Road to Paradise (20 page)

“Let’s find out,” said Candy. “In Quad Cities, we can find a paint store, ask.”

“Paint store? You mean body shop?”

“Whatever.”

Gina groaned in disgust. “My father painted his station wagon
last year. It was a Chevy wagon, but it cost him a thousand dollars, and he didn’t care about matching the car or lowering its value. To paint a Mustang is going to require some hefty cash. And afterward, it’ll be worth nothing. You’ll see.”

“Let’s look into it when we get there,” said Candy.

“No. We shouldn’t paint the car,” Gina said. “We should leave you and get going, is what we should do.”

“Gina, come on,” I said quietly. I looked into my spiral. I had an empty page in front of me. Picking up a pencil, I wrote: Number 1. Look into car painting. Number 2. Think straight.

I couldn’t think straight. I didn’t want to glance at Candy and her doe-brown eyes. “Let’s get to this place Candy knows, and then we’ll figure out what to do. Candy, can we let you off there?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “If you wish. If you want to, you can let me off anywhere.”

“Here?” Gina said, enthusiastically, and then was mock-deflated when she saw my glaring face. We threw away our Styrofoam cups, and got back on the road.

We were all young. We rebelled against despair, went into self-defense mode. Candy started talking about music, asking Gina questions. “What’s the best song you’ve heard all year? Really? Why? And what about last year? What’s this disco thing? Is it any good? You say you can dance to it? No, I’ve never heard ‘I Will Survive.’ Should I have? So what’s Larchmont like? Are you close to the sea? Are there mountains? What is this Westchester? Shel, did you like living in Larchmont? Did Emma?” She didn’t spit out the word
Larchmont
the way she spat out the word
Pppparadise
, as if maggots lived there. But then why was she going to a place that disgusted her?

Thus we whiled away what remained of the road between Missouri and Rock Island, Iowa, on the Mississippi River. We sputtered forty miles an hour in my souped-up eight-cylinder, 350 horsepower, tiny loose cannon of a yellow car, a car that was like the Bullseye on the Royal Airforce planes during the war, making it so easy for Germans to see them and shoot them down. We got
to the Quad Cities near sunset, so near sunset that we didn’t have time to find a better place to park. We stopped at a rocky embankment near an industrial district and warehouses off River Avenue. There was a gazebo, and children’s swings, some ducks in the water. Other people had come out, too. Gina said it was ridiculous to stop here when we were all so hungry and tired, but Candy said, “Gina, look, it’s sunset over the Mississippi.”

“Yeah? So? It’s a sun and it’s setting. Happens every day. After the kind of day we’ve had, excuse me for not waxing misty-eyed.” Gina walked away and, propped by a tree, stood with her arms crossed.

Candy pointed across the river at a moored riverboat called “Isle of Capri.” That was our hotel, she said, and she and I walked away, leaving Gina to herself.

Sometimes words fail me. Often they do. Our stomachs were empty and scared, our hearts sore and disappointed. I know mine was. I know Gina’s was. This wasn’t what I wanted. It wasn’t what Gina wanted. But going to Baltimore and to Three Oaks, and to De Soto wasn’t what I wanted either. And living without a mother wasn’t what I wanted. Or a father. Or siblings. Out of this whole shebang, Candy was the only thing I chose.

I know this was why Gina was upset with me, and angry. I knew what she wanted back is what we had five minutes before Picnic Marsh, before that traffic light in Fremont. The dogs, the idle conversation about Valparaiso, the mild boredom, the anticipation of something. I knew, because I wanted it back, too. Perhaps it was the boredom that got us here. We were looking for something. And sure enough, sometimes when you look for something, you find it.

I felt absurdly responsible for our predicament, and scared for Candy, which was novel for me, feeling anxious for another human being instead of for myself.

But the sunset over the mighty river
was
blazing. For five minutes, in my head, it had stopped raining nails.

I don’t know how Candy knew of this place. Isle of Capri Casino Boat and Hotel. It was so cheesy with its stained old red velvet carpet. I asked her about it as we waited in line at the reception desk.

“Been here once before,” she said, sucking a cinnamon Life Saver, making her breath fresh.

“Been here once before?” I said. “In
Iowa
?”

She didn’t elaborate despite our stares. She was funny like that. She said there was a buffet, but it closed at nine. There was, and it did. We just made it with ten minutes to spare, and the crabby waitress said, “We’ll be closing in five minutes, girls, if you want to go and get more.”

The pot roast was dry, the chicken wings not spicy, the cabbage cold. We didn’t care, we were so hungry. I had valeted my car, hoping that the valet parking lot was in the bowels of the building somewhere, not outside. It was dark. When we got back to the room, I fell on the bed, exhausted. Candy did not share my energy level. She wanted to go gambling.

“Candy, you’re seventeen years old. Do you even have a fake ID?”

She showed me her ID. Candy Cane, it said, born May 11, 1963. “Candy … but that makes you eighteen.”

“Yeah? So?” she said calmly. “What kind of a fake ID would it be if it made me my actual age?”

“Not a very good fake ID,” said Gina, sitting on the bed. “When’s your actual birthday?”

“November 11, 1963. Off by a few days.”

“A few days?”

“Sure.” She smiled. “What’s 180 days in the scheme of things?”

I stared despondently at the ceiling as if hoping to find counsel there. Score that one for Erv. So he was telling the truth about something. What else was he telling the truth about?

Candy put on more gloop, and another shirt; she changed from blue to black, kept on the same blue mini-skirt, making me believe she only had the one, and said, come on let’s go. Gina got ready herself. She’d never been gambling and was curious. I was drained. I didn’t want to be a spoil sport, though; the girls were going, so what was I going to do, stay home like an old cranky mother, say, you young ’uns go, I’ll sit here and knit? So we all put on our jean skirts and our faces, red lips and cheap perfume, we shared Jovan Musk between us, hoping it would smell different on each one of us, and took off for the casino boat, but not before I showed some practical angst. “How much is this going to cost? I can’t bring too much. I didn’t budget for this. I don’t want to lose all my money.”

“Why would you lose all your money, Shel?” said Candy. “You’re so funny. Bring only what you want to lose, no more.”

“Can I bring nothing? Because that’s all I want to lose.”

“Bring a few bucks.”

“I didn’t budget for this … I’ll bring five dollars … oh, cover charge. Well, I didn’t plan for more than two covers, and this is my second, so I’ll bring ten dollars, but that’s it.”

“Bring twenty.”

I’d never been to a casino, and didn’t know what to expect. The young man taking my money and checking IDs at the door, smiled flirtatiously at us. “You girls ready to have some fun?”

“Well, we’re certainly going to try,” said Candy, raising her eyebrows. “That’s what we came here for, some fun.”

“You came to the right place.” The lad grinned, but it turned out he was having us on, being wise with us, because under the merciless fluorescents, it didn’t look like anyone was having fun. Middle-aged people in polyester suits sat near poker machines, pressing down on the big metal handles. The place was filled with cigarette smoke and men in cowboy boots. Some older men shuffled from game to game, from seat to seat, with beer in their hands. They must have spent all their money, because they were watching, not gambling, but watching in a desperate way that told me they’d be pulling that lever, too, if only they hadn’t lost their last quarter.

Candy walked around and we followed. She seemed to know her way around, so she led. She didn’t plant down anywhere, just watched, looking at the people playing the tables. Everywhere, at the blackjack tables, standing bunched and hunched over the roulette, people looked like they’d just lost their dog and were hungry.

“Why is everyone so gloomy?” I asked.

“They’re losing.”

The overweight couple with their little buckets of quarters rattling under the glaring lights, the wife saying to the husband, give me more, and the husband saying, I only got a couple left, Doris, did you spend all yours? She wasn’t answering, Candy told us, because she was praying to Five Flower, the Aztec god of dance and games. “What do you know about Five Flower?” I said to her as we approached the blackjack tables.

“Not much, Shelby,” Candy said, “but I know one or two things.”

We watched two hands. The first time the dealer got a twenty-one after six cards, while the four victims each had two face cards equaling twenty. There was no stirring of hands or expression, no gasp of disappointment. One badly-dressed older woman took a sip of her drink, while the three men pushed their ante forward. The next hand, everybody’s cards were awful and the dealer bust, and still no one made a sound, except to scoop their winnings into separate, meager piles.

“Do you know how to play blackjack?” I asked Candy.

“I do,” she replied. “But I’m not going to play. No fun here.”

“That implies that there’s fun elsewhere.”

“More fun other places, yes.”

We continued our amble. Many of the tables were empty, dealers standing shuffling cards, trying to tempt us to sit down. We sat down. Candy tried to teach me, but I was a poor student, dunce-like in my denseness. I did what? What did I have to do? I had to give the grumpy Asian woman dealer five dollars of my money, and for that she would give me two cards? And the two cards had to come very close to twenty-one or equal twenty-one. “But what do I do to help the cards be twenty-one?”

“Nothing,” said Candy. “But if the two cards add up to a small number, like a five or a six, you can ask for another card.”

“Do I have to
pay
for another card?” I was so pragmatic. I liked that in myself.

“No!” Exasperated.

So I tried. I gave Asian Grumpy five bucks and bought a Jack (which Candy said counted as ten), and a two. “Now what?”

“Ask for another card.”

I did. It was another Jack. Candy shook her head. “Twenty-two. Not good, kid. You bust. Wanna play again?”

“Why would I?”

But I did. I gave the silent woman another five dollars and this time got a ten and a three. “Now what?”

“Ask for another card.”

“But what if I get another ten?”

“That’s the risk you take. You can hold at thirteen if you want.”

“I’ll hold.” The dealer got twenty. Gina and Candy glared at me as if it were my fault. “That’s it,” I said, taking my three chips and jumping off the stool. “I don’t want to play anymore.”

But then two studs came over and sat down next to us; the waitress took our drink orders, and they played while I watched. Gina lost a little, won a little, but Candy steadily won while the dealer steadily lost, turning her twenty dollars into $150 before my drink was up. The boys, impressed with her skills, begged her
to impress them further, and she duly obliged. In five minutes Candy made more than
twice
the money that Gina and I had made driving 800 miles across three state lines to deposit two dogs into a home of a woman who nearly came after us with a shotgun.

“I don’t understand how you did that,” said Gina. “How could you bet a
hundred
bucks?”

“Fearlessly. Bet if you feel like you’re going to win. If you feel like a loser, walk away from the table. Keep the stakes low if you’re cold. Ride it out. But if you’re hot, bet your house, baby, because the cards are with you.”

“But you could’ve lost!”

She shrugged. “So? It’s not my rent money. This is just found money. I still would’ve had more than I started with, which, as you remember, was nuthin’.”

The boys didn’t want to leave Candy’s side, were mesmerized by her long bare legs, smiling, enigmatic eyes, and painted lips. This vision, perched on a bar stool, was making their heads swim. Clearly, the Jovan Musk did smell best on her. Even the name Geeeena did nothing for these drunken gambling boys.

Finally Candy grabbed her money, stopped smiling, and despite their loud protests, said to Gina and me, “Let’s go.”

“You didn’t like those boys?” asked Gina. “They were cute.”

She shook her head. “There were two things wrong with them,” she replied. “They were drunk,
and
they were broke. That’s an especially unattractive combination in men.”

The one drink was knocking me out. And unlike Candy, I wasn’t fearless. Talk about an especially unattractive combination: terrified and drunk. I was afraid to lose my hard-earned money. For me, it was like electric shock therapy watching Candy at the blackjack table putting another fifty-dollar chip on her doubled down ten. Behind her, we strolled one more time around the stained carpet and the shuffling, penniless men with drinks in their hands. Finally deeming us done with the place, she sat down “for just five minutes” at one of the poker machines.

An hour later, Candy was still playing on the same twenty
bucks. She had won fifty, lost it, and was now trying to win it back. Gina and I played, too. I liked poker better than blackjack, it was safer and slower for a coward like me. I could bet a quarter, and if I lost it, it was no big deal. If I won, it was also not a big deal. Candy tried to explain to me that betting a quarter, getting a flush and winning only seventy-five cents was squandering the blessings of the gambling demons. That’s what she called them, the “gambling demons.” “What’s the point?” she asked. “Are you having fun, winning and losing the same twenty-five cents? You have nothing at stake, you win nothing.”

“Yes, but I lose nothing.”

“Yes,” she said, “but you
win
nothing.”

“I’d rather not lose, than win.”

“Wow.” She turned back to her machine, bet the maximum, got a full house and won seventy-five bucks.

“You will learn, Shelby Sloane,” said Candy Cane, our resident philosopher, “that sometimes you have to gamble everything to win everything.”

Gina was trying to imitate Candy, and though she wasn’t brave enough to bet quite as much, she was doing well betting a dollar here and there; she was four times braver than me. Gina got so into it that an hour passed, then another, and suddenly I asked what time it was. No one knew; there are no clocks in casinos, there is no time, no day, no night, only the moment and the machine. The same heavy-set couple was still there, the wife following the husband, saying, give me a quarter, just a quarter, and him saying, I’m almost out, Doris. I keep giving you quarters and you keep losing.

“What time is it?” I asked. They looked at me as if I were nuts. Doris eyed me suspiciously, clutching her empty bucket. He looked at his wrist.

“Three o’clock,” he said.

“It’s three o’clock!” I hissed into Gina’s ear. “Let’s go. Let’s go right now!” How did it get to be three o’clock?

“How did it get to be three o’clock?” said Candy. “Maybe because we got here around ten, and it’s five hours later?”

“We’ve been gambling for
five
hours?” I said, aghast.

“Well, no. Gina and I have been gambling. I don’t know what you’ve been doing.”

Gina laughed heartily. Gina! Laughing at me, taking Candy’s side. Oh, yes. They were pals now, a little gambling, and they were best friends. “Can we go?” I said, tersely. “I won’t be able to drive tomorrow.” I was such a wet blanket.

“Sloane!” exclaimed Gina. “I’ve never had this much fun. Let’s stay one more night.”

“You’re crazy.” I walked away, left the boat and went upstairs. In all my clothes I lay on the bed, waiting for them to come back, and when they didn’t, I sat so I could see the sunrise over the Mississippi and opened my spiral notebook to make a new plan, look at my budget, write down a summary of yesterday. Sunset, sunrise both over one river, strategies, and suddenly I was unconscious in all my clothes on top of the bed. When I woke up, it was light, past sunrise, and the industrial warehouses were gray with morning.

My two traveling companions were still nowhere in sight.

I couldn’t believe it. They hadn’t come back yet! This was Gina, Gina, who not long ago had been saying how we had to drop Candy off at the nearest road sign, throw her out of the car like an empty can and move on, on, on, and here she was, out with Candy till half-past morning.