Lucky Girl by Jamie Pacton (novels for beginners txt) 📕

Where is Bran when I need him to whack me over the head with a fedora?

“Let’s ride back together,” Holden suggests. “I’m sure we still have lots more to talk about.”

Before I can disagree or say anything at all, a bunch of third graders start pouring out of the bus. We get out of the car and wave to them.

“Hi, Holden!” shouts Holden’s sister, Harper, tumbling down the bus stairs. She’s still tan from their fall-break trip, and her long hair is in two pigtails. She flings her arms around her brother. “You made it!”

“Of course I did,” he says with a smile. Harper hangs on to the hug a second longer, and Holden shrugs at me over her head. I always liked how good he was with kids.

“Hi, Harper,” I say when she lets go.

She gives me a quick look and then smiles. It’s like the sun hitting the ocean. “JANE!” she squeals and hugs me too. “It’s so good to see you.”

I spent so much time with Harper over the last few years, it was a bit like she was my little sister as well. As I hug her, I can’t help the smile that creeps onto my face.

THE AQUARIUM OASIS GLOWS BLUE LIKE THE INSIDE OF A FAIRY GROTTO, and the entire place is filled with quiet, steady bubbling noises from hundreds of fish tanks. Peace fills me as I step inside. Some people have churches, but I need watery spaces.

“Ooooohhhh,” all the third graders say in unison as we step inside. Their teacher and some of the parent guides usher them toward the largest tank in the store.

“It looks like a rave,” whispers Holden, standing next to me in front of the group.

“Shut up,” I whisper, but it comes out almost playful. He grins at me.

“Why is it so blue?” one kid asks from the back of the group.

“This is called actinic light,” I say to the third graders. “It’s what coral needs to grow when they’re not in the ocean.”

“How many of you have seen the ocean?” Holden asks smoothly.

Most of the kids hold up their hands, but a few don’t.

“Well,” Holden continues, “I bet a lot of you haven’t seen coral in the ocean, right?”

The kids who didn’t have their hands up look a little less awkward.

“I HAVE!” Harper calls out.

“You have,” says Holden. “We went snorkeling over fall break, and it was awesome. But even if you haven’t seen the ocean, how many of you have seen Finding Nemo?”

Every hand in the room goes up. Holden nudges me. Right, oceanographer go time.

“So, imagine you’re a coral in the ocean,” I say. “You’re not hanging out in the school cafeteria, underneath those bright fluorescent lights, are you?”

All the kids shake their heads.

“That’s right,” I continue. “All the light you’re getting is filtered through layers of water. That’s what the folks here are trying to do. This blue light helps the corals grow and thrive. It tricks them into thinking they’re deep in the ocean.”

Just like me, I think. This blue light is what I need to grow and thrive.

I tell them a few more facts about the ocean and then let them loose.

“Don’t touch anything,” Holden reminds them. “Even in the open tanks. This isn’t a place for touching, like the aquarium in Milwaukee.”

Harper pulls her hand back right before it hits an open tank of coral. I smile at Holden and we split up, moving among the groups of kids and the parent volunteers who are with them.

I stop in front of a tank full of rare fish.

“These all came from Australia,” I tell the kids.

“Just like Nemo!” one shouts.

“Exactly,” I say. “These fish have had a long journey.”

“I bet they miss their parents,” says Harper, staring at a pair of yellow fish as they drift past.

“They’re probably happy where they are,” says Holden, coming up to our group.

There’s a light pressure on my hand, and then his fingers curl around mine for a moment. Without thinking, I wrap my fingers around his. I must be losing it. I’ve been lured into complacency by the blue lights and the soothing bubbles of all the aquarium pumps.

Without a word, I drop Holden’s hand and walk over to a nearby group of kids.

I TAKE THE BUS BACK HOME. To BLOCK OUT THE LOUD CHATTER OF THE kids, I pop my headphones in and look at my phone. The article about lotto winners who lost it all is still pulled up, and I find myself reading, no music turned on, unable to look away. As the bus rattles along the highway, I fill my notebook with more stories of unlucky winners, which just barely takes my mind off of Holden, and how unusually nice he’s being, and what he might have meant by being sorry we broke up.

THE BIG BOOK OF LOTTO WINNER FAILS, CONTINUED Paraphrased from news sources and collected for posterity by Jane Belleweather

UNLUCKY LOTTO WINNER NUMBER FOUR: THE CASE OF UROOJ KHAN

This one is particularly macabre. Forty-six-year-old Urooj Khan won only $1 million on a scratch-off ticket. (That’s fifty-eight times less than what I’ve won, which means I now think of $1 million as not very much, which is so messed up.)

The day after he won, Urooj dropped dead. Who was to blame? Was it a heart attack? Something more sinister? Suspicion and disbelief tore his family apart, and years later, a blood test revealed deadly levels of cyanide in his blood. No one was ever charged, but his sister-in-law and her father were suspected. Somehow, the family moved on, and his winnings were split. But his family (and the Chicago police) still wonder to this day who killed him.

Note to self: Although this case is shrouded in mystery, and correlation is not causation, it’s pretty clear by now that winning lots of money makes people do terrible things. Like, load up a dinner with poison and serve it with a smile.

UNLUCKY LOTTO WINNER