“And instead you’re rich and famous,” I finished.
“I’m successful,” he corrected. “Honestly, the fame sucks and the money is only good for having fun with my mates.” He finished his drink and I noticed that mine had somehow gone empty while we talked.
“Want to move on?” he asked. I nodded. There was a hell of a lot more to see and I had a feeling the night was only just beginning.
I’d been correct. From the rooftop bar, the night exploded from one back alley haunt to the next. Mac led me through Wonderland like the White Rabbit, seemingly possessing a preternatural knowledge of where and how to find the most interesting and exciting spots for debauchery and deviance.
We popped from bar to bar, talking with backpackers from Europe and locals who’d lived on the Mexican coast their entire lives. I made Mac try a fruity cocktail (that he grudgingly admitted to enjoying) in a watering hole converted from a sixteenth century church. From the whispered advice of a one-legged, pockmarked local, we found an unmarked door and knocked only to be welcomed into a full-on rave somehow muted by what must have been solid steel walls. I’d wanted to leave until Mac grabbed my hand and pulled me into the fray and we jumped and screamed with the others until falling back out dripping with sweat and laughing.
Another suggestion ended up being a three-story, neon-hued strip club that looked suspiciously like it doubled as a brothel. That one I dragged Mac out of immediately even as he insisted we should ‘just give it a chance’.
We eventually found that hulking motorcycle group on the street corner and Mac talked to them in terrible broken Spanish until he had them doubled over in laughter describing how I’d walked in on him and the wedding planner in the woman’s bathroom. Then somehow Mac convinced me to jump on the back of a Harley while he argued with another to let him drive (the man didn’t cave). They drove us to another part of the neighborhood and we did shots and sang loudly and badly to Mexican music that I could only guess the words of.
Eventually, the motorcyclists spun out to a different part of town, leaving Mac and me to switch bars yet again, this time to a much quieter place where Mac started up a game of pool with a kid who looked to be in his late teens and who displayed an impressive sleeve of homemade tattoos.
I sat on a barstool, sipping my signature fruity cocktail while Mac and the kid circled the table, stabbing at balls and exchanging friendly insults.
“Where’d you learn to shoot, kid?” Mac asked as he sunk the eight ball to win the game. It hadn’t been a long one. The kid looked drunk, making sweeping declarations and tripping over his stick.
“Wa-Wan more game,” he slurred to Mac.
“Nah, man,” he said. “This is too easy. Play one of your friends.” He nodded to a table set back a bit where a motley collection of guys ranging from the kid’s age to early twenties watched them play.
“Play me,” he insisted. The kid shuffled in his pocket and brought out a wad of cash. My brow furrowed at the sight. I wasn’t sure what the conversion of pesos to dollars was, but it looked like a hell of a lot of money.
Now he had Mac’s attention. His eyes lingered on the money and then flicked up to meet the kid’s.
I expected him to take him up on the challenge, but Mac did the exact opposite. “I think my friend’s tired,” he said, nodding at me.
“Come on!” one of the kid’s friends shouted from the table. “Don’t pussy out, man.” He accentuated his point by slamming his bottle on the table.
It looked for a moment like Mac was going to refuse, but then he smiled and nodded. “All right, boys,” he said. He pulled his own wallet out and threw a stack of notes on the table. “Let’s do this.”
“Put in all of it.” That was one of the friends again. He had stood and walked behind Mac, looking over his shoulder into his wallet. Mac hesitated again, but then nodded. The rest of his bills joined the pile on the table.
It became apparent, quickly, that the first game was a fluke. The moment the money hit the table, the kid sobered, chalked up, and broke the cluster with professional precision. Mac’s jaw hardened and I clutched my drink. He was being hustled. The question was, could he win?
The kid sunk three balls before Mac even got a turn, but when he did step up to the plate, I saw immediately that he had been holding back during the first game as well.
He banked a solid off the wall to push in his stripe, shot the cue ball straight down the length of the table to a corner pocket, and then hopped it over a solid to push a stripe into the opposite corner.
The kids at the table jeered at both Mac and their friend, who glared at them and went to work once Mac missed his next shot.
The game was fast and dirty, each of them only taking three turns apiece until it was just the cue and the eight ball on the table.
“Where’d you learn to play?” the kid asked Mac.
“I shoot with my friend, Twain. He could probably play professional if he didn’t have his head stuck up his ass. After a couple years, I can still barely put up a fight.”
At Twain’s name, the kid looked at his friends with a strange expression on his face, but nothing more was said about the sixth Knight because Mac leaned down, nodded at the right side pocket and spun the eight ball expertly in.
I cheered as the kid reluctantly shook Mac’s hand.
“Ya know,” Mac said, grabbing his stack off the table, “I didn’t much want to bet anyway. You keep yours.”
Awfully nice of him. I would have assumed Mac would take any chance to gloat over a competitor.
Strangely though, the kid didn’t make a move to take his money back. “No,” he said. “You earned it.”
“But—”
“Take it.” His tone was hard, his eyes like flint. I shivered slightly.
Mac nodded and scooped up the money. Then he turned to me and said, “How about moving to the next one?”
“But we just got here,” I said. Then I noticed the look in his eyes. They said, Get your ass in gear. Now.
A twitch of unease started in my stomach. I left my drink on the bar and Mac threw some of the cash next to it. He took my hand and hurried me out the side door.
We walked a couple blocks over, Mac constantly looking over his shoulder.
“Do you think they’re going to follow us?” I asked.
“Maybe,” Mac said. “Should have known I was getting hustled before we even started playing. Those guys hate to part with their money, especially to a tourist.”
“I think we’re fine,” I said once we were a safe distance away. The street was empty and dark, full of shops closed for the evening. In the distance I could hear the echo of the livelier parts of town.
“You could have lost,” I reminded him as he looked once again behind us.
“Nah, then I wouldn’t have any money to pay a cab. I didn’t bring my cards. We’d have been stuck here until one of the Knights came and picked us up. Not something I wanted to do.”
We were in the clear now and Mac relaxed and looked sideways at me. I’d been overly aware that he hadn’t let go of my hand since the bar, but he seemed to just notice it himself.
He let it go quickly.
“Sorry,” he said gruffly.