'What?'
She flicked her finger at the tray full of money. 'We should use real hundreds.'
'Real hundreds?' I was so tired, I didn't understand what she meant.
She grinned. 'We could bring down one of the packets.'
I stared at her, thinking this through. The idea of removing the money from its hiding place gave me a distinctly unsafe feeling, an irrational mixture of panic and fear. I shook my head.
'Come on. It'll be fun.'
'No,' I said. 'I don't want to.'
'But why not?'
'I don't think we should take the risk.'
'What risk? We're just going to use it to play the game.'
'I don't want to disturb it,' I said. 'It seems like it'd be bad luck.'
'Oh, Hank. Don't be silly. When'll you have another chance to play Monopoly with real hundred-dollar bills?'
I started to answer her, but Jacob's voice interrupted me. He'd returned from the bathroom; neither of us had heard him approach. 'It's hidden in the house?' he said. He was standing at the edge of the kitchen, looking tired and overfed. I frowned at Sarah.
'Some of it,' she said. 'Just a couple packets.'
Jacob shuffled toward his chair. 'So why don't we use it?' he asked.
Sarah didn't say anything. She poured my brother another glass of wine. They were both waiting for me to speak. And what could I say? There was no reason not to do it, just my own amorphous suspicion that it was wrong, that in dealing with the money we should be painstakingly rigorous, treating it as something potent and malevolent, like a gun or a bomb. I couldn't think of a way to express this, though, and even if I had, it would've come out sounding silly. It's just a game, they would've said; we'll return it when we're through.
'All right.' I sighed, slouching back in my chair, and Sarah ran upstairs to get a packet.
JACOB was the little dog, Sarah the top hat. I was the racing car. The thrill of the hundred-dollar bills wore off with surprising celerity, so that soon they seemed just like the other denominations we were playing with -- rectangles of colored paper, a little larger, a little thicker than the others, but nothing more. We were using them for imaginary transactions, and this cheapened them somehow, robbed them of their value. They ceased to feel real.
The game took several hours, so it was almost midnight before we finished. We quit when I went bankrupt. Sarah and my brother agreed to call it a draw, but Jacob would've won. He had more properties, more houses and hotels, and a great big, messy pile of money. It wouldn't have been long before he ran her out of business.
I put the game away while Sarah gathered all the hundred-dollar bills together and carried them back upstairs.
I didn't realize how drunk my brother was until he stood up. He heaved himself out of his chair and took two weak-kneed steps toward the counter, his face looking panicked, his arms held out rigidly before him. It was as though he'd suddenly been transformed into some sort of thick-bodied marionette and someone else was now controlling his movements, dragging him across the room by invisible strings. He rested one of his huge hands on the counter and stared down at it, as if he were afraid it might jump away when he turned his head. He gave a short giggle.
'Why don't you stay here tonight?' I said.
He looked around at the table and chairs, the dishwasher, the sink, the stove. 'Stay here?'
'In the guest room. Upstairs.'
Jacob frowned at me. He'd never spent the night at our house before, not in all the years we'd lived there, and it seemed like the idea of doing so now made him nervous. He started to say something, but I interrupted him before his words emerged.
'You can't drive home like this. You're too drunk.'
'What about Sarah?' he whispered loudly, glancing toward the hallway.
'It's all right,' I said. 'She won't mind.'
I helped him upstairs, feeling like a child beside his oversized body, pushing against its soft mass, straining to guide it forward. Every now and then he let out another little laugh.
I put him in the guest room, across the hall from our bedroom. He sat down on the bed and fumbled with his shirt. I crouched on the floor in front of him and started to untie his boots. The dog had followed us upstairs. He sniffed at each piece of furniture in the room, then climbed up onto the bed and curled himself into a tight, compact ball.
When I got the boots off, I looked up to find Jacob staring in bewilderment at the bed's headboard.
'It's all right,' I said. 'I'm putting you to sleep.'
'It's my bed.'
I nodded. 'You're sleeping here tonight.'
'It's my bed,' he said again, with more insistence. He reached out to touch the headboard, and I realized what he meant. He meant that it was the bed he'd slept in as a child.
'That's right,' I said. 'Dad brought it over here just before he died.'
Jacob glanced hazily around the room. Nothing else in it belonged to him.
'It's a new mattress, though,' I said. 'The old one was all worn out.'
He didn't seem to understand me. 'It's in the guest room now,' he said.
He stared at the headboard for another moment or so, then lifted his feet from the floor and eased himself down onto his back. The bed rocked like a boat. The dog lifted his head, seemed to frown at us. I watched Jacob close his eyes. He appeared to fall asleep instantly, his breathing deepening within seconds to a snore. His face went slack, and his jaw fell open, so that I could see his teeth. They seemed too large, too wide and thick, for his mouth.
'Jacob?' I whispered.
He didn't answer. His glasses were still on, and I stood up to take them off. I pulled them from his ears, folded them shut, and set them on the table beside the bed. His face looked much older without the glasses, years older than it really was. I bent and kissed him lightly on the forehead.
Across the hall, the baby started to cry.
Jacob's eyes flickered open. 'Judas kiss,' he whispered hoarsely.
Still leaning over him, I shook my head. 'No. I'm just saying good night.'
He struggled to bring me into focus but didn't seem to manage it. 'I'm spinning,' he said.
'It'll stop. Just wait it out.'
He smiled at that, seemed to fight down a giggle, then suddenly turned serious. 'You kissed me good night?' he asked. His voice slurred a bit.
'Yes.'
He stared up at me, blinking. Then he nodded. 'Good night,' he said thickly.
When he closed his eyes, I backed quietly out of the room.
ACROSS the hall, I found Sarah just climbing into bed. She'd soothed Amanda, and the baby was making a soft gurgling sound as she fell asleep in her crib.
The money was stacked in a pile on my dresser. After I got into my pajamas, I went over and picked it up.
'That was stupid, Sarah,' I said. 'I can't believe you did it.'
She stared at me from the bed. She looked surprised, hurt. 'I thought it would be fun,' she said. Her hair was pinned up in a bun, like a schoolteacher's. She was naked except for a pair of panties.
'We don't touch the money,' I said. 'We agreed about that.'
'But it was fun. Admit it. You had fun.'
I shook my head. 'It's how we'll get caught, taking out the money.'
