“Hood cock,” groaned Biscuit Pisser, “The shit I do for you, Shitface.”

“Don’t do it for me, old chup. Do it for the glory of the CKC.”

“Are we shortening the acronym now, Shitface?”

“I overheard a rich person call it that.”

“Fair enough. It is easier to remember.”

“I know right? I can’t believe we spent so much time calling it the—”

“Hey, you are guyth gonna keep whithpering to eachother or are we gonna play uth thome poker? Common, Jerry, deal uth all in!”

Jerry briskly dealt three sets of two cards and set down the three card river in but two breaths.

“Ehrm,” interrupted Sir Broderick, “We’ve only got four chickensfeed. I was thinking I’d play for both of us.”

“No teamth! That’th remarkably unfair. Altho, did you just thay four chickenthfeed?”

They all burst into cackles.

“Y-yes?”

More cackling.

“Nice job, Limpy George,” snorted Lying Lenny, “Bringing in fresh faces and empty pockets. That’ll make for a hood poker night.”

“Look, I’m thorry you don’t think it wath a hood idea, Lying Lenny! How about thith,” he turned to Sir Broderick and Biscuit Pisser, “I’ll give you both fourty chickenthfeed to play with. No thtringth attached, heh, unlike my yo-yo. Wadda ya thay?”

Sir Broderick and Biscuit Pisser shrugged.

“What’s the worse that could happen?”

“That’th the thpirit! Deal em in, Jerry!”

“I already dealt em in, ya right knob,” snorted Jerry as he quickly set down two more hands for Biscuit Pisser and Sir Broderick.

“Better to be a right knob than a wrong knob, eh?” chuckled Lying Larry.

“Thtop flapping your lipth and check or raithe, Lying Larry.”

“Fine,” Lying Larry knocked on the table.

Limpy George followed with a knock of his own. Sir Broderick knocked as well. When it came to Biscuit Pisser’s turn, he looked sweaty and nervous, like he were a fish wearing a tie or something.

“Biscuit Pisser?” Sir Broderick glared, “Are you going to knock, or are you going to raise?”

“Um, um, errr, um, well, I, uh, um—” Biscuit Pisser quickly threw a twenty chickensfeed chip into the pot. Everyone groaned and threw their cards down on the table.

“So that’s how we’re playing today, eh?” sighed Jerry as he passed the cards to Lying Larry, who gathered them up from the table and began shuffling.

“Go ahead, Bithcuit Pithther, take your winningth.”

“Wh-what did I do?”

Sir Broderick rolled his eyes, “Everyone folded, Biscuit Pisser. Haven’t you played poker before?”

Biscuit Pisser said nothing and took his paltry sum, and soon enough was presented with two more cards, as was eveyone else. They went clockwise around the table again, everyone knocking until once again it came to Biscuit Pisser, who nervously threw in a thirty chickensfeed chip. Everyone groaned and folded, and the chips in the pot were once again raked to his side.

“Biscuit Pisser if you keep doing that you’re going to lose all your chips before we even get started.”

“But so far all it’s done is get me more chips, Shitface.”

“Trust me.”

Two more hands went about the same way, and by that point everyone had fallen into a bit of a rhythmn and, while the game was still being played, it became less about the cards and more about the talking.

“So,” Sir Broderick started, “Don’t laugh at me this time. Are you all rags to riches or something? Why don’t any of you taalk laike thais?”

“Yea,” started Lying Larry, “I started out as upper-poor but got into jewelry thievery, somehow I just ended up here.”

“So this is your penthouse?”

“You know it, chuppy,” Lying Larry smiled as he lit another cigarette.

“I guess that explains all the jewels lying around everywhere.”

“That it does. But you see nobody believes a word I say so I can just kinda keep doing it. I can go up to the Royal Gourd and confess every crime I’ve done and they don’t even bat an eye. Curious, eh?”

“Well I’ll be hamned,” Sir Broderick nodded as Biscuit Pisser threw a thirty chickensfeed chip into the pot, which had actually made it to round two this time. “Oh come now Biscuit Pisser stop ruining it for everyone!”

“I’m just playing the game.”

“Eugh. Anywhathow, whatsabout you, Jerry? Are you a rags-to-riches?”

“No. I was born this rich and I’ll die rich. I’d never commit a crime, unlike these two bass turds I play poker with,” he sniffed a little for emphasis.

“Fair enough. Say, have any of you ever gotten into the CKC?”

“The what now?” puzzled Limpy George.

“The Caldonian Kennel Club Exclusive Wine and Dining Hall.”

The three players burst into cackles that even obscured their frustration as Biscuit Pisser won another hand.

“Why do you wanna know?” chuckled Jerry, “That’s upper-rich, ya knob. Not really our area.”

“The problem is,” started Lying Larry, “Those people really care about the accent and your appearance as much as the money, whereas here in the lower-rich we can enjoy a lot of the luxuries of those fancy pants dog swishers without having to fit into a neat little conformative box. Honestly, if I were you, I’d care not about some stupid dog club and all about getting enough money to get into this district full time. It’s easy living. I wouldn’t trade it for anything. Except more money!”

They cackled. Biscuit Pisser won another hand.

“See,” Sir Broderick started, “What I want is in on that upper upper crust, I want that buttery, flaky crust you only get when you get into a place like the CKC. Cluck, that acronym is good.

“Really I wanted to take my beloved ass Sassafrass in there with me, it was going to be a whole thing. Me and my ass wining and dining in the lap of luxury.

“Wha—another raise?! Surely, Biscuit Pisser, you can’t have a hand that hood. That’s right everyone, I’m calling him on this one. Let’s ride it out, chup.”

And so they rode it out, however, it turned out that Biscuit Pisser had had a flush, and was able to rake in about thirty chickensfeed altogether.

“Hamn, Biscuit Pisser, why don’t you take the money from them? We’re both on the same team here.”

“No teamth!” shouted Limpy George with vitrol, a vein in his forehead popping.

“I’m just playing the game.”

“Whatever. Anywhatnowhow as I was saying I actually went all the way to the upper-rich, me and my ass we did, and I went up to those pearly gates of the CKC and they wouldn’t let me in without a dog.”

“Well,” Lying Larry snorted, “It is a dog club. You’re lucky they let you walk around looking like absolute shit in the first place.”

“Looking like absolute shit?” Sir Broderick downed a flask in frustration, “Why this is fine knight’s armor I’m wearing.”

“Pfft, as if,” chuckled Jerry, “If you really wanted to look even close to hood enough to be noble enough to get into the CKC blah blah blah then you need some sort of a logo, some sort of an insignia on your,” Jerry looked at the burlap sack Sir Broderick wore as a shirt, “On your, em, on your breasplate.”

“By cock, you really think that’s what I need? It wasn’t because I was trying to pass my ass off as a wolfhound that they wouldn’t let me in? A breastplate insignia, you say?”

Everyone cackled, but Sir Broderick was so caught up in the fact that he had just lost another bidding war with Biscuit Pisser that he did not concieve of the implications of that laughter. Even when Jerry added that Sir Broderick ought to cook some fried eggs up on his saucepan hat to serve to the CKC bouncer to sway them over to his side.