Intervention

Issue #137

Jan 14, 2026

I was sitting behind the desk in my office across the hall from Dad’s when there was a knock on the door.

I opened it to find a very, very large man standing there — the kind of man who clearly loved to spend several hours a day in the gym.

“May I help you?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said. “I’m looking for Ollie.”

“That’s me,” I replied. “How can I help?”

“You can,” he said, “by giving me the keys to your 7-Series BMW.”

Image created for the Author with Copyright and Provenance

“Say what?”

“Your car, sir,” he replied calmly. “I’m here to collect it. I’m a repo man.”

You might recall from my recent issues that before returning to California, I’d given the car to my VP, Frank, to return to the dealership. The plan was simple: the owner would sell it and pay off the note. I had been gone for nearly four months, and it certainly was in prime shape when I turned it over.

“Sir,” I said, “I don’t have the car. If you’ll hold on a moment, I’ll call my VP in Dallas, Texas, and get an update.”

I called Frank. He told me he’d returned the car four days later, handed over the keys, and left it with the dealership owner.

“So do you think they sold it and never paid it off?” I asked.

The look on the repo man’s face said everything. He wanted that car today, and now he knew I didn’t have it.

A few days later, Frank called back. Turns out the dealership owner had been using my car as his personal vehicle—just my luck. Six thousand extra miles on it, God only knows what condition it was in. Any chance of money coming back was gone. More likely, I’d owe money to get it sold.

If I thought things were getting better, boy, was I grossly mistaken.

One morning, after a late night, the following week, I was woken by another knock. This time, I opened the door to see my cousin’s husband, Greg.

“Hello, Ollie,” he said. “Get up. Let’s go out and have a bite to eat.”

I was still suffering from a night of partying, so I showered, and we were out the door.

During the meal, I said, “Let’s fly to Las Vegas and have some fun.”

“I can’t afford it, Ollie,” he said. “I really don’t have the money.”

Me being me — always offering to pay — I said, “Let’s go to the travel agent across the street and get tickets.”

I booked us on a flight that afternoon. Went back to the apartment, grabbed a few clothes, and five grand in cash. You need cash to gamble, right?

We arrived and booked into the Riviera Hotel for three nights — still standing back then. OMG. The room was rough. I had booked a twin bedroom to share.

We wandered downstairs, and I launched straight into a night of recklessness. It reminds me now of the movie: The Hangover.

The next thing I knew, I woke up to Greg getting ready to walk out the door.

“Greg, what’s happening?”

“Ollie, I need to get back to work.”

“Work?” I said. “What are you talking about? We still have two more nights here.”

I was suffering badly from a night of God-knows-what. My head was pounding. My memory was shot.

“Why are you leaving?” I asked.

I kept thinking, Why is he going?

“Okay,” I said finally. “Do you have money for a cab?”

“No, it’s okay.”

“How are you getting to the airport?”

I checked my pockets. All I had was a hundred-dollar bill.

“Here,” I said. “If you have to go, you need money.”

Greg worked as a general manager at a Cadillac dealership, and I didn’t want him to miss work.

Before he left, I asked, “So… how did we do last night?”

“Not good, Ollie,” he said. “You lost it all.”

At the start of the night, I’d given all my money to Greg to hold — so I wouldn’t blow through it while I was being stupid. I remembered starting at the roulette wheel, cashing in $500 for chips. Things were going well. I vaguely remembered playing slots, too.

Now Greg was gone, and I was standing there in my underwear, wondering what I was going to do.

My head was throbbing. My memory, broken. The room was disgusting. I wanted out. It felt like death.

As the door shut behind him, I picked up the phone.

“Yes, sir, how can I help you?” the voice said.

“This is the front desk, right?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Is there any way you can move me to a room that’s not so dark and dismal?”

“Of course, Mr. O,” he said. “Right away.”

Seconds after hanging up, there was another knock. Two gentlemen entered.

“We have your new room, sir.”

They grabbed my suitcase, opened every drawer, and started packing. I found that weird packing for me! Next thing I knew, I was walking down the hall behind a cart, barely dressed, just happy to escape that gloomy room.

At the end of the hall, they stopped at double doors. I was confused.

They opened the doors. Voila. My eyes couldn’t focus; everything was a blur.

A massive suite. City skyline. A wet bar big enough to serve fifty people. A room so large it felt like a luxury home.

“I’m so sorry, gentlemen,” I said. “You’ve made a mistake. This can’t be my room.”

I looked behind the door.

$5,500 per night.

They just shrugged and left, so I immediately called the front desk.

“Hello, Mr. O. Are you okay?”

“No,” I said. “There’s a mistake. I was paying $39 a night. I’m broke. I can’t pay this.”

“Mr. O, please come downstairs and speak with the pit boss. Everything will be explained.”

I ran down.

“Oh, good to see you, Mr. O,” they said. Always Mr. O.

“There’s been a mistake,” I said. “I lost everything last night. I have no money.”

“No, sir,” they said. “Please join us behind the counter. Let’s look at your play.”

They pulled up the records.

“Do you recall telling us it was okay for your family member to hold your chips and winnings?”

“A little,” I said. “Why?”

“Well,” they said, “you were gambling on two roulette wheels at once. You won $38,000 over the course of the night. That’s what we know. We have no idea what you did on slots.”

Thirty-eight thousand dollars.

I had zero cash. No money to eat. No money to drink. Nothing. I’d given my last $100 to Greg — the man who’d just left.

“Sir,” they said, “for now, all meals are on us. Eat anywhere you like. Just sign it to your room.”

They asked if I flew or drove in. I told them we flew.

“Great,” they said. “Go to the cage. We’ll refund your airline tickets so you have some cash.”

“Why are you doing this?” I asked.

“We treat winners and losers of large sums differently,” they said. “It’s called comping everything.”

“My room too?” I asked.

“Yes,” they said. “You’re in our best suite. Are you happy with it?”

They sent me to check the slots.

The lady remembered me immediately.

“You were a hit,” she said. “We roped off eight machines in a row. Dollar slots. You kept winning. You cashed almost $40,000.”

I stood there and cried.

Greg had taken my last $100, said he had no money, and disappeared back to California. Every dollar was gone.

I realized he had stolen $78,000; he took everything from me and did a runner.

As I walked through the casino, people kept stopping me.

“Thank you.”
“You’re a great guy.”
“We had so much fun with you last night.”

They thought I worked for the hotel. Kept saying, “Are you Public Relations for the hotel?” Like I’d been hired to cheer people on.

What really happened was I’d been at a Big Bertha slot machine, winning nonstop, passing coins to strangers who’d been losing all night. They told me I made their trip the best ever.

If they only knew the truth.

I wanted to stay, so I called Tim — Christine’s brother. I told him to take $5,000 from my closet, buy a ticket, and bring me clothes.

He arrived carrying dry-cleaned clothes still in plastic. It was laughable.

For the next couple of nights, I played baccarat and lost in the end. Never touched another slot. Everywhere I went, people kept saying thank you. Crowds followed me. I felt liked, valued.

I didn’t want to leave. But I did.

Back home, still feeling embarrassed, I told no one about Vegas. It was my secret.

That first day back, Dad said, “We’re going to lunch, Ollie.”

When we arrived, we walked into a private room in the restaurant, and my mother was there. My sister, too.

My mind drifted as I tried to make sense of the room.

Why was my mother here?
My sister, too.

We rarely gathered like this after the divorce. Not without a reason.

Then something surfaced.

A phone call — recent. My mother was in Russia. I had been drinking heavily. Too heavily. I remember struggling to finish a sentence, losing the thread of my own thoughts while she stayed quiet on the other end of the line.

I hadn’t thought much of it at the time.

Now I wondered if that was when something shifted for her.
If that was the moment she realized I was no longer steering my own life.

“Take a seat, Ollie.”

My mother looked at me.

“Are you doing drugs, Ollie?”

ifOnlyi…had known this was the moment before everything changed — before labels, before clinics, before anyone used the word Rehab.

At the time, I still believed luck explained everything.
The wins. The losses. The chaos.
I didn’t yet understand how much of my life was already being handled by other people.

The next chapter is Rehab.
Not the version you see in movies — but what it actually felt like to be there.

Thank you for being here, Ollie.

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