27
unchangeable past. Its waters soothed the parched floodplains of her tongue. Ice cubes tumbled about in her glass as she tapped along to the cool jazz that always seemed to match or make her mood.
She looked out the floor to ceiling windows of her lair over the glowing lights and come hither allure of Sin City. A city built on broken dreams. She knew what lay beneath the layer of blinding lights. You don’t chase away the darkness with the light in this city, you use the light to blind you to the darkness. All the world’s pleasures one could ever want, except happiness.
Headlights below raced along streetlamp yellowed streets in a constant flow along The Strip. She could be down there, in a city that only slept in disco naps. Always a new face to entertain and a new thing to look at. Always a new sucker looking to give you all they have and more with a smile on their face.
She could be walking among them, taking in the smells of stale smoke and spilleddrinks but not their money. Alone inside the crowd, instead of looking down above themasses. The first choice of her retirement before her, isolation or lonely wanderlust, shecouldn’t decide right now. It was late, and she was supposed to be celebrating.
She opted to swallow the rest of her Gin Rummy with a deep gulp, “Let’s ride this lucky streak into the ground.”
Cynicism, Lea Kelley