Just The Ticket (That's Life Twist in the Tale story)

Having had no luck with Take A Break, I switched to That's Life for my next attempt, which is reproduced below. I always thought it was a very clunky plot, but if you read those stories, you'll come across an absolute stinker from time to time, and I thought this was better than that, certainly. Still, if you don't have absolute confidence in a work, you should probably keep it close to your chest.

'Just The Ticket' was an idea which grew out of a lottery syndicate, and that old joke about what you would do if the person who had it lost it/stole it/fell off a cliff? It takes a slight leap of faith but it gets there in the end. Again, it was never published.

Just The Ticket

by Chris Stanley

Alex sighed as she rang the bell on the bus, stood up and walked towards the doors. Monday morning. It felt like she hadn’t had a break from work at all, since the weekend had been so fraught. Her handbag had been stolen on the same bus on Friday evening, with her keys, wallet and mobile phone.

   She’d only been working at Quinton’s for a few weeks, and was still very much the new girl in the office. She got on well with everybody there, but it was always difficult fitting in with a new group of people, especially one that had worked together for years.

   Alex watched the back of the bus crawl away in a cloud of exhaust fumes, and then crossed the street to her workplace. She filed insurance claims and spent the rest of her day e-mailing her old colleagues. She missed her old job, and her old life. Inevitably, her husband Ian had settled in easily, and the kids had taken to their new school like ducks to water.

   She took the lift to the twelfth floor and slouched towards the double doors of her office. There was something in the atmosphere which wasn’t exactly right. She could hear muffled laughter and a few cheers.

   Swinging open the doors, everyone looked round and gave an enormous cheer. Penny, her boss, ran over to Alex and gave her a tight hug, kissed her on the cheek and put a party hat on her head.

   It was clear a party was in full swing. Everyone was in a fantastic mood, swigging bubbly from plastic cups.

   ‘What’s going on?’ said Alex, confused by now.

   ‘Aw, come off it! Don’t play the innocent! We’re celebrating.’ One of the few men in the office, John, readjusted his glasses and raised his glass to her.

   ‘No, honestly. I don’t have a clue what you’re on about.’

   ‘Hey, you lot,’ hollered Penny. ‘Alex is only trying to rip us off for six million quid! Doesn’t know what we’re on about!’

   Alex froze. She realised what they meant. As soon as she started, she joined in with the Lottery syndicate, and last week it had worked its way around to her as treasurer. She was happy to take the eighteen pounds and buy the syndicate’s tickets, and did so on Thursday. But on Friday, somebody had stolen the bag with the tickets in…

   She gulped. How could she tell them? She needed to tell them right away, but this would destroy any friendship she had at Quinton’s.

   ‘You’re kidding, right?’

   ‘No, it was Jackie’s numbers. All her family’s birthdays.’ Helen, an assessor who sat across from her, was almost hyperventilating with giddiness. ‘Penny tried to ring you, but your phone was off. We’ve all been panicking, and then you walked in, thank goodness.’

   Alex knew why they couldn’t reach her, because the phone was next to those tickets in the inner pocket. She was bewildered. She’d read about people who forgot to buy tickets for their syndicate and then scooped the jackpot, but Alex had always dismissed those people as foolish. But this was so…unfair. She needed time to think.

   Accepting a cup of champagne, she assured everyone that the winning ticket was safe and tried to keep her head down. Her colleagues studied her face, regarding her strangely. She didn’t seem excited at all, and Alex could feel her cheeks reddening by the second.

   When everything had quietened down, Alex looked up the regional Lottery office number and called from a phone box outside. There was good news and bad news – nobody had cashed in a jackpot-winning ticket, but there had to be a ticket for them to claim.

   ‘But can’t you trace it to the shop it was bought from?’ she pleaded.

   ‘Sorry, madam. Unfortunately, no ticket, no money.’

   Alex spent her day on her work, but it was difficult to concentrate. She hardly ate a thing at lunchtime, trying to think of a good way of telling everybody they hadn’t won six million pounds between them. Most people gabbled about the first thing they were going to do with their share.

   ‘I’m going to quit this job,’ joked Belinda, ‘and go and live in the Bahamas!’ She marched up to Penny and shouted ‘Stick this job where the sun doesn’t shine!’ Luckily, they both laughed.

   Alex decided that she’d say it was an honest mistake, that it wasn’t her fault. In all the commotion, she hadn’t even mentioned to anybody that she’d had her bag stolen. But she was convinced they’d think she was on the fiddle. Maybe she could make something up, like Jackie had marked her ticket down incorrectly? It was unlikely.

   Eventually, the stress of the day took its toll on Alex and she ran to the toilet to be sick. Emerging with a face as white as a sheet, she asked Penny if she could take off early. Penny was on such a high that she agreed straight away, and Alex got away as quickly as she could, with the jokes about fleeing to South America behind her.

   Back at home, she searched high and low, hoping that she’d forgotten she’d moved the tickets, or the kids had been searching in her bag and they’d fallen out. But inevitably, there was no sign of the them.

   She slid down the kitchen units and cried for the first time. Great fat tears ran down her hot cheeks, and she banged her head several times on the cupboard door. How could she be so stupid? Her life was ruined. Wasn’t the Lottery supposed to make dreams come true? This was more like her worst nightmare.

   She was still crouching, hugging her knees, when she heard the front door opening and her kids maraud in. Ollie and Kerry and hugged her, wanting to know why she was crying.

   ‘Mummy’s just sad about losing her bag,’ she sniffed, hugging them. Maybe life wasn’t all bad. She could always get another job, and she’d always have her family.

   Ian followed them in and hugged her immediately.

   ‘We’ve got a surprise for you, haven’t we, kids?’

   They nodded enthusiastically and led her into the living room. Alex was still sniffing, her eyes raw. Sat in the middle of the sofa was a bag like the one she lost. She chuckled and hugged her kids.

   ‘Where did you get this?’ she asked.

   ‘We were walking past a charity shop in town when Kerry saw it in the window. We thought it’d be nice to replace the one you lost.’

   Alex raised an eyebrow. ‘That was lucky, wasn’t it?’

   Picking up the bag, she tried the clasp. The one on her old bag was sticky, and sure enough, this one was a struggle to open, too. This was more than lucky, it was impossible.

   It couldn’t happen…there was more chance of winning the lottery!

   There they lay, in the inside pocket. She gasped and collapsed onto the sofa, her face white again.

   ‘What is it, darling?’ said Ian, crouching with a concerned look in front of her.

   ‘Nothing,’ cried Alex, ‘but this bag could turn out to be the bargain of the year!’