Lottery 1
“So are you going to cash it or what?” Steven inquired as he looked at Lucy’s blonde hair. He was having a hard time adjusting to the new color.
Lucy looked at her brother from across the booth. “I don’t know what to do.” she tried to keep from chewing on her newly manicured nails and ruining her incognito look.
The waitress approached the table to refill their drinks. Lucy noticed the kitten stickers that accented the name Jenny on her name tag.
“It’s a lot of money to just throw it away. Give it to me and I’ll get the money.” He leaned forward and gave the waitress the look to brush off. “We can split it half and half.”
“You just want the money.” Lucy scowled at him.
He shook his head and sat back, “You’re going to drive me insane. You ask me here for my advice, I give you three separate answers. None of them are good enough for you.”
“They aren’t!” Lucy’s raised voice attracted some momentary attention. She drew in a breath and glanced out the window at the moving traffic. “The guy killed himself for a reason. I just. I have a really bad feeling about this.” she looked at her brother.
“I can’t help you.” Steven looked out the window as well, as if the answer was out there somewhere.
“I have less than two weeks to decide.” Lucy mumbled unaware the waitress dropped off the check while she spoke.
The siblings sat there in silence for ten minutes or more, searching through the window for a solution they would not find there.
Andrew worked graveyard shift at the “Stop and Save” convenience store. He studied for his community college classes in-between customers. He was an average student, he was studying to be a teacher. Hopefully a math teacher, but science would be great. Lately he hadn’t been able to get in much studying, because of all the reporters hanging out in front trying to find out who the winning lottery holder was.
No one was more curious than Andrew though. This was someone he knew, someone he had probably sold a cola or beer. He might have even sold the winning ticket. He didn’t know, and the suspense was eating at him.
Gary and Norman worked the morning shift, all of their regulars had checked in. None of them had won. Stewart and Abdul worked afternoons, they sold four tickets that week. Only two of those people hadn’t been back to the store. One was Mrs Ronate, the other a habitual gambler who was a regular for the graveyard shift as well. No one had seen Willy Barry since the numbers came up. That was not so unusual. Sometimes Will went on benders and didn’t turn up for weeks at a time.
Andrew knew for certain that if Willy had won, he’d know. Willy would have run into the store, open champagne bottle in his hand and a wad of cash in the other. Screaming about closing this “Pop Stand” and going out for a night on the town. That was who Willy was. A smile crept over Andrews face then faded as he began to go through the rest of the suspects.
The evening crew consisted of Donald and Max. Neither liked Andrew for some unknown reason. However the clean up guys come in during their shift. Sometimes they loiter there or slow walk their work for extra pay. Since the media pays so well for info, they had been really cleaning cracks in between the store’s tile work.
Aurturo and Gertrude had confided of the seventeen tickets sold during that shift, fourteen people had showed up claiming they had not won.
Andrew had seen two of the people he had sold tickets too. Only Willy remained. He sold Willy a ticket the last night he had seen him. He had wished him luck. Willy said if he won he’d pay for Andrew’s entire college tuition and books. Andrew smiled again, he’d do it too.
Miggs and Clout sat in their normal chairs outside Lou Artou’s office. They were Lou’s personal bodyguards, and they were always only a shout away. Lately Lou had been testy about some schmuck named William Barrette who owed him over ten grand for the past two years. William hadn’t shown up to make his weekly payment, or even make his weekly excuse as to why he wasn’t making his weekly payment.
Lou had a gut feeling, and his gut was never wrong. That schmuck came into it big, or if not big then at least large. Large enough he’d skip out on his debts, and live large for a while somewhere out of sight. Sure Will would show back up, poor as he had ever been. The money he’d won blown on who knows and who cares what. The point is, he had debts to settle, and it wouldn’t be the first time Willy tried to stiff him on the check.
Lou had been on the phone for the past twelve hours. He had every eye on the street wide open. If Will so much as popped his head out of a window he’d be spotted. Just the fact that Will wasn’t at his normal gambling haunts, led Lou to believe he’d hit it BIG somehow. Maybe he was even as far away as Nevada by now, who knew.
Lou’s blood stayed at a slow simmer, for now, but he knew he was being made the fool. And no one made a fool of Lou Artou.