“Now don’t do anything stupid like . . . leave the apartment. There’s enough food and a six-pack of Bud in the frig. If you’re quiet and stay put, the police’ll never find you here.” Josh said, towering over Ryan, his eyes beaming down on him.

“Don’t worry. I can take care of myself. I’ll just hang out here and watch some tube.” Ryan sat back in the worn cloth sofa, its red flowers long since faded to pink. He worked his shoulders into the cushion until he felt comfortable, as if he was planning on sitting there the whole day.

“You do that.” Josh flashed him a hard look, unconvinced by Ryan’s assurances. After all, Ryan was the one who got himself into this mess. “I’ll be back about four. You need anything, you give me a call and I’ll pick it up on the way home. When I come back, we’ll figure out how to get you out of here.”

“Thanks,” he said, his face drawn, weighed down by the stress he’d been carrying around for the last few days.

Ryan watched as Josh closed the door behind him. The two of them had been friends since childhood, growing up down the street from each other. At a young age, they started getting into trouble, stealing stuff out of unlocked cars or from open garages. When one of the neighbors caught them and told their parents, Ryan got a lashing with his father’s thickest leather belt on his bare ass, leaving him walking like a saddle-sore cowboy for the next few days.

He lumbered to the kitchen and made himself a bowl of Cheerios and a cup of coffee, then carried his breakfast to the living room and set it down on the wobbly wooden coffee table. The table lurched to one side as he did. He plopped down on the sofa and flipped on the tube, settling on a 70’s sitcom.

After finishing his cereal, he placed the bowl in the sink and poured himself another cup of coffee. As he sat back on the couch, the urge for a cigarette suddenly hit him. He pulled out the twisted Marlboro soft pack from his pocket and tore it open for the last smoke. He removed the mangled stick and gasped in frustration. Now what am I going do, he wondered? He remembered a 7-11 across the street, but also remembered why he was holed up in Josh’s apartment in the first place. The police were after him.

His addiction intensified its hold on him. It’s just across the street, he reasoned, knowing that even a quick trip to the store was all it took for him to get popped and find himself in jail.

His mouth began to dry up; he became jittery, unable to sit still. He nervously tapped his foot on the brown short-pile carpet. It had been last night since he had his last smoke, and except for two years ago when he took a cross-country bus trip to attend his grandfather’s funeral, it was the longest he’d gone without a smoke for the last ten years.

He found a large brim hat in the closet and a pair of dark sunglasses and put them both on. Pulling the door open a crack, he looked out along the walkway like a gazelle ready to cross a lion infested prairie. Silence lingered; the parking lot was empty. He slid out, closing the door gingerly behind him, then bolted to the sidewalk fifty feet away. He looked up and down the street and paused until a single car passed and then ran across the street and up to the window of the 7-11.

Standing just outside the doorway, he peered in through the window. There was a camera hanging on the far wall overlooking the cashier’s station. He opened the door and a high-pitched ding rifled through the store. A shaggy-haired attendant behind the counter looked over at him. He approached the clerk, pulling his hat down and hiking the sunglasses up the bridge of his noise. As he looked at the clerk and asked for a pack of Marlboro, he couldn’t help thinking how crazy this whole thing was; all this to feed an addiction. After all, he was wanted by the police for holding up a liquor store only a few days before. Now, here he was wandering around like a free man.

He laid the money for the pack on the counter. When he looked up beyond the attendant, his eyes locked on the large poster advertising the California Lottery. The yellow background shined brightly, intensified by the reflection of the morning sun. The bottom of the poster mentioned that the last winner had taken home $18 million. What the hell, he thought. He dug out a few more bills and asked the clerk for ten tickets. Scooping up the cigarettes and the tickets, he quickly made his way back across the street.

Once he was safely in the apartment, he sunk into the couch and lit a smoke, filling his lungs with a long satisfying draw and then slowly releasing a blue-grey cloud into the air. He instantly felt his nerves calmed, as if his worries were exhaled with the smoke.

As he sat back watching the tube, he suddenly heard the doorknob rattle, then the door opened with a low, continuous creek. A jolt shot through his spine, his back stiffened. He looked at the door, holding his breath. A small boy appeared; a broad smile on his face. He stood in the doorway as if he was on the edge of cliff, afraid to take another step.

“You ain’t Josh,” he said. His smile turned to surprise, his small green eyes peering through a swath of light brown hair.

“No, I’m not. My name’s Ryan. What’s yours?”

“Sebastian. Friends call me Sab.”

“You always just walk in, Sab?” Ryan sat forward.

“Yeap. Come over whenever my mom gets crazy, and hang out with Josh and watch some TV.”

“Does your mom know you’re over here?”

“She doesn’t care. She’s too busy drinking.” Sab stood there in his frayed blue Superman tee-shirt, dirty blue jeans and bare feet looking at the ground.

“Have a seat. Hey, lock the door, would ya?” Ryan cursed himself for not checking that one before.

“Sure thing,” he nodded, closing the door.

“What do you want to watch?”

He looked up at Ryan. His green eyes glimmered. “Whatever’s on’s fine,” he said as he walked over and sat on the couch. They watched back-to-back sitcoms, and discussed which shows they liked the most, agreeing that Friends and That ’70’s Show were the best ones, although he only knew about stuff that happened in the 1970s from his mother.

When Sab figured his mother had passed out, that it was safe to return home, he said goodbye and that he’d see him again before too long.

As Ryan watched Sab walk out the door, he couldn’t help wondering how Maria and their four-year old son Ethan were getting along at her mother’s house in San Francisco. He got up to make sure the door was locked and then sat back down on the couch and picked up the handset. His hand froze as he began to punch the numbers. He lowered his head, his stomach in knots, wrenching tighter as he though about what he was putting them through.

He put the receiver back in the cradle, deciding he would call them when he had some good news. As he looked up, through a thin slit in the drapes, he saw a flashing red light. His whole body stiffened, his heart raced. There was a pounding at the neighbor’s door and Ryan released a huge sigh. Muffled sounds came from the apartment through the paper-thin walls.

Suddenly, the phone rang. Afraid to pick it up, he let it continue to ring. The repetitive noise pounded in his head, and he finally relented.

“Where the hell have you been?” the voice on the other end boomed.

“The police are here,” he said with his hand over his mouth, afraid they would hear.

“I know. I just drove past the apartment and saw the cherrys flashing. What’s going on?”

“I can’t talk,” he said in a low, guarded voice. “I’ll call you back. Wait for my call before you come home.”

“Fine.” Josh said with aggravation in his voice.

Ryan’s brain bounced around like a cue ball. Should he stay in the apartment, or should he sneak out the back window? He remained on the couch stiff with fear. Then the apartment next door fell silent. The chatting stopped. He heard the door slam shut, and then the flashing lights faded as the car drove off. He walked over to the window, peeking around the frayed yellow curtain and noticed the police car heading down the driveway. He sat down and released a huge sigh, letting all the tension escape from his limbs. Then he reached for the phone and called Josh on his cell. “They’re gone.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah, they just left. Where are you?”

“I’m down the street. I’ll be home in five.”

As soon as Josh got back, they ordered a large pepperoni pizza. Over a cold Bud, they sat on the couch waiting for the pizza delivery guy.

“So what the hell happened with you?” Josh said, taking a sip of beer.

Ryan really didn’t want to talk about it, but since Josh gave him a place to stay when he came knocking on his door the night before at one in the morning, exhausted and looking for a place to ‘hold out’, he figured he owed it to him.

He pulled out a cigarette and fired it up, taking a long drag. “It was after I got fired from the lumberyard. I had that job for two years...It was a great job; good money, and excellent benefits. Then some big East Coast hardware chain bought us out. A week after the takeover, the new manager swooped in like a vulture and started firing people.”

He took another hit from his smoke and set it down in the ashtray on the table. “And since I was one of the newest guys there, I was out. He ended up getting rid of six of the twenty guys that worked there.”

“What, you couldn’t have gotten another job? It’s not the fucking end of the world,” he scolded.

“Hey, I looked,” he said throwing his palms out. “I spent the next six months looking. But nothing except some minimum wage crap job that wouldn’t have given me enough to take care of my family.”

“That would have been better than what you ended up doing,” Josh gave him a stern look as he took a sip of beer.

“Then the shit really hit the fan and Ethan got pneumonia. We had no money. No health insurance. I didn’t know what to do,” he said putting his head in his hands.

There was a knock at the door and Josh got up to answer it. It was the pizza delivery guy. Relieved that the conversation was interrupted, Ryan went to the kitchen for two plates and another couple of beers, brought them out and set them on the table. Josh laid the box down on the table and opened it, a white, hot cloud of steam bellowed out. He tore off a piece for each of them and put it on the plates.

As they worked on the pizza, Ryan told Josh that he needed to stay a few more days. While he appreciated Josh putting him up and didn’t want to push him too far, he knew after only three days since holding up the liquor store, the police were still out there searching for someone matching his description. He knew he needed to let things cool down a bit, that leaving now was just too risky.

They finished off the pizza and spent the rest of the evening talking over a few more beers, until Josh finally staggered off to bed.

Alone in the dimly lit room, Ryan sat silently on the couch. He stared blankly at the wall, lost in his pain. What happened? He kept repeating to himself. Where had things gone wrong? He took a deep breath, trying to contain his emotions. Exhausted from worry, he turned out the lights and lay down, trying to shut out the guilt that swam around in his head.

On Friday night, Ryan and Josh watched the newscaster finish reading the six o’clock news and then switched over to calling off the winning California Lottery numbers.

Ryan quickly pulled his tickets out of his wallet and followed along with each number as they were slowly read off.

Josh looked at him, his eyes widened. “What are you doing?”

“I picked up ten lottery tickets.”

“What? What were you thinking? What the hell were you doing leaving the...” Josh said with fire in his voice.

Ryan put his hand up. “Quiet. They’re starting to read off the numbers now,” he said, giving Josh a thin smile. He ticked off the numbers as the announcer read them off.

The first four numbers matched.

He took a deep breath and sat forward. His eyes focused on the tickets.

The fifth number matched.

Ryan rubbed the back his neck and took a deep breath.

“You only need to two more numbers to hit the jackpot,” Josh blurted out in excitement.

The sixth number matched.

Ryan rubbed his eyes then pinched the bridge of his nose, as if to wake him out of what surely must have been a dream.

The seventh number matched.

Ryan gave out a loud cheer as he sailed off the couch, punching his fist in the air at some imaginary target.

“Tell me you won?” Josh tried to yell over Ryan’s cheering.

“Yep,” he said, handing him the ticket.

Josh compared the numbers as they flashed on the screen, still unsure that this was actually happening. “Oh...my...god,” he said as he realized he was holding the winning ticket. He gave out a loud yelp, shaking the ticket high up in the air. “How much did you win?”

“$26 million.”

“You’re joking. $26 million.”

“That’s what the man said,” he offered with a broad grin across the width of his face.

“Don’t worry about how much it is. You’ve got to think about how you’re going to collect it,” Josh reminded him.

His excitement was replaced by an overpowering sense of reality. “That’s easy. You can pick it up,” he gave him a sly smile.

“I’m not sure about that one.” Josh said, his voice shaking. “All the other times they seem to know where the ticket was sold. Even have a video of the guy who bought it.”

“That’s only when the winner doesn’t come forward right away. All you have to do is go and claim the money tomorrow.” His eyes rested firmly on Josh, waiting for an answer. “Come on, I’ll give you half,” he smiled convincingly.

Josh’s eyebrows raised, a smile crept over his wide puffy face. “Sure. I guess for $13 million, I’ll take the risk.”

*