"Luckey Quarter" is a short story by American writer Stephen King, originally published in USA Weekend in 1995.
Darlene Pullen, who is a struggling single mother with two children (a rebellious teenage daughter and a sickly young son) and an unfulfilling job as a chambermaid at The Rancher's Hotel in Carson City, Nevada, is left a tip of a single quarter with a note saying that it is a "luckey [lucky] quarter".
All seems to be going exceedingly well until she suddenly reappears back in the hotel room, left with nothing but her lucky quarter.
As her two children come to visit her at work, she lets her son have the quarter, and as he uses it in a gamble, it starts to pay off just as it did when Darlene was fantasizing.
In 2005, "Luckey Quarter" was adapted into a short film produced and directed by Robert Cochrane.