[collegeboy]

The next week proceeded with less excitement. While the incidents of the previous weekend were not discussed, Ben and Evan were much more at ease around one another. They began to spend more time together not just as roommates, but as friends. On the following Friday night, Evan invited Ben to join him at poker night with a couple of buddies. Logan and James were both juniors like Evan and were thus a little older than Ben, an eighteen-year-old freshman.

Ben did not play poker very often and was performing more poorly than his competitors. Nonetheless, all four were having a good time. After the game had been going on for awhile, James suggested that they up the ante a bit.

"What did you have in mind?" asked Evan.

"Why don't we turn this into a game of strip poker?"

"Sure," answered Logan, who had been playing well all night, "Might be interesting."

Evan looked at his roommate, trying to sense whether or not he would be comfortable with the idea. When Ben nodded cautiously, Evan agreed that he too would be glad to play.

Thus, James shuffled the deck and dealt five cards to each player. Ben looked at his cards: the six of clubs, the ten of diamonds, the four of spades, and the five and nine of hearts. This hand did not look particularly promising. He discarded three cards and luckily received the ten of clubs in exchange, which matched his other ten. The resulting pair was enough to beat Evan, who only had a king high. Evan was therefore forced to removed his shoes.