Resolution

"God I hope not. I'd die if anyone else noticed."

"Not to worry. What say we get up and see if we can coax the kids out of bed with the smell of breakfast cooking."

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"Say, Joanne, I'm having a little trouble with my hair falling in my face at work. One of the guys suggested that I pull it back in a ponytail at work. He said I shouldn't use a rubber band, I'd need some kind of special hair tie."

"What kind of work do you do?"

"I'm a warehouseman. I drive forklifts. You know store things in racks, load and unload trucks. I help out shipping and receiving. That's where I have trouble. I need to bend over a lot when I breakdown skids and when I wrap skids to ship."

"Well, your friend was right. A rubber band would undo all the good we've accomplished with the shampoo and conditioner over these last several months. You know, you've come a long way in the eight months we've been at this. Your whole appearance has improved. Your skin is even better looking.

"You've come to trust me to do what you need for your hair, haven't you?"

"Well, yeah, I wasn't too sure about this long hair thing, but with what you've done, I really think I like it. Everyone who comments on it thinks it's great as well."

"Well then, I'd like to recommend a perm."

I was shocked. "A perm? You mean with curls and all that?"

She smiled with bit of mirth. "No, not with curls, unless you want curls. What I was thinking was a body wave. Just to give it some texture when you don't really do anything with it. It'll make it easier to style when you're just trying to be causal. It'll even make that ponytail you're talking about look better."

"Well... no curls?" I asked.

"Here, let me show you."

She picked up a book of hair styles and thumbed through the pages. "Here," she said, showing me profile of a woman with hair over her shoulders. It just seemed to flow there was a wave, but no curls.

"Well, yeah, but that's still pretty femmy, you know."

"Yes, it's a feminine style, but I wasn't suggesting that style for you. I just meant to show you the kind of wave I could put into your hair. What makes the style feminine it's the cut. You know the bangs," she said, pointing out the hair over the forehead. "See how they are all poofed up and curl over her forehead? We wouldn't do that for you, unless... you really want to."

"Ah, no. I don't mind softening my look, but I'll keep on the masculine side if you don't mind?"

"Well OK," she teased, "but I think you'd look cute in that kind of do." She chuckled a bit. "OK, how 'bout we see if we can put some body in the do, huh?"

"OK, but remember, you're working on a man."

"Don't worry."

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When I got home, Erica was full of compliments.

"Oh wow, look at you. You look great," she said, giving my hair a gentle squeeze. "You got a perm, didn't you?"

"Well yeah, you like?"

"Like? I love it. What made you decide to perm your hair?"

"I don't know. I... well, I've come to like it kind of long, but it just looks too plain and Joanne recommended a body wave. You don't think it's too curly or anything? I mean I was hoping for something a little less noticeable."

"Oh, I wouldn't worry. A couple of shampoos and it'll relax."

"Joanne said I shouldn't wash it until Tuesday. But I'm concerned about what the guys at work will think."

"Um, well, if you pull it back into a ponytail, I think it'll be OK."

"Talking about ponytails, John a work suggested just that, but he said I shouldn't use a rubber band and Joanne concurs. John said I'd need some special hair ties but I don't even know what to look for."

"They sell them at Safeway. I'll pick up some when I go grocery shopping tomorrow."

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No one commented on my hair at work, well no one except John. He just said, "See you got the hair ties... cool." That was it. I was prepared for some more ribbing, but I guess the ponytail was inevitable and they just expected it.

We were getting into the busy season at work and I worked some overtime, getting trucks loaded. The kids took up more and more of Erica's time. Things seemed so normal, except for the dream. I must have dreamed it at least a couple of times a week. It was really disconcerting. I'm sure I must have dreamed other dreams, but it was the only one I could remember. I think what it was, was, I knew the woman. It was as if I could identify her, I could stop this whole thing. She was the one that Erica would finally do it with. She was her lesbian lover. Am I thinking that if I knew her, I could just keep her away from Erica and stop the inevitable? Yeah sure, just reach out and stop the hands of time.

Actually over the summer, things were great on the home front. We had sex, OK, oral sex two or three times a week. The only thing missing was the good old missionary position. I'd given in and include a once a week doggy style without even asking for my favorite, the missionary. OK, I know, but it was the only vaginal sex I was going to get. Remember, take your happiness where you can get it. And we did snuggle more. Oh, and she did get me some lavender cologne. I always put some on after my shower. I hoped it had faded by the time I went to work. The guys didn't say anything if they smelled it.

We took vacation in August and I wore my hair down for two weeks. I know I got some looks Erica loved it. We actually held hands, hugged and kissed, just like old times. The kids gave us a hard time for being so mushy. But secretly, I think they loved the fact that we acted like we were in love.

And if it weren't for the fact that damned dream kept reminding me of Erica's letter, I'd have believed it was just like old times. Well, that and the fact that oral sex with an occasional doggy style thrown it was what we did for sex. God help me! Just who the hell is that woman and why am I turned on when I dream that dream? And why do I keep dreaming it? I've never heard of anyone having the same damned dream over and over for nearly a year. Maybe I need to go see a shrink; this whole thing is driving me crazy.

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The Saturday after vacation, when I came in from mowing the lawn Erica was watching the noon news. "Can you believe it? Some local guy is holding a winning lottery ticket from last year and hasn't claimed his prize," she told me. "They just did the teaser on it. They said that if he didn't claim the prize he'd lose seventeen grand."

Just then the newscaster said, "And now more on that story of missing lottery winner. Staff reporter, Cathy Richards, is on the scene at 'Robin's Roost' to interview the seller of the winning ticket.

"Cathy, what can you tell us?"

"Well, Bob, I'm here outside Robin's Roost with bartender who would have been on duty when the winning ticket would have been sold. As you may remember, last September Powerball was up to $279 million. Powerball officials confirm that eight winning tickets were sold across the country. That puts each winner's share worth $17,375,000 before taxes.

"With me here now is Frank Hobson, the weekend bartender here at Robin's Roost. Frank, what can you tell us about the purchaser of the winning ticket?"

"Well, not much, except he or maybe she wasn't one of our regulars. They've all checked their tickets they'd have claimed it a long time ago. We put up the notice that we'd sold one of the winning tickets last September and they would have claimed back then."

"Do you know what our winning ticket holder looks like? What kind of car they were driving?

"No, we get a lot of business from folks going to the dump. It was probably one of them."

"Well, there you have it folks, if you were at the dump last September, and stopped by Robin's Roost, check and see if you're holding a winning lottery ticket. You only have two weeks to turn it in."

She read off the numbers and they went back to the newsroom.

I sat down, taking out my wallet. I was at the dump last September. I started digging through the junk that every man puts in his wallet. ATM receipts, scraps of paper with phone numbers of people you can't remember, important warranty information on the pocket knife you bought, faded receipts from God knows what or where. Oh my God. There it is.

"Erica, what were those numbers?"

"What numbers?"

"Those Powerball numbers."

"Why?"

"I was at the dump last September and bought a ticket," I nearly shouted at her waving the ticket.

"I don't know. I really didn't listen to the numbers. I didn't think I needed to know them. I don't understand. They said it was tavern that sold the ticket. You never go to tavern? You're rarely ever any place that serves alcohol unless it's a restaurant. What were you doing in a tavern?"

"You remember what was going on that weekend?" Thank God the kids aren't home.

"That was a year ago, I don't... Oh, wait, was that the Saturday after I..."

"After you told me... after you showed me 'the letter.' I was having a hard time dealing. I needed to work off my frustration and anger, so I cleaned the garage and took a load to the dump. Only after, I, ah, ... well, I still needed some time to cool off, so I stopped for a beer and that guy, the one they interviewed on the news, he told me that Powerball was like two hundred and sixty million or something like that and convinced me to buy a ticket. It was dumb, but it was only a buck. I don't even know why I kept it. Odds are 460 million to one that I won't win... but now maybe I did. How can we find out the numbers?"

"I think that Powerball has a web site."

I went to the computer and typed "Powerball.com" into the address bar and the site came up. I found a link for Old Numbers and search on the month of September last year. I checked the draw date on my ticket and found the numbers. I read them slowly and then in disbelief I read them again. By now Erica was looking over my shoulder. She was breathing through her mouth. As she came to the same realization I did. I was holding the winning lottery ticket.

"OH MY GOD!" she shouted. "You have the winning ticket. It's worth 17 million dollars." She grabbed a chair and sat down. "Oh my God," she whispered.

How the hell do I cash this thing in? The Powerball site didn't even give a hint. After several frustrating minutes of searching I Googled my states lottery commission and found out I needed to go to the capitol.

"We have to go to the state capitol to cash in the ticket," I said out loud.

We talked about what we'd do with the money for the next three hours.

Finally, it was Erica that came to her senses first.

"You know we need to get an investment counselor and get some help to make sure we don't blow the whole thing and end up with nothing but a pile of junk we've bought. I heard somewhere that ninety percent of lottery winners end up broke after five years."

"Where we gonna find an investment counselor?" I asked her.

"I heard some guy on the radio, named Dave Ramsey. He has a web site and helps people with their money and stuff like that."

She took over the computer and did a Google search for the guy and clicked on something called "Endorsed Local Provider" and that took us to a screen that listed categories of providers. She clicked on "Investment" and filled in our contact information.

After that, we just looked at each other. I wasn't too sure about this Dave Ramsey guy, but Erica seemed to think highly of him and I couldn't think of a better way to find someone. I put the winning ticket in an envelope and taped it to the bottom of a drawer in my dresser. We decided to say nothing to the kids until we actually had money in hand.

We could hardly contain ourselves over the weekend. Monday we both put our jobs on notice that we'd need a day off on short notice to take care of some family business. It was tough to keep from telling them what it was, we just said it was something personal and that we'd have to have the whole day because we'd have to got to the state capitol to straighten everything out. Well, since that was where the State Pen was, it was kind of assumed that some family member was in the pen. We didn't do anything to dissuade them.

When I got home, Erica was on the phone. She waved me over. Putting her hand over the mouth piece she said, "Pick up the extension in the kitchen."

I did and when she saw me with the phone in my hand, she said, "Mr. Carson, my husband just picked up the extension. Could you repeat that please?"

"Hi Mr. Wilson, I'm Mike Carson. I'm calling in response to your request at 'DaveRamsey.Com' for an investment counselor. Your wife just informed me that you are holding the missing winning lottery ticket. The first thing you need to do is to make your claim. I suggest that you both take a day off work and do that before the end of the week."

"Yes, we've both told them that we'd need a day on short notice to take care of some personal business, but we wanted to touch base with you before we went to claim the prize. You know, just to make sure we didn't do something stupid," Erica told him.

"Well yes," he said, "there are some things you want to consider before choosing just how to take the prize. First you want to take the lump sum pay out. We can do much better by investing the money than you can do by taking the annuity. I'd be willing to meet you at my office before you need to go to work tomorrow. I'll have a limited power of attorney prepared for you to sign, authorizing me to receive payments and make investments in your name. We can go over just where those investments should go when you come back from the capitol. Oh, I just thought, I believe there is a form you should print out from the web site and have it on hand when you make your claim."

We quickly made the arrangements for the morning and decided to take Wednesday off to go to the capitol. Once we were off the phone, we ran to each other and fiercely hugged. It was everything we could do to contain ourselves when the kids came in. I didn't sleep well that night. I was like a kid just before Christmas. But you know, though I didn't think about it at the time, it was the first night I could be sure that that damned dream didn't attack me.

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The next morning, we each drove to Mike's office and signed the papers and then went off to inform our employers we'd not be in on Wednesday. I was distracted all day, easily as distracted as I was the day after the letter. And again, not much sleep that night.

Just after the kids headed out for school, we check to see I had the ticket and climbed into Erica's car and headed out for the capitol. It was about a two and a half hour drive, but I couldn't keep my foot off the throttle and we made in about two hours. It took some time to find the lottery commission. We had printed out the instructions on their web site, but not knowing the town, we still managed to make a wrong turn.

They were efficient and in about an hour, we were on our way.

When all was said and done, we ended up with $ 7,566,812.50 after taxes. The lump sum was considerably less than the annuity pay out. I hoped that Mike knew what he was doing and we'd make it all back.

The meeting back at his office was pretty intense. Both Erica and I were emotionally beat by the time we left. We learned that it was in our best interest to give some money away to avoid massive taxes. Then basically we funded collage for both kids and set up trust funds for them to receive at age fifty or earlier if they should become totally disabled. We set ourselves up on easy street for immediate retirement, paid off the mortgage and put money in a money market account for new cars.

At home, we decided that two weeks notice was fair for our jobs and we'd give that as soon as the money really became available. There were a lot of things that had to happen before we could really retire. However, we immediately changed our phone numbers, including our cell phones. We talked about moving, but that went on hold because the kids wouldn't want to leave their friends or schools.

We did get some calls wanting us to buy things. Every time that happened we'd hang up and go change the number the call came in on. By Thanksgiving, we had quit our jobs and tried to adjust to being millionaires. Of course, some new toys turned up in the house, a 52" plasma TV entertainment center and the latest and greatest computers for each family member and some personal things like iPod's and such. Not to mention of course, new clothes.

I mentioned that we had become convinced that we needed to give away money to avoid massive taxes and the main place we gave was our church. As you could imagine I got a call from Pastor Oxley when a cashiers check for $ 756,681.25 hit the offering plate. I had to 'fess up to buying a lottery ticket. Instead of the lecture on the evils of gambling I expected he suddenly became my best friend. He invited us to dinner at his house. While we were there, we discovered that the church didn't pay him a salary and that his wife worked to support them. While he didn't exactly ask for it, we got the definite impression that he thought we should toss somewhere between thirty and fifty grand directly to him each year. "You can make tax deductible donations to ordained ministers outside the church offering," was said in jest, but we thought there was something more to it.

I guess three-quarters of a million dollars wasn't enough to set the church up to where they could afford to pay him. I don't know. That wasn't the only time either. Since I had the time, he wanted to go to the movies with me... buddy-buddy like. Interestingly enough, when I was a warehouseman, I hardly got more than a "Good morning. Nice to see you," from him. Now, he was on the phone every couple of days thinking of things we could do, or worse yet things I could do for the church or him, since I had the time. Finally, the next time we had to change our phone number, I told him that I was only giving it out to one person at a time, because some one was sharing it without our permission and I wanted to find out who. Can you go to hell for lying to a pastor? Anyway, we ended up changing churches because of it. I can't say as I minded. I didn't really have any good friends in that church any way. We told the kids that they shouldn't say anything about the lottery win in the new church. We never told them what we did for a living and donated a modest $ 100 a week.

Christmas was the most elaborate holiday we'd ever seen. One of the things that Erica surprised me with as a pair of silk pajamas. They were really luxurious. I surprised myself by liking them as we went to bed. We all went to Aspen the day after Christmas, even though none of us skied. The kids did learn while we were there, and Erica and I tried it but decided it was something you really needed to pick up while you were young. We had a good time anyway.

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The next year went by in a kind of blur. We discovered how it is that people end up broke in a short time after winning the lottery. It seemed that at the end of each month, we were waiting with baited breath for the next payment from our investments so we could go nuts buying things. We finally took stock of how we were living when Christmas came along and couldn't think of a single gift to give one another; we'd already bought everything we could ever want.

Things kind of settled down in the New Year. And then we became aware that, to spite the fact that money would never be a problem again, we were the same people and had the same problems we'd had before. Most of all, we discovered we needed a reason to get out of bed. I mean the kids still went to school, but Erica and I, well, we just got up and hung out. We had gotten tired of shopping, what else was there to buy? I discovered that there were only so many sports you could watch on the ultimate satellite TV and only so many pay per view movies you could watch before you didn't care if you ever saw another one.