to have made other arrangements, the registry showed him marked down for a shared boat ride. All the two-seater vessels had been decommissioned for the night. The guy's face turned red, like that reddish hue of mortification.
He said ok, reluctantly, and we got into the gondola, shoving off smoothly into the clear, current-free waters of the reduplicated canal. I began to ready myself mentally for the task at hand. But there was something weird about the guy sitting with his girlfriend across from me. His face was still the same pronounced shade of maroon. And I noticed he was fidgeting. He looked like a nervous wreck. Sweat was beading up just under his hairline. Something about him was really getting at me. It was making me way too uncomfortable and distracting me from my endeavor. I couldn't concentrate on my mental preparation with him looking like that!
And then I realized. He was going through the same thing I was! No way. What were the odds that this guy was planning to pop the question on the gondola too? That would explain a few things, though. His nervousness continued. I completely blew my chance. Instead of executing the super suave proposal, I sat edgily in the skinny seat beside my unwitting girlfriend and pretended to listen to our gondolier jabber on about his job and hometown in Italy. Unlike the canal (and my boldness in popping the question), he was the Real McCoy.
We docked and got out of the gondola. I felt like half the man I'd been fifteen minutes earlier. Nothing had gone as planned! I'd balled up everything!
The flushed guy hurried off in the other direction with his girlfriend and I bailed to the bathroom to collect myself. To my surprise, he was there too, washing his face and looking even more war-torn than I felt. I had to ask.
"I don't mean to be nosy," I hesitantly inquired, "but were you going to propose to your girlfriend on the boat?"
He looked at me dumbfounded and slowly grinned. "Yeah."
"Did you have it planned for a while too?"
He nodded and I laughed.
"You too?" he asked and we laughed together, enjoying – for the sake of our nerves – the humor of coincidence. We shook hands, exchanged utterances of "good luck" and parted ways, each with an agenda now more set than before.
Putting off her continued insistence that I tell her what was going on, I dragged my girlfriend to the nearest cafe. There, at a table overlooking the not-exactly-authentic-but-nevertheless-enchanting Venetian canal, I popped the question. She ecstatically whisked the ring from the box and accepted.
That night, feeling relieved and relaxed for the first time, I called my friends and family to announce the good news. Everyone wanted to know how my plans had fared. Needless to say, I left out a few details. You know which details I mean.