A guy at my old job handed me a lottery ticket one afternoon, grinning like he’d just done me the biggest favor in the world.
“Good luck,” he said, sliding it onto my desk like it was nothing.

I scratched it during my break, not expecting much. At first, nothing. Then suddenly—three matching numbers. My breath caught. I scratched a little more, slower this time. My eyes widened. I checked again. And again.

There it was, printed boldly across the ticket: $10,000 WINNER.

I froze. My heart started pounding so hard I could hear it in my ears. My hands actually shook as I sat there gripping the ticket, terrified it might somehow disappear if I loosened my fingers. For a moment, the office noise faded away, replaced by a thousand thoughts crashing into my head at once.

A few minutes later, he swung by my desk like it was just another casual check-in.
“Hey, you scratch that ticket yet?”

Panic flared. I didn’t want to tell him. Not yet. Not until I figured out what I was going to do—or whether I even should tell him at all. So I forced a shrug and lied, hoping my voice wouldn’t betray me.
“Nah, not yet. Haven’t had time.”

He nodded and walked off with a faint smirk, and I could feel my face burning. My mind raced—pay off debt, fix my car, finally breathe a little easier. Ten thousand dollars could actually change things.

I flipped the ticket over to read the fine print, searching for instructions on how to redeem it. That’s when my stomach dropped.

Right there, in tiny, almost mocking letters, it read:
“For entertainment purposes only. This is a novelty item.”

A prank ticket.

I just sat there staring at it, half laughing, half furious, my pulse still hammering from the emotional whiplash. I’d gone from broke to rich to embarrassed in under five minutes.

When he came back later and asked again, I didn’t even look up.
“Scratched it. Nothing. Thanks though.”

He grinned, clearly satisfied.

Inside, I was still riding the crash after that wild surge of hope. But one thing was painfully clear—he didn’t give me a lottery ticket. He gave me the most convincing prank of my life.