Page 43 of First Date: Divorce
“Eric!”
“Okay, okay.What’s the price?”
She glared at him.That killed their bargaining power, but she would try.
“You see, as I said, they aren’t really for us.”
The man and woman looked at each other, then both smiled.“No?”the woman asked.
“No,” K.D.said firmly, then realized she needed to backtrack.“Well, they are for us, but as I said, we’re … pretending.”
The elderly couple looked back at her, questioning.She glanced toward Eric.
He could help make it clear they wouldn’t keep the rings so no sense paying for such fine workmanship.
“Pretending?”Mr.Schmidt said.
Was that disbelief in his voice?More likely disapproval.This couple had probably been together for twice as long as she’d been alive.Of course they disapproved of people play-acting at what mattered so much to them.
Okay, so they’d struck out here.And a pawnshop wasn’t the right place for Eric.
Maybe a big-box discount store, or a place with fakes — as long as they didn’t turn fingers green, they would do.Come to think of it, good fakes were fitting, so—
“We can give you a good price.”
At Mrs.Schmidt’s words, her husband gave her anAre you sure?look.She patted his arm without looking at him.“You see—” Her gaze never left K.D.’s face.“—my husband made these rings for a young couple.They made quite a down payment, but they never picked up the rings.Not long before the wedding, they each decided to marry somebody else.”
“Twenty years ago,” said Mr.Schmidt.
“Thirty-three,” his wife corrected gently.“They each have grandchildren now.The woman of that couple is my niece.She is very happy with the right man.And her wrong man is very happy with his right woman.”
“So, my wife says we can give you a good price.”Mr.Schmidt looked at Eric.
It was the strangest negotiation K.D.had ever witnessed.
Mr.Schmidt offered Eric a price based on his cost for materials thirty-three years ago minus the down payment by Mrs.Schmidt’s niece and her ex-fiancé.
Eric mumbled calculations about the cost of gold and inflation, and offered a higher price that made K.D.stifle a gasp.
Mr.Schmidt refused.
Eric kept offering more and Mr.Schmidt kept saying to pay less.
They finally compromised in the middle.
“Oh, my dears!You haven’t tried the rings on!”Mrs.Schmidt said.
Eric’s fit well.But the bride’s ring was too large.
Mrs.Schmidt clicked her tongue.“My niece, she always says she has a fat finger.But that’s not so.She broke that finger as a girl and it never healed right.Fat finger,” she muttered disapprovingly.
It made K.D.chuckle.She appreciated that, since it prevented any sound of disappointment escaping her.
“They’re lovely, and it’s a shame but—”
“Jacob will fix,” Mrs.Schmidt said, and he nodded.
“But we need them now.”
