House Edging

by Tomasz Lesniara

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“Seven, red!” the dealer shouts.

I am sitting on a padded black stool. My elbows glued to the upholstered edge of the roulette table, with my chin resting against my intertwined fingers. The guy in a black Puma tracksuit, who’s been standing next to me for the last six hours, is punching the air with excitement. He has just won nearly nine hundred quid. For him, it’s relatively nothing in the grand scheme of things, but it could signal the beginning of a much greater winning streak. He’s been chasing a single number for some time, just like me, but luck seems to be on his side tonight, or this morning, rather. For him, the risky decision to bet on only one number has finally paid off. It’s a common thing to do. You stick to one number and increase the bet after each spin. If you stay loyal to this mentality for long enough, the ball will eventually land on your number, or you will run out of money. I guess these two polar opposite endings apply to all existing roulette strategies.

An old Chinese lady who calls herself Deedee, a regular, slaps my arm. “Five no good! Change number!” she moans at me.

She always does that. She hardly ever plays herself, but she enjoys being the live commentator, congratulating those who are winning big, while blaming the poor bastards who aren’t doing that well. Tonight, or this morning, that’s me.

“He’s always been chasing the drought, ever since I met him.”, says Scott, the dealer, in response to Deedee.

“Stupid boy!” she shouts.

The guy in a Puma tracksuit has this unsettling, intimidating aura to him. He’s aggressive. He would punch your cunt in if you said something he disagrees with. His phone is ringing. I can see his screen light up behind the thin cotton facade of his front trackie pocket. It’s his Mrs. I know, because he spoke to her on the phone a couple of times in the last hour. She probably wants to ask him where the fuck he is, again. It’s god knows how late, or early, and he had promised he would be home by now. My phone is pinging too. My friends, who don’t know I’m here, keep sending me voice notes on WhatsApp. Spilling their guts, opening up about the latest Hinge date they’d been on, the plans for the upcoming movie night on Friday, or anything else that doesn’t concern me at all, while my financial life is at stake. Or it could be my mum, asking me to voice note her back, because I’ve not been in touch in more than a week. She’s unaware of it all, yet still worried.

We all said goodbye to Monday a couple hours ago. It’s probably around two in the morning, but the place is anything but empty. Two roulette tables out of four are still open. Young and sexy bar staff keep walking around like zombies, with trays in their hands, asking for drink orders.

“One Staropramen, please”, I say to a hot guy with a buzzcut who’s just walking past.

I open my tightly closed hand under the table. There is one chip left, and I’m holding it in my sweaty, shaky palm like a sacred artefact, expecting it to glow up with magic and kill the main antagonist of this story.

The chip I’m holding is a black one, and it’s worth twenty-five pounds. In gambling jargon, we call it a pony. I place it in the middle of the table.

“Colour, please, Scott”, I ask politely.

Scott runs his fingers through his brown, freshly faded hair and places my last pony on a tiny, wooden shelf.

“Twenty-five, cheap change,” he announces. “Fancy a new colour?”

“Emm, yeah. Give me yellow, please.”

In times of desperation, people often decide to switch the colour of the chips they’re playing with to a different one, hoping it will trigger a change in their circumstances. We all know it doesn’t work like that. There probably isn’t an ancient god of gambling staring at us from above, rolling his eyes at us because we’re playing with blue, and he happens to support Celtic. But we’re all delusional.

The hot buzzcut lad puts a freshly poured pint of Staropramen on the small, wheely table behind me. I can hear the bottom of the glass hit the wooden surface. Scott slides twenty-five yellow chips towards me, each worth a pound. I place ten of them on number five. I’ve been chasing it for ages. My plan is to try that again if it’s not a win, and if that doesn’t work either, I will bet with the remaining five. Then, I will reassess.

“Bets on!” Scott shouts and looks me in the eyes for a single second. The ball is spinning. Deedee is humming along to Katy Perry’s Firework song, which is blasting through the speakers. I close my eyes in some sort of prayer.

“Five, red!”

I open my eyes. The overwhelming sense of warmth fills my chest, as if my heart is leaking lava. Deedee smiles at me and rolls her eyes right after.

Finally, I hit the drought number – the number that hadn’t come up in the most consecutive spins. It’s always my choice of play because I enjoy rooting for the underdog, both in gambling and in life. But, after a drought number is finally hit, it updates itself to another one. The new drought is begging to be drawn from the moment it arrives on screen. That’s the tricky bit.

“How much is that, Scott?” I ask while taking a well-deserved sip of my beer. I know the answer, but asking the question helps boost the sense of accomplishment.

“That’s three hundred and fifty pounds, my man. You’ve finally hit it. It’s been getting close for a while”, Scott replies.

“I’ll have three pinks and two ponies, please. I’m going for a break.”

The pink chip is a cash chip worth a hundred pounds. Everyone’s favourite chip, no doubt. Scott hands me my three fifty in five cash chips and says well done. While getting up, I grab my beer and look at the screen placed next to the table. The new drought number is seventeen, and it hasn’t come up in exactly two hundred spins.

“Catch ya later, Max!” I hear Scott say as I walk away.

The casino is like a candy store for a lone fruitcake like me. There are all sorts here. Spice boys in Represent hoodies, neds with hands down their pants, lads from the Royal Navy – all you can eat, really. Sometimes it feels good just to be in close proximity to them. It’s like being admitted to an exclusive circle you’ve been rejected from time and time again in your life. And if I keep my cool, they might invite me for a vape, buy me a drink, or spoil me with their patter for the rest of the night. I mean, morning.

I go to the toilet. Two ripped guys in baggy jeans and super tight t-shirts are pissing next to each other at the urinals. I notice their chiselled triceps as I get closer to the sink. In the round mirror right in front of me, I see my greasy black hair and tired eyes glued to my skinny yet puffy face. I wash my hands and pretend to adjust my contact lenses with my hands still wet. “Let’s finish with a wee shake, that’s it”, the guy behind me says in a jokey manner, and approaches the sinks while still zipping up his trousers. His mate is still at it, pissing like an elephant.

“Any luck, mate?” he proceeds to ask me.

“Nah man, not tonight.”

“Just keep at it, bro. We all have to win sometime!”

Despite standing right in front of the sink next to mine, the guy chooses not to wash his hands. If this whole gambling saga has taught me one thing, it’s that men usually don’t wash their hands after pissing. I’ve seen it in clubs and concert venues, but here, in this hyper-masculine enclave of circle jerking, they are all at their most natural.

My phone vibrates in my pocket as I keep looking at my reflection in the mirror. This empty bathroom serves as a temporary shelter from the battlefield on the other side of the wooden door. Laddish laughs mixed with 2010s’ pop songs, the manager’s raspy voice inviting people back to the poker room, and over-the-top sounds that the slot machines make to announce that someone has just won 34 pence – that’s the soundtrack to my life. At this point of the night, or morning, I always ask myself – should I just give it a rest and go home? Cash out the three-fifty in my back pocket and order myself an Uber? Okay, I might be a couple of hundred down, but it might also all go to shit again. Or, something exceptionally good could happen. Whatever that is.

Eventually, I splash cold water on my face, wipe it with my cuff, and lift the beer from the marble countertop. I almost bump into a muscly, middle-aged guy in tradie trousers as I leave the bathroom. He’s not been home yet either. “Sorry, pal”, I say after spilling a few drops of Staropramen on the brownish carpet. The place is even busier than a few minutes ago.

As my feet approach the table, my eyes shift towards the screen. I check the drought number. Fuck – seventeen came up while I was in the bathroom. The new drought is number thirty-four. I instantly get angry. If only I had stayed at the table, I would probably have another couple hundred quid by now. Scott is giving me the side eye as I stand outside a circle of desperate souls. At the corner of the table, there is a middle-aged woman in a baggy, grey tracksuit, sitting with a cup of tea in her hand.

“Excuse me, could you let me in if you’re not playing? Sorry to ask.”

“What?”, she looks at me, sort of unfazed.

“If you’re not playing, could I take your seat, please?”

“Excuse me, pal! You need to let him in if you’re not playing!” says Scott, backing me up.

The woman gives me a sad look, as if I just evicted her from her house, and leaves the table while taking a sip of tea from her white cup. I push the stool underneath the table, as I don’t want to be the only one sitting down, and pop my pint next to other people’s drinks. The Puma tracksuit guy is still here, this time to my left, and he isn’t happy. Things clearly didn’t stay good for long. With each spin, he keeps aggressively throwing more and more ponies at poor Scott, who is clearly exhausted after several hours of high-intensity play.

When a table is busy, there is always another employee watching over the dealer, making sure the payouts are accurate. Tonight, the guy keeping Scott right is an older gent named Stevie. He can’t be fucked with other people’s shit. He will not say excuse me, he will not empathise with you if things don’t go your way, and he will not hesitate to tell you off if you’re betting after the “no more bets” call. The young lad on my right-hand side is the first to experience the wrath of Stevie. A few inches shorter than me, palish, with short blond hair and a Stone Island jumper, he looks interesting.

“No more bets means no more bets! If you don’t understand a simple rule like that, then you can give slot machines a go! Maybe you will find that easier!” shouts enraged Stevie. “Sorry, bro. I didn’t mean that.”

Stevie is in a particularly bad mood this morning. He is frowning. He is sighing. He doesn’t want to be here. In reality, none of us do. Or do we? Perhaps, you could say that winning big makes you want to stay. But that’s not necessarily true. It’s losing that ignites in you the dedication to keep playing until the birds start chirping outside. You have things to prove to yourself. You want to validate the theory that you’re not a foolish person – someone who would intentionally waste money by losing it. If you’re gonna gamble, you need to demonstrate that you’re smart and special. You’re tricking the system. You’re able to earn ten times more money than most working people earn during a tough, twelve-hour shift, and you don’t have to wait a month to get what you earned. You’re a genius.

Suddenly, things are better for me now. Number thirty-four comes up. I keep playing. Only a few minutes pass, and the ball lands on another drought number that follows. The lack becomes luck. My bravado levels increase. A metaphorical Stone Island badge appears on my sleeve. I sip my beer. Life is good. The lad on the right gives me a look, but I think it’s actually the look. Am I steaming? These things never end well for me.

I see his struggle. I can feel his stress. His short, shyish pal keeps popping in and out of the picture. Here he is, pulling the cuff of his jumper, telling him they should leave. Another spin, and he’s here again, asking for money so he can buy them both drinks.

“Don’t fucking annoy me, man, you’re being a pest!” the guy on my right says to his mate while the ball spins around the wheel.

“You want a drink or not, mate? Relax, fuck sake.”

“Vodka red bull”, he rushes to decide, and quickly turns his head towards the wheel, squeezing the leather-padded edges of the table with his pale, veiny hands.

He is in the same position I was in just twenty minutes ago. There are questions spinning around his mind, all flying around in circles at high speed like the ball that determines our emotions and reactions.

Suddenly, everything disappears.

I wake up wearing my clothes. My eyeballs and eyelids feel glued together because my lenses are still in. I’m half-sitting, half-lying on the edge of my bed. The first thing on my mind is work. It’s clearly morning. But is it six or ten? That’s a roulette of its own. I touch the left front pocket of my jeans to get my phone. It’s not there. Fuck, it’s not there. I know I have to stay calm. I knew this day would come. I’ve been mentally preparing for it for a long time. That’s what happens when you’re a 365 party boy. Sooner or later, you lose your phone. One time in twenty-eight years is totally acceptable. Gen Z cunts smash and lose their phones all the time these days. Don’t focus on it too much just now. Just get on with it. The only important thing right now is work.

I open my old silver MacBook with anticipation. My heart is pumping. Am I fired? Am I going to lose my job? Are they all working at their desks right now, talking about me, wondering where the hell I am?

As soon as I’m presented with the opportunity, I type in my password as fast as I can. I see my desktop. It’s quarter past seven. My head is pounding, but at least I can breathe again now that I know the world is still spinning. Quarter past seven is not bad at all. I need to look at the bright side of things. I might have lost my brand new iPhone, which I took out on a three-year contract, but it’s not nine o’clock yet. I got away with it.

I open the FaceTime app on my laptop to call my manager, Sara. She picks up immediately. “Why are you FaceTiming me?”

“I’m sorry, I need to ask a favour.”

“Oh-oh.”

“Yeah,” I sigh. “I went out on a date last night after work, and it got a bit out of hand. I’m an idiot, I’m sorry.”

“What do you mean out of hand?” she asks with more concern than anger. “Are you too rough to come in?”

“I lost my phone at some point during the night. I think it was stolen.”

“Max, what the fuck?”

“I was wondering if I could put in a last-minute annual leave through, and take the day to go to the police, report it, and stuff like that. See if I can track it as well, and notify my parents. I had my cards inside my phone case as well.”

Sara doesn’t know that the wallet part is a lie.

“Jesus, Max,” she replies. “I guess it’s a yes. What else could I say? You need to do what you need to do. Who were you with?”

“Just a guy from Hinge,” I lie again. There was no guy. The spinning ball was my date.

“Was he with you?”

“We said goodbye, and he left to get his train. I went to the bus stop.”

“Did you have your phone then?”

“I don’t remember.”

She’s already in her office. I can see a concerned look on her face. I’m walking around my room, holding the bottom of my laptop with my open palm.

“Max,” she sighs again. “Oh my actual god. Is there a chance he might have took it? Or that you were spiked?”

“No. I don’t think so. I need to gather my thoughts. I’m still in a bit of a shock. Please, I just need today to get everything in order. If there are any urgent emails or calls, you know, work-related, I will take them from here. I’m sorry. I obviously didn’t plan for that to happen.”

“Ok. Take care of everything and keep me updated. Hope everything is okay.” “Ok. Thanks, Sara. Bye.”

I terminate the call.

***

A long sigh. I take a seat on my bed and rest my back against the wall. Open the FindMyiPhone app from the bottom dock of my laptop screen. I see the motherfucker, whoever he is, running around the whole of Glasgow with my phone in his pocket like a postie with a jetpack, like it’s Subway Surfers. Actually, I don’t even know if it’s a he, but I feel like it is. Dirty bastard is trying to sell it. I can tell. I stare at the Apple map like it’s the World Cup final, and the shitholes I see don’t make me think the guy’s a taxi or bus driver.

I block my phone remotely with a few clicks on the touchpad and type in a message to be permanently displayed on the screen:

THIS PHONE IS STOLEN. DO NOT BUY THIS PHONE. MAX LAS, GLA

The app gives me an option to send pinging noises to the phone. Fair to say, if the sounds really get played by the phone, I’m giving the rascal a real sonic pounding. My adrenaline is so high that I can’t concentrate on one thing at a time. I try to log in to my bank. It’s asking for a text message code. Damn it. I fucked up big time.

I’m still wearing my clothes from last night. I get up, get to my cheap white desk, and put on a pair of black trackie bottoms I threw on the chair a few nights prior. Now, no bottom can function without a top, so I settle for an old Nike tee that’s been hanging on the drying rack for what seems like weeks. Time to get the fuck out of here and do something.

The street stinks. The door to the building bangs shut right behind me, and my headphones are in. I’m thirsty for blood. Based on the bravado in my walk and the outfit I’m wearing, it would be difficult to guess I’m listening to Radar by Britney Spears, but here we go. Interesting sense of style, ten million quid smile, I run through the depressing high street passing old ladies on mobility scooters and neddy lads who would gag on it for a four pack of Stella. Chinese takeaway, Indian takeaway, a place where gorgeous ladies get their nails done, a vape shop, another vape shop, a mortgage place no one goes to, another vape shop, Greggs, and finally – I’m where I’m supposed to be. The bank. The godforsaken Virgin Money. Give it to me, Richard Branson. Give it to me as hard as you can.

I walk up to the cash machine. My heart is racing. I put my bank card into the ATM. Pin, pin – what is my pin? Okay, 2-0-1-2. The year of Summertime Sadness, but you’re not supposed to know that. I click to see my balance.

AVAILABLE FUNDS 700.00

What the fuck? I didn’t do too bad. That said, I don’t remember winning it, or cashing it in – giving my bank card to the malevolent twink at the cash desk, and saying: “I’m worried I will lose my money. Could you please put it on my VISA card?”. That’s my usual shtick.

I withdraw all the money from the account and shove the cash into my trackie pocket. God knows what delayed transactions or charges might appear on my account in the next few hours, unexpectedly, like the annoying boomers who show up at your door to pester you for your TV license. Okay, I don’t know how much I actually spent last night, but that’s not important. Seven hundred quid is enough to get me to the point where I decide how to deal with this situation.

I head back home. On my way, I jump into a corner shop. The lovely older lady in a striking, colourful hijab greets me with a smile. I’m fuming, but I smile back. She’s the wife of the shop owner. I buy a can of red Desperados and open it as soon as I’m out of the shop. The headphones are back in. I have cash, it’s time to go home and get to work.

I finish my can of Desp the moment I walk into my bedroom and throw it in the laundry basket. The laptop is on again, and the FindMyiPhone app is displaying the blue dot that represents my phone at a place called Pump Up Your Fitness. It’s a gym. The dot is moving slightly, but only what seems like a few millimetres at a time. I immediately Google the gym and phone the number.

“Hello,” A deep voice makes a sound in my ear.

“Yes, hi. My phone was stolen last night, and the FindMyiPhone app is locating it at your gym. The person who has it is at your gym right now. Can you please help me?”

All I hear is silence.

“Please answer, I know you’re there,” I say.

“This must be some sort of mistake,” the deep voice states. “This isn’t a gym. This is my number.”

***

“What do you mean? The phone is showing at a gym in the West End, it’s called Pump Up Your Fitness, and this is the number that comes up when I Google the gym. What doesn’t add up on your end?”

“Again, I don’t work at any gym. But I think I could help you. What’s your name?” the man asks calmly.

“Max.”

“Max, maybe I could help you.”

“How?” I begin to lose my patience. “How are you going to help me exactly? Do you have my phone or not?”

“I don’t have your phone, but I think I might be able to help you find it. Would you meet in town for a chat?”

“What are you talking about?”

“We could meet and see what might have happened when you lost your phone? Maybe you left it in a taxi, or an Uber?”

Uber. I’m not gonna let some old pervert meet me for a coffee and fuck me up the ass under the pretext of helping me find my phone. This is not my first rodeo. I was locked in hotel rooms before, after being promised lavish afters. I’m not looking to be put in the back of a Toyota Yaris and taken somewhere where I’ll be taking in my meals through a straw. Fuck that.

As soon as I put the call to an end, some memories start to come back. The lad, the palish Stone Island lad. It’s always them, by the way. I can see the smoking area upstairs, full of people. The metal bench and the dreaded words.

Fuck this shit, I’m going to get my phone back. I realise I must have got this lad an Uber. We were sitting together in the smoking area, on the bench, and talking. That must have been after I cashed out. It must have been.

In a typical Max fashion, I thought we could be sipping champagne in Lake Como one day. I recall the conversation.

“Let me at least order you an Uber.”

“You don’t have to do that, man. I appreciate all your help tonight.”

“I wanna make sure you get home safe. You’re a wonderful guy, and all I want to do is to make sure you get home safe.”

“It’s going to be expensive.”

“It doesn’t matter.”

I go to the Uber website and log in. Check the past trips. There is one at 4:22 am. The destination is Cambuslang in the South East of Glasgow, departing from the casino. I don’t wanna play any games anymore. I want my phone. This guy might have the answers I need. I order an Uber from my browser, and as soon as I’m done reading my account history again, the car is waiting for me outside my place.

The ride is taking ages. Big tower blocks, poor bastards begging for mercy, and bookie shops everywhere. I fall asleep for a split second, and once I catch myself, we’re at the destination. It’s a neglected terraced house, with high grasses dominating the front garden, and wonky roughcasting hurting my eyes.

I leave the Uber car and walk to the front door. Ding-dong, the bell rings.

A miserable figure appears once the doors open. I get goosebumps all over my body.

“You’re back. You really meant it! You’re back”, he proclaims, all excited, exposing the gaps between his brownish, rotten teeth.

His face looks like it survived a nuclear blast. His eyes are tired, bloodshot, and keep wandering towards his forehead and back down again. A stench travels from the space behind him and hits me in the face.

“I’m sorry,” I say. “I was expecting someone else, must have rung the wrong bell.”

“No, don’t leave. I know it’s you!”

I turn back and walk as fast as I can without turning it into an obvious run.

“Don’t be shy, come in, please,” the guy begs as I walk away.

“Please, come back”, I hear him shout from a distance. “We all have to win sometime!”