The Privileges by Jonathan Dee Read Free Book Online Page A

“Yes!”
    “Fold,” Cynthia said automatically, and then, more gently, “Now we’re going to learn what’s called the poker face. You want to have the exact same face all the time, like a statue. That way you’re keeping the secret of what cards you have, until the end when it’s time to show.”
    But it ran against their nature. They scowled and groaned when the draw didn’t give them what they were hoping for, and they wiggled and widened their eyes when they found themselves with something good. Cynthia had so taken to heart the children’s generosity in suggesting that today they should all play what Mommy wanted to play that she couldn’t bring herself to just throw them the game. She wanted to even things out between them, not lose on purpose to keep them happy, or allow herself to win a few just to teach them another lame lesson about being a good sport. It wasn’t as though she was really taking their money. They were excited, and as long as the spell was unbroken the hours would keep marching smartly by and maybe tonight for once she wouldn’t already be staring at the front door when it opened and her husband came home.
    So she sent April back to Adam’s dresser, to the top drawer this time, and April came back holding two red bandannas. Cynthia knew they were there because she’d used them to tie Adam’s wrists to the headboard, though that seemed like an awfully long time ago now. She called the kids in front of her chair and tied the bandannas around their faces so that everything below their eyes was drapedlike a bank robber. Then she sent them back to her bedroom to look at themselves in the full-length mirror, whence she soon heard screams of delight. Jonas ran back into the kitchen, pretending to shoot her.
    “Stick ’em up!” he said.
    “Back in your seat, there, pardner,” Cynthia told him. “If you want my money you’ll have to win it off me fair and square. Now, the name of the game,” she said, dealing, “is Jacks or Better.”
    She ordered out for an early dinner—turkey sandwiches, chips, a bag of Milanos, even one small glass each of regular Coke, which they weren’t normally allowed to have. Anything to keep them at the table. The bandannas weren’t enough, because the kids’ expressive eyes still gave their hands away, so she went into the bedroom herself and came back with two pairs of sunglasses, her own and Adam’s, and balanced them on the children’s ears. They looked like little Unabombers, but at least now the playing field was somewhat level. They would never, ever fold, even after the principle had been explained to them more than once; but even so, at one point in the afternoon Cynthia was thrilled to discover that she was down three bucks to her children.
    Then their attention began to waver. Jonas said he was bored, the word itself billowing out his red bandanna. April’s desire to keep her mother happy was much stronger, but she had started putting her head down on the table between hands.
    “Can we go to the playground?” Jonas asked.
    Cynthia glanced quickly at the air-shaft windows to confirm that it was still raining; then something made her look again, and she saw one of their neighbors—some old woman, she didn’t know who—standing at her own kitchen window, staring brazenly in at Cynthia and her incognito children, and scowling. What was worse, Cynthia saw, was that she was on the phone.
    “Hey!” Cynthia said. She stood right up from the table and pulled open the kitchen window as far as it would go, which wasn’t very far owing to the child-safety guards. She bent from the waist and shouted sideways out the window. “Hey! What are you looking at?”
    Emboldened by his mother’s high spirits, eager to jump to her defensewhether he knew the source of the attack or not, Jonas ran up beside her, lifted the corner of his bandanna, and yelled out the window, “Yeah! What are you looking at?”
    Cynthia turned; they stared at each other, and