Lottery 1
Shaniqua was awoken by her cell phone around two in the morning.
Every part of her wanted to roll over and go back to sleep. Her mind was filled with nothing, her thoughts would not manifest on their own. The phone on the night stand went off a second time. Shaniqua reached over and grabbed the phone. She wanted to turn it off, who would be calling her at this ungodly hour? When she looked at the unknown caller I.D. she almost switched it off.
The reporter in her never slept however, and her reporter’s reflex answered the phone.
“Hi. I didn’t know who else to call.” the woman on the other end said in hushed tone.
Shaniqua sat up in bed, “It’s alright, I’m here for you.” Even though at this very second in time, she had no idea who she was talking to or even a tight grasp of where she was in the world.
“It’s Lucy. We met in the Pub earlier.” The woman continued.
The light came on in Shaniqua’s mind, it all came back to her in an instant.
“You were right about needing someone to talk to.” Lucy continued. A car door could be heard closing in the background. “My brother is freaking out. He said someone called his cell phone, not his room at the hotel ok, just his cell phone. That everybody probably knows he has. His friends, and coworkers, you get the idea?” Her voice then trailed away from the phone, “No, no. That’s not what I want. I want to go here. Here. Can you get there? Yes? Good. Thank You.” Lucy’s voice then returned to the phone. “He’s determined that someone is after him, or after us. He said the person who called asked for both of us, and said he knew we won the lottery. Well that right there tipped me off. He’s always running his mouth about this and that. He can’t keep a secret, not even as a little child, he was always telling someone. Anyway, what was I talking about? The phone call… Are you still there?”
“Yes.” Shaniqua answered quickly.
“Good. So, he’s upset and heading on the first flight home. Howeeeevvveeeerrrrr…. and I don’t know how you feel about this, seeing how I just met you and all this.” Lucy sounded more excited that scared.
“What?” Shaniqua asked.
“I got the rest of his tickets for the world wide trip… And I was thinking. Maybe you’d like to travel with me and see the world.” She said at the end to sweeten the deal, “My treat!”
Shaniqua was stunned. “Uhh.” was all she managed to get out.
“You don’t have to say anything now.” Lucy coaxed. “Just think about it, over night. I’m coming back to the pub. I’ll catch up with you for breakfast at say about nine in the morning. That will give us plenty of time to catch up on our beauty rest. We’ve got to look our best when we go into Paris.”
“That does sound fun.” Shaniqua thought out loud.
“It will be!” Lucy exclaimed out loud. “It will be like a girls only slumber party, all over the world!”
Shaniqua chuckled.
“I’ll see you in the morning then.” Lucy said happily then added in, “Bestie!” then hung up.
Shaniqua looked at her phone and thought about the new turn of events. She’d always wanted to see the world, and if she was with Lucy all the time she would be there to stop anything bad from happening. Then by the end of the trip they would know each other well enough, and she could explain the situation to Lucy and maybe everyone could come to some kind of beneficial agreement.
It could be the news story of the year, and it was all hers.