Unwashed and Somewhat Slightly Dazed

Dan, the husband of Mel's sister Carley, has just gotten off work late on a Wednesday night. Damn these shifts where they're so short handed that no one gets out before prime time begins on TV.

Chucking his coat and briefcase into the passenger seat of a twelve-year-old Ford, Dan gets into the car and eagerly shuts the car door. It was two minutes until eleven...which meant that the lottery numbers for Powerball would be announced in just one short minute. Normally, Dan wasn't much for gambling, but once that jackpot past the one billion dollar mark last week, even he suddenly found some spare cash to buy tickets.

And it just so happened that Dan had his Powerball tickets clutched in his right hand. He decided to idle in the parking lot to hear the drawing over the radio. With the amount of attention being paid to this unprecedented jackpot, nearly every radio station in town was covering the drawing. It wasn't difficult to find what he was looking for on the FM dial.

"...nd here are tonight's winning Powerball numbers. 34! 8! 19! 4! And 27! Tonight's Powerball is 10! Again: 34, 8, 19, 4, 27 and the bonus number is ten!"

Dan eagerly watched his tickets in the weak interior car light. He was pleasantly surprised when he matched the first two numbers. He was shocked when he matched the next three. And Dan could not describe how he felt when he found out he had chosen ten as the bonus number. He felt his stomach drop down right to his knees, his vision went blurry, and his head began to spin.

Dan fought off the urge to vomit as he cleared his mind the best he could. He took another look at that ticket. Just then, a push alert from the local CBS affiliate appeared on his iPhone, reiterating tonight's winning numbers. Dan held up his phone next to the ticket to make absolutely sure that he heard that correctly, and that his eyes were not deceiving him. For one frantic minute, Dan did not take his eyes off the screen of his phone and the lottery tickets he had bought Monday afternoon after work.

Finally, it hit him.

"I-I...did it," he whispered. "I fucking...did it! I DID IT! I'M RICH AS HELL!"

Tears began to fall down his face as Dan felt his head spin even worse than before, and the urge to vomit returned with a vengeance. But he was smiling bigger than he had ever had before. Dan had just become America's newest multimillionaire. What will be his first action?

1. Dan heads home and lies low for a couple of days.
2. Dan kicks the car door open and bazooka barfs into the parking lot.
3. Dan, despite feeling sick as a dog, rushes to the gas station where he bought the tickets.
4. Dan suddenly wakes up in bed. It's 4:30 AM, Wednesday morning...

Add New Option

Go Back

View Forward Story Tree
View Back Story Tree