Bobbi LaBrea, Omni Capital junior banker, told Euclid on the phone that as part of due diligence she planned to visit the Buccaneer and, perhaps, two other Boardwalk casinos. She had arrived in Atlantic City the previous night, checking into the Mariner Club hotel. She parked her BMW at the VIP zone in front of the Mariner Club’s main entrance, and when she suggested that Euclid meet her there at the valet, he replied that he was going to pick her up. He pulled up the ramp in his Pontiac, the engine roaring. As the valet held the passenger door open for Bobbi, Euclid leaned over and hastily brushed dust and crumbs from the passenger seat with his sleeve. Bobbi tipped the valet five dollars.
“Nice car,” Bobbi said, getting in.
Euclid’s face reddened. “You like it? There was a bidding war for this baby.”
He revved up the engine some more. “I need to make a quick pit stop,” he told her as they took off. “It’s a two-minute detour. I forgot to turn on the AC this morning. I have two cats, don’t want them to bake all day.”
“God forbid,” Bobbi said.
He sped along Atlantic Avenue. Minutes later, they arrived at the front of a blue-and-white two-story apartment building. “The Breakers” was written in gold letters on a rectangular plaque mounted on a pole by the entrance. A hundred yards away, across the Boardwalk, the lazy ocean licked the edges of the wide sandy beach.
“The Breakers,” Bobbi said, looking at the sign. “An audacious name.”
“It’s a premium location, and we have a pool,” Euclid said. He pointed at the turquoise swimming pool behind a metal fence surrounded by cheap plastic chaise-lounges. “It’s a resort-grade facility.”
“I see.”
“I’d invite you in, but my place is a mess.”
“Bummer,” Bobbi replied. “I’ll wait in the car then.”
Euclid’s place wasn’t a mess, and he would have loved to invite Bobbi in to meet his cats and to showcase his musical instruments, but his bladder was about to burst, and he rushed inside, eschewing further niceties.
Bobbi rolled down the car window, inhaled the salty air, and listened to the ocean waves break ashore. A lonely seagull hovered over the deserted beach, resting on the airstreams with barely a move.
She examined Euclid’s glove compartment. Discount coupons. A couple of Dr. Sholl’s. A brochure for hair-replacement products. A Flomax prescription.
One of the building’s first-floor window screens went up, and Bobbi saw Euclid gesturing for her attention. He held up one of his cats, a fluffy orange tabby, and waved at her with the cat’s paw.
“Say hello to Miss Bobbi. Hi, Miss Bobbi. I’m Tangerine,” he intoned in a high-pitched cat-talking voice. He then put Tangerine down and said he would be right back.
“The other one is a calico named Percy,” he said when he got back in the car.
“That’s great,” Bobbi said. “Short for persimmon?”
“Ha, no. For Percy Shelley.”
“Very clever.”
“How’s business in the Buccaneer?” Bobbi asked when they left the apartment building parking lot and drove up north on Pacific Avenue.
“Their business is steady. They get Chinese ladies by the busload every day from New York,” Euclid replied. “That place is recession proof.”
The Buccaneer Hotel and Casino was located a mile and a half from Euclid’s apartment, on the northern part of the Boardwalk. As Euclid pulled up to the casino valet, a liveried old man hurried to open the passenger door for Bobbi. She slipped him a fiver. Euclid, oblivious to Bobbi’s stealth expediency, handed him a wrinkly dollar.
The casino was built in the 1970s, one of the first venues to rise up along the shore. In its heyday it hosted boxing matches and beauty pageants and rolled out the red carpet for the high rollers from all over the East Coast and from abroad. The hotel tower––then the highest building in New Jersey––had a presidential suite and a well-connected concierge service on call to procure tickets and late-night dinners and less mainstream delights for their patrons.
Now all that glamour was gone. “Gamblers wanted” declared a neon sign near the casino entrance, and Bobbi thought that instead of communicating a joyful summons for a freewheeling pastime, the sign betrayed a crippling shortage. She imagined how this cheerful but hollow enthusiasm was conjured up by pushy, unencumbered-by-doubt business consultants (she used to date that kind once) and made its way down the corporate structure, through staff memos and resolutions, to be carried out, with the expectation of full sincerity and diligence, by the front-line workers.
“Limited-time special,” a dutiful security guard greeted them with a monotonous, perfunctory chant. “Four hours of play, get a free room to stay, conditions apply.”
Upon recognizing Euclid, the security guard sprung out of his protocol-imposed verbal coma and gave him a lively high-five. He sized Bobbi up with interest, realized she was with Euclid, winked at him, and, seeing another customer roll in through the doors astride an electric wheelchair, fell back into his pre-recorded, focus-group-tested torpor.
“Four hours of play, get a free room to stay, conditions apply,” he droned on as Euclid and Bobbi proceeded to the casino floor.
It seemed that the management of the casino had lost the will to fight to keep the air of the casino fresh. Its HVAC systems pumped cold air with loud gusto but were helpless to stave off the stale, musty odor of food-court lard and the decades-long sourness of cigarette smoke. This failure of hospitality was remedied by keeping the inside temperature in the frigid 60s and layering it with the sweet, funereal scent of air fresheners. Bobbi sensed a discomfort in Euclid’s posture as they maneuvered between the slot machines.
They strolled by a roulette table hosted by a forlorn dealer, a black man in his seventies dressed in a pictorial version of a pirate getup: a white full-sleeved shirt with ruffled cuffs and front, and a faux-leather brown vest. Seeing the potential customers approach, the dealer’s dejected frown leapt, in a trained move, into a spasmic smile.
“Spin the wheel, win a meal,” the dealer bade them.
Bobbi approached the table and took out a hundred-dollar bill from her purse. The dealer gave her four green twenty-five-dollar chips. The chips were filthy and stuck to each other when Bobbi tried to separate them and place a bet. The dealer apologized and gave her new chips. They were just as sticky.
Bobbi put two green chips on red and two others on separate numbers. “Slow day?” she asked the dealer.
“It’s better on weekends,” he replied.
The dealer spun the wheel. The roulette ball rolled and bounced around the surface of the wheel as the three of them watched in silence.
“What’s fascinating about this moment,” Euclid said, “is that this ball, right now, is in a sort of a quantum state. And that makes us all in a quantum state. It’s a fluid, uncertain situation, where neither this ball nor us nor anybody really knows where it’s gonna land. So it’s going to bounce until it falls into a random niche, that up until a fraction of a moment ago, it didn’t even know about, and once it is in that niche, nothing can nudge that ball away from it. It’s done and done. Certainty has arrived and declared itself to the world: I’m here and I’m red. And nothing in this world can turn it into black. People are like that roulette ball: they fall into a niche randomly and not by some deliberation, and then learn to love it.”
Bobbi and the dealer eyed each other.
“That’s deep, Euclid,” she said.
The ball landed on black. Bobbi lost the two numbers as well. She and Euclid turned away from the roulette to continue their tour of the floor.
“Hold on, miss,” the dealer called her. “I got a buffet coupon for you.”
“Keep it.”
Bobbi found herself empathizing with the casino floor workers. There was honesty and simplicity to what they did. She wondered what they made in an hour. She observed the busyness of the room, the kind of slots being played, the nightly rates of the adjacent hotel––sixty-nine dollars a night––and did a quick calculation in her head. She arrived at some quite pitiful numbers. After the shareholders and bondholders get paid, these dealers and security guards are lucky to be making ten dollars an hour, she thought. No––she then downgraded her grim assessment––they’ll be lucky to hold on to their jobs for the next six months.
“I’m starving,” Euclid said. “Do you want to grab something to eat? There’s a decent Italian joint here. Or we can go to the food court.”
“Italian joint sounds good,” Bobbi said. “My treat.”
It was too late for lunch and too early for dinner, and the restaurant was nearly empty. The greeter led them to a secluded table by a large panoramic window with a view of the ocean.
“So,” Bobbi said when they got drinks and placed their orders, “which one of your parents was a geometry fan?”
“My mother,” Euclid said, sounding pleasantly surprised. “She was a math teacher. She taught me calculus when I was nine.”
“I see. That’s how you ended up playing in a band.”
“That’s right.” Euclid lit up and giggled. Not only did Bobbi not need an explanation of his name’s origins, but she had also uncannily dissected the intricate dynamics behind his life’s trajectory.
“And you? How did you become a banker?” Euclid asked.
“It’s a long story. But technically I’m in private equity.”
“Private equity? Is it different from banking?”
“PE is just an umbrella term people use to avoid a narrow description of what they do.”
“Huh.” Euclid sipped his drink, feigning an understanding. “How do you like it?”
“It can be a grind.”
“You get bored?”
“Oh, no. I mean you can spend weeks putting numbers together and herding all the parties to come to the table, but then you have moments of sheer exhilaration. Or terror.”
“Terror?”
“Yeah. Like when you’re two beeps away from either making a killing or being fired.”
“Wow.” Euclid nodded, wondering what a beep was. “Brutal. And your coworkers? Are they nice?”
She grimaced slightly before answering. “Nice is not the kind of word I’d use to describe a PE person,” Bobbi said and took a sip of her wine, mulling whether to expand on her thought.
“Squares?” Euclid probed.
“Squares?” Her shoulders shook as she chuckled. “No. They’re assholes. But some of them are quite fascinating people. There’s no place for a square person in private equity. Well, maybe in back office.”
“Huh. Bad boys.”
“Yes, bad boys,” Bobbi said, and Euclid sensed some admiration in her voice. “You’re never bored.”
A waiter came, carrying the dinner plates: chicken parm for Euclid, pasta primavera for Bobbi. The waiter asked if they needed a refill on their drinks, and Euclid opted for another vodka cocktail. The waiter left.
“Are you from New York originally?” Euclid asked, biting on a piece of chicken.
“No. I’m from the South.”
“I sensed some traces of a drawl there. Where from exactly?”
“Alabama.”
“Alabama! You’re kidding,” he shouted with a mouthful.
“Nope.” Bobbi smacked her lips. “Nelson thinks I’m a squirrel skinner,” she added with a slight roll of her eyes.
“Whaaat?” Euclid hollered in high pitch.
“To him everyone west of the Hudson is a hick. He means that affectionately, though. I’m his grand experiment. His Eliza Dolittle.” She noted a slight confusion on Euclid’s face and offered another reference. “His Billy Ray Valentine.”
“Aha!” Euclid slammed the table, threw his head back, and cackled. “So we’re both from the sticks then. I like that.” He cut off another piece of chicken and put it in his mouth. “Where in Alabama?”
“This town called Florence. It’s across the river from Muscle Shoals. Ever heard?”
Euclid inhaled in awe. He took a big gulp of water. He coughed, covering his mouth with a white table napkin.
“Muscle Shoals! You gotta be kidding me! That’s like the very birthplace of Southern rock, and I would even go as far as to say the entire American music heritage. It’s a legendary place.”
“Yes,” Bobbi said. “You’ve been there?”
“No. Never been to the South. But it’s on my list of places to visit. Southern rock is actually my specialty. You grew up on rock music, I bet?”
“Yes.” Bobbi humored Euclid.
The waiter brought another cocktail. Euclid gulped half of it.
“To me, what makes Southern rock special is that it’s a blend. It’s a music that came down the Appalachian hills and went up the Mississippi Delta. It’s part white and part Black. Part rebel, part gospel.”
“Huh. Interesting.” Bobbi nodded politely. A good banker, she sensed Euclid’s pent-up fascination with the topic and encouraged him to expand. “Which part, you think, is more dominant?”
Euclid erupted. Here was a sympathetic ear, someone who could understand and appreciate his intricate thoughts on the American music tradition and who had actually expressed an interest in his elaborate theory.
“I think it’s gospel. Yeah, the roots of it, they go all the way to gospel. To me, Black revival is––and not that I’m religious or anything––the most important American contribution to world music.” Euclid spoke in one breath. “I think if we trace the roots of all the great musicians of the twentieth century, we will arrive at one Black woman with an electric guitar––Sister Rosetta Tharpe. Maybe you’ve heard of her. She had a gospel show on the radio in the ’30s and ’40s. Anyway, Elvis, Bob Dylan, all the big names in rock ’n’ roll were heavily influenced by her. And all the British rock bands that we thought were so original, they’d be nowhere if it weren’t for her. Gospel captures the very essence of the human spirit. Not the American. The human spirit. There’s a difference.” He peered at her. “It’s just more encompassing. Ultimately, I think that a choir of Black women in purple robes that clap and wobble in unison and praise the Lord and . . . and . . . it’s the pinnacle of . . . of . . .”
Euclid grasped at air with both hands to signal an ineffable awesomeness.
“. . . the unity and the solidarity and brotherhood and welcoming everyone with open arms . . . People get ready, there’s a train a-comin’. That’s what we Yankees don’t have. There’s no place for us on that train.” He caught his breath and sighed. “We are dispersed, fending for ourselves one by one. Taking pride in our survival skills as if this is something to be proud of. We were sold a bag of goods, yeah. But Southern folk––no, those folk can’t be fooled.” He shook his head. “They stick together. They help each other. They have a good bullshit detector, pardon my French.”
Bobbi listened to him with quiet attention. Several times she wanted to interrupt him, to save him from a runaway thought that could lead him to an awkward place. But Euclid was on a roll.
“One day, when this is all over, I will go on a road trip through the South. First, to Muscle Shoals, maybe jam there with some local band. Then Selma, Montgomery, Birmingham, visiting all the Black churches I can find. I want to stand and clap and sing together with those big Black mamas—if they’ll have me, of course. I hope they will. Then roll down to the gulf. New Orleans. Preservation Hall.”
He stopped again to catch his breath and gauge the effect of his ramblings on Bobbi. She replied with a warm, if a bit prim, smile.
“So, yeah, Southern rock is my specialty. My bandmates are more versatile. Larry, the drummer, is into prog rock. Peter can play more pop rock. You know, the kind people like to hear at weddings or birthdays. Journey, that kind of stuff, heh. I mean I can play it too, if I have to. It’s our other side hustle. But my primary artistic and emotional disposition is Southern rock. The Outlaws, Lynyrd Skynyrd. Deep tracks, too. That’s the songs they don’t usually play on the radio.”
He stopped and again examined Bobbi’s face for a reaction. He was met, once again, with a polite corporate impenetrability.
“Here’s a funny story,” he said. “There’s this Skynyrd song called ‘The Needle and the Spoon’ in my repertoire. I used to practice it in my mother’s basement. That was back when I was seventeen. I listened to it on repeat for days. Finally, she came down, wondering what the song was about. I had to tell her it was about a seamstress and a cook. Ha. And she bought it!”
Now Bobbi laughed. He laughed too, pleased that his little anecdote had broken through her detached business facade.
“Were you using?” Bobbi asked very softly when she stopped laughing. She tilted her head, and her eyes narrowed, and there was some sticky, dogged alertness in her tone.
“What?”
“Never mind.”
“Were you?”
The pause was long, too long. “No,” she finally said, but her lengthy internal deliberations were not lost on Euclid.
“Someone was,” he said with a probing smirk.
“Someone, yeah,” she replied.
“Someone in your family?”
“We don’t have to talk about that. Tell me more about your mother.”
“She passed on.”
“I’m sorry.”
“She went on a European cruise a few years back and had a stroke. Came back in an urn.”
“Hey, not a bad way to die, if you ask me.”
“No.”
The waiter came and took away their plates. Bobbi asked for a check.
“Next time it’s on me,” Euclid said.
Bobbi paid the bill, and they walked from the restaurant to the valet parking in silence.
“I appreciate your fascination with the South,” Bobbi finally said. “But don’t romanticize it too much. There’s a lot of misery there.”
“Of course. But that’s the reason they make the best music,” he replied. “It’s the cry of the soul.” He paused and looked at her. “I guess my point is that us, whites, we just can’t play Black music the way it’s supposed to be played. We approach it from the wrong angle. We make it all about a broken romance, about a woman who left. It’s a good take, but a superficial one. Southern music is about much more than that. It has simple words, but it’s about something existential.”
The valet brought his car.
Euclid revved up the engine, and they headed back to the Mariner Club.
“Although Skynyrd could pull it off,” he said, picking up on his unfinished thought. He glanced at Bobbi. “Can one like Skynyrd and be a Democrat?” he asked. There was an aching, a grasping for reassurance beneath his vocal nonchalance.
“Sure,” Bobbi replied soothingly. “A Southern Democrat. Like Huey Long.”
“Who?”
“Huey Long, Louisiana governor.”
“He likes Skynyrd?”
“He could have. He’s long dead now. Long before rock ’n’ roll.”
“I gotta look him up.”
“You should. He was very combative. Hard-core populist. People loved him. Pissed off a lot of people, too.”
“Sounds like an interesting guy.”
“He got shot.”
“Oh.”
Five silent minutes later, he dropped Bobbi off in front of the Mariner Club’s main entrance.
“Heading back to New York tonight?” he asked.
“Yes. I have some early meetings tomorrow.” She sighed.
“I like you, Bobbi,” he said. “You and me, we can rock ’n’ roll. I mean . . . do business together.”
“We sure can.”
On his dashboard sat the Atlantic City Funding Proposal folder that Bobbi had given to him earlier. He tapped on it.
“So, uh, I’m gonna take a look at this and get back to you with my questions.” He made sure to sound businesslike.
“Call me anytime,” Bobbi said and exited the car. Euclid bid her farewell with two air-ripping vrooms of the Pontiac’s motor.