Breakfast at Cassandra's Ch. 06

It started out like any other vacation.

Sightseeing, chowing down at some famous food spots, and in this case, gambling.

Jimmy, Bert, and Harold hit the slots at The Sahara, then tried some blackjack at The Frontier.

They had lunch at Westy's and watched the girls dance at The Flamingo Club.

Don't let the senior-citizen status fool you - Jimmy and Bert could still get down.

***

"Well," Bert began, enjoying one last bite of his tuna on rye.

"Well what?" Jimmy fired back, puffing on his cigar.

Smoke billowed everywhere throughout Binion's Horseshoe Casino, and there was plenty billowing from Jimmy, as Harold had to turn and cough.

"Should we start our search?" Bert suggested.

Jimmy gave a wry smile.

"We ain't gonna find him," he said, as if the two knew this cold reality all along. "Finding H.D...eh, I was just throwin' that out there..."

"What, to get us to Vegas?" Bert scoffed, following with a lengthy belch.

"Let's at least try, old friend," Bert persisted, refusing to concede.

This is when things got interesting.

***

They started the only place they could: Caesars Palace, where Marvin Harding apparently dealt blackjack when he arrived in Vegas in 1971.

The young dealers working there never heard of him. They were gracious enough to give it thought, but the name didn't ring a bell.

The search committee poked around further, asking management and the bartender that was working at the time, Rusty.

Nada.

They asked the drink girls, they asked the 18- or 19-year-old kid fixing one of the slot machines.

Nothing, zilch.

They started to wonder if Marvin Harding ever actually came to Vegas.

Frustration got the best of them and they did some more gambling and drinking at Binion's.

But after his third White Russian, Bert got a head full of steam and decided they should revisit the manager's office at Caesar's.

The manager was a young gal, maybe 30, and Bert posed the idea of checking employee records.

Danielle, the manager, did say they started inputting all employee information into the new computer.

But the information only went as far back as 1975.

They gave it a whirl anyhow.

There it was, lo and behold.

Harding, Marvin...blackjack dealer...

He had worked at Caesar's until '76 and then properly gave his two-weeks notice.

Reason for leaving? Was offered a better salary at The Golden Nugget down the street.

After three hours of amateur sleuthing, the search committee was finally getting somewhere.

***

If Marvin Harding was still working at The Golden Nugget in 1982, he wasn't on this day.

As "Pac-Man Fever" blared from the radio in the nearby arcade, the search committee briskly made their way to the blackjack table - Bert hobbling quickly on his bad knees - and found no Marvin.

They were told by the dealer that there was no Marvin Harding working there at all.

But from a nearby bar stool, opportunity called.

"I know Marvin Harding," said a short, rotund, bald guy named Stew Peters. "Hell, we used to rap here all the time..."

The group immediately ordered themselves a round of drinks, plus one for their new friend.

After venting his anger about an impending football players strike on the horizon, Stew was urged to share with them his knowledge of Marvin's possible whereabouts these days.

"Well, lemme see...," he offered, leaning back in his seat. "I saw Marvin...he was fed up...said he was tired of dealing - blackjack that is...and he just walked out..."

There was an awkward pause.

"And that was...when?" Jimmy prodded.

"Oh...about three years ago," Stew answered.

Jimmy, Bert and Harold hung their heads.

But not for long.

"I do believe...he still hangs out at Sisko's, down on Fourth," Stew suggested.

They bought their new friend another round, and headed out.

***

Sisko's was a dive bar if there ever was one.

The street it was on looked like it should be condemned: sign posts with no signs, potholes the size of moon craters, and broken beer bottles everywhere.

Nevertheless, the three parked their rent-a-car and made their way into the corner bar.

There was barely any light.

They figured order something that came in a bottle: it seemed safer.

A round of room-temperature Budweisers arrived, and the search committee planted themselves on the end of the bar nearest the door.

"Well, I'll be a sonofabitch," Jimmy said, with a hint of victory coming through in his voice. "That's him..."

"That's who?" Bert asked after a big gulp of his brew.

"Marvin Harding, dipshit, the reason we're here?!" Jimmy fired back.

The man he was referring to was passed out at the other end of the bar, slumping forward, his head resting right next to his 13th bottle of Meister Brau.

Jimmy recognized the birth mark just above his right temple, visible only because of the bright lights from the nearby jukebox.

They all took a deep breath and made their way over.

After several nudges and even shakes, Marvin was finally awoken.

He spoke in a drunken slur.

"Alright, 50 bucks to look at it, 75 to touch it...(hiccup) a hundred to suck it and 200 to watch me suck it," he managed to get out, his eyes barely open.

"Marvin, it's us," Bert told him. "It's your old pals from Hollywood - me, Jimmy...this is our new friend, Harold...he's an assistant to Brittany Flowers...you remember her?"

That name rang a bell for Marvin: beautiful harps played in his head...

"Brittany Flowers? I haven't heard that name in far too long..."

He stared off into the distance.

"The last time I..." he began, but abruptly finished.

With that, Marvin threw up, all over Bert's shoes and all over the peanut-shelled covered floor.

It was time to go.

***

They got Marvin back to the hotel. He had to put one arm around Bert and the other around Jimmy to do so.

They carried him into the room and slumped him down onto the bed.

"So what's up with you, Harding? You seriously turning tricks with that horsecock of yours?" Bert asked, albeit with a chuckle.

"Hey, what the hell else can I do?" he asked. "I got fired from every job I had. At Caesar's I was good. I was sober. And then...I relapsed. By '79. I really missed you guys...I missed Hollywood."

He nearly fell asleep again, but instead propped himself up on the bed.

"And I missed Brittany," he lamented.

"We know you always held a candle for her," Bert said. "But you never made a move..."

"She didn't take me seriously, just like everybody else," he said dejectedly.

"Yes, she did, Marvin. She always cared about you. She even put up with all your ridiculousness. The drinking, the arrests..." Bert went on.

Marvin stared off into the distance again.

"We need to get him into the shower," Jimmy suggested.

***

Getting Marvin into the hotel room was a big enough chore itself.

Getting him stripped and into the shower was even tougher.

As Bert and Jimmy undressed their friend, Harold started to run the water in the shower and adjusted the temperature.

He turned around, dumbfounded by what he saw.

"For Christ's sake," he couldn't keep himself from saying.

As much as he heard about it, Harold was still nonetheless flabbergasted the first time he saw Marvin Harding's massive endowment.

"Why don't you take a picture, it'll last longer," Marvin snidely suggested.

"Sorry, I...," Harold tried to apologize.

It was a sight to behold. Marvin's penis - although completely relaxed - hung down past his thighs, damn near halfway to his knees.

"They don't make em like that anymore, kiddo," Jimmy teased. "Alright, Harding, one leg at a time. Up over the tub. Come on, you got it..."

Harold's stares lingered on Marvin's humongous package.

"Being this big ain't all it's cracked up to be, young man," Marvin lamented. "Can hardly ever get this thing up nowadays."

With that, he picked up his long, hefty tool and swung it about. Although an act of frustration with his near-perpetual flaccid state, the effect was nevertheless comical.

"It takes a tower crane to raise that thing up, Harding," joked Jimmy.

***

In the morning, what was a group of three was now four.

And they packed up and headed for Hollywood.

A man intent on keeping a promise to himself, Marvin swore off booze for good and hoped to find a new life back in Tinseltown.

TO BE CONTINUED...