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agnellaoral	My father always said the same thing about money. "Save for the storm, not the sunshine." He was a roofer. He spent forty years on ladders, patching holes, replacing shingles, listening to homeowners complain about the price of a new roof. He saved everything. He drove a truck with rust on the doors. He wore boots with holes in the soles. He put money in an envelope every week. An envelope he kept in the back of his closet, behind his work shirts. He called it the storm fund. He died three years ago. Lung cancer. Probably from the asbestos in the old roofs he tore off in the eighties. He left me the envelope. Twenty thousand dollars. Cash. I put it in a savings account and never touched it. I told myself it was for emergencies. Real emergencies. The kind my father saved for. Not new tires. Not a vacation. Not a couch that didn't smell like someone else's cat. Real emergencies. The emergency came on a Friday. I was at work. I'm a dental hygienist. I clean teeth for a living. It's not glamorous. It pays the bills. I was between patients, wiping down my station, when my phone rang. It was my landlord. He said there was water coming through the ceiling of the apartment below mine. He said he needed to check my bathroom. I told him I was at work. He said he'd let himself in. I said okay. He called back twenty minutes later. The pipe under my sink had burst. It had been leaking for hours. The water had damaged my floor, my cabinets, the ceiling of the apartment below. He said I needed to call my insurance. He said it was going to be expensive. I called my insurance. They said they didn't cover pipe bursts. I read my policy. They were right. I called a plumber. He came that afternoon. He fixed the pipe. He gave me a bill for eight hundred dollars. I paid it. I had two thousand dollars in my checking account. Eight hundred was a hit. But it wasn't the storm. The storm came the next week. The contractor came to look at the damage. He said the cabinets needed to be replaced. The floor needed to be replaced. The subfloor needed to be dried and treated. The wall needed to be opened to check for mold. He gave me an estimate. Fourteen thousand dollars. I sat on my couch and stared at the estimate. Fourteen thousand dollars. My father's envelope had twenty. Fourteen would leave six. Six for the next emergency. The one I couldn't see yet. I called my landlord. He said the damage was my responsibility. The pipe was in my unit. He was right. I called my insurance again. They said the same thing. I called my brother. He said he could lend me five thousand. I said I'd think about it. I sat on my couch for a long time. The couch that smelled like someone else's cat. The couch I'd been meaning to replace for two years. The couch I was going to replace with the money I was saving. The money that was now going to fix a floor I didn't break. I opened my laptop. I looked at my bank account. The twenty thousand was there. My father's envelope. The storm fund. I closed the browser. I opened it again. I closed it. I wasn't going to touch it. That was the deal. The storm fund was for emergencies. This was an emergency. But it didn't feel like one. It felt like a punishment. Like something that happened because I rented an apartment with old pipes and cheap cabinets. Like something that happened because I wasn't paying attention. I needed a distraction. Something that wasn't the estimate. Something that wasn't the smell of my couch. Something that wasn't my father's envelope. I had a bookmark I'd saved a year ago. I'd never used it. I'd saved it because a patient mentioned it. A guy who came in for cleanings every six months. He always talked about his wins. I thought he was exaggerating. I clicked the bookmark. The site loaded. I looked at it for a while. I had a credit card with a thousand-dollar limit. I never used it. I decided to register at Vavada. I deposited five hundred dollars. Money I shouldn't have spent. Money that should have gone to the floor. But I told myself it was a distraction. A few hours of not thinking about pipes and subfloors and the ceiling below my apartment. I played blackjack. I'd played before. A cruise once. A casino in Atlantic City with friends. I knew the rules. I knew basic strategy. I played slow. Twenty-five dollars a hand. I lost the first ten hands. Dropped to two hundred and fifty. I lost another five. Dropped to a hundred and twenty-five. I was losing the way people lose when they're not paying attention. The way I was losing. Not paying attention. Thinking about my father's envelope. Thinking about the storm fund. Thinking about the roofers he worked with. The men who died young. The men who saved everything and died anyway. I was down to fifty dollars when I got a hand. A pair of eights against a dealer six. I split. First hand: a three. Eleven. I doubled. Got a ten. Twenty-one. Second hand: a ten. Eighteen. The dealer turned over a ten. Sixteen. Drew a five. Twenty-one. I lost both hands. My balance was zero. I stared at the screen. Five hundred dollars. Gone. In less than an hour. I sat there. The estimate was on my coffee table. Fourteen thousand dollars. My father's envelope was in my head. Twenty thousand dollars. I deposited another five hundred. The last five hundred on my credit card. I registered at Vavada again. I played blackjack again. I bet small. Twenty-five dollars. I lost. Twenty-five dollars. I lost. Twenty-five dollars. I lost. I was down to four hundred. I bet fifty. I won. Four fifty. I bet fifty. I won. Five hundred. I bet fifty. I won. Five fifty. I bet a hundred. I won. Six fifty. I bet a hundred. I won. Seven fifty. I was on a run. The kind of run that happens when you stop thinking. When you stop caring about the storm fund and the floor and the pipe that burst. When you just play. I bet two hundred. I was dealt a nine and a two against a dealer five. Eleven. I doubled. Got a ten. Twenty-one. The dealer turned over a ten. Fifteen. Drew a seven. Twenty-two. Bust. I won. My balance was eleven fifty. I bet three hundred. I was dealt a natural blackjack against a dealer four. The dealer turned over a nine. Thirteen. Drew a ten. Twenty-three. Bust. I won. My balance was seventeen fifty. I bet five hundred. I was dealt a pair of tens against a dealer six. I stood. The dealer turned over a nine. Fifteen. Drew a six. Twenty-one. I lost. My balance was twelve fifty. I cashed out. Every cent. I closed the laptop. I sat on my couch. The estimate was still on the coffee table. The smell was still in the fabric. But I had twelve hundred and fifty dollars in my account. Not fourteen thousand. Not enough for the floor. But something. The money hit my credit card two days later. I paid off the thousand I'd deposited. I had two hundred and fifty left. I used it to buy a new couch. Not a nice one. A cheap one from a discount store. But it was mine. It didn't smell like someone else's cat. I sat on it that night, in my apartment, with the damaged floor and the cabinets that needed replacing. I sat on my new couch and looked at my father's envelope in my head. Twenty thousand dollars. The storm fund. The money he saved for forty years. The money he never spent on himself. I called the contractor the next morning. I told him to start the work. I paid him from the envelope. Fourteen thousand dollars. Six thousand left. Six thousand for the next storm. The one I couldn't see yet. The one my father was still saving for. I still play sometimes. Not often. Once a month. On the nights when I'm sitting on my new couch, looking at my bank account, thinking about my father. I register at Vavada. I deposit fifty dollars. I play blackjack. I lose most of the time. That's fine. That's what I expect. But sometimes I win. Not like that night. Small wins. A hundred dollars. Two hundred dollars. I cash out immediately. I use it for things my father would have called stupid. A dinner out. A movie. A book I'll read once and put on a shelf. I think about that night sometimes. The burst pipe. The estimate. The run of cards that came out of nowhere. I think about my father. The roofers. The men who saved everything and died anyway. I think about the storm fund. The envelope in the closet. The money he never spent. I spent some of it. On a floor I didn't break. On cabinets I didn't choose. On an apartment that wasn't mine. But I kept six thousand. Six thousand for the next storm. The one I can't see yet. The one I'm saving for. The way he taught me. The way I'll always save. Even when I play. Even when I win. Even when I lose. The envelope is still there. In my head. In my closet. Waiting for the storm.