Ticket To Love. Jen Safrey

it every week when they cashed their meager paychecks up the street. They talked about it every month when they had to decide which bill was going to have to be paid late.

      It shimmered in the air there between them, dancing for them, teasing them that it could be real.

      Both women bolted.

      They flew down the hall and reached their bedroom doorway simultaneously, smashing into each other and crushing through together, each wanting to be the first to touch the ticket. They flung themselves at the dresser, and the mirror on top shimmied precariously. They both frantically searched the top of the dresser but came up empty.

      “Where is it?” Steph shouted.

      “I always put it here! Right here!” Acey cried in a panic. She picked up various porcelain trinket boxes, shaking the cheap gold-plated chains inside, finding nothing but a thin layer of dust under each one. “Where is it? Where is it?”

      “We did buy one yesterday, right?”

      “We have not forgotten one Thursday since you were legally old enough to go halves with me. And you were with me when I bought it yesterday, remember? They had no lemon Snapple and you had to get raspberry?”

      “Check your purse!” Steph screamed. “Check your pockets! Check everything!”

      Acey was distracted by her sister’s histrionics. For the first time, Steph seemed to be able to outfreak Acey herself. It was like long-awaited proof that she was a Corelli, too.

      Acey leaped onto her bed and dumped the contents of her purse. She rifled through gum wrappers and uncapped pens and ATM receipts. Steph was flinging clothes out of the laundry hamper, searching, Acey guessed, for the jeans she’d worn yesterday. Acey flipped open her wallet and pulled out the only two dollars in there, then held the wallet upside down, willing something she couldn’t see to magically fall out of it.

      When it didn’t, she began to wail. “It can’t be missing, it just can’t, it can’t…”

      “Keep looking!” Steph barked, thrusting her hands into denim pockets. “Don’t stop. Just shut up until you find it!”

      The next twenty minutes were a blur. Acey and Steph were driven to turning over sofa cushions and searching in unthinkable places like the freezer and the mailbox. Acey could hear her sister chanting softly, “Thirty-five million, thirty-five million,” and Acey’s own heart felt as if it might stop.

      If only they didn’t do Quick Picks all the time. If she and Steph had played their own numbers, they’d have known right away if it was necessary to rip the apartment to shreds. But maybe they had hit, and it was gone, gone…

      No. She couldn’t freak out. Steph would kill her. Of course, if they didn’t find the ticket, it was highly likely Steph would kill her anyway, but… Acey lifted the lumpy braided throw rug, and their cat, Sherlock, darted out from underneath it. He glared at Acey with affront, then raised his back leg and licked himself. “Sherlock,” Acey said, “the cat without a clue.”

      Sherlock stopped licking and looked glad he couldn’t understand English because he suspected he was being insulted. “I wish we had a dog,” Acey said through gritted teeth, replacing the rug. “A bloodhound. So it could help us. But, no. All you do is nap and play with—” Paper!

      Acey ran to her sister, who was emptying the silverware drawer. “Steph, you’re the mystery writer. Solve this case. It involves a cat who loves to play with little bits of paper.”

      Steph dropped a handful of forks and streaked back into the bedroom, Acey on her heels, until she got to Sherlock’s cat bed, between the girls’ beds. And there, in the center, was the ticket. Acey and Steph moved toward it with a reverence reserved for the Holy Grail. And just as Acey was lowering her hand toward the hair-covered cushion, from out of nowhere Sherlock bounced off a bed and landed on the ticket.

      “No!” Acey whispered.

      Sherlock, apparently in revenge for Acey’s sarcasm two moments prior, clamped down on the ticket with his teeth.

      Steph grabbed Sherlock’s feather toy, which was lying nearby. She shook it, and Sherlock was distracted, mesmerized by the motion and the little tinkly bell. He dropped the ticket. In slow motion, Acey crept her hand toward him, and had one finger on the ticket when she got scratched.

      “Ow!” she said, pulling back her freshly bleeding hand. Sherlock circled once and sat on the ticket.

      Steph, still on her hands and knees, crawled behind Sherlock and lifted him up. Acey reached again for the ticket, crooning, “Nice kitty, nice kitty,” and pulled her hand away before the next swipe could get her. Steph adjusted her hold on the cat so both his front legs were spread wide. He wriggled, but not quickly enough. Acey had it in her hand.

      Jackpot.

      Steph lowered Sherlock, and she and Acey stared down at the ticket, which was a bit wrinkled but miraculously had no punctures.

      “Go get the numbers,” Acey finally said. “I’ll check the date and make sure it’s the right ticket.”

      Steph scampered off. In Acey’s palm, the ticket felt heavier than a piece of paper, and her hand shook with exhaustion and anticipation. She found yesterday’s date—May 24—and took a deep breath. Steph stepped back into the room and Acey saw her steady herself.

      “Ready?” Steph asked.

      “Ready.” Acey squeezed her eyes shut.

      “All right. Here I go. The first number is…four.”

      Acey opened her eyes and looked at the first number on the ticket.

      Eight.

      “Argh!” She threw the ticket as hard as she could. Being paper, it just floated to the floor at her feet. Acey stomped on it. “I can’t believe it! After all that!”

      Steph picked up the ticket and checked the numbers against her notebook. “Sheesh. We didn’t even get one number.”

      Acey flopped onto her bed as dramatically as she knew how. “In twenty-seven whole years on this planet, why can’t anything good happen to me? Ever?”

      “Join the club.”

      Acey shook her head. “No. Everything I try goes to hell. At least you’re writing books.” In fact, that was why Steph had caught the lottery story. She religiously parked herself in front of the news every single night when she got back from her receptionist’s job at the local hair salon. She considered the news a treasure trove of ideas for the mystery novels she’d been writing since she was about fifteen. Acey was jealous of her smart, two-years-younger sister sometimes, knowing deep down that if one of them was going to be successful, it wouldn’t be Acey.

      “I’m writing books, but I’m not selling books. I got another rejection letter two days ago.”

      “So what? At least you’re doing something. I’m doomed to struggle every day at the pizza place for the rest of my life.”

      “Acey, there are a million things you could do if you really wanted to. You always make all these plans and then you never follow through. Maybe you could—”

      “If you don’t mind, I don’t want to talk about my dim future. I’d rather dwell on the deep disappointment of not winning thirty-five million.”

      “If it makes you feel any better, you would have had to give me half.”

      Acey sighed loudly.

      Steph went to sit down on her bed, but the contents of two dresser drawers were piled there, so she nudged Acey over and sat down next to her. Now that the craziness had passed, Acey noticed, Steph was back to her calm, rational self. “Listen,” Steph said, “it’s not as if we expect to win when we buy lottery tickets. Not really. It’s just a dream.”

      “But I thought it was us just now, finally. Didn’t you think it was us?”

      Steph