{"id":31,"date":"2016-01-05T18:43:53","date_gmt":"2016-01-05T23:43:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/grimaulkin.com\/800words\/?p=31"},"modified":"2016-01-05T18:43:53","modified_gmt":"2016-01-05T23:43:53","slug":"writing-prompt-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/grimaulkin.com\/800words\/?p=31","title":{"rendered":"Writing Prompt"},"content":{"rendered":"

365 Days.<\/em>
\na life changing event, give up something for 365 days<\/em>
\n365 Writing Prompts, January 4<\/em><\/p>\n

The morning I won the lottery, I went to work as usual. “Did you hear,” said Paulette, “someone in town won the lottery.”<\/p>\n

“I’d better tell Dave to check the tickets,” I said. We played the office pool, that way we would all stick it to the man if we won. However, if the pot was big, I would go and buy my own ticket. I didn’t mind sharing.<\/p>\n

“He already checked,” said Paulette, gathering her breakfast in the cafeteria and heading to cash out. \u00a0We won five dollars.”<\/p>\n

“Great.” I picked up my coffee, because that was all I could afford this morning. It was Thursday, it was pay week, I had five dollars in my bank account. Now less than four, with the coffee.<\/p>\n

I had some granola bars at my desk. Maybe a couple of those would tide me over until lunch, which would consist of the soup and half sandwich special.<\/p>\n

I went to work. I had left the lottery ticket on my refrigerator at home. It wasn’t until I got home and switched on the news to see that the news cameras had staked out the place I had bought my ticket. They weren’t saying what the winning number were, so I had to check online.<\/p>\n

It was all a blur after that.<\/p>\n

I told no one. I put the ticket in an envelope – in fact, many envelopes, because I kept opening the envelope to make sure it was there. I barely slept with it under my pillow.<\/p>\n

I called in sick the next morning. I had to look up where the lottery headquarters were, and i drove down there first thing. There were more news vans camped out here. I held my purse close to my chest, and shook my head when they asked if I was the winner. Inside, I presented my ticket. I refused to let it go. They ended up getting people to come to the counter, because I wouldn’t let the ticket out of my sight.<\/p>\n

“Do you have a lawyer?”<\/p>\n

“No.”<\/p>\n

“Do you have a bank account?”<\/p>\n

I had brought a blank check. They would direct deposit it in a day or so. “Would you like to come with us while we make the announcement?”<\/p>\n

“No. Don’t tell anyone I won.”<\/p>\n

The man who was the lottery commissioner gave me a strange look. I signed papers, opting out of having my name publicized, and got a receipt and a voided check for my winnings, after taxes. Just under five hundred million dollars.<\/p>\n

I went home, and ate my last can of cream of mushroom soup out of a can. I scrounged up some instant coffee and had frozen mini-pizza for dinner.<\/p>\n

I made a list of all the bills I needed to pay. I made a list of all the places I was going to travel to. I made a list of all the things I was going to buy (a house in the woods or a condo, a new car). My three cats came and rubbed up against me, looking for some lovin’. I added “kitty condos” and “Purina One” to the list.<\/p>\n

The lottery commission was true to its word, and didn’t breathe a peep about who won, saying that “they prefer to remain anonymous.” I kept checking my bank account every hour. \u00a0And lo and behold, at 12:03 a.m., the money was suddenly there.<\/p>\n

At 12:05 a.m., I was paying off bills. I slept the best night’s sleep I had in a long, long time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

365 Days. a life changing event, give up something for 365 days 365 Writing Prompts, January 4 The morning I won the lottery, I went to work as usual. “Did you hear,” said Paulette, “someone in town won the lottery.” “I’d better tell Dave to check the tickets,” I said…. Continue reading → <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/grimaulkin.com\/800words\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/grimaulkin.com\/800words\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/grimaulkin.com\/800words\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grimaulkin.com\/800words\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grimaulkin.com\/800words\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=31"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/grimaulkin.com\/800words\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32,"href":"https:\/\/grimaulkin.com\/800words\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31\/revisions\/32"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/grimaulkin.com\/800words\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=31"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grimaulkin.com\/800words\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=31"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grimaulkin.com\/800words\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=31"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}