Poker Face

In the south of the state Nevada, 290 miles east of Huntington Beach there is a strip so beautifully and spectacularly lit, it can be viewed from Space itself. Quite a feat for one city single-handedly, but when its strip alone is known globally as The Entertainment Capital of the World it is kind of expected.

It still dazzled Zachary. They weren’t in the Las Vegas Strip just yet, rather more they were in the more subdued parts of the city, without the tourists or the blinding lights and the glamour to accompany them. Sort of like a child in its successful siblings shadow.

The last time he particularly remember coming to Vegas, he’d been here on the pretence of filming the music video for his bands song, ‘Bat Country’. It had been a fun time - although being driven round by his friend Matthew who had worn sunglasses he could barely see through was slightly nerve wracking.

Under the force of the daytime sunlight, there wasn’t actually anything to appeal to Zack. He’d been to just about every strip club with his brother and friends, seen enough shows at the hotels with his mother and sister, lost enough money to the casinos.

But that was what drew him back stag weekend after stag weekend, birthday after birthday, pointless weekend away after pointless weekend away. He wanted to throw his money at scantily clad women dancing round metal poles, and he wanted to waste his money on gambling against the best of the best.

Zack was good though. All the time playing the games and watching others, he’d picked up the strategies with ease and in high school he had quickly become known as the Hustler. He knew all the cheats, all the tricks of the trade to blag your way to winning.

Strip poker was his favourite. He had grown very fond of inviting the ladies for a game of strip poker, often playing until at least one of them was in his bed screaming his name. He also liked Liar’s poker because it involved the use of alcohol.

He looked round the vehicle at the others. Matt Sanders was driving in the front seat, this time wearing sunglasses he could safely see through no problem. Beside him was the stag, Brian Haner Junior laughing at something Matt Berry, sat in the seat behind, had said. Between them sat Johnny, turned and talking animatedly to James Sullivan and Jason who were in the very back with all of their luggage for the coming weekend.

If all went well, they probably wouldn’t remember this weekend. As they say, what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, and that was certainly what they aimed for. The less Michelle knew of their antics in Las Vegas, the better her married life to Brian would be. Or at least, that’s what they hoped; it all depended on Matt not remembering a thing and spilling to his girlfriend Val who would inevitably tell her sister.

This year they would stay at the Luxor, mostly because it looked like the Sphinx, and one drunken night on the tour bus they had decided it would be fun to stay in a hotel the shape of a sphinx with a pyramid projecting from its ass.

Zack could see it looming upon them as he turned his attention from the tourists and billboards to look out of the window ahead. Big and black and…Egyptian. He’d Googled the hotel; it looked very posh and he wondered whether deciding on a hotel just because of a drunken whim was a good thing or not.

He then came to the conclusion that it was Brian’s money anyway so he shouldn’t particularly care. Or at least, Brian Senior’s money anyway. If he had picked the hotel, he would have picked one in the centre of the strip rather than one at the south end. Well if they hadn’t been drunk when they picked it that is.

“Why did we pick this hotel again?” Jimmy asked, finally sitting round as they pulled into the car lot, making their way towards the front entrance where two young valets in red velour jackets stood watching as they approached, others escorted guests in and out, fetching cars and parking them.

“Because it has a pyramid sticking out of the ass of the cat,” Jason grinned in reply, already unbuckling his seatbelt and sitting forward to get a better look.

“I told Michelle it was ‘cause it had the light thing you can see from space,” Brian laughed. Of course that was the story they gave her; they could hardly tell her they had been on the brink of being paralytic with laughter purely because of the way the hotel was shaped, and that it was that alone that swung the vote.

“You can see Vegas from space without that!” Zack laughed back before sitting forward to stretch, the van now coming to halt. Sliding the door back, he jumped out into the heat of the sun and looked around him as the others followed suit and went to get the luggage out for the porter.

That was the perk of staying in hotels like this. Matt and Jason Berry got a break from lugging the shit they took with them and instead someone else was given the job of roadie, usually kids much younger and scrawnier than them. But then the stuff they lugged was usually heavier than a few suitcases anyway.

After checking in they were led to their rooms with the porter bringing up the rear with the trolley of luggage. They passed many tourists on their way up, their looks causing raised eyebrows and people to hurry up. Just as Zack expected, the tattoos and the muscles alarmed other guests, it was always the same.

He found himself rooming with Johnny and Matt Sanders. The Berry’s got the room across the hall - he was mildly thankful of this, they couldn’t spend the nights knocking on the walls with deliberate intention to keep them awake and piss them off. Brian was sharing with Jimmy in the room to their left.

Zack wasn’t surprised; Brian and Jimmy had been best friends longer than anybody else had known each other. At least, before they met through Johnny’s older brother anyways. But that aside they were very close, and Jimmy was the best man after all. He was kind of orientating the entire trip, it was he who had made the booking at the Luxor the day after the night before.

He moved across the room and gazed out of the window before turning back. They hadn’t got much of a view, especially not at the south end of the strip.

“Can we go to the casino now?” He announced, watching as Johnny jumped from bed to bed, only to misjudge the gap between the bed he had been on and the last bed he had to explore, and subsequently face plant the floor, his body sliding across it a meter or two.

Zack and Matt roared with laughter, especially when Johnny sat back and allowed them to see the red carpet burn on his forehead. The sound of the laughter inevitably had the others come investigate till they too began to laugh at the bassist’s misfortune.

“Dude what the fuck?” Brian chuckled, slapping him up the side of his head when everyone was done laughing. Had Johnny been any other person they knew he would have skulked off to the bathroom but it was Johnny and in his early years with the band he had been the subject of incessant torture from all the guys. He was now hardened to it and he merely grinned with triumph.

“Can we go now?” Zack repeated himself, confident Johnny wouldn’t do something else to distract them. “My money is quite literally burning my pocket.”

“So is mine,” Jimmy replied, scratching his head and looking round before settling on Brian, who merely shrugged with his hands delved deep into his pockets. No-one needed anymore persuasion to go, and so they left the room and headed downstairs to the bright lights of the timeless casinos Vegas was famous for.

Zack, hand clasped around his wallet as he went for some betting chips, made for the first roulette table regardless of where the others went. He watched for a few spins, huddling into the crowds of others watching too before putting down his own stake.

This time, he didn’t win but he knew his strength was in card games and after a few failings he made for the nearest game of poker. There seemed to be a crowed larger than normal gathered around the table, but he managed to get himself a good view just by making the right faces at people. They were too scared to argue when they saw the size of him.

There were five people at the table, aside from the dealer. Four suits, and a woman. Whilst the men were sweating, pulling nervously at their collars and glancing side-to-side in the hopes of a glance at the hands dealt to their opponents the woman was an entirely different picture.

Apart from her striking beauty with her soft tanned features and dark hair that fell in just the right way to accentuate the curve of her jaw, and the shape of her beautiful eyes, she was the epitome of calm. Her face was serene, she showed no hint of worry or fear, not even at the amount of chips stacked in the middle of the table.

Eventually she lay her cards on the table, smiling round at all of the men. Their fists came down on the table in fury, watching as their chips were pushed towards the beautiful woman. Standing, a burly man Zack hadn’t noticed before took her chips from the table and followed her to the next.

And so did the entourage leaving the dealer and the four suits to wallow in their misery at the table. In his head Zack surmised upwards of a hundred-thousand dollars had been placed on the table; these men were serious betters.

He watched the woman play three more poker games of varying types, only to see her win. Except that on these occasions she pushed back to the men their chips, and would remain seated at the table. One man stayed at the table for all three goes, reduced to a fit of tears by the time he had yet again lost to her. This woman, Zack figured, was a well seasoned card player.

By now he decided he needed a drink and went in search of the bar. At the exact same time, the woman also came to bar. She had seen the tattooed man with the piercing green eyes watching her and she had recognised him from somewhere.

Stepping beside him, she flashed her bodyguard a wary smile before making a small coughing sound to get his attention. Zack looked to his left, slightly startled to find her standing by his shoulder, a soft smile on her lips. “Hello,” she greeted, her voice tainted with a fading English accent.

“Hi,” he replied, looking back over the bar as the tender moved onto the next person; it would be his turn next with any luck.

“Do I know you from somewhere?” She came out with, blunt and straight to the point. It took him back. “Your face is familiar to me.”

“I don’t know,” he answered honestly. “I’ve been to Vegas a lot in my life.”

“No, it’s not that.”

The woman furrowed her neatly plucked brows in deep concentration, her jade eyes watching him intently. He tried to keep looking at the tender, and all the bottles of alcohol on the shelves opposite but it was just too hard, he wanted to look at her again and again.

“You’re in a band…” she eventually murmured before clicking her fingers and smiling. “You’re in Avenged Sevenfold? Your band filmed a music video here.”

Zack grinned now and nodded to confirm it to her, “Zacky Vengeance at your service.”

The woman, smiling, now bounced up onto her tiptoes and stuck her arm in the air before yelling out, “Service please!” and instantly acquiring the assistance of one of the many tenders in the smart black shirts.

As soon as she had been handed her drink, she threw a wink at Zack before walking away. He turned and followed her till she was lost in the crowd. He frowned before shaking his head of the image of that beautiful woman; the tender had asked his order.

“Who was that?” Zack asked curiously. She must have been a someone or she wouldn’t have been followed around by such a large scary looking man; he scared even Zack. Then again, she could have been the daughter of an overprotective Sheik from the Far East.

The tender grinned attaining the order. “Only the best damn looking woman in the whole of Vegas,” he answered, “not to mention the fact she’s also the best poker player in the city.” He pushed the drink over the bar and accepted the cash. “The only reason they haven’t kicked her out of the casinos is because she rakes in so much business.”

“How come?” Zack frowned, confused by this answer. “Surely if all she did was win she would be under suspicion by the FBI and kicked out?”

“Men don’t play her for money,” the tender explained. “They play her to win a date but so far no man has ever succeeded. Some men come back year after year to try it.”

“What’s her name?” A chorus of rousing noise had them both look over in the direction of a gathering crowd; over the top Zack could just make out the balding head of the bodyguard. She was obviously letting yet more men think they can win a chance at a heart she apparently kept under lock and key.

“Thing is no-one knows,” the tender said and they looked at each other once more. “She goes by Poker Face but that’s it. Her real name is just as much a mystery as is the Stig on Top Gear in the UK.”

Poker Face? Zack found himself laughing. Only a self-confessed fan of Lady GaGa would actually publicly name their self after her song. He rose an eyebrow up and looked at the young man with the dishevelled hair.

“Poker Face?” He repeated. “Honestly? Does she happen to be a fan of Lady GaGa?”

The bartender laughed but shook his head all the same. “Admittedly she is a fan, or so I’ve heard, but that’s not the reason.”

“And what is?”

“The only time you will ever see her so calm and serene is whilst she is playing Poker,” he explained. “It’s her poker face, hence the name.”

“And no-one has ever won?”

The bartender shook his head. Zack felt a grin slap itself to his face and, downing the rest of his drink, he thanked the young man before upping from his chair and making his way to the table where she sat, batting her eyelashes cutely at men getting up from the table in dismay their heads hung.

Pulling out the chair opposite her, he dropped down to face her and smiled across the table. ‘Poker Face’ smiled back and tilted her head to the side just ever so slightly in amusement at this man, this Zacky Vengeance.

It was certainly the first time a man had come to the table and sparked any sort of interest in her. Two other men came to the table and she smiled at them; they had played her and lost many a time.

When no other man stepped up to the table, the dealer dealt the cards and they began the game. Typically, the two seasoned players began to sweat when they realised there was every chance they would not win yet again, but Zack remained as calm as she, smiling confidently across the table.

“To say this is your first time I am impressed at how calm you appear,” she spoke, glancing up at him and then back down to her hand of cards.

“This is only my first time playing you,” Zack replied, a sly grin on his lips that pulled and tugged at the strings of her heart. He had been smiling the entire time, and it was making her light headed and giddy. Her heart was getting silly with its erratic beating and she could barely concentrate on the game at hand.

“No matter how well you play,” the man to his left spoke as he undid the top button of his shirt, “it is impossible to beat this fine young woman.”

By now, it hadn’t gone unnoticed that his friends had appeared on the fringe of the spectators, watching with curiosity the game that was underway. Aside from wanting to go on a date with such a rare beauty, he wanted to know what her real name was and he was determined to find out.

Eventually it had come to a showdown. Zack versus Poker Face, a situation never before seen; the crowds were so silent if it hadn’t been for the slow machines you would have heard a pin drop.

The excitement and the anticipation was prickling the skin, the tension easily cut with a knife. Breathe was baited, and people subconsciously found themselves leaning towards the table in a bid to hear even better what was going on.

Being the gentleman that he was, he nodded his head to Poker Face, inviting her to show her hand. It was impressive. Now all eyes turned to him and he lay upon the green baize a set of cards that produced a gasp of surprise from the gathered crowd.

Poker Face stared down at the hand. Zack pushed his chair back out, before coming to his feet and moving round the table towards her. He dropped to a crouch at her side as she looked round at him; she expected to see a gloating smirk but all she saw was that same enchanting smile.

“So ‘Poker Face’,” he spoke quietly as applause broke out. Only she would have heard him anyway. “Aside from the fact I’ll meet you in the lobby at eight, what’s your real name?”

She gulped, and found herself smiling at him. She figured it was an infectious response.

“Sarah.”