Prentiss’s remark about how he hadn’t been seeing much of me lately me- You’re not even coming around to pick up money anymore- made me realize I’d come dangerously close to straying from the path I’d set for myself. I was almost embarrassed to realize how far off course I’d wandered.
Bolo’s patronage had made a huge difference in my life, financially- I went from mid five figures to well past mid six figures in the stretch of a few months. But I’d let my autonomy fall by the wayside. I’d become a ghost in PanStar’s machine. It had become increasingly obvious that I needed to revisit the circuit I’d maintained prior to my pivot.
My first few years in the States, I’d regularly attended two weekly events: a dominoes game at a lumber yard owned by the best friend of the man who housed me when I first arrived in Brooklyn and a poker game held in the basement of a beer distributor managed by a Costa Rican guy I’d met at the church I attended in Flatbush. Both drew a fairly prosperous crowd- men who owned small, established businesses and a handful of local-level political functionaries, plus a smattering of mid-level hustlers who worked hard at maintaining a surface level of respectability, easily belied by their willingness to drop large sums of cash on losing hands. Attendance was very casual- players came and went and it would be easy for me to pick back up where I’d left off, especially if I turned up with a box of Bolo’s Panamanian cigars in hand.
The lumber yard was located on a quiet side street in an industrial part of Canarsie. Domino games took place every Thursday night, after business hours. There were two games going on simultaneously the night I dropped in. I saw a group of three men seated around a table, waiting for their turn to play. I didn’t know any of them by name, but one or two of them looked familiar.
I walked over and laid my dominoes set on the table, then placed the wooden cigar box next to it. “You looking for a fourth?” I asked.
From there, everyone took their seat. I handed out cigars. Someone passed me a plastic cup of rum. The game fell into place. We were playing for fairly low sums, which was fine- I didn’t know my partner and didn’t want to stake my money on a stranger’s skills, or lack thereof.
“You live around here?” the man to my left asked me.
“No,” I replied. “I’m closer to downtown Brooklyn.”
“What do you do for a living?” he asked.
“I own a shipping barrel company,” I said. I didn’t bother asking his profession, because I knew he was going to tell me.
“I own a security company,” he told me.
“What do you secure?” I asked.
“Places like this,” the man gestured around the yard. “Lumber yards, storage facilities. A little side business in nightclub security and bouncers for hire- but that’s another story,” he said with a small laugh.
