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TK can’t even remember now whose idea it was to hold a Ladder 126 Texas Hold ‘Em tournament, but he’d done his research and watched enough youtube tutorials about how the game was played to feel fairly confident going in. Besides, he knew his brothers and sisters like the back of his hand; he was more than confident he could pick out when they were lying and use it to his own advantage.
However, 3 hours in and nearly $400 down, he was starting to think he’d been a little too confident.
“Show me whatcha got, baby brother,” Judd smirked, throwing his own cards down on the table. Full House.
TK hesitated for a moment, dreading the next one. Heaving a great sigh and rolling his eyes, he lay down his meager pair of threes to a raucous bout of laughter and shouts.
“Seriously TK? How are you so bad at this?” Mateo asked.
“Yeah, wasn’t it you who was crowing all week about you’d smoke us all? Relieve us of all our money so you could go on a cruise with your boyfriend?” Marjan teased, pointing her finger at him as Judd swept his money back across the table.
“Whatever. This is stupid. It’s Judd! He’s just...a poker prodigy or something! I don’t understand how. Gambling is illegal in Texas anyway, how’d you get so good at this?” TK whined.
“Says the guy who brought a cop to the illegal poker game,” Judd laughed, looking up at Carlos who was standing behind his chair, holding a can of coke and smiling.
“Paul invited me, actually,” he said, sipping. “And just because gambling is illegal doesn’t mean we Texans don’t gamble.”
“Exactly. Every other state around knows it’s illegal here, and that’s why there’s a ton of casinos just across the state line in every direction,” Mateo said.
“Are you even old enough to go inside a casino, probie?” Marjan cracked from the kitchen, which Mateo followed with a har, har that earned him a noogie from Paul.
“Alright, alright. Deal ‘em up again,” Judd said as Paul picked up the deck. “One more and then I gotta call it a night and get home to Gracey ‘cuz she will kill me if I show up past midnight and sleep through church tomorrow mornin’.”
The game went on as the rest had, each player raising, calling, or folding as they wished until finally it was TK, Judd, and Marjan left. TK watched them both with eager eyes, looking for tells he’d learned about in the videos. They were both pretty stoic, looking back at him and at each other occasionally. He felt pretty good about this hand; he had four sevens. He tried to keep his own face in check as he watched the others. Marjan locked eyes with him before immediately cutting her gaze to Paul sitting next to him, who’d folded out already. Judd looked at Marjan for a moment, then to Paul as well, before sliding his eyes to TK almost as an afterthought. It occurred to TK that the atmosphere was tense in a different way than just the three of them trying to read each other. He watched his two opponents again. Both kept looking at Paul, so he slowly moved his focus to Paul.
Paul, it seemed, was busy watching Carlos, who was still standing behind Judd’s chair, consequently facing TK directly. Once Paul locked gazes with Carlos, Carlos pursed his lips a bit. Paul looked back to Marjan and Judd in turn, pursing his lips in almost the same way.
“I fold,” Marjan said, throwing her cards face down on the table. Judd looked at TK directly now, before once again cutting over to Paul. TK didn’t move his gaze from Judd.
“I’ll see your fifty, and raise you a hundred,” Judd said to TK. TK had bet most of what he’d had left, since he was pretty sure this hand was going to beat whatever Judd had, and that Judd was just bluffing. He refused to bow out this time.
“Alright. All in,” he said, pushing the rest of his meager chips into the middle of the table.
“Oh shit, here we go. Moment’a truth.” Judd lay his cards down and TK followed. There was another cacophony of shouts from around the room as Judd’s straight flush was revealed.
Carlos whistled and slapped Judd on the shoulder. “I was worried there for a minute that he had a royal flush and you’d doomed yourself.” TK looked up at him in confusion. Carlos walked over to TK’s chair, wrapping his arms around TK’s shoulders from behind and placing a kiss to his temple. “Aw baby, it’s alright. Better luck next time.”
And then, seemingly apropos of nothing, Carlos added, “You know when you’re hiding something, you do this really cute scrunchy thing with your nose? It’s super adorable.”
TK froze for a moment, looking around the table once again. Every single one of them were looking at him with slightly guilty expressions on their faces. He thought back to the entire night. Carlos standing behind Judd and facing Paul, who was next to TK and could look straight at Marjan and Judd easily. Paul and Carlos, who could communicate silently even at the worst of times. And Carlos blatantly watching TK most of the night, which he’d interpreted as boyfriend infatuation but was apparently reading his tells and relaying them to Paul, who then relayed it to Judd and Marjan.
“Oh my god, screw all of you! You’re all off my holiday gift list!” he cried, shoving back in his chair amidst the sounds of laughter from the whole house.
“Baby!” Carlos called through his own laughter. “Come on, babe, you know it was all in fun!”
TK knew that, of course, but that didn’t mean couldn’t pout about it a little. He felt like an idiot, but that was mostly his fault for hyping himself up to everyone the whole week leading up to this.
Carlos caught up to him and pulled him into a hug, placing a kiss to his forehead. TK relented and wrapped his arms around his boyfriend’s waist. “I know, but I thought at least you’d be on my side! You completely sold me out, you traitor!”
“I know, and I’m not even sorry,” Carlos said with a laugh.
Little did TK know, Carlos had bought the tickets for the cruise months ago, and was waiting for their one year anniversary--in two weeks--to gift them to TK. The rest of them knew about the tickets, too, which is why they definitely didn’t feel bad about the whole thing.