Confessions of a Shopaholic

So we all troop into the sitting room, and my dad lights the gas flame-effect fire and turns on the telly. And there it is! The National Lottery, in glorious Technicolor. The lights are shining, and Dale Winton is joshing with Tiffany from EastEnders, and every so often the audience gives an excited whoop. My stomach’s getting tighter and tighter, and my heart’s going thump-thump-thump. Because in a few minutes those balls are going to fall. In a few minutes I’m going to be a millionaire. I just know I am.

I lean calmly back on the sofa and think what I’ll do when I win. At the very instant that I win, I mean. Do I scream? Do I keep quiet? Maybe I shouldn’t tell anyone for twenty-four hours. Maybe I shouldn’t tell anyone at all.

This new thought transfixes me. I could be a secret winner! I could have all the money and none of the pressure. If people asked me how I could afford so many designer clothes I’d just tell them I was doing lots of freelance work. Yes! And I could transform all my friends’ lives anonymously, like a good angel.

I’m just working out how big a house I could manage to buy without everyone twigging, when a voice on the screen alerts me.

“Question to number three.”

What?

“My favorite animal is the flamingo because it’s pink, fluffy, and has long legs.” The girl sitting on the stool excitedly unwinds a pair of long glossy legs, and the audience goes wild. I stare at her dazedly. What’s going on? Why are we watching Blind Date?

“Now, this show used to be fun,” says Mum. “But it’s gone downhill.”

“You call this rubbish fun?” retorts my dad incredulously.

“Listen, Dad, actually, could we turn back to—”

“I didn’t say it was fun now. I said—”

“Dad!” I say, trying not to sound too panicky. “Could we just go back to BBC1 for a moment?”

Blind Date disappears and I sigh with relief. The next moment, an earnest man in a suit fills the screen.

“What the police failed to appreciate,” he says in a nasal voice, “is that the witnesses were not sufficiently—”

“Dad!”

“Where’s the television guide?” he says impatiently. “There’s got to be something better than this.”

“There’s the lottery!” I almost scream. “I want to watch the lottery!”

I know strictly speaking that whether I watch it or not won’t affect my chances of winning — but I don’t want to miss the great moment, do I? You might think I’m a bit mad, but I feel that if I watch it, I can kind of communicate with the balls through the screen. I’ll stare hard at them as they get tossed around and silently urge on my winning numbers. It’s a bit like supporting a team. Team 1 6 9 16 23 44.

Except the numbers never come out in order, do they?

Team 44 1 23 6 9 16. Possibly. Or Team 23 6 1. .

Suddenly there’s a round of applause and Martine McCutcheon’s finished her song. Oh my God. It’s about to happen. My life is about to change.

“The lottery’s become terribly commercialized, hasn’t it?” says my mum, as Dale Winton leads Martine over to the red button. “It’s a shame, really.”

“What do you mean, it’s become commercialized?” retorts my dad.

“People used to play the lottery because they wanted to support the charities.”

“No they didn’t! Don’t be ridiculous! No one gives a fig about the charities. This is all about self, self, self.” Dad gestures toward Dale Winton with the remote control and the screen goes dead.

“Dad!” I wail.

“So you think no one cares about the charities?” says my mum into the silence.

“That’s not what I said.”

“Dad! Put it back on!” I screech. “Put-it-back-on!” I’m about to wrestle him for the remote control when he flicks it back on again.

I stare at the screen in utter disbelief. The first ball has already dropped. And it’s 44. My number 44.

“. . last appeared three weeks ago. And here comes the second ball. . And it’s number 1.”

I can’t move. It’s taking place, before my very eyes. I’m actually winning the lottery. I’m winning the bloody lottery!

Now that it’s happening, I feel surprisingly calm about it. It’s as if I’ve known, all my life, that this would happen. Sitting here silently on the sofa, I feel as though I’m in a fly-on-the-wall documentary about myself. “Becky Bloomwood always secretly knew she would win the lottery one day. But on the day it happened, even she couldn’t have predicted. .”