The Ignorant Satisfaction
Ronnie was the “usual” kid. He never got into much trouble, got decent grades, had graduated high school, and enrolled in college .
The summer had just recently come to an end, and his 18th birthday was coming quickly. His friends, knowing that he was straight edge, decided to convince him to purchase lottery tickets as an act of defiance for their own satisfaction. On his birthday, he purchased two lottery tickets. His knowledge of lottery tickets was unaccounted for, so he went with what he thought was simple, two scratch-offs. Ronnie walked out of the gas station and walked back over to the bench near the fence where his brother, James, and his friends were waiting. Ronnie got the boyish punches that every teenage guy gets from his friends when he makes a meaningless accomplishment.
Julian, one of the neighborhood’s well-known trouble makers got in his face and handed him a nickel to scratch off the lottery ticket. Ronnie grabbed the nickel and rolled his eyes. He began rubbing the nickel on the designated area of the first ticket. He moved slowly at first, and then his pace quickened as he moved further down the card. He got up and walked towards a nearby garbage can when he suddenly stopped. James, Tyson, Julian and Jason yelled towards him assuming his pause was a joke. Instead of moving towards to garbage can he looked at them and began walking back towards the gas station. He went inside and redeemed his lottery ticket for cash, not just a little bit of cash, but the jackpot. Ronnie kept a pokerface. When he walked back to his friends they jokingly slapped him around a little for getting their hopes up. “Sorry guys, I was in shock ‘cause I thought I won, but when I went to get the money the cashier just laughed at me for not reading the ticket right.” “This is why fools like you should just keep being the goody-two-shoes you are. Jason, no more trying to convince this girl to do little things like this, we all know he’ll only fail," said Tyson as a joke.
They all walked to the best local pizza place where the guys threw down money to get Ronnie some pizza for his birthday. After they ate, Tyson collected the money and got ready to pay. When he walked up to the cashier, she said that the food had already been paid for. Ronnie laughed, got up, and immediately walked out.
James, being the most athletic and one of few of them who could run without coughing up a lung, reached Ronnie first. He said, “How much did you win Ron!?”, but before he could answer he was tackled from behind. “Show us the money now!!” all the guys were saying. Out of the pocket inside his shirt, Ronnie pulled out a thick pile of one hundred dollar bills wrapped in a band reading “CONGRATULATIONS” . Screaming and swearing, they all ran to Julian’s house nearby. When they got there, his older sister was drunk like usual, but they made their way into Julian’s messy, smoke reeking room. They sat in a circle on the floor, while Julian, James, Tyson and Jason talked over each other about how to spend the money.
James looked at him with a goofy smirk on his face. “Don’t you see Ronnie? You have enough money to last a lifetime! Why don’t you just try to live a little? It’s not guna kill you, a smoke and a beer ain’t a big deal bro.”
“Shut up James,” he said, “go to bed”.