figured it must have belonged to the old lady who had lived there. She
had died before we moved in. Everyone had said she was a little loopy.
"What do you think it's worth?" I asked Brian.
"Probably more than the house," he said.
We figured we could sell it and buy food, pay off the house—Mom and
Dad kept missing the monthly payments, and there was talk that we were
going to be evicted—and maybe still have enough left over for
something special, like a new pair of sneakers for each of us.
We brought the ring home and showed it to Mom. She held it up to the
light, then said we needed to have it appraised. The next day she took the
Trailways bus to Bluefield. When she returned, she told us it was in fact
a genuine two-carat diamond.
"So what's it worth?" I asked.
"That doesn't matter," Mom said.
"How come?"
"Because we're not selling it."
She was keeping it, she explained, to replace the wedding ring her
mother had given her, the one Dad had pawned shortly after they got
married.
"But Mom," I said. "that ring could get us a lot of food."
"That's true," Mom said, "but it could also improve my self-esteem. And
at times like these, self-esteem is even more vital than food."
Mom's self-esteem did need some shoring up. Sometimes, things just