“Baby,” said the mother of Tiana, still holding her fork over her good china plate, “why does your grandmother have a letter from the lottery?” The table went silent. DeShawn put down his glass. The smile he had been wearing all afternoon, the proud one he saved for company, slid off his face like melted wax. “Grandma,” he said, in a voice much too bright, “what is that?” I smoothed the white envelope with the Georgia seal on my tablecloth. “It is a letter about sixteen million dollars,” I said. “It is mine. I won it in April, and I put it in a trust at my church.”
Nobody moved. Tiana, who had been so sweet about the brochure, looked at me with her mouth open. “Sixteen million,” whispered one of her cousins. “Grandma, you would have told us,” DeShawn said. “You would have told your own grandson.” I took a long breath. “Honey, for twenty two years I bought a two dollar ticket every Friday, and for twenty two years you told me I was throwing it away. So I decided to keep this to myself. I wanted to find out who I was living with when they thought I had nothing.”
Right then the doorbell rang. DeShawn started, and Tiana went white. “That will be my lawyer,” I said, rising slowly. “Ms. Whitfield. From my church.” She came into the dining room in her Sunday suit with a leather portfolio, nodded to the company, and took the seat I offered her. She laid three documents on my tablecloth, one at a time, like cards. The first was a Social Security form with my name. The second was an application to Magnolia Pines, with DeShawn listed as my power of attorney. The third was a letter to the county about my house.
A letter with a lottery seal set on a good tablecloth told a family who had been living with them all along.
“Mrs. Greer has never signed any of these,” Ms. Whitfield said, in her calm courtroom voice. “The Social Security change was submitted online from an account in the name of her grandson. The power of attorney has no notary. The county letter is dated before her fall. Mr. Greer, I would advise you not to say anything until you have counsel.” DeShawn opened his mouth and closed it. The mother of Tiana had risen to her feet. She is a tall woman, a deacon at her church, and I have never seen anybody look so ashamed on behalf of another person.
“Tiana,” she said. “Did you know about this?” Tiana was crying. “I knew about the nursing home,” she said. “DeShawn said it would be safer. I did not know about the Social Security. I swear, Mama. I did not know.” “You did not ask,” her mother said, not unkindly. “That is a different sin, but it is a sin.” She turned to me. “Miss Mabel, I am so sorry. I will take my daughter home with me tonight if you wish. I will bring her back when she has learned something.”
I looked at my grandson. He had gone so thin in the face. I remembered him at eight, standing on a milk crate beside me, helping me stir the batter of a pound cake, and I felt grief like a small cold stone. “DeShawn,” I said, “I am not going to Magnolia Pines. Not next month, not ever. I may visit for bingo on a Thursday, if they have good pie. You and Tiana have thirty days to find another place. Ms. Whitfield will see that every cent of my Social Security comes back to my account, and you will help her do it.”
He nodded, slowly. “Are you going to have me arrested, Grandma?” he asked, hardly audible. “I could,” I said. “The law would say I should. But I am eighty one, and I have buried a husband and two sisters, and I would rather have a grandson than a conviction. You will pay every dollar back, and you will go to a counselor at my church every Tuesday, and you will tell the truth about why you did this. If you do, we will talk about Christmas.” Tears ran down his face. “Yes, Grandma,” he said. “Yes, Grandma. I will.”
Tiana moved back to her mother. The day she left, I gave her an envelope with a cashier check inside, enough to pay for the nursing degree she had talked about when they first moved in. She did not want to take it. I told her it was not for the family. It was for Tiana. She cried and hugged me with her whole body, and I felt, under all the hurt, how young she was. Last month she wrote to tell me she had passed her first exam. I framed the postcard.
I did a few other things with the money. I put a new roof on the church. I paid off the mortgages of three widows on Abercorn Street without telling them whose idea it was. I bought a recliner so good that I fell asleep in it twice at the office of the lawyer. And on a quiet afternoon in November, DeShawn came by on his lunch break from the warehouse. He sat on my porch with his hands between his knees and asked if I would teach him how to pick numbers. “I do not know if I can,” I said. “But you may sit with me.”
Every Friday now, I walk to the Kroger on Abercorn and stand in line behind the same folks I have known for thirty years. I still buy one ticket. Same numbers. The birthday of my husband, my own birthday, our wedding day, and the year we bought this house. Two dollars. DeShawn comes with me, and carries my bag. The clerk always asks why a woman like me keeps playing. I tell her it was never about the money. It was about getting to be a fool with hope, a little while longer.