Benjamin Bystander

Written by Orest Ormenaj

Cash Rules Everything Around Me. I could start and stop this whole piece with that one mantra there solely off of its verity. Instead of that, I want to let money do the talking. Literally!

Nothing like the feeling of being freshly born. A dark, forestry green with no creases or folds and blue stripes down the middle. Two and a half inches wide, six inches long. My nickname is “Benjamin”. The worth of my existence is 100 times that of my younger counterparts. Our home changes from the innards of a machine to a patchy, faux leather wallet on an almost nightly basis. I am surrounded by carbon copies of myself, hastily taken out of the dispenser and thrust into an environment that smells of sweat and cheap tobacco. We are passed back and forth between the cards and the chips scattered across the crescent table. Our owner decides that he wants to forego all of us but me tonight. He leaves me on top of the marble island next to his phone. He greedily looks at the potential prize in front of him, eyes never leaving the tempting stack of chips for tonight’s pot. Our safest moments were inside the teller machine as a conduit for transactions. People always tend to hunch over with a slight glint in their eyes when they come to collect.

Tonight our owner yells excitedly. More chips are subtly slid over to his side of the table. He spends his night cavorting with servers who bat their eyes the more earnings get added. They stack glasses of brown liquid next to him, each he takes more fervently than the next. A few scantily clad women come back and rub his shoulders as his eyelids begin to droop, his arms flailing the longer the night drags. The rest of my siblings have been stuffed away in some sort of dark compartment with long-lost relatives, perhaps for a transfer later. Suddenly, the lights above us begin to flicker. It happens at the same instance when our owner takes his stack of coldly stacked carmine chips and pushes them to the other side of the table. The bespoke dealer looks at him with one eye raised, but allows the action to proceed. Cards are dealt, voices fall hushed, and eyes widen. A tempered minute passes for what feels closer to an eternity. Our owner’s face morphs through expression faster than I can register, before the dealer plainly pushes the chips into his corner. Our owner makes a lunge for them, but to no avail. He is assaulted by two unfeeling giants as tears begin to well in the corner of his eyes. He can barely make eye contact with anything but his trembling feet. What a sight to behold, reduced to a pathetic whimpering participant in this otherwise raucous event. I am simply a bystander to mediocrity. I wonder how much longer I will be allowed freedom before I, too, am transferred to another owner. Anything and everything for a piece of me. I would much rather be torn in half than continue to linger upon this cold table as a new set of people go to place their bets. The dealer picks me up while examining me with a cautious eye. Before long, I too, join my siblings in a ghastly drawer.