Winning numbers 0982741 I 56. Mom, we won $15 million. $15 million. All mine. If she dies, I get everything [panting and gasps] in life. Money can change fate, but kindness is what saves people. Today, Afreyalis ATK brings you a story of a $15 million lottery ticket. a good-hearted mother and the greed that turned a daughter-in-law into a killer.
Where are you listening from today? Drop your location in the comments. And after hearing this story, if you were David, would you take Femi in? Don’t forget to subscribe to Afalis TK so you don’t miss the stories that awaken the heart. A sweltering afternoon in Lagos, the sky looked scorched.
Dust from the dirt road swirled everywhere, clinging to market goods, to passing hair to the sunburnt skin of the poor. Mama Sad, small in frame, headscarf faded with time, carrying a basket of warm bean cakes, was packing up after a slow day of sales. Her purse held only a few scattered na. As she passed a roadside coffee stall, she saw a skinny boy in ragged clothes.
His name was Femi, scolded unfairly for spilling water. His face streaked with tears and grime. She stopped, her heart tightening. “Come here, child.” Femi approached, hesitant. She reached into her basket and pressed two warm bean cakes into his hands. “Don’t cry.” A full stomach makes the world a little kinder.
The boy’s eyes lit up as if no one in Lagos had ever handed him anything this gentle. She turned to leave but noticed Fei fiddling with a crumpled lottery ticket he’d picked off the ground. Ink faded worthless. Mama sad chuckled. That one’s old, my dear. Let me buy you a new one. Maybe God sees kindness. It was the first time all day she used her last 100 naira. The ticket seller shook his head.
You say it sweetly, mama, but this world really rewards good people. She only smiled. I don’t do good for reward. I do it because I was once that child. She handed Femi the ticket, ruffled his hair, and walked away. That night, in their rickety home, the family gathered for dinner.
The old radio crackled as the lottery results were announced. David, her hard-working son, eating a poor man’s supper, picked up the ticket she dee left on the table. Let me check this for fun. Mama, nobody ever wins these. Tara, his flashy daughter-in-law, sat polishing her red nails, yawning uninterested. Mama Sad was stacking bean cakes for tomorrow’s sales.
David stared at the numbers, eyes glued to the paper. Then suddenly, he jumped up, the chair crashing behind him. Mama, mama. His voice shook. We won. Mama Sad looked up. How much? 5,000? 10,000? David swallowed hard, checked again, then gasped. $15 million. The room froze. The radio crackled on. The fire still flickered, but everything stopped.
Mama Sad stepped back, clutching her chest, tears pouring down her wrinkled cheeks. In her whole life, she had never seen more than a million naira. Now, a number existed before her that had only lived in a poor woman’s prayers. She collapsed into her chair, weeping. Lord, you heard me. David embraced her, smiling through tears.
But across the room, another expression was forming. Tara, the ambitious daughter-in-law, hands shaking, lips parted as if she might faint, but not from joy. In her eyes, there was no gratitude, no thought of fixing the leaking roof, buying medicine for her aging mother-in-law, or helping David build a new life.
What sparkled in Tara’s gaze, brighter than the family celebrations, was ambition. That very night, Tara didn’t sleep. The ceiling fan groaned as it turned, hot wind squeezing through cracked walls like shallow breaths. The air was thick with the smell of fried oil, dampness, and poverty. a dust you couldn’t wipe off. David slept soundly after another day, laboring at a construction site.
He curled around his torn pillow like a child who never owned anything soft or expensive. His steady snoring only irritated Terra Moore. She leaned against the termite eataten wooden wall, lamplight flickering across her still painted face. In her hand, the lottery ticket was wrinkled from how tightly she’d been gripping it.
The printed numbers seemed to dance, taunting her. $15 million, she whispered, her lips twitching. She looked around the room. The stained ceiling, the cracked corner wall, the warped wooden wardrobe, cheap clothes dangling like laundry no one admired. Her high heels bought on installment lay abandoned in the corner, their fake leather peeling.
What she pictured was no longer this leaking tin shack, but a mansion behind iron gates, cars in the driveway, air conditioning humming like lullabibies. She saw herself in silk dresses holding designer bags, friends admiring her. Her own family silenced forever for mocking her for marrying a poor man.
Then Mamasad’s voice from earlier flashed in her mind. I will share it with you, but it must be used for what is right. Terra bit her lip until it bled. Used for what is right. What does she know about right? All her life she sold bean cakes on dirty streets. She wears those torn headscarves. If she keeps this money, she just hand it to filthy children and those broke neighbors.
Tira rested her head against the wall, wood groaning beneath her. A rage swelled inside her, not just at Mama Sad, but at life itself. the burning mornings, cramped buses, the judgmental looks from fancy market women as she counted coins to pay them. If she controls the money, I get nothing,” she muttered.
Each word like a needle on her tongue. “I must be the one in charge. People will call me Madame Terra, not the poor daughter-in-law. She doesn’t deserve it.” One truth was crystal clear to her. If everything went Mama Sad’s way, the money would be divided fairly. A piece for David, a piece for charity, a portion to fix the roof, a portion for something good, and Terra, she would still be counting Naira to buy moisturizer, still sneaking money to sew a real dress, still enduring Mama Sad’s gentle but suffocating gaze. No, not ever.
Terra hissed, squeezing the ticket tighter, her palms slick with sweat. She did not sleep at all that night. She imagined every scenario, forcing David to sign everything under her management, hiding the ticket, convincing everyone only she was smart enough to protect the money.
With every thought, she drifted further from the man sleeping beside her, and farther from the mother-in-law, who still believed the world worked on kindness. Morning arrived. The Lagos sun wasn’t fierce yet, but the air was already thick. Horns, vendors calls, crying children, the city’s noisy symphony. Mama Sad sat on the porch, folding plastic bags, preparing for the market as if winning the lottery hadn’t changed anything.
David tied his shoes, still glowing with last night’s joy, but equally confused by a future he couldn’t imagine. Terra stepped from the room in a clean dress, hair tied high, calm on the outside, a storm inside. She sat across from Mama Sad, placing a cheap cup of tea before her, voice sweet as sugar. Mom, I thought a lot last night.
Mama Sad looked up, her old eyes still gentle. Yes, speak my child. Tur glided her fingers along the table’s edge, pretending it was casual. I just worry. We don’t know how to keep that money safe. What if the lottery company tricks us? What if outsiders come after us? You’re older.
What if something happens to you? She paused, sighing in exactly the way someone worried would sigh. You should let me keep the ticket. I know about investment, about money. I just want to help you. David turned toward her, surprised. He had never heard his wife talk about investment except when she argued she needed new clothes.
Mama Sad studied Tara in silence for a few heartbeats. She had been a wife, a mother, a street vendor. She knew too well how money changes eyes, but her voice remained soft as if she always reserved tenderness for her children. My child, this is my money. I will share it with you all, but it must be used for what is right.
Terra froze for a fraction of a second, then smiled. A smile beautiful enough to make men on the street turn their heads. But in her eyes, what glimmered was not love. Tara smiled, but her gaze was a blade. In the damp room, where sunlight seeped through a tiny tear in the rusty tin roof, Tara muttered, her voice from a sleepless night.
If she dies, David is the heir, and I am his wife. I would have everything. Her fingers tightened, knuckles whitening like bone. The thought had startled her at first, but moments later it began to feel reasonable. A glittering vision flashed before her mind. A silver dining table, friends envious, her walking across a red carpet with a triumphant smile.
Then the image of Mama Sad returned, silver hair, gentle eyes soft as dusk. Terra gritted her teeth. Kindness can’t buy my dreams. Something slid into her mind like a snake curling around her heart, tightening. She began to calculate. If the old woman lives, gives she gets only scraps. If she dies, gives David inherits everything.
And Terra, Tara becomes the one who manages it. The idea flickered like gasoline flame. The more she thought about it, the more it made sense. She rose, kicking aside a loose plank. A coil of old rope rolled out. David used it at construction sites. She picked it up, fingers stroking the coarse fibers. Hanging suicide.
The thought ran cold along her spine. Next was the crooked plastic chair in the corner. She dragged it to the center of the room. In the next room, where mama sed off and napped, the door’s hinge was already loose. one staged scene, someone discovering it later. She wasn’t a killer.
At least that’s what she told herself. She’d take her own life, overwhelmed by stress. People will pity her. Terra stepped to the doorway and peered toward the kitchen. Mama Sad was stirring ash in the stove, murmuring her habitual prayers. For a moment, Tara hesitated, but ambition quickly filled that space.
She returned to the room and pulled out her phone. Her voice trembled, but only because she was acting. “Hello, David. I’m worried about mom.” She cried all night, saying she was afraid the money would tear the family apart. “I think she’s depressed.” On the line, David sounded confused, anxious. “Are you sure?” “Oh god, I’m on sight and signals bad.
Just stay with her. Don’t leave her alone. Okay.” Tara bit her lip, adding a little stage sniff. I’ll try. Please come home soon. She hung up, heart pounding like a drum. With one call, she’d planted the seed in David’s mind. Depression. The future explanation that would make everything believable.
Then she picked up the rope and practiced tying knots. The rough fibers scraped her skin, leaving red lines. But Terra didn’t care. Everything had to be precise. calculated, deliberate. Chair positioned correctly, rope tied into a loop, door locked just enough to be easily forced open. The room staged to look like a poor mother crushed by pressure.
Tara sat and wiped sweat from her forehead. She repeated the steps like someone solving a problem, not snuffing out a life. Outside, the neighborhood came alive. Street vendors shouting, metal clanging, and in the distance, construction hammers echoed. Across town, David stood amid cement dust, so worried, he skipped lunch, checking his phone over and over.
Mom depressed, she never complained. Could winning the lottery scare her like that? He ran his fingers through his hair, unaware his wife was assembling evidence back home, piece by piece. David worried all day, never knowing Tara was building the crime he would later mourn. When Mama Sad fell asleep, Tara waited like a snake.
Outside, Legos had sunk into darkness. Distant car engines, barking dogs, and a silence heavy as a black cloth smothered the fragile house. Mama Sad lay on her creaking bamboo bed, breathing softly, her aging face peaceful. On the table, an oil lamp flickered against an old photo of her and David on his high school graduation day.
A rare moment of pride she never let go of. Terra stood in the doorways shadow. She had waited all day for David to leave, for the neighbors to go inside, for the last footsteps in the alley to fade. Now it was only two women in the house, one with a kind heart, one with a heart scorched by greed. Tara moved like a hunting cat.
In her hand was Mama Sad’s old headscarf, soft fabric that when pulled tight, became a strangling cord. She stood over the bed, watching the gentle lines on her mother-in-law’s face. For a second, hesitation flickered, then dissolved under the echo inside her head. “If she lives, you’ll never have it all.” Terra lifted the scarf, a deep breath.
Then she tightened it. Mama Sad jolted awake, eyes wide in horror, fingers grasping blindly for someone to save her. A strangled whimper slipped from her throat. Ta rah. It was the last word she managed. Half shock, half pain. Terra pulled harder, her face carved in ice. The oil lamp swayed, throwing twisted shadows on the wall.
Two bodies locked in a silent struggle. Seconds, a few ragged breaths. Then everything stopped. Mama Sad’s body sagged. Her eyes remained open, staring into nothing, unable to believe death had come from the hand she once called daughter. Terra stepped back, unwrapped the scarf from her neck. Her heart hammered, but her eyes gleamed, not with fear. “It’s done.
” She dragged the body toward the living room. The old woman’s head rolled against the dusty floor, silver hair tangled. Terra positioned the chair in the center, hung the scarf from the ceiling beam, propped the body up against the seat, placed Mamasad’s own hand gripping part of the rope as if she had tightened it herself.
The scene was grotesque and cruel, but disturbingly convincing as a suicide under financial stress. Before leaving the room, Tara leaned close, lips curling in a victorious whisper. “Thanks for the retirement fund, mama. Now it was time to play the grieving daughter-in-law. Terra burst outside, screaming with perfect horror. Mama.
Oh my god. She hanged herself. Help. The cry tore through the narrow alley. Lights snapped on. Doors flew open. A woman from next door ran across, shrieking. Dear Lord, call David. Call David. People flooded in like a tide. faces shocked, curious, horrified or hungry for tragedy. Minutes later, David sprinted through the crowd, covered in cement dust, shirt soaked in sweat.
Mama, mama. Tara collapsed to the floor, wailing, her performance flawless. I went in and saw her. I couldn’t stop her. She said to leave her alone. David saw only once, and his knees gave out. His mother hung lifeless, head tilted, scarf tight around her neck. A brutal portrait of despair. He screamed, rushing forward, tearing her down, shaking her. Mama, no, not like this.
It’s me, your son. I’m here. But she was already cold. David crumpled on the floor, his sobs tearing the house apart, ripping through the lake last night. Guilt clawed him. Why wasn’t I home? Why didn’t I see she needed me? behind him. Terra placed her hand on his shoulder, tears streaming like rain. Neighbors sighed and shook their heads.
They pied the son who lost his mother, never realizing the killer was the one consoling him. Terra wrapped her arms around David, letting everyone see a daughter-in-law so heartbroken she could barely stand. No one noticed. The tiny smile at the corner of her lips, a glint like a blade under the flickering lamp.
David fell apart beside his mother’s body, never knowing the murderer was holding him. The funeral was simple. No expensive wreaths, no elegant black outfits, no brass band like the burials of the wealthy, just a white cloth over Mama Sad’s body, a plain wooden coffin, and a few neighbors wiping their tears with the edges of their scarves.
David knelt beside the fresh mound of earth, burying his face in his callous hands. He whispered something to the soil. Words only those who lose their mothers ever understand. Tara stood behind him chewing gum, her eyes drifting everywhere except the grave. While the pastor read the final prayer, Terra barely heard him.
She was too busy calculating, “Sell this house. Buy a new one. A black Buick will suit my style. Start a luxury beauty salon. Private VIP rooms.” A woman nearby noticed Tara staring off dreily and murmured, “Poor thing, she must be in shock.” Had they looked closer, they would have seen Tara’s eyes weren’t red at all. They glittered with hunger.
People slowly dispersed. David went with church members to the fellowship hall. Tara remained alone, brushing dirt from her heels, fixing her dress. She didn’t notice. Another pair of eyes was still there. Femi the boy Mama Sad once gave bean cakes to the child Terra treated like trash. He stood a few steps away plastic sack hanging at his side, chin smudged with dust.
He stared at Terra, not with fear, but with the gaze of someone who knew. The night Mama Sad died, Thi had stood by the back door, waiting for the small wooden box she promised him after work. He had watched Tara drag the body from the bedroom to the living room. He saw the scarf, the chair, saw Tara trembling as she staged the scene.
But who would ever ask him? He was just a poor street child living off scraps, parentless. His voice meant as little as wind scraping across rusty roofs. Tara knew that, which was why she was unafraid. A week later, Tara walked into the lottery office, papers in hand, red lipstick shining, voice sweeter than syrup. The clerk reviewed her file.
Since the ticket holder passed away, we need the original signature and inheritance authorization. Terra was ready. She produced the forged signature she had practiced all night. The clerk examined it under magnification. A crease formed on his forehead. I’m sorry. This doesn’t match our record from the time of purchase.
We need the original. Terra forced a smile. Oh, perhaps she signed in a hurry. The clerk shook his head. Impossible. And transactions of this size are strictly verified. Without the original, we can’t transfer the prize. Tara walked home, gripping the folder so tightly the pages crumpled. David asked, “Is everything okay?” She smiled brightly, falsely.
Of course. Just a few more documents, he hugged her. Mom signed for me a few times. Her signature must be somewhere. She smiled again, but in her mind, only one thought throbbed. I need her box. That’s where every signature she ever made is kept. That night, Tur tore through Mama Sad’s room. She pulled out the wooden chest from beneath the bed.
small sale receipts, church donation slips, market invoices, and an envelope containing Mama Sad’s original signature. Clear, steady, perfect for verification. Terra laughed out loud. Finally, she grabbed a lighter. If the original burned, no one could prove what it truly looked like.
She could replace it with her forgery. The flame flicked to life. She opened the envelope and froze. The documents were still there, but the lottery ticket was gone. Not in the box, not in the envelope, not in the baskets or drawers. She tore the room apart, flipped rugs, pried up floorboards, but the ticket had disappeared.
Two days later, Lagos darkened, heavy clouds sinking low like an omen. At the end of the dusty street, the window of an old police post swung open when a small hand knocked. Femi. [snorts] He stood at the counter, oversized rubber sandals, shirt torn at the shoulder, messy curls. But in his eyes was something adults had long lost.
Courage when no one believes you. The officer on duty, broad-shouldered, gravelvoiced, looked down at him. Who are you looking for? This isn’t a playground. Thumb clenched his fists, trembling but determined, and placed something on the desk, the lottery ticket Mama Assad had won. The tiny piece of paper lay on the wooden counter like evidence heavier than any testimony.
Femy’s voice shook, but it was clear. She killed Mama. Silence crashed over the room. The officer frowned. Who? Auntie Tira. I saw her. I was by the back door that day. Mama promised me a wooden box after work. I saw Terra drag her from the bedroom. I saw the scarf. I saw the chair. He swallowed hard, reliving the scene. Mama was kind to me. I couldn’t stay quiet.
The officer stared at him, half skeptical, half shaken. No one expects a stray child to bring the key to a murder. But the ticket, it was the physical evidence the police had been desperate to locate. The officer called his superior. In a small interrogation room, an uneven exchange unfolded. You know if you’re lying, you could get in serious trouble.
Femi nodded, eyes steady. How did you get the ticket? I took it from Mama’s room after Auntie Terra rummaged through her things. I thought she’d tear it up. I kept it so it wouldn’t vanish. The older officer, a man who had seen more tragedies than this boy ever would, studied Fei for a long time. He saw something adults seldom manage.
Truth spoken, not for gain, but for justice for the dead. He rose. Call forensics. Call homicide. Open a case file. Hours later, Mama Assad’s house was sealed off. Neighbors murmured. Did she not take her own life? I knew it. A woman like her would never give up living. But who did it? A curse? Evil spirits? No one dared suspect Tora, the grieving daughter-in-law who’d wept so convincingly at the grave.
Inside, forensic teams began their work. Cold light swept across surfaces, the plastic chairs worn rungs, the scarf rope hanging from the ceiling beam, the bedroom door frame. A technician crouched and frowned. There’s drag marking. That’s not consistent with self-placement. Another compared tissue samples.
Pressure pattern on the neck shows force applied from behind, not self-inflicted. Terra had no idea. She thought the scene was flawless, but she hadn’t considered the signs. Mama Sav left behind in her struggle. Scratch marks, fiber pulls on the scarf, bruising on the arms. Tiny things, each a critical puzzle piece. In the interview room, Fei was given food and water kept separate from others.
A female officer asked gently, “Are you scared?” He looked up. Mama once said, “If someone saves you once, you must save them when they need it.” Meanwhile, Tara was oblivious to the walls collapsing behind her. She toured neighborhoods talking about moving homes, opening a salon, trying on rings. People praised her for staying strong after her mother-in-law’s death.
She smiled, convinced everything was hers. But at the police station, an investigator tapped the file. Fingerprints on the rope. Tara compression pattern on the neck consistent with Tara’s height and strength. Fingerprints on the chair used to hoist the body. Overwhelmingly, Tara’s inconsistent with late discovery.
Scrape fibers on the bedroom door. DNA matches mama. The case file closed with verdict-like weight. Forensic findings, every print, every fiber, every drag mark led back to Tira. In the courtroom, harsh white light washed over worn wooden benches. The air was thick with paper, sweat, and the scent of justice about to carve into someone’s heart.
David sat in the front row, gripping a sheet of paper as if releasing it might shatter his entire world. Terra was escorted in. No neat hair, no red lipstick, only a pale face and dark eyes that still carried their familiar gleam of envy. The jury repeated its findings. It wasn’t a stranger pronouncing her guilty.
It was the truth itself rising, the forged signature, the fingerprints, the strangling marks, and a small witness named Fei. Terra shot to her feet, screaming, “I deserved that money. She looked down on me. I did everything for myself. She stood in my way. Her voice echoed through the chamber. No sering tone, no griefstricken act from the funeral.
It was the voice of someone whose mask had fallen. David stared at her. The woman who vowed eternity with him, who once laughed beside him during power outages, who had embraced his mother and pretended to mourn her. Now revealed as someone driven only by ego and greed. The judge removed his glasses, voice striking like a hammer. No one deserves what is bought with another person’s blood.
He paused, gaze piercing terror. You did not only kill a mother, you killed the trust of a family, betrayed compassion, and murdered the woman who gave you a home. The gavl slammed sharp and final life imprisonment. Some people exhaled in relief. Others shuddered. Terra froze. Her knees buckled. Her head bowed, but her eyes still raged, refusing to accept the verdict. David covered his face.
He had once imagined a new home, his mother healthy, a future opening wide. Now he sat in this courtroom, his life cracked like glass. A single tear fell onto the paper he held, the winning lottery ticket. But it was no longer a doorway to fortune. It was the ashes of everything his family once was. An officer gently handed him the evidence pouch. It belonged to your mother.
Keep it. David held the ticket as if holding her remains. He ran his thumb across the back where Mama Assad had scribbled a few crooked lines almost like an accidental will. The ink was faint but still legible. If we win, David will go to college and Fei will go to school, too.
David read it, choked once, twice, three times. His eyes burned, but now not only from grief. These were the life instructions of a kind mother. Written before someone else’s greed silenced her. The ticket in David’s hands was no longer paper. It became her testament. The courtroom fell silent for several seconds.
As if everyone could hear the voice of the dead. David rose and looked toward the doorway where Terara was being led away. No curses, no rage, only a quiet sorrow, the kind that forces a person to grow in a single moment. He folded the ticket and pressed it to his chest. And in the crowd, Fei stood hidden in a corner, watching David, silently, waiting for Mama Assad’s words to come true.
“If we win, David will go to college, and Fei will go to school, too.” Court adjourned. Footsteps echoed down the long hallway like the lingering sound of the verdict that had just struck. David walked out, but his steps did not lead him home. They led him to the market where in her final days, Mama Sad still sat selling beam cakes.
At that old street corner, between vendors shouts and blaring motorbikes, he spotted a small familiar figure. Femi. The boy sat beside an empty stall, clutching his torn plastic bag, watching people pass as if they were the whole world. David approached and sat beside him. Femi flinched, instinctively, ready to stand, his reflex from being chased away too many times.
David gently placed a hand on his shoulder. My mother said, “If we ever won, you would go to school.” The boy’s eyes widened, confused, startled, trembling. David swallowed and spoke not a promise, but the decision of a man who had lost his mother, but found a purpose. So from today, you are my son. Dust lifted in the breeze, and a sliver of light slipped through the gaps of rusted roofing, falling across two lives.
One man who lost everything, and one boy who thought he belong nowhere. Femi blinked, tears slipping soundlessly. I I really have a home. David nodded. It’s what my mother wanted, and I won’t disobey her. The boy hugged him, tentative at first, then clinging tight as if gripping the last lifeline life had ever handed him.
They walked through the dusty Legos road. No luxury car greeted them. No flashing cameras, just worn sandals and old shoes, leaving two prints, one big, one small, headed the same way. As they passed neighbors whispering, “That’s Fei,” David took him in. Mama’s sad was good. Her goodness didn’t die with her.
Something shifted in the legs afternoon, as if even the rusted rooftops bowed in a quiet smile. That evening, David entered Mama Sad’s room. He opened her cupboard, took her scarf, her old blouse, and the lottery ticket. He set them on a small shrine below a candle. Mother, I’ll do exactly what you wrote. He looked over at Femi asleep on a mat, curly hair, arms wrapped around that crumpled plastic bag as if it was still the greatest thing he owned.
David smiled. The sight reminded him of himself as a boy, poor yet held by a mother who believed his life mattered. The next morning, David walked Femi to the school gates. The boy hesitated. “If they ask, who am I?” David rested a firm hand on his shoulder. “You are my son.” The small hand squeezed his in return.
They stepped into the schoolyard. Children’s laughter ringing like the overture of a new life. No luxury car, no mansion, no overflowing bank account. But David understood. He was fulfilling what Mama Assad had written in shaky ink on the back of that ticket. He turned away from the school, walking toward the sunlit road, feeling lighter than any words of sympathy could make him.
Terra lost everything to greed. But Mama Sad, even in death, had won through her son’s heart and the future of the boy she once fed at a market stall. Along the dusty Lagos Street, two broken lives were stitched back together by one simple sentence. So from today, you are my son. No luxury, no mansion, but something money could never buy.
Justice, humanity, and the living memory of a kind mother. Money doesn’t make people evil. It simply strips the mask off those who already were. Not everyone who lives beside you loves you. Yet the one you help with just a little kindness may be the very soul who saves you. And if you think wickedness goes unseen, remember this.
Heaven sees it and so do children.
Disclaimer : This content may be created by AI for entertainment purposes. Any resemblance to real persons, events, or places is coincidental.
