Free A Winning Ticket by J. Michael Stewart

A Winning Ticket
    T he first snowflakes of the coming storm were beginning to whip against the window glass. Benjamin Zimmerman stood at the kitchen sink and stared outside. The pot of venison stew cooking on the propane stove was almost done. The meat, carrots, and potatoes, along with a pan of fresh-made biscuits, now cooling on the countertop, melted together into a mouthwatering aroma that wafted through the house.
    A blizzard warning had been issued earlier in the day, and the local weatherman was predicting twelve to fourteen inches of new snow, with winds gusting to around fifty miles an hour. That kind of wind could produce drifts of several feet. Soon, the visibility would drop to almost zero, and Benjamin would not be able to see past the front porch that lay just beyond the small kitchen window.
    This week it was Benjamin’s turn to make supper. Harrison, his brother, was outside feeding and watering the four horses and putting fresh hay out for the cattle. Benjamin knew that Harrison hated doing farm chores, but he disliked kitchen duty even more. Benjamin preferred to be outside in the fresh air, taking care of the animals—taking care of the farmland he loved—but in order to placate Harrison, he had agreed to cook dinner every other week.
    Benjamin pressed his forehead against the window of the hundred and twenty-year-old farmhouse he shared with his brother. Neither had ever married or had children, which left the house hauntingly empty at times.
    Their great-great-grandfather had purchased the farm in the late eighteen-hundreds, and it had been passed down through the family ever since. The house itself was a small two-story, reminiscent of late nineteenth-century architecture, with white clapboard siding. Inside were three small bedrooms, one tiny bathroom, a living room, and a combination kitchen and dining area. But for what the house lacked in size, it made up for in character. Benjamin loved the old hardwood floors and the hand-hewn stone fireplace in the living room. They rarely used it anymore, opting instead for the modern furnace, but the fireplace brought back fond memories for Benjamin. When he was a child, his grandfather would sit on the stone bench and roast chestnuts over the open flame. When they were done, he would toss the still hot nuts to Benjamin, who would juggle them in his hands, letting them cool, before peeling them and popping them into his mouth.
    When Benjamin thought of the eight-hundred acres that surrounded the house, he felt the weight of the responsibility that had fallen on his and Harrison’s shoulders. Roughly one-third of the acreage was planted in corn, another third in soybeans, and the rest was a combination of pasture, wooded areas, and buildings. Of course, all the crops had been harvested several months ago, which left the land brown and seemingly devoid of life—save for the few animals they had left. Harrison often complained at the farm’s lifelessness during the winter months, but Benjamin saw it differently. There was always something to do—always some animal that needed taken care of—so Benjamin loved winter just as much as the other three seasons. Instead of viewing it as depressing and cold, he saw it as a time to catch up on work that sometimes fell by the wayside during the busier summer months.
    Benjamin was the oldest of the brothers—by exactly ten minutes. Although they both had the same dark eyes, square jaw, and tall, slender frame, they were fraternal, not identical, twins. When their mother found out she was having twin boys, she had insisted on naming them Benjamin and Harrison because, according to her, a distant relative had once served as President Harrison’s personal secretary. Benjamin thought the story was probably total bullshit, but he never told his mother that. That kind of family disrespect would have earned him a swift thrashing with a hickory switch—his mother’s favorite tool to keep her two rambunctious sons in