Welcome to Kimberly K. Jones

“Match all six numbers and be the winner of the Mega Multi Million Dollar Lotto Lottery!” brayed the skinny man on the TV. “This week's jackpot is three and a half million dollars!”

The camera swept to a tall blonde woman with freakishly long, silver fingernails who was poised to pluck a numbered ping-pong ball as it popped out of the lottery bin.

Janna tightly gripped the pink slip of paper that could change her life. All week she had worried -- what if she lost it, what if it got ripped? What if it was the winning ticket, but it got wet and the precious magic numbers disappeared in a smear of ink, and along with them her chance at happiness? Or worst of all, what if her mom found the forbidden lottery slip and took it away -- like last time?

“But we need the money, Mom!” Janna had moaned.

“The last thing that people who need money can afford is a lottery ticket!” Janna's mom had said.

“But if you don't buy a ticket, how can you ever win? You know, buy a ticket, buy a dream?”

“You have a greater chance of being struck by lightening, dear, yet I don't see you out in the field paying for a chance at that.”

Then Mom had ripped up the piece of paper that held Janna's hopes into very tiny, very unhopeful pieces and flushed them down the toilet. It wasn't fair!

But that was last week, this was now. Janna had kept the lottery ticket under her pillow in an envelope ever since she bought it, and now the paper was safe in her hand, the numbers crisp and clear. It was the winning ticket, she simply knew it. Those six numbers would take that anxious look from her mother's eyes, those magic integers would buy them a new car to replace their old and decrepit hatchback named Maybe, because maybe it would start and maybe it wouldn't. Those nice numerals would buy Janna anything and everything that she had ever, ever wanted or would ever, ever want. She would be just like Elizabeth Newby across the street -- a modern day princess with the newest gadgets and gizmos, the neatest clothes, the coolest of everything cool. How happy those numbers would make her!

The first ball popped out, and the silver talons pounced.

“Check your tickets, ladies and gentlemen. The first number is.... sixty three!”

Janna didn't need to check her slip. She knew that sixty-three was on it.

The second ball hopped out.

“Thirteen! Lucky thirteen for some folks out there. Are you one of them?”

Yes, Janna was one of them.

The third ball appeared.

“The third number is nine. Three more to go! Are you still with us?”

Janna was. There was a slight pause before the fourth ball appeared, and for a moment Janna lost her hope, her resolve, her absolute belief that she held the ticket to over three million dollars in her hand. The ball finally appeared.

“Fourth on our numbers hit parade today is twenty-two. Those of you who have matched four are already winners, you know. One hundred dollars to anyone who matches four out of six.”

Janna had already won one hundred dollars. She kissed the piece of paper, breathing sweet, supportive words into it.

“Thirty-one! Do you have a thirty-one?”

Janna didn't even have to look, she had looked so many times that she knew the numbers on the pink slip by heart, but she looked all the same, just to make sure that the thirty-one hadn't disappeared.

It hadn't.

Five numbers out of six meant she had already won one thousand dollars, but if she didn't win the entire jackpot, she didn't want any money at all. They could keep their piddly thousand bucks!

The model's silver pincers snatched the final ball like a bird on a worm. There was a horrible second as she fumbled the ball slightly and instead of rotating it gracefully, the painted number got lost in her palm.

“You klutz!” Janna shrieked at the TV, then, afraid the anger would break the magic, she concentrated on being calm and serene.

Sixty-six, she breathed.

Sixty-six, she willed.

Sixty-six, she would do anything for a sixty-six.

Sixty-six, it had to be a sixty-six.

It wouldn't be fair if it was anything except sixty-six! Maybe if she said 'sixty-six' sixty-six times?

Sixty-six. Sixty-six. Sixty-six. Sixty-six. Sixty-six. Sixty-six...

The model had regained control of the ball and was slowly rotating it to the screen. There it was! It was ... ninety-nine. Janna went cold and still. She felt as if she had just run full speed into a wall. She had been so close. Goodbye new car -- hello Maybe. It wasn't fair!

But wait -- the silver finger fangs were turning the ball. Here it came, right side up! The ninety-nine turned into a sixty-six! Sixty-six! Janna had known all the time it had been a winning ticket! How could she ever have doubted it?

The man with the donkey voice was speaking. “We hope you were the lucky one, but if not, there is always next week's Mega Multi Million Dollar Lotto Lottery. Buy a dream for a dollar! Goodnight folks!”

Janna stood in the center of the room, clutching the ticket to her chest. Now that she was rich, the very air she breathed seemed different. Now that she was rich, she would change a lot of things. Now that she was rich, she could have everything that Elizabeth Newby had. No, she could have more than Elizabeth Newby had, and before Elizabeth Newby had it.

Janna heard the door open behind her and turned to see her mom with an armful of groceries and a handful of mail. Janna jumped up and ran to her, knocking the mail in the air. She whooped and threw her arms around Carol Danner. She heard glass break as the grocery bag fell to the floor.

“I won! I won!”

Mom grabbed Janna's shoulders to hold her back and stared at her daughter, who was still jumping and shrieking. Janna waved the pink slip in her mother's face.

“We're rich! I won the lottery just like I always said I would!”

Janna's mom said nothing, but Janna could see the tiredness fall from her eyes, and she saw quite clearly the images that appeared in her mother's mind -- their own house with clean smelling carpet, a dishwasher, a vacation, a new winter coat instead of a used one...
The telephone rang. Janna fell silent as her mother reached, dreamlike, for the phone.

“Hello?”

Janna could see her mother's hand tremble as she handed the receiver to Janna.

“Hello, Janna? This is the President of the United States, I just want to congratulate you on winning the lottery. It couldn't have happened to a nicer person!”
Janna nodded dumbly into the receiver.

“Say thank you,” her mother hissed.

“Thank you,” Janna squeaked.


Release date March 10, 2009