Blizzard Ball Read online

  Copyright © 2012 Dennis Kelly

  ISBN: 0-87839-488-5

  ISBN-13: 978-0-87839-488-3

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  First Edition, September 2011

  Electronic Edition, March 2012

  Printed in the United States of America

  Published by North Star Press of St. Cloud, Inc. P.O. Box 451 St. Cloud, Minnesota 56302

  Use this code visit www.northstarpress.com

  Dedication

  I would like to thank my wife Linda for providing me the space to woo the muse; the AAA Writers’ Group, Andrea, Astrid, and Angela for their competence and encouragement; the Loft Literary Center for fostering the development of writers; and for all of you who the “promise of riches for nothing is a lure you can’t resist.”

  Luck

  There was a blizzard coming. Kirchner could feel it in his back. A thorny ache from a million crystal daggers he couldn’t cast off. He had learned to manage the discomfort, but the Minnesota winter and prolonged standing aggravated the old injury to no end.

  Sandwiched belly to backside between a housepainter in splattered coveralls and a student cut off from the world by wired earbuds, Kirchner sidestepped the stalled convenience store line. What’s the hold up? Ahead, lottery players traded carefully considered picks and fistfuls of cash for the pink paper drug of hope.

  A sign overhead read blizzardball: Imagine What Luck Could Do. Depends what side of luck you’re on, Kirchner thought. As a cop, with twenty-seven years in the trenches he plied the backwaters of luck. There was no euphoria or winning in that flotsam, just the nightmare of the fateful “Why me?” A random shot fired into a crowd. A retiree scammed of his life savings. A driver ripped from the steering wheel by a carjacker.

  The BlizzardBall Lottery jackpot had just hit $750 million. Twice-weekly drawings over the past four months had failed to produce a winner. The next scheduled drawing was in three days—Christmas day.

  The world’s richest prize was the headline story and had captured the lead on national news. For many, the prospect of winning unimaginable wealth was the last great chance to make up for lost opportunity, amend wrong turns, and take flight from misfortunes. But not everyone shared in the wishful hysteria. The clergy spared no wrath in denouncing the lottery as a scourge on the flock. Gamblers Anonymous and mental health professionals called for a cap on the lottery prize as their hotlines buzzed with calls from folks afflicted by lottery fever.

  Kirchner shifted his weight from foot to foot and juggled his groceries. The convenience store line now snaked all the way back to the rolling hot dog cooker. The energy seemed too on-edge for seven-thirty in the morning. A hunchback woman with tennis balls on her walker knocked a bottle of Mr. Clean to the floor. The air filled with nose-twitching ammonia. Small groups of overly caffeinated lottery players formed. A hard hat cable guy, a suit with a leather briefcase, and a dental assistant nervously laughed off the possibility of winning. A Somali taxi driver held to himself and stood on the tips of his toes, neck craned, to gauge the progress of the line.

  An electric shock fired down Kirchner’s leg, inflaming his sciatic nerve. He winced and let out a tight groan. Although the accident had been seventeen years ago, the pain was a constant reminder of his good fortune. Responding to a garden-variety domestic complaint on a salty August afternoon, he had walked into a murder-suicide attempt. An enraged unshaven man, with puffy squinted eyes that looked like mini-donuts, was perched on the outside edge of the twenty-first floor balcony. Clutched to his chest was his live-in girlfriend’s squirming young child. His body swayed and pitched as if standing on a rolling ship. Sweat leaked through his work shirt with a Doo-Doo Diaper Service patch on its sleeve. Inconsolable, he ranted, “I’m going to make that chicano bitch pay, screwing the neighbor, while I take all the shit.” Kirchner was pretty certain the point about the job had been lost on the pleading girlfriend. Kirchner’s partner had her corralled in the kitchen away from sharp objects, while Kirchner eased toward the diaper-man and into a cloud of alcohol.

  Kirchner didn’t much look the part of hero cop. Always a bit overweight, belly spilling over the belt, he never felt comfortable all buttoned down like some of the studs on the force. He was quiet by disposition with a soft, disarming appeal that made him approachable, easy to talk to—a valuable asset in police work.

  Kirchner suggested he and the would-be jumper go down the street, get something to drink, cool off and let the kid play. Just as he started to feel the faint pulse of rapport, the crazed girlfriend broke loose and grabbed for her daughter. A skirmish ensued. The diaper-man’s grip slipped from the rail. Kirchner lurched for the child, caught her by the shirt, and lost his footing. Diaper-man, child, and cop tumbled over the side of the building. He thought he’d always remember the terror in the little girl’s eyes. With the kid cradled in his arms like a football, Kirchner crashed through an umbrella and a glass patio table. They ended up falling only one floor, fifteen feet, to the balcony just below. The child was bruised and scratched, but nothing life-threatening. Kirchner walked away wearing a permanent glass shirt. The diaper-man wasn’t so lucky. He hit his head on a metal railing and died instantly.

  “Lottery ticket?” the clerk asked, as Kirchner set a frozen pizza, a quart of orange juice, and a bag of hard peppermint starlight candy on the counter.

  “Why not?” Cheap entertainment, he reasoned. “Quick Pick.”

  Kirchner made a mental note of his numbers as he tucked the ticket into his wallet. Some held luck out to random chance or the confluence of events. Others assigned it to positive thinking, predestination, divine intervention, or the magical realm. But he couldn’t quite get his mind around it.

  Kirchner fought his way past the lottery customers into the parking lot. Sleet slashed in diagonally from the northeast, turning to snow. An old man, his head bent into the wind, coat clutched around his throat, brushed by Kirchner on his way to buy a lottery ticket. Kirchner would bet the geezer had a rabbit’s foot in his pocket. He was equally certain that an up-for-grabs $750 million would attract all manner of thieves, big brains, and schemers bent on steering luck their way. Kirchner dug a fist into his aching back. “Blizzard’s coming.”

  BlizzardBall

  The BlizzardBall Lottery director sat in his office and popped two Maalox tablets into his mouth, washing them down with cold coffee.

  “You wanted to see me, Boss?”

  “Jesus,” Morty Frish said. “Slow down before you blow a gasket.” Morty pointed Jake Wilson, his public relations manager, to a chair in front of his desk.

  “Goddamn media circus out there,” Jake said, patting his sweaty forehead with his tie. Jake was a young man, but his fleshy, sallow face was ready for old age.

  “I know the pressure’s on, but let’s just get through this next drawing.” Morty, already exhausted by Jake, pinched the bridge of his nose.

  “TV crews are flying in from as far away as Japan to be a witness to the drawing, and get this, some guy at CNN called and wants to make sure we have kosher on hand. Must think we’re running a deli. There’s no way the TV studio is big enough to handle this event.” Jake stopped, suddenly aware he was rambling, and watched Morty write something on a sticky note.

  “I’ve made alternate arrangements for the drawing.” Morty handed the note to Jake. “Make sure the independent auditors are notified.”

  “I can only imagine the frenzy when a winner steps forward,” Jake said as he stuck the note to his tie.

  Morty walked over to a large
state wall map with colored pins indicating the location of past BlizzardBall winners. He tapped his finger on a northern Minnesota town. “I don’t want another Biwabik fiasco.”

  “What do you want me to do, hand pick ’em?” Jake’s left eye was exhibiting the chronic twitch that made everything he said seem as if there was a hidden joke in it.

  “I expect you,” Morty, lacking in patience, pointed at Jake, “to interview any potential jackpot claimant, verify their ticket, clean them up, and get my approval before any public appearance. I don’t want another Dirk Schweitzer.”

  “What? There’s a problem with a guy living the American Dream?”

  Dirk Schweitzer had shown up to collect his $25 million lottery jackpot check too drunk to stand. Leaning on a hooker in a halter top and black net stockings, the keys to a new pickup in hand, he announced, unbeknownst to his wife, that he was getting a divorce.

  “Just no more Dirks, okay?” Morty said, waving Jake off. “Send Bonnie in here.”

  Jake retreated from Morty’s office, his singing bouncing off the hallway walls. “My Bonnie lies over the ocean, my Bonnie lies over the sea, my Bonnie lies all over St. Paul, will my Bonnie lie over me?”

  Morty looked out the window for a mental escape, but the overhead fluorescent light bounced back his reflection. He had bushy hooded eyebrows that arched over a flat pug nose—the result of sticking his face in others peoples business. “Damn psych ward,” he said to himself as he tried to rub out a deep furrow from his brow.

  Bonnie Hannover, the Lottery database security manager, slammed her folder on Morty’s desk and blew back feathery bangs hanging over her large framed glasses. “I’ve had it with that slob Wilson,” she said. “Why do you keep that potty-mouth around? I came this close to putting a letter opener in his voice box.”

  “Bonnie, calm down,” Morty said, wincing. Her perfume, like overripe melons, choked off the air in the room.

  “You look terrible. Stick your face out.” Bonnie pulled a tissue from her pocket and wiped the Maalox chalk from the corner of Morty’s mouth.

  “I don’t know how I’d manage without you.” Morty slid his hand over Bonnie’s substantial hip. She thwacked him, patted down her skirt, and retreated to a chair across from his desk.

  Morty cleared his throat. “What’s the updated count?”

  Bonnie drew the data report from her folder. “Take a look at the duplicate summary.” She pointed to some highlighted numbers.

  “Jesus!” Morty twisted a pencil through his fingers like a miniature baton. Over thirty-five thousand tickets had been purchased for the same number combination. “What’s going on?”

  “They’re the number picks from an astrologer featured in one of those grocery store tabloids.” Bonnie rolled her eyes. “I wouldn’t be too concerned—the stargazer’s other predictions include Hillary Clinton quitting politics to become a woman wrestler and marijuana replacing petroleum as the nation’s chief energy source.”

  Morty threw the pencil in the air. The point caught in the acoustical ceiling tile and stuck. It hung like a stalactite along with a dozen other #2 pencils. “What else?”

  “Some neuroscientist out of Johns Hopkins has been scanning the brains of healthy lottery players. He’s determined that the anticipation of winning activates the same brain circuits as the ones responsible for addictive behavior among strung-out drug users.”

  “So what’s he suggesting? That we dispense methadone with each ticket?” Morty throttled the Maalox bottle.

  “Save the heartburn for the Cash and Dash.” Bonnie pried the bottle out of Morty’s hand. “Our servers can hardly keep up with that hole-in-the-wall convenience store.”

  “Vancouver?” Morty asked.

  “It’s like Whack-A-Mole. Shut the outstate scalpers down here, they pop up over there. They must have an army out there hawking BlizzardBall tickets. Our authorized vendor tracking shows the Cash and Dash is the top ticket-selling outlet in the state.” Bonnie’s face pinched up as she warned, “That’s certainly not going to go unnoticed.”

  “Low priority.” Morty flicked his wrist as if chasing off a fly. “By the time the Cash and Dash convenience store anomaly surfaces, there’ll be a winner, and those Canadian jackals will have moved on to some other big jackpot lottery. Chances are the Cash and Dash will eventually disappear too.”

  “Look, Mr. Lottery, between the scalpers and the run-up, we’re courting trouble. I’ll squeal like a stuck pig if things get screwed up. You understand me?”

  Morty wondered whether the pig comment was self-referential. He personally considered her big-boned full figure attractive, no matter what others said. He got the point, however, and prudently left it alone.

  “Bonnie, honey, we’re doing the right thing here,” Morty said, his voice almost plaintive, as he reached out and stroked her forearm. He pandered to her interest in pets and oiled the relationship as needed in return for favors. “The run-up strategy has dumped millions of dollars into the state lottery fund. And need I remind you,” he said. “Three cents of every dollar we bring in goes toward animal protection.”

  “You better be right.” Bonnie nervously picked a cat hair off her sweater.

  “Of course I am.” Morty checked his watch and said, “One hour until the draw. Time to put a bow around the ticket file.”

  Bonnie quickly gathered her folder and headed out of the office.

  “Close the door,” Morty called after her. He took a deep breath and on the exhale pulled out his cell phone and laid it on his desk. As he thought about his plan and the risk, his brain manically cycled between fear and elation. He wiped his sweaty hands on his pants. He picked up the phone. While it rang, he rummaged through his desk and located a cigar, stripped off the wrapper, and ran his tongue along the leaves, tip to end. “Basarov. Morty here,” he said in a low voice, “game on!”

  Probability

  Professor Sergei Petrov paused, searching the faces of his nineteen University of St. Petersburg undergrad mathematics students for some sign of intelligence. The late afternoon sun filtered through the stained glass windows of the Twelve Collegia, a former palace of Peter the Great, dappling the students in prismatic colors. “Dabro pozhalovat!” he barked, rapping his knuckles on the podium. “So, can a recurring event truly be random? If this question does not torment you, keep you up at night, you do not belong here. Are not the most important occurrences of your life the result of probability?”

  The professor loosened his plaid tie and felt the weight of his wool herringbone sport coat on his shoulders. Nothing to do now, but cede this cerebral battle to an unseasonably warm winter day. He could not compete with the allure of the pubs along the Universitatskaya Embankment. He pointed to the door. “Class dismissed, yes.” There was a short burst of appreciative applause, and then the students darted for the exit.

  The professor’s eyes followed the nubile fanny of a coed out the door but were caught by Dmitri Basarov entering the room. The professor put his hand on his heart. “My friend!” he said, and turned to clean up the blackboard. “It has been so long,” he added as he tried to fight off the flush of embarrassment.

  “What is it you do here, lecture or lecher?” Basarov said, enjoying the joke.

  “Yes and yes.” The professor set the eraser down and turned his attention back to Basarov. “Call it fringe benefits.”

  “I do remember the low-rent life of a University professor,” Basarov said.

  “You are also well recalled for having left a dead-end academic career for the frontier of cyber hacking.”

  “Ah, good to hear I am not forgotten. May I suggest visit to the pub?” Basarov led the way out of the classroom, their footsteps echoing off the stone floor. They passed portraits of important alumni, among them the revolutionary Vladimir Lenin, President Vladimir Putin, and curiously, the Russian-educated American novelist Ayn Rand.

  Sergei claimed a wobbly table set on the sidewalk, open to the winter sun and within sight
of Saint Andrew’s Cathedral. “Two Livivske Premiums in stone mugs,” he called out to the waiter. He turned to his former academic colleague and looked into the shadows cast from dark eyes set deep in their sockets. “So, what brings you to St. Petersburg?” Sergei asked. “Let me guess, your ponies quit on you?”

  “You heard about my technical difficulties,” said Basarov, shaking his head slowly. For a moment the hard-core Internet security hacker seemed improbably humbled. After leaving academia, Basarov had moved to Brighton Beach, a predominantly Russian neighborhood in Brooklyn. There he ran a software business and recruited underpaid and out-of-work Russian programmers to facilitate his schemes.

  He had successfully exploited a hole in New York’s off-track betting system. His programmers intentionally overloaded the computer system used to handle the bets with data, causing a delay in the transmission of the off-track bets to the tracks. Basarov’s inside guy took advantage of the delay by placing bets on winning horses for races that had already run. The scheme raked in millions before it collapsed due to its own greed. The inside programmer disappeared, leaving the feds to charge Basarov with grand larceny and tax evasion. Luckily he found an accountant who cooked, simmered, and served up a paper trail so bulletproof that the feds dropped the charges, leaving Basarov with only a levy for back taxes. A minor consequence for Basarov, considering he had potentially faced a long prison stretch.

  “I am off the horses, Sergei,” Basarov said. “The future is Lotto!” Basarov instantly perked up as he mentioned the new opportunity.

  “Lotto?” Sergei let out a hearty laugh.

  “The BlizzardBall lotto from the States,” Basarov said evenly. “Minnesota, no less. The prize is currently over a half a billion

  U.S. dollars and rising.”