A Helping Hand

I know, I know, country clubs have this really bad reputation. They're filled with stuck up pricks who smirk at the rabble. The members strut around like they're God's gift to the world and they are generally people you would prefer to avoid. But that's not the case at Evenwood. I joined many years ago, back when I thought I would have time to golf. Evenwood is just a small golf course with a bunch of people who like to play the game. And what would a game be if we didn't have a little something riding on it, eh? Most of the members would lay odds on almost anything. Golf is renowned for have more types of bets than you can shake a club at, but it seems the men at Evenwood spend most of their non-golfing hours coming up with even more stupid bets. They once bet on the hour that a dandelion would release its seed, only to come two seconds short of stopping a gardener from plucking up the flower; it turned out that Jim Thales won because he predicted that would happen (there's suspicion that there was some fraud involved, but nobody was willing to risk bad blood just to get his quarter back, so the matter was dropped). I'm not really into betting myself. I don't get pulled into it, not usually. The way I figure it, if I win the bet, I get money, but I already have money. Best to leave it in the wallet, I say.

Like I said, the membership is just a bunch of golfers, most of whom are pretty bad. Evenwood's course is difficult, to be sure, but you ought to be able to break 100, for goodness' sake. Most of the members can't, though. Maybe that's why they don't strut around like those people do at the other clubs. Just as well, if you ask me. The fact that you can play golf better than a few people is nothing to crow about. The pros put us all to shame.

As bad as the members are, they're still really fun people to be around. That brings me to an important point about the club: we're all friends. We help each other out, when we can. If one of us knows of someone who is hurting - emotionally, physically, or financially - we pitch in and see what we can do to fix things. The club is like a family, I guess, but a family you choose, not the one you're born into.

I'll give you an example. A while back, one of the members lost his wife to cancer. A bunch of us talked to him before her death and tried to prepare him. We went to the hospital with him to visit her. We talked to him, reminding him of the great times he had with his wife and of the many people who cared for him. Then, after her death, we looked after him, took him out to dinner, had him over for Christmas, played golf with him, and tried our best to keep his spirits up. It took a while, but he eventually got perspective on the whole thing (nobody gets out alive, all of us want the ride to last a bit longer no matter how long the ride was to begin with, that sort of stuff) and started dating again. It made us all feel good that we helped someone overcome one of life's many challenges. It's, in part, what the club is all about.

And maybe that's why I have fun: I am always playing with friends. I play with a bunch of different guys, but the ones I have the most fun with are DJ, Garl, and Hammy, black musicians who played with a few bands back in the 50s and 60s. The names are odd, but it seems all musicians have to have some sort of nickname; nobody could explain to me why. I have no idea how Garl got his nickname, but if you saw him you would understand why I don't ask about it. They're pretty good players, but what makes them fun is all the ribbing they give each other and the stories they tell. They usually leave me alone, poor white trash that I am, but they sure dig into each other.

DJ probably has the quickest wit, so he's my favorite, but Garl is pretty quick, too. Hammy just sits back and lets the two of them go at it, then nails one of them when he's tired and weak. I join them once in a while to play golf and enjoy the show.

_________________________

Garl, Hammy, and DJ were about to tee up when I joined them. They had just finished establishing the rules of the latest bet. DJ saw me and winked; I figured he had, once again, managed to bend the rules to give himself an advantage. One of these days, Garl is going to figure things out and turn DJ into a dust mop. But not today, if DJ's grin says anything.

"Hey, man," DJ called out, "hurry up and get out here. We're late."

"Okay, okay," I answered, "I'm coming. I just have to find my game and I'm good."

"Oh, man," DJ winced, "we don't have time for that. It'll be a good twenty years before you find your game, if ever. Just hurry up and miss. We don't got all day. I'm waiting to pick up Garl's dime."

I laughed at that. When I first joined this group, way back when, I would be amazed and amused at the bets they had going. Front nine, back nine, total, sandies, polies (I had never heard of this, but you get a point if you sink a putt that is farther away than the length of the flag stick), and some special stuff DJ comes up with that only DJ wins. One time, they bet on who would get closest to the pin on the third green throwing a golf ball from the pro shop. Weird bets, all the time. I laughed when I heard these guys setting up the bets. Someone will say "I've got a dime on Hump, here; he's my man." Someone else says, "You bump that to a quarter and I'll take some action." I thought that was so funny, playing for coins, basically. Eventually, DJ explained that a dime was $10,000, and a quarter was $25,000. Oh.

Anyway, I teed up my ball and pounded it into the trees. Pretty typical. I watched the ball roll near, or maybe behind, a tree. I heard a noise that sounded like a stifled chuckle and spun around to face the group.

"Don't you go smirking at me, dude!" I yelled in mock anger. "One day, you'll be doing the same thing."

"Nuh uh," Garl said. "I'll shoot myself the day before I hit a tee shot like that."

"Yeah," I said, "fuck you too." Garl pouted to let me know I was dead meat as soon as he caught me alone.

The rest of them teed off, with Garl being the longest and straightest. Everyone except me hit the fairway, so I had the walk of shame over to the trees to find my ball. Right behind a tree. Figures.

The three of them reached the green on the next shot and patiently waited for me to get there, too. "Why do you guys even play with me?" I asked, disgusted it took so many shots to catch up to them.

"We feel sorry for you," DJ answered, "you being so unathletic and all. We even tried finding you a woman, but no one was desperate enough."

"Thanks, but I can get my own women," I said.

"Where'd you find a trap big enough?" DJ asked. "Ain't those things illegal or something?"

"There's nothing illegal about money and it works just fine," I said.

"Damn," Garl said, "I had no idea you were rich."

"I'm not. What makes you think I'm rich?"

"Well," Garl said, "if you're buying women, you're probably having to pony up some major cash. I just didn't know you had enough money to make up for, well, you know..."

"Garl," Hammy chimed in, "he just said he could get women. That means he knows how to do it. It don't mean he can actually afford it."

I grinned. They were right, of course; I couldn't afford it. Things were tight and I was close to having to leave the club because the expenses were more than I was comfortable with. I would hate to leave, but my business almost went under and I didn't have a lot of extra cash. If it weren't for Eric at the club, I don't think I would have made it this far. Eric is kind of a nerdy guy, not much of a golfer, but very friendly and a really good accountant. He set some things up for me that helped calm the storm, at least for a little while. But I wasn't out of the woods yet.

As we dragged our bags across a large lawn, otherwise known as 'golfing,' DJ came over to me. I tensed up; this usually means I'm in for some kind of whupping. "You know, I've been watching your swing and I think I'm pretty justified in saying that's the best swing I have ever seen. People ask me who has the best swing and I always say 'John Bransen.' Anyone who can hit the ball with that swing has got to be a terrific golfer," DJ said. I glared at him while he laughed. A while later, when I hit behind the ball and splattered grass and dirt ten yards out, DJ wondered aloud if I had a grading permit. But he gave the other guys much worse, so I guess I made out okay.

For the rest of the round, DJ, Garl, and Hammy watched me put my ball everywhere except where I wanted, all the while expertly dropping their own shots just where they needed them. They don't do gigs that often anymore, so they have plenty of time to fine tune their games. All I can fine tune are my excuses.

Eventually, we got to the sixteenth hole. The sixteenth hole is a real bear, long and narrow. It's a par four, but I can't reach the green in two, so the best I can do is bogie, and that's only if I'm lucky enough to hit the green in three. And this one time, I managed to reach the green in three.

"Damn," DJ said, "you reached the green in three? You got game!" He was laughing while he said that, but I decided to treat the proclamation seriously.

Hammy was away and managed to lag his putt up to a foot. They gave him the putt for bogie, knowing he was out of the hole. DJ sank his twenty footer for birdie, putting a lot of pressure on Garl to sink his ten foot putt. But Garl did, to halve the hole. No money changed hands this time.

Then it was my turn. I was out about fifteen feet, but I always let the other guys finish the hole first, since there is usually a lot of money riding on these things, especially when we get to the end of the round. I lined up my putt, hoping to sink this one for a rare par. It was certainly possible.

But it was not to be. The speed looked good and the line looked right, just a little breaker to the left. But the ball stopped short by about four inches. I hate that. I would rather miss by two feet than leave it four inches short.

"That's good," Garl said. I was about to pick my ball up when DJ told me to wait.

"Garl," DJ said, "What are you doing, giving him a putt like that? It's got to be a good four inches, maybe more." DJ looked at me steadily, with a tiny grin on his face, and said "Four inches is pretty long, isn't it?"

I laughed. I knew what he was getting at. "Now you hold on, DJ," I said. "Don't you go telling all the women that four inches isn't long. I pretty much have them convinced it's huge, so don't you go messing that up."

DJ laughed. "I won't ruin your game, man. I know you do it with smoke and mirrors. Your secret's safe with me. Besides, those women shouldn't be expecting much from a white man anyway. Why would they think you have anything worth discussing?"

He said it in jest, but for some reason it bothered me. I didn't have a lot to brag about, but my dick was actually pretty good, at least in physical dimensions. I didn't have a lot of stamina, but my dick was certainly big enough. And the more I thought about it, the more I got annoyed.

"It's bigger than anything you guys have," I blurted out.

DJ roared with laughter. Hammy smiled and Garl chuckled a bit. The laughter made me madder. I didn't know why it was bothering me, but it did.

"I've got ten bucks that says I'm bigger than any of you." I stuck my chin out in defiance.

This time, they all laughed. "Dude," Garl said, "if you want to go up against some prime black dick, don't waste our time with little boy stuff. You sure you want to do this? Do you know anything about BBC?"

I smirked. "British Broadcasting Corporation. Yeah, I've heard of them," I said in a sarcastic voice.

They roared with laughter. I had no idea what was so funny, but I was the only one. "Dude," DJ choked out, "BBC means Big Black Cock. You don't get out much, do you?" DJ shook his head as he laughed a few more times.

"Okay, fine." I fumed, "Listen, I can walk the walk. Make it a hundred dollars." This was a bit steep for me, but I was seeing red.

The laughter got even louder. I was raging now.

"Okay, okay," I said, "one thousand dollars. You beat me and I'll give you one thousand dollars."

Whoops, that was not a good idea. I didn't have a thousand dollars for some stupid bet like this. But this was about pride now.

Garl smiled and said, "Dude, we're musicians. Do you know what that means? It means that we drop more than a thousand bucks' worth of cocaine off the mirror at the after party, that's what." He looked at his friends, shrugged, and said, "Okay, we'll take your money. We can see you aren't successful like us superstars, so we'll cut you some slack."

At this point, I wished they had said the bet was too small and they didn't want to bother. But they called my bluff and I didn't see a way out. Jeez, a thousand bucks. What if I lose? I didn't think I would, but what if?

"Okay," DJ said, "a thousand bucks if your dick is bigger than all of ours. What are the terms?"

I winced. "Okay, first of all, I didn't say I was the longest. Being long just means you hurt your partner, so I'm glad I'm only a little longer than normal, about six and a half inches. But girth feels good, and girth I've got in spades." I glanced at them, lowered my head, and said, "Sorry, I didn't mean it quite like that."

They all laughed. Garl said, "That's okay, man. We know you're just white trash, so we don't expect you to be eloquent like we are."

"Okay, okay," I smiled. "So the bet is that I am bigger around than any of you."

DJ said, "You're on, dude. Whip it out and show us. If we think we're bigger, we'll prove it and take your money. If you're bigger, well, why are we even discussing that? That's just plain ridiculous." He shrugged his shoulders and looked at the others.

"Hmm," I said, "if I whip it out right now and get erect, you'll measure it and see if you can compete. Somehow, I don't think jacking off in front of a bunch of guys is going to get me hard. Let's try something else."

Hammy said, "How about a picture? You can take a picture with a tape measure and show what you've got."

"No," I said, "I don't think that's going to work. I know enough about computers to be able to make an image show exactly what I want. You guys will just think I've cheated. We'll have to think of something else."

"Hey," Garl said, "why don't we get one of the women to do the honors? We can pay her a hundred bucks to check things out and report back."

"You think we can get anyone?" I asked.

DJ laughed. "Are you kidding, man? We could probably find someone to check your junk for free. Kathy would do it, for sure."

Kathy wasn't particularly attractive, but she was better than having some guys waiting for me to get hard.

"Wait a second," Garl said. "If you win, you get a thousand dollars from each of us, but if one of us wins, all we get is a thousand dollars from you. That doesn't seem fair. What if I'm the biggest? I should have a chance to get a thousand bucks from everyone, not just you."

"Fine with me," I said. "I'm going to win the money anyway."

Garl laughed. "Maybe, little boy, maybe, but the proof is in the pudding."

"That's not the saying," I protested. "It's 'the proof of the pudding is in the eating.'"

"Thank you, professor," Garl said. "Whatever."

We talked about the bet some more and decided everyone was in for a thousand dollars and the winner takes all. DJ said he would talk to Kathy to see if she was available. DJ is slick enough to talk the pants off a nun, so I was pretty sure Kathy would do the honors. Most everything was set.

Except when DJ talked to Kathy and she said yes, word got around. The club is small and rumors fly like wildfire. I was having lunch a couple of days later when Richard dropped by my table.

"Hey, man, how're you doing? What's up?" Richard said. Richard's a pretty cool guy and I enjoy playing the occasional round with him. He's a little worse than I am, so he makes me feel good about my game.

"What's up? My handicap, that's what. And my blood pressure. How about you?"

Richard looked side to side, then leaned over and said, "What's this I hear about a bet? Kathy told me she was going to measure you and you could walk away with three thousand dollars. What's up with that?"

I grinned sheepishly. "DJ insinuated some things that I don't think are true and I'm going to set him right for a thousand of his bucks, that's all."

"Can I get in on the action?" Richard asked.

"Hmm," I said, "I'm not sure. I'm not really running this thing. You'll probably have to talk to DJ."

And that's all it took. Before I knew it, there were rumors that a hundred guys had thrown their hats into the ring. I was pretty sure I had them all beat, so I started thinking about what a hundred thousand dollars would do. It would sure help the business. I decided I'd take all comers (no pun, please) and save my business.

Of course, the extra contestants meant that things would take longer to resolve. We decided we would use a small room off the women's locker room for the measurements; there was a sitting room there that nobody used, so it should be free for the documentation of appendages.

Now that we found the room, we had to find the inspectors. With a hundred guys, I doubted we would find enough women. If we had only one or two women, or even three or four, it would take forever to go through everyone. But I asked DJ about it and he winked, saying he'd taken care of everything. Knowing DJ, I was sure he had.

The only rule was the woman doing the measuring on a contestant could not be married to that contestant; wives could measure anyone but their husbands.

_________________________

The following week, DJ brought the list of men and the women inspectors for each man. I was a bit surprised by the list, since it included some men I thought would avoid this sort of thing. Jerry, who's about 90, was on the list; I'm not sure he understood he would have to get erect for the measurement to be accurate. And Eric, the accountant, was there, too. I guess he felt he had something to show, or maybe he just wanted someone to handle his dick, even for a short time. In any case, everyone in the club knew that the judging was on. Now for the awkward part: my inspector was Vera and I had to contact her to set up a time for the measurement.

Now, it must be understood that Vera is a catch for anyone. One of the younger women in the club, she's graceful and luscious. I have, on more than one occasion, wondered idly what was beneath that dress or skirt she was wearing. Leopard underwear? You never knew. But Vera will know about me, every little detail, and some details not so little. She will take that delightful hand of hers and wrap a tape measure around my dick, carefully checking the scale to make sure she gets a good reading. Just thinking about it made me hard. I got hard just thinking of her bending forward, carefully looking at the tape while I carefully looked at her breasts, imagining doing all sorts of things to her. This could be really good.

Or terribly awful. What if it was a random draw and she really didn't want anything to do with it? And what about her husband? I won't bother saying his name; I'll just refer to him as Mr. Prick. He lives up to his name. He struts around like he owns the place (well, he does own part of it, as all members do), snapping his fingers to get people to cluster around him so he can make his demands. He is a lousy golfer, very slow, and he cheats. He's been in front of the disciplinary committee several times. I don't know why the club doesn't just kick him out. Well, actually, I do. Two reasons: money and Vera. The club needs every member it can get so it can stay solvent. And if Mr. Prick goes, we lose Vera, taking away a lot of charm of the club. So Mr. Prick stays.