Lunch money ring

About a month ago, I was on the hunt for a dirty uniform so I could get it washed before the game since my daughter couldn’t seem to remember to get it out herself. When I searched the backpack, I found quite a treasure trove in there. There was a couple missing portable chargers, the match to a single sock that’s been hanging out alone in the laundry room for a month or so, the newest and nicest water bottle we own, the missing lunch tote from a few weeks ago, my favorite lip balm I just bought, and one of my necklaces all tangled up in a metal ball. Although I was half irritated at the sight of all this, I was also strangely pleased to finally recover these missing items.

It wasn’t until I reached the small zipper section in the front of her bag that I was really taken back. And not in a good way. There, sitting right out in the open as soon as I unzipped it was a huge roll of $1.00 bills, all folded nicely together. At first glance, I figured there was over $50 worth of ones in there as big as the roll was. Whatever the amount, I was shocked! Alone in the room, I outwardly voiced, “What the heck?!” Then grabbed the roll of money and found the older sister upstairs and demanded her to “Take a look at this! This was in your sister’s bag! What the heck?!” The sight of the roll of money shocked her as well, but she smirked and kinda giggled and said, “That’s probably your change from all the times you give her money, Mom. She purposely forgets to give it back to you.”

I guess that was a possibility because I do forget to ask for my change back quite a bit, but it was the way the money was all folded perfectly with each corner all matched up and mostly all ones. It seemed too clean and organized which made it more suspicious. Honestly, it looked like the wads of drug money you see in movies, like when the guy gets shot dead and the killer takes the folded up wad of cash from the dead man’s pocket. Sadly, that was my first thought, “What is she running an illegal drug ring and I’ve been completely oblivious?” A 15-year-old, straight A student involved in lots of activities, who barely has enough time in the day to do her homework, is a drug lord? Ya, I don’t think so.

Anyway, when she arrived home later that day, you can bet my first question was, “So what’s with the giant wad of money in the front of your backpack? I found it today when I was looking for your uniform.” She quickly responded like it was no big deal, “Oh it’s just the money my friends pay me back when we go to lunch. I use your debit card to buy lunch and they pay me back in cash.” I’m sure my facial expression was quite confusing as part of my brain was like “Oh okay, good, not illegal and not acquired suspiciously” and then the other part of my brain was screaming, “Why in tarnation are you paying for lunch if your friends have plenty of cash to pay for their own?!” Her explanation……”because it’s quicker for me to just run my card.”

Ohhhh, well, of course! What does that, maybe save one precious minute in the drive-thru? Made total sense to her but zero sense to me. However, I admit, I was pleased to find out she was NOT running a drug ring. That was good news! But she was running quite a profitable business for herself that’s for sure. So I grabbed the cash and counted it, not $50 but close to it. Then I kindly explained to her that my name is on that old debit card so I will be collecting my cash from her, thank you very much!

Geesh! When I started my hunt in her backpack for the uniform, I was sure I’d find food wrappers and dirty clothes, and maybe some missing phone chargers or something, but not a big wad of moola. If I wouldn’t have gone searching, who knows how much lunch money she would have racked up by the time the school year was over? Running a regular lunch money ring here…