'Til Debt Do Us Part by Michelle Larks - excerpt

‘Til Debt Do Us Part

by Michelle Larks

Harrah’s Casino, located in Joliet,

Illinois, is also known as "the boat" by the

local population. After Chicago, Joliet is

the second largest city in Illinois and is

located about forty miles south of the

Windy City. Joliet is nicknamed the City of

Champions, and gamblers pay homage to

the moniker daily as they try to excel and

beat the gambling odds.

The floating venue was jam-packed,

as it always tends to be on Friday evenings as people try to become the

next millionaire. The weather outdoors was unseasonably warm. The

temperatures tend to be fickle in Chicago, and residents hoped spring

weather was waiting just around the corner.

It was the first Friday of March 2001. It was payday for many of the

casino customers, so the pickings were sweet for the wealthy owners.

Men and women of all ethnic backgrounds were mostly dressed

casually in jeans and colorful tops. They stood or sat, waiting for their turn

to dance with Lady Luck.

Good fortune comes in the guise of the roulette, blackjack, and crap

tables; as well as the coveted piece-de-resistance…the slot machine.

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The atmosphere crackled with excitement as bells sounded or red

and blue bulbs flashed…announcing winners.

A firm tug on the handle of a slot machine could change a person’s

financial status magically, or as usually was the case, create new ones.

With bated breath, the patrons awaited the outcome of the flip of a

card, roll of the dice, or display on the slot machine. Hoping and praying the

gambling gods would shine upon them.

Waitresses flitted in and out of crowds, carrying black trays filled with

cups of soft drinks and alcoholic beverages. The clientele gratefully gulped

down the cold liquids as they continued their quest for financial freedom.

Exclamations of joy and relief shone on the winners’ faces when they

hit the jackpot. Those not as fortunate sat tensely with worried expressions

on their wrinkled brows as they chewed their fingernails to the quick with

anxiety, wondering how they were going to pay their bills since they used

that money to gamble.

A ring of perspiration stained the armpits of Nichole ‘Nikki’

Singleton’s mandarin orange silk blouse. She had removed the matching

brown tweed jacket of her pantsuit hours ago. It was slung half off the back

of her seat.

Nikki’s round dark brown eyes glinted with anticipation. She

unconsciously stroked her chin as she mentally calculated the odds of her

winning the roll of the dice. Nikki looked down at her stack of chips on the

craps table; coming up was the all-important make or break bet.

She clutched the dice tightly in her shaking, damp left hand. Her

honey brown face was drawn with tension. And Nikki's perfectly coifed,



bone straight, shoulder length, relaxed, dark hair stood spiked on end from

her continually running her hands through it.

Before the tiny white and black cubes left her hand, Nikki looked

upward and said a quick prayer. “Lord, please let the dice fall in my favor.”

Her eyes widened in disbelief, and her shoulders slumped forward

dejectedly after seeing how the dice landed. She hadn’t been able to catch

a break the entire evening.

The croupier raked Nikki’s former chips to his side of the table. He

shook his head at her apologetically as she picked up her purse and jacket

and stepped away from the table. Her stomach cramped spasmodically

from the sizeable amount of money she’d just lost.

An older white woman, clad in faded stonewashed blue jeans and an

old faded Northwestern sweatshirt with big, brassy blond hair and dark

shades, shot Nikki a sympathetic look. She shrugged her shoulders as she

slipped into Nikki’s vacated place.

Nikki and her best friend, Maya Nelson, had arrived three hours ago,

around seven o’clock that evening. As soon as they entered the vessel,

Maya made a beeline to the ladies’ room while Nikki sped to the cashier

cage and plunked down a cashier’s check for fifteen hundred dollars. She

wanted the amount credited to her Harrah’s gambling card.

Nikki had counted on winning big that evening, emphatically sure

that Lady Luck would hover over her. Instead, as the evening progressed,

the capricious woman deserted her unmercifully.

As Nikki stood in silent shock, a few steps away from the table, she

massaged her temples, pondering the latest dent in her finances.



Meanwhile Maya punched the spin button on the slot machine that she had

been playing on for most of the evening. Like Nikki’s, Maya’s stash had

dwindled, but not as drastically. She looked across the room and noted the

panicky expression on Nikki’s face; frozen in place like a doe caught in

headlights.

Cutting her eyes at the machine morosely one more time, Maya

decided to call it a night. She strolled across the room to see how badly her

friend was faring. A woman darted into Maya’s warmed seat and pulled her

Harrah’s card out of her purse.

“How’s it going, girl?” Maya sighed audibly, pushing a thin micro

braid away from her face. “You look like you lost your best friend. And we

know that’s not the case because I’m right here. So what’s up?”

“This just isn’t my night,” Nikki said. Her voice trembled with

frustration. Like a raging brush fire, her mind was consumed with getting

her hands on more cash.

“You know the first rule of winning is quitting while you’re ahead,”

Maya said, scolding her friend. She yawned and covered her mouth. Her

fingernails were painted a cocoa brown shade, which nearly matched her

even skin tone. She was dressed in a black rayon pantsuit and a frilly white

chiffon blouse that flattered her full sized figure. Minus a few strategically

placed strands, her micro braids were pulled off her forehead into a thick

ponytail. “It’s getting late, Nik. And since I have to work in the morning, I’m

gonna head home now. How much longer do you plan on staying here?”

“I need to at least try to win back some of the money I lost; so

probably another hour,” Nikki replied. She tried not to look too eagerly at



the ATM machines located near the cashier’s cage. She wished Maya would

just leave so she could handle her business.

“Okay, I’m out. Call me when you get home to let me know you made

it safely.” Maya looked at Nikki with concern. “Remember…gambling is just

a recreational activity just like a ballgame. It’s just something to do to pass

the time. Don’t make the mistake of taking this stuff too seriously.”

“I know.” Nikki sighed as she patted down a lock of her unruly hair. “I

don’t plan on staying here much longer either. Unlike you, I have a long ride

home.”

The friends lived in different parts of the city. Nikki resided on the far

north side of Chicago, and Maya lived closer to Joliet in a southern suburb.

When they traveled to the boat, they usually didn't ride together. The two

young women bade each other farewell.

As Maya stood before the double exit doors, her full cheeks morphed

from a smile into a frown. She pulled the black leather strap of her shoulder

bag onto her shoulder as she watched her friend walk over to what her six-

year-old son, TJ, called the money machine.

Nikki’s manicured pearl tipped fingers shook as she entered her pin

number on the keypad and pressed enter. A slip of paper listing her account

balance, spewed from the tiny slot. The paper informed her that she had

already reached her maximum withdrawal limit for the day.

As Nikki held the paper away from her face, her eyes nearly bulged

out of their sockets. The account balance of the household account she

shared with her husband, Jeff, was dangerously low. And Nikki had

overdrawn her own personal checking account about a week ago.



Miniscule watery pinpricks of fear stung Nikki’s eyeballs. Her heart

began palpitating rapidly as she realized the balloon payment for the home

equality credit line that she and Jeff had borrowed from the bank for

remodeling the apartment building they owned, was due in a couple of

weeks.

Wiping her eyes and squaring her shoulders, a million reasons

justifying her actions seeped through Nikki's mind. She cocked her head to

the side and mathematically calculated how she could continue to play and

win since her luck had been so rotten. She told herself not to panic and to

write the casino another check for five hundred dollars. Realistically, doing

so should be okay since payday was Tuesday, and her account was

sheltered by overdraft protection. The action could possibly extend her

credit. After all she was a VIP customer. At least that's what Harrah’s told

her in the letters that came to her house monthly with free comps.

An hour later, following futile stints on the roulette table and slot

machine, Nikki still hadn’t managed to recoup her losses. She groaned as

she half-heartedly pulled the handle of the slot machine one last time. Nikki

glanced at her wristwatch and shuttered. It was already eleven o’clock. She

only had an hour to get home before Jeff did.

The night had been a total bust for Nikki. She’d lost the entire fifteen

hundred dollars, plus the five hundred dollar check she’d written to the

casino and her fifty dollars seed money that had been folded up inside the

depths of her wallet.

As she put on her jacket and headed for the exit, Nikki suddenly

remembered the monthly bank statement would probably be delivered



tomorrow. She broke out in a cold sweat, and her breathing became

shallow as her thoughts darted to the possibility of Jeff opening the mail

before she did. There was no doubt in her mind that her husband's anger

would blow the roof off the house if he discovered her extracurricular

activities. Nikki had been positive that she was going to win tonight and be

able to deposit the monies in their joint checking account that was

precariously low at that moment.

She burned rubber as she departed the parking lot and drove

perilously close to eighty miles per hour on Interstate 55. Upon reaching

the outskirts of the downtown area, she exited onto Interstate 94 and

made it home with fifteen minutes to spare. She hurriedly backed her

custom tinted baby blue colored Chrysler 300 inside the garage at the rear

of the three-flat apartment building.

Jeffrey and Nichole Singleton resided on the north side of Chicago in

Wicker Park. And the distance was not a hop, skip, or jump from Joliet.

As soon as Nikki shut and locked the front door, she unbuttoned her

blouse, unzipped her pants, and hopped down the hallway into the

bathroom. She quickly shucked off her clothing and dropped them into an

untidy pile next to the clothes hamper. Then she slipped into a red and

black teddy hanging on the peg of the bathroom door. When she finished,

Nikki heard the lock turn on the back door, and she dove into the bed like

an Olympic swimmer diving into a pool.

She shifted her body to her left side, away from the door, hoping her

rapidly thudding heart would slow down. Nikki burrowed her body under

the brown and beige striped comforter.



As Jeff walked into the darkened bedroom, he turned on and

dimmed the overhead light. He glanced at the bed, and then walked into

the blue and white striped wallpapered bathroom. He scooped Nikki’s

clothing from the floor and dropped them into the white rattan clothes

hamper. Then he opened the shower stall door and turned on the faucets.

A deluge of warm water from the showerhead soaked his five foot eleven

inch, lanky, dark teak brown frame.

After he finished showering, Jeff draped a towel around his

midsection and returned to the bedroom. He sat on the side of the bed,

and with another towel, dried his close-cropped hair. His eyes were small

and beady, and he had long lashes and thick eyebrows. A thin moustache

covered his thick upper lip. His left cheek bared the remnants of a fading

scar that he received during a brawl at school in eighth grade. Jeff was

employed as the second shift supervisor in the Information Technology

Department for the City of Chicago.

He glanced over at Nikki again, surprised she was already in bed.

Usually after he arrived home from work on Fridays, they would go out to

one of the local cafés for a bite to eat.

Jeff leaned over and kissed his wife’s shoulder. Nikki shrugged her

shoulders, feigning sleep. She opened one eye, then the other. Nikki looked

up and returned her husband’s smile.

“Hey, honey. You’re home already? I guess I lost track of time.” She

sat up in the bed and stretched her arms over her head. “How was your

day? I didn’t hear from you all evening.”



“I was busy,” Jeff admitted. He picked up the bottle of lotion from his

nightstand and smeared the white liquid over his body. “We had a major

system outage tonight and couldn’t get a hold of the primary or backup on-

call programmers. So that made for a tense night. Finally, I ended up calling

one of the team leaders.” He waved his hand impatiently. “Needless to say,

Mr. McDonald wasn’t happy about his weekend being disturbed.”

Nikki smoothed her hair back. “Give me the lotion so I can do your

back.” Jeff handed her the bottle and she poured drops of the pear-scented

lotion into her hand, then massaged the thick liquid onto Jeff’s shoulders

and upper back. “That’s terrible. I don’t understand how you can work in

the IT field. I couldn’t do it. The job would be too stressful for me.”

“It’s not too bad most of the time.” Jeff nodded his head. “Ahh, that

feels good.” When Nikki finished, he slithered into the bed and pulled her

into his arms. His breath felt velvety soft on Nikki’s neck. “I thought we’d

try the new sushi bar that opened down the street when I came home

tonight. What’s wrong? Why are you in bed so early? Don’t you feel well?”

he asked.

“I had premenstrual cramps earlier,” Nikki lied. She shifted her body

in the bed to get comfortable. “After I came home from work, I took some

painkillers and laid down for a while. I feel much better now.”

Jeff turned on the television, and they lay entwined in each other’s

arms, watching the news.

“How was your day?” Jeff asked during a commercial break. He

stroked the top of Nikki’s head, which rested on his shoulder.



“It wasn’t too bad. Victor assigned me a new project today, even

though my plate is already full.” Her dainty nose wrinkled in exasperation.

“I have the dubious honor of creating print ads for a new retail, startup dot-

com company. The concept is for the client to have an enterprise like a

virtual shopping mall.” She regaled him with tales about her day,

deliberately omitting her clandestine trip to Joliet.

Jeffrey Singleton was an intelligent, methodical man with his eyes on

the prize. His firm desire was that he and Nikki attain financial freedom and

be able to retire from their jobs before the age of fifty.

When Nikki and Jeff announced their engagement six years ago, they

solicited advice from several friends employed in the finance field. They

eventually selected Jeff’s college buddy, Ronald Sheldon, along with Nikki’s

friend, Lindsay Mason, to develop a financial plan for them.

After further discussion, Nikki and Jeff mutually decided Ron was best

suited to oversee their financial investments. Jeff handled the household

finances the first two years of their four-year marriage. Then last year, Nikki

decided that she wanted a shot at the task. Their finances had been on a

downward slope for the past seven months. And to make matters worse,

Jeff was left in the dark regarding his wife’s costly new hobby that would

wreak havoc over their lives.

© Copyright 2009 Michelle Larks. Urban Christian

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'Til Debt Do Us Part by Michelle Larks - excerpt

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