The Dead Man’s Hand
Douglas was in his late twenties. He worked at a big government research complex. He was a computer network administrator. After doing his BA at the local university, Douglas held a couple of jobs. He was a clerk on the graveyard shift at a video store. Then he worked as a waiter at a big steak house.
Douglas had the good judgement to sign up for one of those 9 month computer diploma programs from a then prominent local private school. This was during the tech boom of the late 1990s. After finishing the IT diploma program, Douglas caught on with the government job at the research lab.
Some of his classmates went for the high salary and stock options available in high tech startups at that time, and encouraged Douglas to do so too. But Douglas was more of the eight to four type and the steady, secure government job suited him fine. Turned out well too, as many of his old classmates were out of work after the tech crash in the early 2000s. In fact one of his old classmates who once bought a Saab with his signing bonus in high tech served Douglas a tasty steak at that same restaurant where he used to work.
Douglas lived modestly by himself in an apartment building near where he worked. He worked regular eight to four. As a systems guy, he sometimes had to work evenings or weekends for server upgrades, security patches and stuff like that. Douglas didn’t mind as the overtime was infrequent and paid at the union rates.
Growing up and in college, Douglas liked to play cards. A couple of times a month he met his buddies for poker night. Douglas was a pretty good player, and he won money off his friends more often than he lost. After going to work full time, his college buddies moved out of town and got married and stuff like that. The poker nights became few and far between. Douglas had other stuff to do so he didn’t really miss the regular card games.
Then one Sunday night Douglas switched over from a dull football game. Just clicking around, he happened onto the final table of a Texas hold’em tournament on one of the high numbered cable channels. Douglas watched it intently and took an instant liking to hold’em. There were plenty of commercials during the show for online poker rooms. Douglas decided he was going to play hold’em on the Internet.
So Douglas opened an account and made a $50 deposit at one of the poker sites who had advertised during the Sunday night show. He didn’t bother with the play money area and went straight to the real money tables. Like most players, Douglas lost his initial deposit.
The next time he worked overtime, Douglas used the extra money he earned to go back to that Internet poker room. This time he had learned enough to be able break even at the start. Then he improved some more and started winning money, like he did in the old days against his buddies.
Douglas enjoyed playing poker online and certainly enjoyed winning at Texas hold’em. He had no illusions about getting rich at it or quitting his government job to play for a living. It was just something he found enjoyable and modestly profitable.
Douglas liked to play in the evenings. Before he started playing hold’em on the Internet, he liked to go to bed around 11 PM and get up around 7 AM for a solid eight hours sleep every work night. After he started playing he was staying up a bit later. He did discipline himself to go to bed by midnight, so he’d still get the good 7 hours sleep on work nights.
One night Douglas was playing well and the electronic dealer was giving him good cards. Straight, flush, full house, several times over. As a result Douglas was having a good night and winning at a good rate. At 11:50 PM Douglas noticed it was getting late. So he decided he’d play until he won one more hand, then he’d go to bed. The way things were going, he figured he’d get that last win pretty quick.
Well, the electronic dealer giveth, and the electronic dealer taketh away. In hold’em your cards can go cold very quickly and for a long time. Suddenly Douglas was getting poor hands he couldn’t win with. He wasn’t even getting two pairs, which is itself usually not enough to win. When he did get good hands, he caught some bad luck and lost. One time he lost a king high flush to an ace high flush. Another time he lost a full house to a four of a kind.
These things happen in Texas hold’em, and Douglas didn’t get upset over his run of bad luck. He was annoyed when he looked at the clock and saw it was twenty to one in the morning. Well past the midnight quitting time he’d set for himself. Plus his run of bad luck had eroded his winnings for the night and now he was in a loss for the session.
So Douglas decided to quit for the night. But by the time he decided the cards were being dealt so he decided to play this last hand then quit. Now his two cards were Ace of clubs and eight of diamonds. Usually Douglas would just fold this hand as it is not a very strong hand. Plus Ace-eight is kind of a bad luck hand.
But since it was the last hand of the night, Douglas decided to call the blind bet and play it. If anyone had raised the blind Douglas would have folded. He was kind of hoping someone would. But nobody did and the flop came down.
Now the flop came down Ace of diamonds, eight of spades, two of diamonds. That gave Douglas a strong two pair of aces and eights. Douglas didn’t care for aces and eights and he would have folded the hand if there had been heavy betting on the flop. But the betting was light on the flop so Douglas stayed in the hand.
The next card was the turn. The turn was the 6 of clubs. Betting remained lukewarm so, feeling more confident, Douglas called a small bet to stay in the hand.
Finally the river card. The river was the Ace of spades. That gave Douglas a full house, Aces over eights. Douglas bet aggressively. He found two callers and Douglas won a nice sized pot at the showdown.
The win was good for Douglas. It put him back into a profit position for the session. He felt a bit strange winning with the dead man’s hand Aces over eights. But he was glad to win a hand after the spell of bad luck.
Annoyed with himself for staying up too late, Douglas logged out and hurried to bed. He didn’t want to be tired the next morning at work. The next morning he was a bit tired. Hardly bleary eyed, but he resolved to stick to his midnight bedtime in the future.
Unfortunately for Douglas, that Aces over eights would be his final poker hand.
Going down the hard steps of his apartment building, Douglas took a nasty tumble. It was raining that day and there was some water on the steps from someone's shoes. And maybe Douglas was not as alert as usual that morning from staying up too late the night before.
He hit his head hard when he fell on the concrete landing. Some neighbours heard the fall. They saw Douglas knocked out and called an ambulance. The ambulance arrived quickly and they took Douglas to the hospital. Unfortunately Douglas had a serious head injury. He didn’t regain consciousness and he died late that evening.
So if you’re playing poker online at night, when it’s time to quit and go to bed, then log out and go to bed. And, whatever you do, if you’re dealt Ace-eight in Texas hold’em, then click Fold right away.
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If you liked this story, I wrote two other campfire stories on my general blog.
Campfire Story
Campfire Story II
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