Hanna didn’t know if he was being serious or joking. “Anyway, let’s talk about what else we’re gonna buy,” she said, hopping out of bed and changing into more family-friendly pajamas. “We definitely have to take a vacation,” she said, slipping into her sweatpants.
“Orlando!” Tom suggested.
“Yes! The kids would love Disney.” She had actually fantasized about taking that trip the first time she and her sisters had ever played the lottery. Lucy slept with her Mickey Mouse plush every night.
“Well, I meant for The Wizarding World of Harry Potter,” he said. “But we can do both.”
Her heart swelled, and she beamed at him.
She had suggested to Tom earlier this year that he and Drake read the series together after she spotted the books at the public library. In just five months they had already gotten to Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. It made Hanna happy seeing her son bond with his dad. Drake didn’t like to go fishing or toss the football around, so this was the next best thing.
“Sounds perfect,” she said, tying her hair into a messy topknot.
Tom got out of bed, the floor creaking under the weight of his two-hundred-pound body. “I like this game,” he said, walking over and putting his hands around her waist. “What else?”
Hanna smiled at him through the small round mirror on her makeup vanity. “I want to send Drake and Lucy to Evangeline Oaks Academy.”
He scrunched his nose. “That hoity-toity school where all the kids have their own Porsches before they can even drive?”
She jabbed him playfully in the ribs with her elbow. “Stop. It’s not that stuck-up.” Hanna turned around to face him directly. “You know how I feel about their current school.” She had been complaining to Tom about the overcrowding and bullies almost every night this year. She couldn’t help but feel that her kids deserved so much more, and finally she could do something about it. “It’s one of the best schools in the state—and besides, how cute would our babies be in those little blue uniforms?”
Tom nodded his head. “I mean, there’s no denying they’d be freaking adorable, but…” He shrugged his shoulders. “You know we’re not gonna fit in with that crowd.”
She patted her hands on his hard chest. “I can fit in with anybody,” she said with a wink.
As they walked out of their room and down the creaky stairs, she could hear the muffled sound of SpongeBob SquarePants on the television below.
“Are you gonna tell them?” Tom whispered in her ear.
She hadn’t even thought about how or when she was going to tell Drake and Lucy. They’d obviously know something was up when she stopped going to work and they were enrolled in a fancy new school. And they’d surely ask questions when they moved into a new house. But for now, Hanna didn’t know how to even broach the topic. And she certainly didn’t want them bragging to everyone at church. “Let’s not say anything yet,” she said to Tom. “Let’s just enjoy the moment.”
* * *
Hanna couldn’t believe Pastor Dave’s sermon that morning. It was as if he was speaking right to her and her sisters, as if by some divine knowledge he knew they had just won millions.
“God doesn’t want you to struggle,” he had preached to the congregation sitting quietly in their Sunday best. The warm Louisiana air seeped through the old stained-glass windows. “He wants you to be blessed, and he wants to bless you. Please turn to Jeremiah 17.”
Perhaps the lottery money was a blessing from God, Hanna had thought to herself. How else could they explain their luck?
The three sisters had sat side by side in the same pew their family had sat in every Sunday since they were kids.
It had taken everything in Hanna’s power not to talk about it, and she could tell Callie, Lexi, and their parents were all dying to say something, too, with their beaming smiles and wide eyes during the service. All she’d wanted to do was recount the night before and hash out plans, but it had to wait until lunch after church, when the whole family would meet at their mom and dad’s house to celebrate the news.
But on the drive over, she’d remembered Drake and Lucy. She realized her sisters and parents would spill the beans to her kids.
The car pulled into the dirt-paved driveway of her childhood home, a small two-bedroom, one-bath their family had dubbed “the shack.” It was covered in green vinyl siding and had aged through the years at the same rate as her parents. Despite its weathered flaws like the chipped paint on the porch and the broken light fixture by the front door, the house still sparked happiness in Hanna every time she saw it. There was something so comforting about being home.
As they got out of the car, Hanna looked at Drake and Lucy and announced, “Hey kids, before we go inside Gigi and Papa’s, we have something we wanted to talk to you about.” Their church shoes squished in the mud as they made their way to the old metal porch-swing set tarnished from withstanding one-too-many years of Louisiana rainstorms.
Lucy scuffed her white Mary Janes on the porch’s concrete floor. “But, Mama, we were so quiet in church.”
“What are you talking about, sweetie?” Hanna sat down on the swing next to her.
“Well, what did we do this time? We’re in trouble, aren’t we?” Drake hung his head and sat down. “We’re always in trouble.”
Hanna glanced over at Tom. Was she really that big of a nag to her kids? She sighed and then laughed. “No, sweetie, you’re not in trouble at all.”
“Your mom has some exciting news to tell you,” Tom said, picking up Lucy and holding her in his lap as he sat down.
“What is it, Mommy?” Lucy’s white bow affixed to the crown of her head blew in the breeze.
Hanna’s stomach tingled with excitement. She couldn’t wait to tell them how their lives were going to change forever. How they were going to be given everything she wasn’t as a kid. How they were going to have every opportunity they deserved. She looked at Tom, who flashed an encouraging wink.
“Well?” Drake tilted his head to the side and shielded his eyes from the midday sun.
“So, remember how Pastor Dave was talking about blessings today?” She ran her hands over her faded floral cotton dress.
Her kids nodded their heads.
“Okay, so… we’ve been blessed!” Hanna clapped her hands excitedly. “You know how I sometimes play the lottery with your aunties and we’ve talked about what we would do if we won a bunch of money from it?”
Drake’s eyes got bigger. “You won?!”
Hanna confirmed his question with a huge smile.
“What does that mean, Mama?” Lucy asked over Drake’s repeated proclamations of “Wow!”
Hanna leaned down to her little girl’s level. “It just means we have some extra money now. We can buy more things, and Mommy doesn’t have to work anymore.”
“Yay!” Lucy squealed, clapping her hands. “Does this mean we get to go to Disney World?”
“We’ve already got a meeting on the books with Mickey to plan out the details,” Tom said, adjusting Lucy’s bow so it wasn’t smushed in his face as she sat in his lap. He then looked at Drake. “And we’ll obviously be seeing our guy Harry Potter, too.”