A ruckus of laughter flows from the living room, catching my attention. I give my dad and brothers a salute as I make my way to see what’s so funny. “You can count on me!”
Later, everyone moves to the backyard, sitting on patio furniture while people coo over kids and dogs. Zo and Nico are climbing over one dog as Dane plucks hair clumps from another. There’s a quick buzz from my phone and I peek to find the group chat with my coworkers.
Robbie: Anyone’s life change forever last night?
Huh?
Dylan: Nope. Looks like we keep buying animal print G-strings and shaking our asses.
Oh, the Mega Millions. Duh.
“Does anyone know if the jackpot was hit last night?” I ask everyone, but no one’s paying attention. Grabbing my wallet from my back pocket, I lazily riffle through it until I find the folded paper and look up the winning numbers online.
03, 17, 32... I check my ticket and see the same first three numbers in the top grid, followed by the same numbers, 58 and 63.
No way...
I blink rapidly at the last number in the bottom grid, the single Mega Ball number. 10.Cool, that’s my rugby position.
I switch my focus back to my screen and zoom in on the bottom grid for the Mega Ball number.
10.
“Uh...” I mumble. Just a tiny blinking light is active in my brain right now. This can’t be real.
Rafael comes up to me and pats me on the back. “You okay, man? I haven’t seen you concentrate that hard... ever.”
I pass him the ticket and my phone. “Are you seeing what I’m seeing? This has to be fake, right?”
His brow furrows, but he scrutinizes each number. Raf is the smartest person I know. He’s a freaking chief financialofficer. An officer of money! He’ll be able to—
“Ay, dios mío, Jonah,” he whispers. His eyes bug out when he faces me, the ticket pinched between his fingers. “Is this yours?”
“I bought it from my coworker last night.”
I’ve never seen Raf’s eyes wider than they are now when he hisses, “Jonah, you just won $540 million dollars.”
The next few minutes pass in a fog, all sound and mental wherewithal fading away, leaving me barely able to process what just happened. Rough hands shake my shoulders, and when I come to, I’m sitting on a patio chair with my entire family surrounding me.
“Did you hear what I said, Jonah?” Raf asks, kneeling in front of me so his eyes are level with mine.
I shake my head.
“I said, you cannot tell anyone outside of the family about this.”
“Why not? I just won the freaking lottery.”
“Because that’s how you’ll lose it all. While you were off in La-La Land just now, I did some cursory research, and everyone online says you should remain as anonymous as possible. Previous winners say once family and friends find out, they come for your winnings, and you can lose relationships quickly if you ever turn off their cash flow.”
“But I don’t need all of this. I can totally give everyone money.”
Angie stands. “He’s right, Jonah. It’s bad enough that all of us were here to find out.” She turns to everyone and pins each with a stern expression. “Absolutely no one here isevergoing to ask Jonah for money. It’s not worth damaging our family.”
“Well, if I can’t give money to everyone, what am I supposed to do?” Just then, the best idea comes to mind. “I’m gonna buy a yacht!”
“No,” everyone says at various levels of frustration.
“First things first,” Raf sighs. “I’m setting you up with a financial advisor and a lawyer or two.”
