The Lucky Numbers

Dear Ms. Wicker,

Your son, Billy, is an excellent student, but occasionally he forgets things, like today he couldn't remember the product of 7 and 2. Ha-Ha! Seriously, do you remember me? My maiden name was Renee Conway. How would you like to get together sometime, say tomorrow afternoon? Write me back, I'm excited to catch up.

Sincerely,
Renee Morgan

Upon reading this note from her son's teacher, Lisa Wicker's first reaction was to be astonished, but astonishment was quickly replaced by annoyance. After spending some hours thinking about it, she wrote a response:

Dear Ms. Morgan,

How could I forget you? Unfortunately, I cannot meet you tomorrow which is the 22nd. Would you like to come to my house on Wednesday, which is the 23rd?. . .

* * *

Nine years earlier, when Lisa Wicker had just started college, she found a mysterious note in her dorm room. It summoned her to a meeting behind the gym at 8 pm that night and hinted that failure to arrive could be dangerous.

At the meeting, there were a group of other girls who all appeared to be Freshmen like Lisa. They had all received similar notes and they were all naturally puzzled.

An older girl called the meeting to order. "Greetings! And welcome to our lovely new Freshmen. You have all been selected for a tremendous honor. The chance to join the single most exclusive club on this campus: The Lucky Numbers!" She went on to talk a little bit about the activities which the Lucky Numbers did: Volunteer work, parties. It all sounded fairly standard, but then she said, "But before you can join our wonderful club, there is an initiation. The basics are this. You will each be given a number which is your lucky number, although you may consider that something of a misnomer by the time initiation ends." She giggled at her own joke. "Nevertheless, we advise you not to get any ideas about sharing this with your friends, or worse, school authorities, we have friends in High Places. Even the College President might be in on us. On the other end, we have people like campus cops, janitorial staff, and even the cafeteria servers close to us, so you watch your backs. And if you're good girls who keep your mouths shut, you will become Lucky Numbers." She pronounced the last word like she expected applause, but nobody was inclined to give it.

Afterwards, they had each been given a slip of paper with a number on it. Lisa's had been fourteen.

* * *

"Well," said Renee taking a sip of coffee and settling across Lisa on her couch. "This is so cool! Who would have thought that your son would be in my class?"

" 'Cool' is not exactly my word choice," said Lisa unsmiling.

"And the funny thing," Renee went on, "is that I wouldn't have picked up on it if you hadn't been using your maiden name. Bit of a feminist?"

"Actually, I still have my old last name because I've never been married."

"Oh," said Renee embarrassed. "I'm sorry. I just figured since you're a parent. . ."

"Billy's father raped me and was never brought to justice. It's the reason I dropped out of Oldton College."

Now Renee was extremely uncomfortable. "I don't know what to say. I always wondered why you dropped out of college right before we were going to vote you in." Trying to change the subject she said, "So, I guess you got my joke about how Billy forgets the product of seven and two?"

"I got all of your jokes."

* * *

The morning after the meeting, Lisa was showering before class when a voice from outside the shower booth said, "Hurry Up!"

"There's lots of other booths open," Lisa called out with surprise, "and anyway I just started."

"Actually, you've been in there a whole fourteen minutes," responded the voice. Then there was silence.

When Lisa nervously stepped out of the shower, she found that her bathrobe, her towel, and worse, the key to her dorm room were gone and had been replaced with a note, Slowpoke, your stuff is in room 14, which, by the way, is on the boys' side. You'll have to come on over if you want it back.

When she arrived wet and naked at room 14, a girl named Renee Conway was hanging out and laughing with the two boys who occupied that room. When she saw Lisa, she smiled sympathetically and gave the naked girl a hug. This naturally produced a round of catcalling from the boys, but Renee laughed and said, "Good job, and don't look so sad. They did the same thing to me when I was a Freshman. Only I was number twenty-three. Say, how'd you like to have lunch today?"

* * *

"I wonder," said Lisa silently stirring her coffee, "if, after all these years, you're still proud of your membership in the Lucky Numbers."

Renee shrugged. "Honestly, I think I am. We did so much great work. Volunteering at soup kitchens. Helping with blood drives. Raising money for charity. I know some of the pranks were a little mean, but they were done in a friendly way. And we had that no-hard-feelings-hug policy. Remember? Every time an initiate goes through one of those pranks, she has to be given a hug to show that we're only doing it because we love her." She paused and smiled again. "And sometimes that was a problem for the ones pulling the prank. Do you remember when I bought you lunch?"

* * *

Lisa arrived at the cafeteria feeling a little bit better then she had that morning. Maybe now that she had been through that one prank The Lucky Numbers would be nice to her. And this girl Renee really seemed like she wanted to be friends. But when she first got there, she was surprised to see that Renee was already seated with two trays in front of her.

"Am I late?" Lisa asked, "I thought you said that you wanted to meet at noon."

"Forget about it," said Renee, "but I was in a hurry so I ordered for you. I hope you like pizza. I figured I couldn't go wrong with that."

"It's fine," said Lisa, "how much do I owe you?"

"Forget about that too. Just enjoy."

Lisa took a few bites of her pizza. "So have you been waiting long?"

Renee smiled triumphantly, "I guess about fifteen minutes."

"That long?"

"Well maybe not that long. More like fourteen minutes."

Lisa's ears pricked up. She looked at her pizza. "You know, this tastes kind of funny."

Renee smiled even more brightly than before. "That's probably just the Ipecac."

* * *

"So," Renee went on, "after you threw up in the middle of the cafeteria, I had to give you a no-hard-feelings-hug even though your entire front was covered with vomit."

"My heart is crying with sympathy for you over that," said Lisa. "Do you remember what your lucky number was?"

"Twenty-three, I don't think it's possible to forget something like that," said Lisa. She smiled at the memory. Then her smile fell. "Today is the twenty-third." She forced herself to laugh. "There wouldn't be Ipecac in this coffee, would there?"

"I wouldn't be so crude. Let me tell you about when I got raped. . .Or rather after I got raped. . ."

* * *

"Please have a seat," said the Director of Student Affairs ushering Lisa into his office. "I understand you're here to report a rape. That's rather serious."

Lisa thought that his last sentence was rather unnecessary, but she nodded silently.

"Well, then please relax. Who is the perpetrator?"

"Jason," said Lisa fighting back tears, "Jason Gilmore."

"Jason Gilmore? I know him. He's on our football team."

"Does that matter?"

"Of course not." The Director sighed thoughtfully. "Still, he is a great football player. Everyone knows him. He has a big number fourteen on his jersey. Oh, well, it doesn't matter. Describe the incident."

But Lisa was too stunned to speak.

"Miss Wicker, can you describe the incident?"

"No," she said quietly, "I can't." She stood up.

"Where are you going?"

"Just leave me alone. Get away from me." And she tore out of the office.

* * *

"My God, Lisa," said Renee when Lisa had finished the story, "You do know that this was just a coincidence. The Lucky Numbers would never do anything like that to someone. And we couldn't if we wanted too. The school would never have gone along with it."

"Well," said Lisa. "It happened and today is the 23rd." She picked up a long knife from the tea tray and pointed it at Renee. "Take your clothes off."

"Are you serious?"

"Take them off."

Uncertainly, Renee undressed. "I hope you're not expecting me to go naked in public," she said with a forced laugh. "As a teacher I could get into trouble."

"That's the least of your worries. Now march that way into the bathroom and stand in the tub."

Renee slowly walked to the bathroom, took a tentative step into the tub and turned around to face Lisa. Then, she burst into laughter. "Wow, she said, you played a really good prank on me, Lisa. I guess I deserved it for all those things I did to you."

"No argument there."

"But, look I really have to be getting home and what if your son comes home and sees this. It might be kind of hard to explain to a nine-year-old, so don't you think I should put my clothes back on-"

Lisa stabbed Renee directly in the belly. Then, she stabbed her again and again. By the sixth or seventh stab, Renee was lying on the ground motionless, but Lisa counted out twenty-three stabs partly to be sure Renee was dead and partly for the sentiment.

When she was done, she stood up, turned on the sink, and scrubbed the blood off her knife.

After she was done with that, she took another look at the mess she would have to clean up before Billy got home. But before she did that, she grabbed Renee's corpse and pressed it to herself.

"I almost forgot the No-hard-feelings hug," she said with a laugh.