“Why not date someone in the game?” Owl asked. I’ll give him this much, he hid his eagerness well. Probably not well enough to get past Urban’s hearing, but well in general. “That way you can justify everything the same way.”
“Such a bad idea.” said Urban as I raised her bet by a dollar. “From my experience, couples that work together can’t get along, so doing what we do together? That’d be hell.”
“Maybe.” I conceded. “But shit, you can’t just cut out dating. What’s next? Friends? Hobbies?” Urban didn’t answer, which made the whole table sort of lurch into silence. “Urban, come on. You’ve got friends, right?”
“I’m a lot different out of the costume.” She finally said, jump starting the game again. Improv folded while Stunner and Owl called.
“As in…” I prodded.
“I’m content to just stay in my section at work and keep contact with others to a minimum. “She called too.”
“You’re shy?!” Stunner’s laugh was as unwelcome as the echos it made around us were grating. Owl tried to give her a meaningful look that said ‘shut your trap’, but it wasn’t working.
I tried to give Urban as sympathetic a look as I could give with my face covered. “Well that’s no good, Urban. You’ve got to have people around you in this line of… unpaid work.” I spread my cards out before me. “Actually, not unpaid. I just made five bucks.”
Improv nodded, jabbing his thick finger on the table to accentuate his point. “’coat’s right. A person doesn’t have someone close, someone they can talk to… even if you can’t tell ’em everything.. keeps your head on straight. God knows there’s shit we see nobody ought to.”
“Sounds like I’m not the only one with a story.” Urban said. She sounded happy to get the subject off of her shyness. “Care to share?”
The big man only nodded and started his tale as Owl started dealing the next hand.
To Be Continued…
