Ice Country(14)
“Thanks,” I mumble. So all I gotta do is throw in twenny sickles and it’s over. We leave with whatever we’ve got left. I do some quick math in my head. The one-oh-five I won in the first hand is down to eighty five with the four antes. Take away Buff’s four antes and we’re left with sixty five in winnings, before I ever even bet this hand. If I throw in twenny now…well, an extra forty five sickles will be nice, but they might not even cover the repairs to Yo’s tables and chairs.
But I have no choice—I have to play. So if I’ve got to play with twin boulders in my hand, I might as well play big.
I shove forty sickles into the middle.
“Whoa, we’ve got a player,” Pierced exclaims, rubbing his hands together. Like everyone else, me and Buff included, I think he expected me to just throw away my twenny sickles and run out with my tail between my legs. Not tonight.
He flips two more coins in and I watch as everyone else except Buff does the same. It’s the biggest pot of the night and not even a single draw card has been turned. I flip the first card. A boulder! Excitement buzzes through me as I realize I’m about to make both Buff and I rich. But amongst the shower of silver coins that are floating through my mind, I see only one face. Jolie’s. She’s smiling the biggest, happiest smile I’ve ever seen as she comes home. Although I thought we started this because of what happened at Yo’s, I realize now that subconsciously I was always doing it for her—to bring our family back together.
Although my butt’s glued to the very chair I desperately wanted to leave not too long ago, I feel like I’m flying way up high where the summer songbirds cut lazy circles across the gray clouds. Nay, higher than that, above the clouds, where the sky’s redder than blood and the sun’s hotter than chill. Nothing can bring down my mood, not even a thirty sickle bet by one of the twins. Everyone, including me, matches it, but I run a few more coins through my fingers, trying to decide whether to add a bet on top.
Anticipation of adding silver to the pot zips up my spine. Everything feels so light, like I could fly right out of here with all the silver on the table and a new life.
Somehow I manage to bet small, flattening my face like a stone wall. Twenny more sickles. I expect a few folds, but everyone matches. I meet Buff’s eyes, which are unblinking and wider than the palace grounds.
I flip the second card. A medium stone. I’m still way ahead with my triple boulders. No bets this time around, so I throw in another twenny, which everyone matches. We’re all in too deep to back down now, but what none of them knows is that I’ve got them right where I want them.
Last card. A small stone, nothing against my trifecta of boulders.
The final round of betting begins with a surprise. Pierced-Ears raises an eyebrow and then pushes his entire pile into the pot. My mouth drops open, and so does Buff’s, but everyone else looks like it’s the most natural thing in the world for him to do at this point, even though they have to all know I’ve got a huge hand.
Then the folding begins. Both twins chuck their cards into the mountain-sized pile of coins with gusto. A couple of them flip over, a crown and an arrow, nothing that could’ve stacked up against mine anyway. Long-Face shakes his head and then flips his cards over to show us before folding. Twin crowns. A good hand, but not good enough.
It’s down to me and Pierced and I can’t for the life of me see how he could have me beat, and it doesn’t matter anyway. I’ve already got so much riding on this hand that I was always going to see it through to the end. I push whatever coins I’ve got left into the pot.
“Maybe you’ve got stones after all, kid,” Pierced says with a nod.
I smile, basking in the unexpected bit of respect from a guy who looked ready to take my head off four hands ago. And now I’m going to take all his silver.
“But you ain’t got no brains,” he adds, which wipes the smile right off my face. Huh? What does he know? “Show ’em.”
He doesn’t have to ask me twice. I snap one boulder over, then the other, slide them toward the draw cards to make it obvious what I’ve got.
He glares at the cards like he’s going to grab them and rip them to shreds. But then his expression changes: his lips turn up, his eyebrows arch, and he laughs. Of all things, he laughs.
With a short twist of his wrist, he reveals his cards, the final boulder and a medium stone. I gawk at them, try to figure out what they mean, think back to how in the chill those cards could be better than my three boulders. The name of the very game we’re playing springs to mind. Boulders-’n-avalanches. His two cards, when combined with the draw cards: two boulders, two medium stones, and one small stone—an avalanche. The best hand in the game, and a nail in my coffin.