He Taught Me the Game
Racetrack sat on his bed, counting his cards to make sure he still had all 52 in the worn deck. He sighed as he placed the final card on top. 52. By some miracle, he still had them all. He frowned as he looked at the deck, thinking they were so worn, he would need to splurge on a new one soon. For now he would just have to shuffle the deck backwards, to try to keep the cards from getting too bent in one direction.
"Are those yours?"
Racetrack looked up, startled out of his reverie, and met a pair of astonishingly ice blue eyes. "Yeah, kid," He said, nodding to the young boy standing in front of his bunk. "Dey's mine."
The boy nodded solemnly, still looking into his eyes. He was small, didn't look to be any older then eight. "Whatcha doin' with 'em?"
"I'm shufflin' em." Racetrack looked back up at the boy again and felt of pang of pity for the young boy who was away from his parents at such a young age. He sighed, grieving silently over the trip to Tibby's he was giving up with his next words, "Then I'm gonna play some poker, you wanna join me?"
The boy's eyes lit up slightly in his grimy face. Then fell, as he studied his equally dirty hands, "I dunno how to play."
"Well, I'll teach ya. Aint nobody better then me at poker, I'll teach ya all I know."
"Really!"
"Yeah, sure kid," Racetrack said, getting up off his bunk and sitting on the floor leaning back against the foot of the bed, "Sit down here. We'll play an open hand first." Racetrack dealt them both of them 5 cards, face up, "This is your original hand, now what you want to do is have the highest combination of cards possible." Racetrack continued his monolougue, naming off the possible hands, in order. "Got that?"
"Yeah. Royal Flush, Straight Flush, Four of a kind, Full House, Flush, Straight, Three of a kind, Two pairs, and a pair."
Racetrack raised his eyebrows in shock, "How'd you remember that?"
The boy shrugged, "I dunno, I got a good memory."
Racetrack snorted, "Yeah, I guess so…. Ok, so anyways, you can put up to three of your cards down, and get three new cards from the deck. Unless you have an ace, then you can put four cards down, as long as you keep the ace in your hand. Got it?"
"Yeah, I got it."
"Ok so…" Racetrack looked over the boy's cards, and reached over, pointing, "If I was you, I'd put down that one, and that one... By the way, kid, what's your name?"
"William." He said, not taking his eyes off his cards, and pushing the two racetrack had pointed at to the side.
Racetrack nodded, and moved three of his cards to the side, before dealing more, first to William, then to himself. "Ok, now, you've got a pair of nines. That's not a horrible hand, because it beats every pair below a nine, and also, if the other person only has a high card, so don't be afraid to bet a little bit on a hand like that. Ok, I have three of a kind, in fours. Now, here's where the game of poker is really played. It has very little to do with the hands your dealt, and everything to do with how you bet. If you know how to bet, you know how to win." He continued, explaining the artistry of the bluff, then explaining when to raise, when to fold, and when to check. "Don't worry, it takes a bit of getting used to, and everybody has their own distinct betting style. Which is also something that's good to pay attention to. If you can learn how the people your playing with bet, it's a lot easier to figure out what their hands are."
William nodded, trying to follow Racetrack throughout his entire speech. "Ok, I think I get it."
"Ok, you ready to play a real hand?"
"Yeah."
"Alright, it's your deal, so you start by giving me a card, then you, then me, till we both have a total of five cards."
William nodded, dealing the cards, not with as much speed and ease as Racetrack had done, but without misdealing.
The two boys sat up, playing poker for 3 hours straight, talking the whole time. Racetrack won most of the hands, and if they had been playing for money, he would have been ahead, by a lot, but he had to admit, he was impressed at the quick way William picked up on the game.
They stopped playing, as feet were heard pounding up the stairs.
"Heya, Race, how were the tracks today?" Jack asked, as he breezed into the bunkroom, and hopped up onto his bunk with ease.
"Eh, won some, lost some… Have you met William yet?"
"Nah, hey kid. I'm Jack."
William regarded him with his icy blue eyes, "Hi," he said, smiling with the shy air of a young boy, looking up at an older someone who appeared to be at least 10 feet high. "My sistah told me about you. She say's you're the best thing that's ever happened to the street kids of New Yawk."
"Yeah? What's your sistah's name?"
"Maddie. You don't know her, sir. She works at a factory, a few blocks away. But she heard about you during the strike."
"Hear that boys? I'm famous!" Jack grinned, at the boys that were in earshot, who all grinned back at him, some commenting loudly, "Atta boy, Jack" and "See, he has a way with the ladies."
William flushed slightly, at the attention, before standing on legs that were cramped from sitting in the same position for so long. "Thanks for teaching me Race. Maybe we can play for money next time."
"Yeah, sure kid. I'll go easy on you, I'd hate for you to go broke on my account." Racetrack grinned at the boy, as he made his way through the pack of boys that were getting ready for bed, and found an empty bunk in the corner of the room.
William laid in the empty bunk, thinking over the last few hours. Maddie had been worried about him coming to the lodging house by himself, but he couldn't stay at the girls lodging house, so she had finally given into the 8 year old's begging, with the promise that she would be able to see him every day. He smiled as he thought about telling her all about Racetrack. Turning over on his side, he drifted off to sleep with images of aces running through his dreams.