The lucky card

It was a Saturday afternoon. Birds were chirping and bees were humming. Mia and Tibi (don’t bother why his parents named him that way) were playing a game of Super Intergalactic Stellar Racing with their bikes. Mia pretended to be the ace pilot of the Nima Squad, Dan McCloud. As for Tibi, he was Ark’kor, tyrant of the Gemma system. Watching hours of Star Wars must have had an influence on them

Mia decided to take a break. It’s been two hours past lunch that they have been playing. She took out her bottle of fruit punch (made with apple, grapes, strawberry and grenade apple) and started chugging it. Whew! She tasted the sweet and sour flavour coursing through her taste buds. She was satiated. At a small distance, Tibi dropped a glare towards Mia. He started shouting to her.

- Stop drinking and start catching up to me!

- I am coming!

- Geez, you're so slow!

- I am hurrying as fast as I can!

- That isn’t enough!

Mia laughed as she tried to reach neck to neck with Tibi in their race.

- Hey! First one to reach Rachael’s house is a Sore Booger!

- I won’t lose!

The children started to peddle faster and faster. Both of them were determined to arrive before the other in order to not obtain the ridiculous title. Unfortunately, the winner of the race is null since they both came in a tie. Both argued for who arrived first but without a judge they couldn’t determine the winner. After a while, both agreed that it’s a waste of time.

- Why don’t we invite Rachael to the game.

- Yeah! Hurry and see if she wants too!

So, Mia got off her bike and went to the front door to knock three times. No answer.

She decided to ring the doorbell to which Für Elise was played. After a couple of seconds, Rachael’s mother arrived to answer her call.

- Oh! Hi kids! Did you come to see Rachael?

- Actually, we wanted to know if she wants to play Super Intergalactic Stellar Racing.

- Hold on… Let me get her. Rachael, sweetie, you have some friends who want to play with you!

- Coming!

Approximately thirty seconds passed before she arrived at the door.

- Hey Mia! Hey Tibi! What brings you here?

- We wanted to know if you wanted to play Super Intergalactic Stellar Racing with us.

- Unfortunately, I am going to go to this big garage sale with my daddy… want to come with us?

- Sure! Can I have your phone so I can ask my mother?

- Sure! MOM! GIVE ME THE PHONE SO THE GANG CAN ASK THEIR PARENTS IF THEY CAN JOIN US AT THE BAZAAR.

The mother arrived a couple of seconds later with a cordless phone. She first handed the device to Mia. Immediately, Mia dialed her home phone number. Once her mother answered, she asked if she could go junk shopping with her friend Rachael and Tibi. She accepted! Full of joy, she handed the phone to Tibi so he could call his parents.

Likewise, his parents agreed. So everything was set for them to enjoy the rest of the afternoon shopping through people's rubbish. Like they say one man’s trash is another man's treasure.

So the children strapped themselves in the Rogue 2016 and headed up north of town for the bazaar.

Many stalls were opened. Mia doesn’t know if she could find something interesting by looking at the junk they're selling. But hey! Who knows? There may be a treasure laying here to be discovered. It’s time to find out. They will separate into two teams: Mia and Raphael, Tibi and Raphael’s father.

So they started scrutinizing stall by stall. The children came to one conclusion.

1.This place is dusty.

2.Most of the clothes probably come from donation.

3,There are no toys or video games for children.

Absolutely nothing worth buying!

Suddenly, Mia found a stall with a pile of books. There was one in particular that caught her attention: the black leather album. She was drawn to it. Something is saying to take a look.

When she opened the book, she found the most incredible thing she has ever seen before. It was a collection of first edition Pokemon cards, all in one album. Mia was too young to comprehend the value of the collection of these cards. However, on the first page, there it was… the holographic Charizard card, a card sought out by many celebrities like Logan Paul. Mia was astonished. She knew that the card was worth a fortune by the number of Youtube videos she had seen. There was no time to wait. She took out her wallet which she kept with her everytime she went out and paid the seller 20.00$ for the entire collection.

Now Mia was clever. She didn’t say a thing to her friends about the card’s value. She justified her purchase saying that “I just like Pokemon cards”. She was boiling with excitement to appraise it.

Mia waited four months before being appraised by a professional connoisseur. When she visited the specialist with her family, according to him, it was legitimate and her card was worth 20,000$. Her parents were amazed at how much money she’s holding right now.

- Will you sell it to me… exact price?

For many, that was the jackpot. The parents nodded to her to say yes. And so, succumbing to pressure, Mia took the decision to sell to the appraiser. The man gave her exactly 20,000$ in cash. Everyone in the family was happy. Little that the girl and her family knows, the card worth way more than that.

Couple of years have passed and Mia is now a young adult. She learned from her errors of selling the Charizard card for only 20,000$. She was a bit upset every time she thought about it since she could have been a millionaire.

Oh well! What’s done is done. After all those years, many wondered what has she done with that amount of money? Some said she had blown all of it. Others believed she shared the money with charity or family. What I know is she reached financial freedom.