Chapter Three

The Smiths - "Please, please, please let me get what I want."

Good times for a change,

See, the luck I've had

Can make a good man

Turn bad

So please please please

Let me, let me, let me

Let me get what I want

This time

Haven't had a dream in a long time

See, the life I've had

Can make a good man bad

So for once in my life

Let me get what I want

Lord knows, it would be the first time

Lord knows, it would be the first time

Chapter 3

The weather has been incredible since I left University. The days are only just calling themselves May and I can't remember the last time it rained. I had never really understood William Blake's obsession with Yorkshire when I read his poetry as a kid, but now I think I'm starting to get it.

I'm gently hugged awake by the warm arms of the morning sun breaking through my window and my eyes are guided to an image of rolling countryside that wouldn't look out of place in a John Sibson painting. Today is my day off work, which I plan to spend in the dappled sunlight of the local woods reading one of the many books I have on display in my flat but have never read. I should really stay true to my pre-tense and go to my local cafe to read and display my worth for all to see.  

As I shower I'm so energised by the idea of finally doing something intellectually productive with my day that I burst into a rendition of “Long live the queen” by Frank Turner. I love this song. Even after the song has ended I repeat the line "...meekly shuffling down the path of mediocrity, well if that's your road then take it but it's not the road for me" over and over again, hypnotised, achieving a feeling of complete connection to an idea. In those few moments every day, my leaving University is justified as a rebellion. I have not failed, I have simply broken ranks to venture into the unknown; joining a secret fraternity of brave souls who carve out their own destiny outside of what is expected from them.

Now clean I eat, and inevitably after eating I am compelled to play a few hands of online poker. This has become commonplace after my time in University where I would fill the vacuum of intellectual challenge created by my non-attendance to lectures by immersing myself in an online world unlike the one I am forced to draw breath unto. Here I am not known by name, only a moniker. A moniker that draws no assumptions of my upbringing, ethnicity or character. Here I am only how I bet, and that level of control appeals to me on a fundamental level.

Soon the morning becomes the afternoon, lunch time becoming no more relevant an idea than that of a now defunct religious practise. All that exists is poker. A part of my soul is wagered alongside every bet, my personality weaved into its size. My person relies entirely on the outcome of these button clicks and every day they prove successful. My value is here. Forget reading, forget Univeristy, forget a career. With every extra dollar added to my account balance my confidence swells along with my ego. I don't need the world of work where I am nothing, I have the world of poker where I am something.

I am brought crashing back into my less favoured reality by the electronic blaring of a cheap alarm clock, indicating that's it's time to awake from my assumed slumber and wear my lack of success as a uniform. It's time for work. As I point my vehicle in the direction of the fish and chip shop where I spend my days, without the guiding hand of a night's sleep to steady the wheel, I imagine myself as an actor preparing for his breaking role. I must immerse myself in this environment, taking in every bit of useful information for my role to come. I am Daniel Day-Lewis. This is not my reality, I am in preparation for something greater. I arrive five minutes before the start of my shift and throw on an apron. I am now ready to take to the stage for another day of convincing my audience that I was born to fry chips.

Little Pete is of the greatest actors I have ever had the pleasure of walking the boards with. Every morning he arrives zestfully at the chippy in a suit that continues on past the ends of his child like frame, yet carrying himself with so much conviction that one could be forgiven for thinking he intended it that way. He plays the chain's business development manager, a title vague enough to bestow upon him the confidence to command every member of staff as if he is a personal mentor to each of them. We had met for the first time eighteen months before this performance in a working class snooker club, which due to the passion of one of its bartenders, had squeezed some poker tables into a function room in the back. He was perfecting his craft under the pseudonym "Barry Thompson", a name which had been afforded to him by a fake driving license that a less than savoury friend had introduced him to. Unlike his contemporary role, the character of Barry was a necessity as he was only seventeen at the time, a full year under the legal age to gamble in our country and had a face that would betray every attempted lie. Barry and I chatted across the felt and bonded immediately over our love for the game. His willingness to create an entirely new identity to follow a passion not approved by his parents invoked an intense attraction towards him the likes of which I had never felt before. His fierce independence fought to show itself through every movement and every word creating an aura around him which people couldn't help but want to be a part of.

We quickly graduated from the smoky back rooms of the snooker hall to the casinos of Leeds, which was a good twenty miles away from our parents' homes and the games were significantly higher stakes. We would pool our money, win a few hundred quid in the early evening and then spend every penny of it back in the bars of our home town when we would return. No pound in our possession was ever safe from our desire to gamble or drink it. When I left for University he began his career in business where he immediately put to work his extensive practise in becoming another character. His life as Barry was not in vain as thanks to him Little Pete found it effortless to move up to the position of authority that he is in now. A position which he uses every morning to ensure I am not fired despite a glaring ineptitude on my part to do the jobs required of me. It's a good job this is a preparation role.

The week passes quickly with Pete's reassuring glances easing my frustration of not being able to grasp what would appear to be a simple task. How can I justify such an elevated sense of self when I can't even fry chips in a designated time? Without words he tells me that this is not what I am meant to do. That I must endure this rehearsal for a role that will separate me from the mediocrity that I loathe. These glances make me feel lighter as I am whipped by the wind of their ideas to the refuge of the weekend.

This is to be a weekend of online poker tournaments. I have invited two friends who are similarly enthralled by this complex game over to my flat in Leeds relieve ourselves of financial shackles; and maybe pick up some glory along the way. The most accomplished of the two is Dan who is a tall, dark almost smoky character who wouldn't look out of place in an Italian aftershave advert. He almost looks like the smoke of the forty cigarettes he consumes a day has been forced by some kind of magic to take the form of a man with exquisite cheekbones. The second is "Si" Mitchell, son of Mitch Mitchell. Now this is a man who you could easily mistake for a Golden Labrador. He is easily distracted, full of energy and doesn't seem concerned with the follies of man. It is impossible not to smile in his presence; he has the innocence of a child, the energy and loyalty of a dog, all wrapped up in package of a handsome Yorkshire man.

We set up our monitors, put some high morale music on and start clicking buttons. In mere minutes, forty hours have passed. No meals, just energy drinks and coffee to keep us going. As the final table closes I am almost delirious, the previous few days of poker feeling more like a montage from an eighties film than a memory. I check my account balance five or six times in disbelief yet it remains unchanged. It would appear that I have defeated over six thousand players to win one of poker's biggest online tournaments. The curtain goes up.