Jackpot

by Nic Stone

  The crowd parts for Zan (pffft), and when she sees him, she spreads her arms. “¡Nietito!”

  He leans down and she kisses him once on each cheek.

  “Lita, este es Rico,” he says, dragging me forward (and he does have to drag because my feet feel cemented to the floor).

  “Ohhhh! ¡Mucho gusto, mi amor!” She rises, and everyone behind us starts whispering. “Come, come to Lita. I am so happy to meet you!” She wraps me in a hug—apparently, all Macklins smell otherworldly—and then tugs my face down to kiss me on both cheeks like she did Zan.

  Then she pulls back. “You should be ashamed, Alejandro,” she says to Zan while looking me over. “Your description of her beauty was mierda.”

  That word I know…and man, is every inch of my skin on fire.

  Zan’s is too. “Rico, this is my grandma—”

  “Ay with the grandma thing.” She waves the word away like some foul odor.

  It unearths a smile from the deepest depths of my being, and she returns a matching one. I’ve never had a grandmother, but if Lita is the prototype, I can see what the fuss is about. Her presence is like a blanket with arms.

  “Thank you so much for coming, mi’ja,” she says, squeezing both of my hands. “You will visit our home for dinner and we will talk much more, okay?”

  She kisses me again and returns to her seat before I can respond.

  “Wow. She’s like a celebrity,” I say to Zan once we’re out of earshot. I hear Lady Consuela multiple times from behind me.

  Zan laughs. “Definitely the Macklin Matriarch,” he says. “Kind of a sore spot for my mom, but it is what it is.”

  I really want to ask what country she’s from, but if the answer is this one, I’ll feel like an assho—

  “Mexico.”

  “Huh?”

  “My dad’s half Mexican. That’s where the Spanish comes from. Lita insisted we all be fluent.”

  “Ah.”

  “You’d be surprised how weird people get when they find out.”

  “Really?”

  “Yep. It’s like their prejudice boils up and cooks their brains. Come meet my parents.”

  Over the next ten minutes, I meet Mr. and Mrs. Macklin, the bride, the groom, four aunts, three uncles, seven cousins, Zan’s brother Joaquín—big hug from Anna-Maria (who Zan tells me is also Mexican and came to America for school; stirs that choices thing right back up)—and a next-door neighbor girl who, despite my presence, gapes at Zan like he powers the spinning of the earth.

  We don’t spend any more than a few seconds with each person, but I definitely get a feel for Zan-the-Man’s origins. There are a lot of huggers.

  After the fancy passed hors d’oeuvres and expensive champagne (that I dutifully skip), we sit for a five-course dinner. I have quite the cheap palate, so the beluga caviar, foie gras, steak tartare, and veal Oscar aren’t really my speed, but despite feeling like I’m in some kind of fairy-tale land, not once do I ever feel as out of place as I anticipated.

  If I had to guess, I’d say it’s because the baby brother of the bride rarely lets go of my hand.

  I got a lot of play after that wedding. Once Alexander was back alone in his “bedroom” (which is almost the size of Rico’s apartment, not that it matters), he couldn’t sleep. He worked me for hours—staring up at the ceiling, rocking in his desk chair, pacing the oak floor.

  Thinking.

  About her.

  How good she is to Jax. How hard she works.

  How much better a person she is than he. He wishes he had her courage. Her resilience.

  He thought about how soft and warm her skin is. Her perfect hands and beautiful eyes. Her question from all those weeks ago—Is that what you want?—spun inside his head at the same velocity I spun between his fingers.

  He thought about the company and how he doesn’t want to work there, let alone take it over.

  But does he have a choice?

  How would Dad react if he went to college instead? And what would Alexander do for money? Yeah, he’d been “working” for years…but being employed by your family’s half-a-billion-dollar company was probably different from having a job with a real boss and all that.

  Then there was the ticket. The search for Ethel Streeter. His growing suspicion they were headed for a dead end—no pun intended.

  Should he just tell her? Come right out with it?

  And then what?

  He flicked me again.

  Spin, spin, spin, spin, spin, spin…

  I don’t even get time to process the evening and put my feet back on the ground because it turns out Lita is serious about the dinner thing: halfway through my shift the next day, I get a call at work from Zan telling me she wants me at this family dinner for the newlyweds before they head off on their monthlong honeymoon.

  That dinner is tonight.

  (Also: monthlong? Where the hell are they even going?!)

  After calling to clear it with Mama—who sounds reluctant but eventually caves—I spend the next four hours stocking and restocking everything in sight—working on candy right now—in a futile attempt to keep my nerves in check.

  The thirty-second intro-plus-hugs with Zan’s whole fam in the thick of a wonderland wedding were one thing. I was all dolled up and actually kinda looked like I belonged there.

  Today, though? I’m in ripped, bleach-spotted jeans, a faded—though nicely fitted—Batman T-shirt, a pair of glittery flats Mama scrounged from a thrift store near a ballet studio, and her Brazen Bitches biker jacket. My hair looks like a fist protruding from the crown of my head, and the only thing on my face is a series of dark spots from my last breakout—

  “Ricoooo!”

  “Oh my God!” I startle, and the box I’m carrying goes into the air.

  Guess I can say I make it rain Skittles now.

  “Sorry, honey. Didn’t mean to startle ya.” Hypershiny black shoes and navy dress pants appear in my peripheral. “Just wanted to say hello. Lovin’ the Batman shirt!”

  My eyes climb the suit and land on a smiling face.

  Mr. Fifty hasn’t shaved since the last time he was in here.

  It’s actually not a bad look. “Nice beard.”

  “Ya like it?” He runs a hand over it. “Thought I’d try something new.”

  In his other hand, he’s got a Slim Jim, a Vitaminwater Zero, and a bag of salt ’n’ vinegar pork rinds (yuck).

  I smile. Like a real smile. It’s kinda weird, but seeing Mr. Fifty today is…settling.

  I gather the scattered Skittles bags and stand. “Come on up front and I’ll ring those up for you.”

  ($41.86 in change.)

  The jitter reprieve lasts exactly thirty-eight minutes. Because at 3:54 p.m., when Zan saunters in looking every bit the son-of-a-millionaire he is, my angst rockets through the fluorescent-lighted ceiling again. He winks at me in passing as he goes to greet Mr. Z, and after getting a full report on the Macklin paper products he supplied, he waits until I finish clocking out, takes my hand (the rest of me whips into hurricane frenzy), and pulls me outside.

  I’m still figuring out how to breathe normally.

  “Can we pop by my house so I can change?” I ask. That’s when I realize there’s no Tonka.

  “Change for what? You look perfect.”

  “Uhh—”

  “This is us today,” he says as we approach an old two-door Honda. He opens the door for me, and the seat belt automatically slides forward on a track to let me inside. Once the door is shut, the thing moves back to its starting point, strapping me in without my consent.

  I peek around. Thing’s even got a cassette tape deck—I would’ve sworn Mama’s truck was the last working vehicle on earth with one of those.

  Once Zan is held in place by his own demon seat belt, he fasten
s the one that goes across the lap (which prompts me to do it too), then shoves the key in the ignition and tries to start the car. There a whrrrrr-whrrrrr-whrrrr sound, but no crank.

  “Dammit,” he says.

  Something beneath the steering column gets pulled and there’s a pop sound. Then he hops out and the hood goes up. After about twenty seconds, hood drops, he hops back in, turns the key again, and boom. Put-put-putter, but the engine’s running.

  I am so confused.

  “Soooooo…”

  “Took the Jeep in for regular maintenance—oil change, tires balanced and rotated, that type of thing, right?”

  “Sure.”

  “They found two 50D nails in the sidewall of my front passenger tire. TWO!”

  No clue what any of that means. Which doesn’t help my Poor Girl Visiting Rich World jitters. “Okay…”

  “The things are five and a half inches long and six millimeters in diameter!”

  “Dang.” Still clueless.

  “Our mechanic thinks somebody did it on purpose. Anyway, those tires are special order, so it’ll be Wednesday before a new one is in.”

  “What about the spare?” You know, the one protruding from the back door?

  He shakes his head. “That’s what I said, but my mom doesn’t want me driving around without a spare, so even if we were to use that one, I’d have to wait until the new one comes in.”

  Ah. I see. “So this is your spare car.” Because of course he would have a spare car—

  “This is my dad’s car.”

  “Ah, so it’s his spare car, not yours. My bad.”

  “Try the one he drives every day. He doesn’t have a spare.”

  I take it all in…the crank windows, the manual locks, the torn upholstery with the padding sticking out of it. “Nope. You’re full of it.”

  He laughs. “Cross my heart. He’s actually pretty proud of it. He’s never spent more than two thousand dollars on a car, yet every car he’s had has lasted at least a decade. He’s on year eleven with this baby fella, and it was already sixteen years old when he bought it.” He pats the dashboard. “Parts can be hard to find, and Dad’ll have to replace the spark plugs soon if he doesn’t want to get rid of him, but Timothy Macklin will definitely rock this car till the wheels fall off. Literally.”

  Wow.

  “Something very few know about my father: the guy does not like spending money.”

  Hope this isn’t outta line….“Your sister’s wedding seemed pretty extravagant.”

  “That was all Mom and Lita. Dad had bloodshot eyes for two days after finding the bill for the flowers. Never in my life heard him yell Mami so loud.”

  I chuckle. “So what’s your mom like?”

  “She drives a fully loaded Maserati SUV.”

  Now I’m really laughing.

  He shakes his head. “It’s ridiculous. She’s the company attorney, but she’d spend everything if he let her.”

  Wonder what that’s like…the limit being a friggin’ Maserati. “I still can’t believe I’m going to your house.”

  Whoops. That wasn’t supposed to leave my head.

  “Why not?”

  “Oh come on, Macklin. Before a couple months ago, would you have expected the weirdo brown girl from history to wind up beside you in your dad’s bucket?”

  He laughs. “Gorgeous weirdo brown girl from history. Get it right.”

  “I’m serious!” And flustered now. Hate when he catches me off guard like that.

  “Okay, touché.” His head turns toward me in my peripheral. “Loving every minute, though—”

  “Eyes on the road, fool.”

  More laughing from him—and smiling from me—but when we get to the next red light, he turns to me with a kind of serious look. “I’ve got a question for you, Danger.”

  Gulp. “Okay…”

  “What if it were you?”

  “Huh?”

  “We’ve been looking for Ethel Streeter because you’re convinced she has a winning lotto ticket, right? What if you had it? What would you do with the cash?”

  Well, this is out of left field. “That’s…random.”

  “Well, the longer we go without finding her, the more I think about it,” he says. “I did the math: if the winner took the annuity option, after taxes they’d get roughly two-point-four million a year for thirty years. That’s over two hundred grand a month, Rico. Only like three percent of American households see that annually.”

  “Okay…”

  “Just interested to hear what you’d do with that kinda dough.”

  Why is he asking me this?

  Actually, better question: Why does the thought of answering make me uncomfortable? It’s not like I don’t know….My mind runs through a list every time Jax or Mama gets sick. Even wrote it down once. I’d obviously start by getting us some good health insurance….

  But I certainly can’t tell him that.

  “I’d probably buy us a new car and a decent house.”

  He nods. “Go on.”

  “I’ve never really thought beyond that,” I say. “I guess I’d start a college fund for Jax. Maybe send him to Space Camp.”

  “Oh, is he into space? I had no idea.”

  I swallow again. I honestly don’t know either, but every kid would jump at the chance to go to Space Camp, right? I didn’t get to, so why not Jax? “Yeah.”

  “What about for you? College?”

  “I mean, if I have that kind of annual income, I won’t need college. Don’t people go to earn the credentials that will land them higher-paying jobs?”

  “Fair. So would you invest what you don’t need to live? Save it? Give it to charity?”

  “I told you I hadn’t thought that far, Macklin. It’s a waste of time. I don’t have the ticket.”

  I’m annoyed.

  And he can tell. Doesn’t ask any more questions.

  Unfortunately, after a few minutes, the silence is suffocating. So I break it. “What would you do?”

  “Hmm?”

  “If you had the ticket? What would you do?”

  “Oh.” His eyes narrow, and he gulps.

  Which is weird. “I mean, you said yourself that you aren’t rich, right? You have to work for your money just like the rest of us. So the ticket could be beneficial to you too.”

  A reminder I needed. I’ve been trying not to think about it, but right now? In this car with him asking me that question?

  “So? What would you do?” I press. “Get your own place and move out? ‘Invest,’ as you say, so you never have to work? Start your own line of Macklin fidget spinners?” Man, am I on edge now. Wonder if he can tell.

  He glances at me out of the corner of his eye. “You really wanna know?”

  “Yep.”

  “I’d throw it away,” he says. “That kind of money’s a recipe for disaster.”

  I don’t say anything after that.

  * * *

  —

  Zan’s old-school rap music is the only sound in the car for the rest of the ride—ironically, the song playing when we pull up to the wrought iron gate features a guy bragging about having no job or rent money but driving a Benz and wearing “gator boots” and (“pimped-out”) Gucci suits.

  And as we roll up the winding driveway, I’ll admit that after the twenty-minute trip here in the geriatric Honda, I halfway expected us to pull up to something moderate.

  Nope.

  The house is astounding. Brick. Wide and deep and pillared.

  A literal mansion.

  Zan pulls into door four of the six-car garage, and I see not one, but two Maseratis—an SUV the size of my bedroom, and a convertible coupe. “Your mom has two cars?”

  “Nope,” he says, shutting off the ignition. “Con
vertible is Lita’s. Come on.”

  I leave my jacket in the car—kinda doubt Catholic grandmas are into Brazen Bitches—and we approach the door that leads to the inside of the castl—I mean the house.

  I try to keep my cool, but even more than Ness’s, this home reminds me of days exploring the empty shells of houses with Mama and letting my imagination run free. The moment we’re out of the car and I see that the garage has a loft space (what is up there?), words start flying out before I can swallow them back: “Macklin, this house. How many bedrooms? How many baths? Is there an elevator?”

  “Eight bedrooms, ten full baths, four half, no elevator.” He sighs. “You really want me to go over all this?”

  “Sorry.” I take another look around the massive garage. “I’ve just never seen a house this size, let alone been inside one.”

  He stops walking and turns to face me. I’m still gawking around like a dweeb, so I smack right into him. When I look up, he grins down and reaches around to tug my hair loose from its knot. As the curls tumble down, he shakes them out, then rests his hands on my shoulders and traces my collarbones with his thumbs. (Whoa.)

  “There are three kitchens, an indoor pool and racquetball court, a gym with sauna and steam room, and a wine cellar so stocked, we could get the senior class wasted. Lita lives in a four-bedroom house out back, and my ‘room’ is basically an apartment complete with living room and kitchenette. I’ve got more shit and space than I could ever need, but you know what? Sometimes I get so lonely, the distance from my bed to the door seems insurmountable.” We lock eyes. “And not counting Ness, you’re only the second person to ever come over.”

  I blink. A lot. “Really?”

  “Yep. True friends can be hard to come by, Danger. I, uhh…can’t say I let a lot of people in, if you get what I mean.”

  What’s weird? I totally do get it.

  “Something valuable went missing the last time I brought a ‘friend’ over.”

  My gaze falls to my faux-sparkly shoes. “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be.” He kisses my forehead. “I’ve got you now. Literally nothing else matters.”