Money Can't Buy Love

by Connie Briscoe

  “You’re right, Alise,” Monica said. “We have to have patience. And if we don’t get in, you can keep inviting us to the affairs so we can get to know more of the members.”

  “We could always rob a bank and get rich,” Lenora said, only half joking. “Or win the lottery.”

  Chapter 12

  Lenora was a lot more upset about possibly not getting into The Girlfriends social club than she had let on at lunch with Monica and Alise. Getting into the club was almost all she and Monica talked about these days. Both of them had submitted a résumé and an application form along with three letters of recommendation and had agonized over making sure everything was perfect. They attended several events and parties throughout the year, trying to get to know the women. In short, they had spent months kissing butt for the second year in a row, perhaps only to be rejected because they weren’t rich enough or connected enough. It would be monumentally disappointing if they didn’t get in.

  For now, she still needed to find the lost lottery ticket. So she searched while waiting for a phone call from Gerald. When he left her condo earlier that afternoon, he said that he and his partners were having drinks in Baltimore tonight with the client, the one they were working so hard to woo back, and that he would call when he was done. If it wasn’t too late, he would swing by her place since it was sort of on the way back to his apartment in Silver Spring.

  Waiting for Gerald had become such an aggravating pastime for her. She loved that he was a go-getter and wanted so much out of life. She just hated that his ambition meant so many lonely evenings for her.

  She sat at her desk and decided to go through the clutter very carefully in hopes that the lottery ticket was buried somewhere in there. Each week the piles of envelopes grew taller as she tossed more bills on top. Major credit cards, department store cards, phone bills, utilities. The envelopes and the papers inside were nasty, evil, predatory things. She hated sifting through them but had no choice if she wanted to find that lottery ticket.

  The only bills she made sure to pay on time every month were her mortgage and condo maintenance fees and her auto insurance. Those three bills alone devoured nearly all of her monthly income. For the other bills, she would pay a small amount most months, just enough to keep them out of collection. A couple of bills would sometimes slip by, like her Macy’s credit card. She had gone insane charging furniture for the condo and making repairs to her aging Honda, and it finally caught up to her. The situation was a constant juggling act that kept her stomach in knots. She knew that if she kept it up much longer, one day it was all going to come tumbling down.

  In all honesty, she shouldn’t even be thinking about joining The Girlfriends. Where the heck was she going to get the thousand dollars for their initiation fee? She would have to borrow it, maybe from her parents. She had always figured that if she were ever lucky enough to get admitted, she would find the money somewhere.

  If she and Gerald were married, none of this would be a problem. They would have two incomes, and she wouldn’t have a stack of overdue bills sitting on the desk taunting her.

  Lenora stopped looking for the ticket. She was only about halfway through the clutter, but her mind was on Gerald, not on some stupid piece of paper that was likely worthless. She couldn’t take another minute of this wallowing in self-pity, waiting for her man to call and bring her to life. She was going to call him. It was already after nine o’clock. He couldn’t possibly still be with the client, could he? Sometimes she wondered if Gerald was seeing another woman. She didn’t want to believe that, but with the absences, the missed phone calls, and the lack of sex in their relationship, she couldn’t help but be suspicious.

  She reached for the phone on the table next to the bed but paused with her hand in midair. She should probably give him another few minutes to call her. She hated behaving like a jealous nuisance of a girlfriend. She didn’t want to be that person, and Gerald didn’t want to be with that person. If they were going to be husband and wife someday, she had to trust the man and give him the space to do his thing.

  She walked to the bookshelf lining the wall next to her small desk and scanned the shelves. She noticed a couple of books about digital photography she had yet to read; now was as good a time as any to get into them, she figured. She picked one out, and as she passed back by the desk, an idea came to her.

  She paused and stared at her laptop. Maybe if she looked at the winning numbers, she would get a feel for whether she might have won anything and decide if she should keep searching for the ticket. She did remember seeing the numbers 2 and 17 on her ticket. She sat in front of the laptop, turned it on, and googled the words “Maryland Lottery.” She clicked the link to the lottery’s web page. When the site came up, she looked down the side of the page to the winning numbers and saw both 2 and 17. The jackpot was at five million dollars, with a cash option of two million, two hundred and fifty thousand.

  “Damn!” she said aloud. Getting two matching Mega Millions numbers was fairly unusual. Where was that stupid ticket? She reached for the shoulder bag dangling from the back of the chair. That was where she first put the ticket after buying it. She dug through the bag and all the compartments for the umpteenth time then dumped the contents on top of her desk. Still no ticket.

  She glanced around the room and frowned. Where could that ticket be? The most likely place was in this very bag, where she always kept her lottery tickets until she tossed them. Had she lost it somewhere outside the condo? It would be her dumb luck that she had the winning numbers and had lost the damn ticket. Someone else would find it lying on the ground and become a millionaire. And she would be none the wiser but still poor as hell.

  She eyed Paws, who was in her doggie bed nibbling on a chew toy. Nah, Lenora thought. She couldn’t be that unlucky. That ticket had to be around here somewhere. She stood, walked to her dresser, and began opening drawers and digging through pajamas and undergarments. She even checked under the bed and beneath the pile of clean clothes in the armchair.

  Still no lottery ticket. She was about to give up when she thought again about the numbers 2 and 17 and decided to go through the papers on her desk one more time. And presto! She found the ticket almost immediately, tucked between two files. She had taken the ticket out of her bag a couple of nights ago, gotten distracted when the telephone rang, and forgotten all about it.

  Lenora sat back down and positioned the ticket up next to the computer screen. She realized at a glance that one of the two groups of numbers on the ticket was close to the six winning numbers. Her heart skipped a beat as she checked the numbers one by one. When she was done, she paused for a few seconds. Not only were 2 and 17 there, but all six numbers matched. What the hell? That had never happened to her before, not even close. She shook her head. She had to have made a mistake. Better look again.

  She started over, checking more slowly this time. When she finished, the numbers still matched. The pounding in her chest was deafening. She tried to calm herself so she could think straight. But that didn’t do much good.

  She jumped up. She had just won the jackpot!

  A sharp pain started in the pit of her stomach and shot up to her chest. She clutched her waist and doubled over. She thought she was going to lose her last meal and was tempted to run toward the bathroom. But the pain soon dissipated.

  She sank back down into the chair. She had just won the lottery big-time. She should be ecstatic, yet she felt queasy and ill. She would never have expected to feel this lousy right after winning so much money. This was good news, right?

  Yes, it was fantastic. But it was also the end of life as she had known it for thirty-seven years. That was thrilling… and also frightening as hell.

  Chapter 13

  Lenora flew into the bathroom, where she wet a facecloth with cold water and placed it on the back of her neck. She had to get a grip or she would pass out. That was the worst thing that could happen when you lived alone.

  She stared at her reflection in t
he bathroom mirror but hardly saw her face. All she saw was dollar signs. Big ones!

  She had to tell someone. She ran back to her bed, grabbed the phone on the nightstand, and frantically dialed Gerald’s number. Then she slammed the phone down. Did she really want Gerald to be the first to know? Or should she tell her parents first, even though they lived in another state? Or one of her girlfriends?

  She flopped down on the bed, placed her fingers on both sides of her forehead, and rubbed in a circle. Paws had detected that something odd was happening. The pooch stood on the floor near the bed, staring up at Lenora and wagging her tail. Instead of picking Paws up and petting her, Lenora sat frozen, willing her breathing to slow down. Then she finally realized that, yes, she wanted Gerald to be the first to know. They were going to build a life together, right? Of course he should be first.

  She picked up the phone again and dialed his cell number—or tried to. Her hands were shaking so badly she misdialed. She hung up and tried once more. Wrong again. She disconnected hastily and the third time dialed more slowly.

  She couldn’t wait to share this unbelievable news with him. But she was going to have to. He was either on the line or had his phone turned off. She hated it when she wanted to reach him urgently and couldn’t. And it had never been more urgent than now, this very moment. She had mind-boggling, life-altering news to tell her man, and she couldn’t even reach him. She grabbed her ponytail. She felt like yanking all her hair out. She felt like throwing something. Instead, she hit Redial and got Gerald’s machine.

  She left him a message to call her as soon as possible. She didn’t want to get any more detailed than that in a phone message. Then she ran to her desk and sat down at the computer once more. She picked up the winning lottery ticket and triple-checked the numbers. When she realized that she was still a winner, she kissed the ticket ardently and held it close to her chest. “Thank you, sweet Jesus!” She was holding five million bucks in her hand.

  She stood up. She had to squirrel the ticket away until she figured out what to do next. She knew that she probably had to take it to an office somewhere in Baltimore, but it was Sunday night. Nothing was open now. She had to tuck this precious baby somewhere safe until she could get to the lottery board.

  But where? She glanced around the condo. She didn’t have a safe or one of those fireproof boxes. That was when it hit her. What if there was a fire overnight and the place burned down? Very unlikely, she knew. But when you had this kind of money in your possession, you couldn’t be too careful.

  She figured she should tell someone and get some suggestions as to what to do with the ticket. For now, she tucked it into the bottom of a dresser drawer, right beneath her underwire bras, and decided to call her folks in Richmond. Lenora had left home shortly after college and never went back. Even though she loved her folks, Maryland was now home.

  Her mom answered on the second ring. “What’s the matter with you?” Mama asked. Lenora could tell by her mother’s tone that she knew something big had happened. Lenora tried to steady her emotions by picturing her mother sitting at the wooden kitchen table in the house where Lenora had grown up. No doubt at this latish hour Ma’s hair was up in rollers and she was wearing one of her many flowered housedresses. Daddy was likely nearby reading a book or magazine. Every night after dinner, her parents would sit around the kitchen table, sometimes with guests, and talk until bedtime.

  “You’re not going to believe it,” Lenora said breathlessly. “I’m not sure I believe it, and I have the proof right here.” Her efforts to calm herself down did not seem to be working. She hopped up to her feet and paced the floor. How the hell could she sit down now? This was too exciting.

  “What is it?” Ma asked. “Don’t tell me you’re getting married.”

  Lenora laughed. “No, not that. Even better. Or maybe I should say almost as good.”

  “You won a million dollars,” Ma said.

  Lenora laughed again. “Nope. More.”

  “More what?”

  “More money than that.”

  Silence.

  “Ma, you still there?”

  “What do you mean, more money than a million dollars?” Mama asked. “I was just joking.”

  Lenora heard her father’s voice in the background. “What’s this about a million dollars?”

  Lenora couldn’t hold it in any longer. “Ma, I won the Maryland Lottery. Five million dollars!”

  “Lenora, you stop messing with me. That’s not even funny. You trying to give me a heart attack?”

  “I’m not kidding, Ma. I got the winning ticket right here.”

  “Oh, Lord!” Ma exclaimed.

  Lenora could hear her father demanding to be caught up. She paused as her mother explained to him what was going on.

  “Where is the ticket?” Mama asked.

  “It’s in a drawer. That’s what I was going to ask you. What should I do with it? It would be just my dumb luck for a fire to break out in the building before I cash it. Or I’ll get robbed on the way over to the lottery office tomorrow.”

  “Okay, Lenora, calm down,” Ma said. “The ticket is fine for tonight, as long as you don’t tell every soul you know where it is. Have you told anybody else?”

  “Only you.”

  “Good,” Ma said. “Where do you have to take it?”

  “I have to call tomorrow to make sure. Somewhere in Baltimore, I think.”

  “Your father said you should go to Kinko’s or somewhere like that first thing in the morning and get a copy of the ticket made before you turn it in.”

  “Good idea.”

  “Where did you buy the ticket?” Ma asked.

  “At a convenience store last week.”

  Ma smacked her lips. “Unbelievable.”

  “I know,” Lenora said.

  “Hold on,” Mama said. “Your father wants to talk to you.”

  “Girl, you something else,” Daddy said. “When did you find out?”

  “Just now,” Lenora said. “The drawing was on Friday, but I forgot all about the ticket until now. So I looked up the winning numbers online. Can you believe it?”

  “No, indeed. What you going to do with all that money?”

  “I haven’t even had time to think about that yet, Daddy. I honestly don’t know.”

  “Put it in the bank, but first find yourself a good accountant,” he said. “The leeches will be knocking on your door as soon as they hear about it.”

  “Oh, God,” she said.

  “I’m not trying to scare you,” Daddy said. “I just want to prepare you and make sure you do the right thing.”

  “I know.”

  “And anybody call that you don’t know and say they related to me or your mama, you hang up the phone.”

  Lenora laughed.

  “I’m dead serious,” Daddy said. “When were you planning to take the ticket in?”

  “Tomorrow, I guess.” Lenora held her head in her hands. She could barely think much less plan this all out. “I guess I should take someone with me. Gerald or Monica. I don’t want to go alone. In fact, I think I’ll call Monica now and tell her.”

  “I wouldn’t go blabbing to everybody you know,” Daddy said. “They’ll all be looking for a handout.”

  “You’re right. But she’s my best friend.”

  “I’m just saying you should be careful who you tell before you turn it in,” he said. “And even after you turn it in. Monica is probably fine, but she’s going to go and tell someone and then that person will blab, and before you know it, all of D.C. and Baltimore will know.”

  “I’ll make Monica swear not to tell anyone.”

  She said good night to her parents and hung up, intending to call Monica. Instead she decided to try Gerald again. She really wanted him to hear the good news. Unfortunately he still wasn’t answering. Well, she wasn’t going to fret about it, not now, not when she had just become the Baltimore area’s newest millionaire—at least before taxes and assuming she was the on
ly winner. Even if there were other winners and after taxes, she had a big fat check coming to her. She would finally be able to pay off her bills and a whole lot more.

  She picked up the stack of bills on her desk, held them high over her head, and let them tumble to the floor. She picked Paws up and held her as she danced on top of the bills and across the floor.

  “Hot damn!” She placed Paws down and hastily dialed Monica’s number.

  “Let me call you back,” Monica said. “I’m in the middle of watching Obsession on On Demand.”

  “This is way more important than a movie, girl,” Lenora said. “You alone?”

  “Yeah,” Monica said. “Why?”

  “Put your cell on speakerphone.”

  “What for?”

  “Put it on speakerphone,” Lenora repeated. “Hurry up.”

  “But what on earth for?”

  “Just do it, Monica. You’ll understand why in a sec.”

  “I’m telling you, Lenora, this better be good, making me miss my movie. Okay, it’s on speakerphone. Go ahead.”

  Lenora screamed at the top of her lungs. “Ahh!”

  “What the fuck is wrong with you, fool?” an exasperated Monica asked.

  Lenora screamed again. She realized that she had been dying to do that. To let it all out was just what she needed. “Oh, girl, you’re not going to believe this.”

  “Believe what?” Monica asked.

  “I won the damn lottery!”

  “Really?” Monica asked. “Seriously?”

  “Yes, very seriously.”

  “How much you talking about?”

  “Five million,” Lenora said.

  “Come again.”

  “You heard it right.”

  “Oh, my God! Are you sure?” Monica asked.

  Lenora laughed. She understood why her friend was having trouble taking it all in. She was having trouble herself and she had seen the ticket with her own eyes. She had held it and hidden it inside her drawer and still had trouble wrapping her mind around the enormity of it. She sat down on the bed. “Unbelievable, huh?”