A Story Idea Each Day for a Week — Day 8

This is the fifth year in a row I’ve run this series in April. Why a story idea each day for the month? Several reasons which I’ll work my through during this series of posts. Here’s another one:

You always need more than one in your gun.

Want that explained? Go here to read a Business of Screenwriting post.

Today’s story idea: Bank supervisor makes multi-million-euro error.

A German labour court has ruled that a bank supervisor was unfairly sacked for missing a multi-million-euro error by a colleague who fell asleep during a financial transaction.

The clerk was transferring 64.20 euros (£54.60) when he dozed off with his finger on the keyboard, resulting in a transfer of 222,222,222.22 euros.

His supervisor was fired for allegedly failing to check the transaction.

But judges in the state of Hesse said she should have only been reprimanded.

The incident took place in April last year when a tired bank clerk fell asleep at his computer with his finger pressed on the number two key.

His 48-year-old supervisor, an employee at the bank since 1986, told the court she had not noticed the error and approved the transaction.

The focus of the news story is the bank employee who made the error. That’s not the narrative point of attack I’d take. Instead I want my Protagonist to be the lucky bastard who is on the receiving end of that error.

I’m going to run with this idea as a satire.

Ollie and Gayle each work two low-end jobs to make ends meet. Strapped with debt from one of those bogus for-profit universities as each has tried to learn some technical skills to upgrade their appeal to potential employers, but so far no luck. In debt on their credit cards, they religiously make their monthly payments adding a few dollars to the minimum charge, but interest fees keep solvency somewhere beyond the horizon.

In other words, the couple is the poster child for what the American middle class has become. Pretty much screwed.

Cut to Big Ass Bank. Friday. Near closing time. Employees are celebrating because some merger just closed which has sent their stock value soaring. On the top floor, the white collar 1% types celebrate with $1000 bottles of champagne.

Meanwhile several floors below, a mid-level management type is sexually harassing a female employee. Manager makes a move. She backs up. Finger on computer keyboard. 2,2,2,2,2,2,2, enter.

Cut to bank supervisor zipping through transactions when a buddy stealths up with some champagne he purloined from the big wigs party upstairs. There’s the transaction: $222,222,222.22. Slips right by the supervisor’s nose.

Of course, the money ends up in the account of Ollie and Gayle.

Now let’s stop right here. As long as Ollie and Gayle don’t touch that money, they will have done nothing illegal. But seeing the couple had just that night gotten done praying for a miracle from God, who’s to say the Big Guy Upstairs didn’t respond by dumping over $200M into their account?

So Ollie and Gayle go full on carpe diem and embrace their good fortune. The couple figures they have 48 hours until Monday morning — when the bank figures out their mistake — to get rid of as much of that money in their account as they can. Likely their plan involves an end point of jetting out of the U.S. with as much cash in hand as possible and starting a new life in some remote third world country.

I don’t have it all figured out, of course. I know the bank can freeze their assets and stop the couple from using their debit card. On the other hand, before the bank discovers the problem, what if Ollie and Gayle start giving as much of the money away as possible along with buying a bunch of stuff, and somehow in that their actions raise the attention of Anonymous. And these tech savvy anarchists figure out a way to transfer the funds to another account which Ollie and Gayle can use.

This couple, representatives of the 99%, are in a race with time to give away as much of the 1%’s money as they can, all the while heading to what they hope is their exit point to a dream life somewhere. Of course, the bank discovers the problem and here comes law enforcement, combined with the bank’s own private black ops security forces.

It’s a reverse Bonnie and Clyde meets The Amazing Race.

We’re talking a massive chase. Major media. Ollie and Gayle become celebrities, giving voice to the silent majority of middle class Americans whose lives both blow and suck. Aided by Anonymous and fans at every stop along the way, and flinging real dollars and virtual bitcoins to hundreds of thousands of other needy people, it becomes the story on every channel.

Will Ollie and Gayle escape? Will they got hunted down? Will they let fame and fortune go to their heads? Will the pressure cause the couple to freak out and lose their moral equilibrium? Will Anonymous use them as pawns in their own schemes? Maybe the saga jump starts the Occupy Movement.

I’m not sure. But if one powerful dynamic in movies is wish fulfillment, suddenly having access to over $200M would seem to fit that bill to a T.

There you go: My eighth story idea for the month. And it’s yours. Free!

Now it’s your turn. What would you do with this story setup?

Each day this month, I invite you to join me in comments to do some brainstorming. Gender bend, genre bend, what if. Take each day’s story idea and see what it can become when we play around with it. These are all valuable skills for a writer to develop.

See you in comments (hit Reply to join the conversation). And come back tomorrow for another Story Idea Each Day For A Month.

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