Nobody's Fool

could still see the swelling of his knee. “It’s the reason I worry about you, for all the good it does me.”
    Sully stepped into his shorts before turning around to face her. “I never asked you to worry about me,” he said. “In fact, I’d prefer you didn’t.”
    Ruth fought the tears she felt coming, finished dressing as quickly as she could, while Sully searched for his undershirt. “It’s really your plan to end up alone, isn’t it?” she said.
    â€œIt might be best,” Sully admitted.
    At the motel room door, she turned back to him. “You should have forgiven your father,” she told him. “And I should have known what it meant when you didn’t.”
    When she was gone, Sully studied the slammed door curiously. Somehow his father had sneaked back into the conversation. Even dead he was a crafty son of a bitch.
    â€œYou again,” Sully said, sliding onto the bar stool next to Rub, who was nursing a beer.
    â€œWhere’d you go?” Rub wondered. “I went over to Carl’s but you weren’t there.”
    â€œI must’ve already left,” Sully explained.
    â€œWhere?”
    â€œNone of your business, Rub,” Sully told him. “There’s no law says I’ve got to spend every hour of every day with you, is there?”
    Rub shrugged.
    â€œIs there?” Sully said.
    â€œYou get mad when you want me and I’m not around,” he reminded Sully.
    This was true. “Anyhow, here you are.”
    â€œWe got work?”
    â€œCarl wasn’t there.”
    â€œHe’s in back, playing cards.” Rub nodded, indicating the big dining room, the one Tiny closed during the off-season.
    â€œThat explains it,” Sully said.
    Birdie came over. “You had a call right after you left,” she said.
    â€œMiles Anderson?”
    â€œMiles Anderson. He wants you to call him back ‘at your very first convenience.’ ” Birdie imitated Miles Anderson’s speech. “Here’s his number.”
    Sully took the slip of paper Birdie handed him and stuffed it into his pocket.
    â€œAren’t you going to call him?” Rub wanted to know.
    â€œNot right now,” he said, though he knew that was exactly what he should do. That was the trouble with stupid streaks. You often knew the right thing to do, you just couldn’t locate the will.
    â€œHow come?”
    â€œBecause right now it’s not convenient,” Sully told him, confusing Rub, to whom the empty moment looked as convenient as could be. “Because I waited an hour for the bastard and now he can wait for me. Because right now I’d rather play poker. How about you?”
    Rub studied the dregs of his beer sadly. “Bootsie took my money,” he confessed. “I never should have gone by the dime store,” he admitted.
    â€œHow does she always know when I’ve paid you?” Sully marveled.
    â€œShe always guesses, somehow,” Rub said, himself mystified. “Don’t do no good to lie to her, either.”
    â€œI thought you were working this afternoon,” Carl Roebuck said when he looked up and saw Sully. There were four players in the game seated at a round table directly beneath a chandelier. In addition to Carl, the others were all men Sully knew. They could all afford to lose, too, which was good, provided they could be coerced to do it.
    â€œI thought I was too,” Sully said, pulling up a free chair. “Just as well, though. This looks like a better career move.”
    â€œI wouldn’t be too sure,” one of the other men said. “This son of a bitch is winning every other hand.”
    Everyone looked at Carl Roebuck, who did not look like a man ashamed of winning.
    â€œMr. Lucky,” one of the men said.
    Sully took out some money in order to make himself truly welcome. “His secret is, he cheats,” Sully said. “Luckily I know all his tricks, which means he’s done cheating for today.”
    Carl sold Sully some chips. “You could be roofing the house on Belvedere, you know.”
    Sully nodded. “Just like you to send a one-legged man up on a roof. I fall off on my head and then you don’t have to pay me all the money you owe me.”

“Have it your way.” Carl dealt cards around the table. “Even with one leg you’d be safer up there on the roof than you are here,