The Aftermath

14

Tom said good night to Teri and stood on the porch watching until she reached her car and got it started. Then he stepped back inside, closing and locking the door behind him. "So what did you think?" he asked his girls.

"I liked her!" Angie answered, "Do you think she will write her story soon?"

"I don't know." Tom answered honestly.

"I thought she was professional and honest." Samantha said, sitting down next to Angie and giving her a one arm hug. "I felt like she could be trusted."

"Trusted to do what?" Angie asked.

"To write the story she said she was after, and not add to the freak show going on about us."

"Freak show?" Angie asked.

"You know, the crap about your father being guilty -- that the courts made a mistake, all that stuff. Trying to make us in to freaks so people can gawk and throw stones." Samantha told her.

"It's working," Angie said in a low voice, "they already broke the windows."

"Yeah, but they're fixed now." Tom said, grabbing the keys to the SUV from their hook beside the door. "I'm going to run up and talk to Manny about getting those pictures of Stewart like Charlie suggested. I'll be back late."

"Alright." Samantha said. "Be careful."

"I will."

"Call when you get there?"

"Sure."

Tom got up to Barona just after seven o'clock that evening. Walking through the main doors, after handing his SUV off to the valet, he was assaulted with the noise and confusion that is a casino.

Tom marveled at the designs of casinos. Any casino really, but Barona was his second home, and he never got tired of looking at the layouts, lights, and flooring. Both as a budding psychiatrist and as a marketing professional, he took in the whole as well as the parts.

Casinos were designed to promote themselves for themselves. They strove to keep you inside, to remove you from time, and even from space. The goal and message of a casino was simply, 'Don't get up.'

There are no clocks in casinos -- removing time. The patterns of the carpeting have no direction. There are no true paths through the machines. There is nothing urging you in one direction or another. Drinks are brought to you, ash trays are emptied for you, press the button and meals are delivered to you. If they could, they would hook you to a catheter so the calls of nature would not interrupt your play. Everything invites you to sit down and play, and nothing prompts you to leave.

If you ever believe that something in a casino is haphazard, study it well, because it is not.

Tom studied the layouts thoroughly, and it was from here, in this main area of the casino that he achieved some of his best marketing design ideas. He never answered their call however. He knew that the hypnosis would work on him just as well as anyone else.

He walked down the main path separating table games from the machine games. After accepting the offer of a drink, and taking a diet coke, he walked to the poker room at the back of the casino, away from all of the pressure of the main room.

The poker room had its own hypnosis, though subtle and more alluring to men like Tom.

Walking to the floor manager desk, he asked if Manny was working. The desk manager picked up the phone and called Manny into the room. Tom waited, while flipping pages through a poker magazine.

When Manny arrived he shook Tom's hand and clapped him on the shoulder, "Hey Tom, good to see you!"

"It is good to be seen." Tom told him.

"No doubt, eh? Yeah I heard about the trial of course. Everyone did, but hell, I knew you weren't guilty of that shit." Manny grinned.

"That means a lot to me Manny, it really does." Tom nodded, "I need a favor."

"What can I do for you?"

Tom explained about Jim Stewart coming into play against him, and then the attack on the freeway afterward.

"Yeah? You think he's the guy huh?" Manny rubbed his neck and looked around, "Look, I can't get you film, but I might be able to get you some still shots, enough to see the car he left in."

"That would be perfect. How much would I owe you?"

Manny waved his hand, "If I can get them at all, they're yours. If it costs me anything, I'll tell you the bill."

"I'm good up to a grand." Tom said seriously.

"Really? Well I guess they would be important to you. Let me see what I can do."

Tom took his hand from his pocket, and shielded by Manny's body from the floor manager's desk, he shook Manny's hand, palming ten bills into his. "Pay up front." Tom said, "Keep the change."

Manny didn't even blink, he just pocketed the money with a smooth gesture, "I would probably have done it for free Tom, you sure?"

"I'm good, and like you said, it's very important to me."

"So OK, I'll get them for you. Come back tomorrow or Thursday. I'll have them by that time."

"When are you off next, I'm not sure of my schedule."

"Not tell Saturday." Many told him.

Tom nodded, "Alright, then it's time for poker."

Manny clapped him on the shoulder again and wished him luck. 

#

On his way home a profitable night of play, he dialed the local pizza delivery shop and ordered a pie. "It's almost closing, sir. I don't think the driver can make another delivery tonight."

"Tell him there is forty in it for him if he does."

"Wow, ok, I'll ask." The clerk told him. He was back on the line in less than a minute. "He says yeah. He'll deliver it."

"Good." Tom said and gave him his order.

He made it home before the delivery driver arrived and sat in the SUV until the driver parked at the curb. Tom got out and paid him with three twenties and said good night to the happy teen.

Quietly he went inside and sat down at the dining room table, and had a slice. Angie loved cold pizza for breakfast. After three slices he put the box in the refrigerator, and thought over the day for a while. Then he went up to go to bed.