Darlinghurst Road Page 9

  Video Poker is my preferred casino game. It's basically a slot machine that instead of reels, uses cards to play a hand of poker with you. On this wintry day, I found myself at a Canadian casino and started to unwind; playing my game and enjoying a cup of their free coffee. A few chairs away, a guy sat down and started playing a machine with an angry thump on the button. He kept looking over at me and it reached the stage where it was starting to get a little uncomfortable.

  The waitress came to refill my coffee and I made a comment to her about the thumper. She smiled and said “he comes in every day and always plays the machine that you're playing, some of these guys are funny about that sort of thing, maybe he's trying to give you the evil eye so you'll move.”

  For some reason, this guy was annoying me with his aggressive stares and although, unlike him, I didn't care which one of the thousands of machines I played, so my heels dug in and I wasn't about to move! I played for a while and he kept looking over. He was getting angry, putting in bill after bill and clearly losing on the machine that he was playing but still I sat there, slowly playing and if I have to be honest, enjoying his actions more than my machine. It slowly dawned on me that I had a problem, my friend on the other machine was not the only one who was losing; all I had in my pocket was a hundred and now, it was almost gone.

  I thought briefly about finding an ATM and staying longer but I was on a traveler’s budget so, with a certain sadness, almost like losing an auction for a prized work of art, I decided to concede defeat. As I got up, he did too. He thumped the button on his machine to collect the handful of coins that he had in there. As the machine spat the coins into his cup, he gave me a dirty look and his impatience was growing. As he walked toward me, I looked down at the screen and realized that, in my distraction, I had held a pair on the last hand; as I got up and turned to get my jacket from the back of the chair, I saw that the machine had a given me a credit.

  Thumper was standing there now, right behind me and ready to jump on the machine the moment that I stepped away. In a perfect example of how a gambler gets addicted, I turned back, hit the button that said MAX BET, played my last game and drew the highest possible hand in poker: a Royal Flush. The machine started to flash, a bell went off and he stood there, a vein in his neck popping out and turning red as he watched the show.

  As the attendant paid me the jackpot, I was thankful for the casino security guards that I saw walking around. This guy literally looked like he wanted to murder me. As I walked away, I was a good boy and resisted the temptation to point at the machine, smile and say “all yours.”

  I crossed back over the border to America and decided to stick around for a little while. When I filled out my immigration paperwork, I was told that it would be easier to file it from outside the country so taking their advice, I flew back to Australia and filed from there.

  Deja Fucking Vu

  When I started to make plans for a return to Australia, it dawned on me that I really wasn't able to make any. I was at the mercy of American Immigration and working to their timetable not mine. The paperwork may be processed in a few months or it might take years.

  The other thing that hit me was, although I had been around Sydney most of my life, I really knew very little of the outer parts of this city of millions. When I got off the plane in Sydney, I caught a bus into the city and started walking up William Street toward Darlinghurst Road. Old habits die hard and I ended up back where it all started, Kings bloody Cross.

  It had only been a couple of years and the old Kings Cross Pleasure Palace was still the same, as sleazy as ever and looking a bit worse for wear. I walked up to the counter and asked for Trevor. Still larger than life, he looked a little older somehow but then The Cross will do that to you. When he asked me what I wanted, I told him a job. Trevor shook his head “no, I fired you.” I told him that he was wrong, I'd actually quit and he said “same thing.” After some banter and some bullshit, he hired me and I went back to the night shift in Oxford Street. Some of the faces had changed but very little else had. I sighed, counted my drawer and started my shift.

  Goodbye Darlinghurst Road

  Somebody once said to me that there is a big difference between running away and avoiding trouble. Trouble was brewing and I wanted to avoid it at all costs. I was approached by an undercover cop who wanted me to answer a few questions about my job at the Pleasure Palace. “We'll do it quietly, nothing heavy, no pressure, just sit down with me and a couple of other guys, we talk a bit, you go back to work and we'll even pay you for your time.”

  I thought about it for less than ten seconds and then told him no. My explanation was that I was headed back overseas and didn't want to be involved. He seemed to accept that and moved on to the next guy. That was partly true but the reality was that I had no desire to put myself in that position. I was a nobody, a guy working behind the counter but still, it wouldn't have gone down very well if Trevor found out that I was having some sort of secret meeting with the cops. On a good day, I might have been told to simply fuck off but on a bad day, there might have been consequences of some sort. I'd been around The Cross too long to be playing that sort of game.

  It was good timing because my immigration paperwork had gone through and I had already booked a flight back to the States. I had a few weeks to kill so I decided to keep working but this new development changed all that. The smart thing to do under the circumstances was to be the messenger and give Trevor the heads up. That way, if anything happened in the time before I left Sydney, hopefully I'd be in the clear as far as the company was concerned.

  I sat down with Trevor and told him about the approach from the cop. At his request, we had a meeting with the big boss and I told my story again. What happened after that, I don't know because it was their problem now. I'd bought the time that I needed so, after the meeting, I told Trevor goodbye and spent the last few weeks relaxing in the summer sun of Sydney.

  The plane sat on the tarmac, I looked out the window at the Sydney skyline and the reality hit me. I was going to live in another country and it would be probably be quite some time before I would see Australia again. It was great to be leaving behind the crazy world of Kings Cross but in many ways, it was also sad to be leaving Australia. As the big plane took to the air, I started to miss it already. The last time was a visit, I was a tourist, my home was Australia and I had every intention of returning to the country of my birth. This time I was flying in as a Permanent Resident of the United States of America. Did I make the right decision? I started to doubt myself then a quote came to mind that I had read years before in a Reader's Digest. It was from Helen Keller and it kind of stuck with me.

  “Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. The fearful are caught as often as the bold. Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature. Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.”

  As the plane started heading out of Australian skies, I thought about the life that I was leaving behind and wondered about what lay ahead. The flight attendant handed me a nice cold beer, I settled back in my seat, took a sip and thought “screw it, let the adventure begin!”

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  About The Author

  T.C. Doust is an Australian writer who now lives in Florida. He was Born in 1967 and spent most of his early life in Australia. It has been said that T. C. Doust is a writer with a very unique voice because when he writes, it is honest and without compromise. He has traveled extensively throughout both Australia and the United States and along the way, met many of the characters featured in his books.

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