Coffee Drinkers Preferred

Page 109

Coffee Drinkers Preferred Page 109 of 307 standing next to me in the elevator say, "Aww... how cute." It never hurt to be wearing a conversation starter. I planted myself at the end of a long line of thirty year old one armed bandits and overflowing ashtrays. The once vibrant red carpet was tired and dingy. It was literally gray in places. It was eleven in the morning and all the people were gray. Gray waitresses. Gray gamblers. And I don't mean their hair, even though a few were older. I'm talking about their skin. It was right out of the Lathe Of Heaven. Racism had been solved by turning everyone gray. That's the way it was in here. But nothing had been solved, unless you call seeing the life sucked right out of human beings a solution. I gave a half-hearted tug at the slot machine in front of me. It was a Dukes Of Hazard machine. 1 casually snapped a few photos of the inside of the place. One that offered a dull logo of The Pot Of Gold Casino above the bar. An evil faced leprechaun with a fist full of dollars in one hand and a bottle of whisky in the other. I'd like to say that I spotted Sariah right then so that I would not have to confess to spending close to fifteen hours in that pit. This place made sidestream smoke seem like perfume. There were odors here that had no names. "Necesitamos beber, simplemente para sobrevivir." The little voice in my head whispered. "Vamos a morir."