4. Quinn #3
“How much?” I asked, trying for neutral and landing somewhere around controlled hope.
“Three dollars.”
I gaped at her. “Octavia.”
“Quinn.”
“You can’t sell this for three dollars.”
She glanced at the box, then back at me. “Everything in this store is three dollars until I decide it has emotional significance.”
“It’s ivory.”
“I know.”
That stopped me. “You know?”
She made an impatient little sound. “Sweetheart, I’ve been buying dead people’s things since before your parents knew each other. Of course I know.”
“Then you absolutely cannot charge me three dollars for it.”
She crossed her arms over her brocade jacket and leaned back like an auntie preparing to win on principle. “I absolutely can, because I said three dollars.”
“Octavia…”
“I have the right to assign whatever value I want to anything in this store, and I value that at three dollars… for you.”
I looked at the box. Looked at her. “Octavia.”
Her eyes softened, but only a little. “You told me what it was. If you were looking to take advantage, you’d have kept your pretty mouth shut and floated out of here feeling victorious. Instead, you tried to give me more money. That means you get grandmother pricing.”
“You’re not my grandmother.”
“Not legally, no. Spiritually, the case is stronger.”
I laughed despite myself. “I really should pay you more.”
“And I should stop wearing chartreuse with my complexion, but here we both are.” She pointed at the register. “Do you want it or would you like me to call my nephew the dentist? He’ll pay market value and would love to tell you all about it.”
Sighing, I took out my wallet. There was no winning when Octavia had chosen benevolence as a weapon.
“Fine,” I said. “But when I get paid next week, I’m buying a coat and overpaying on purpose.”
Her eyes twinkled mischievously. “I have a camel hair number with your name on it and at least one previous owner’s secrets in the lining.”
“That does sound like me.” I handed her the money. She rang it up with ceremony entirely disproportionate to the amount, then slid the little box back across the counter toward me. Max chuffed in approval.
Octavia looked down at him. “And you, sir, have an excellent eye. Better than half the men I dated in the seventies.”
Max accepted this as his due.
I tucked the case into my bag, an odd little thrill settling under my ribs.
It wasn’t just from the thrill, though that was part of it, but the ridiculous generosity of an old woman with strong opinions and independent pricing systems—an old woman who knew me.
It reminded me that sometimes life did still hand you something lovely.
As Max and I turned toward the door, Octavia called after me, “If that thing inside is cursed, bring it back.”
I looked over my shoulder. “What if it’s useful?”
“Then keep it and marry rich.”
“That’s always your answer.”
“And yet you never listen.”
Max’s tail wagged once. Apparently, the matter remained under active review. We stepped back out onto the street, three dollars lighter and, in ways that mattered much more, absurdly rich.
By the time Max and I got home, the city had donned its shiny nighttime costume.
My building’s front door resisted the first push, and the stairwell smelled faintly of somebody’s aggressively seasoned dinner.
When I got the apartment door open and Max trotted inside ahead of me with his usual purposeful sweep of the place, my body immediately unclenched.
I loved the city, but I was so grateful to be home.
I dropped my keys in the bowl by the door and kicked off my boots. “Okay,” I told Max. “Let’s assess the damage.”
He sat in the middle of the rug and watched me.
After putting the little ivory case on the table, I went through my Sunday night routine. I changed into sleep shorts and one of my college T-shirts, fed Max his dinner, washed my face, and laid out my outfit for tomorrow on the chair by the bed: navy trousers, cream blouse, green silk scarf.
When that was done, I went back to the case, grabbing a cloth to clean it.
There was something almost ceremonial about small discoveries when you lived the way I did. I never tore into them. I wanted to earn them first.
Max had settled half under the coffee table, chin between his paws, but the second I sat and picked up the case, his ears tipped forward.
“Yes, yes,” I said. “You found it. Your instincts are unparalleled. You’re Indiana Jones in dog form.”
His tail thumped once.
The case was prettier when it was clean than it had been under the dust it had accumulated in the thrift store. Still singed at one corner, still worn smooth with age, but undeniably beautiful now that I could really look at it. I ran my thumb over the burn marks again, then opened the lid.
Inside, nestled in faded velvet, lay a necklace.
It was a simple piece and somehow lovelier for it.
An old coin pendant, bronze or something close to it, hung from a slim chain that had darkened with age.
The surface of the coin was worn down in places where fingers would have touched it more often, but there was still enough detail to make me think it had once been handsome in a stern, ceremonial manner.
One side of the pendant was blackened at the rim, the metal uneven where fire had kissed it hard and then moved on.
It should, by all reasonable standards, and to reasonable people, have looked damaged.
To me, though, it looked as if it had lived and had its own stories to tell.
“Oh,” I said softly.
Max got up and came over, front paws braced lightly against the couch cushion so he could inspect my prize with me.
“I know,” I whispered. “Very us.”
It was old and a little battered, not polished at all, but somehow, it was still beautiful.
I lifted the chain from the velvet and held it up to the light.
The pendant swung gently, catching gold from the lamp in the softer places that hadn’t been scorched.
There were cleaner, more expensive pieces of jewelry in the world.
Thousands within a twenty-block radius, probably being stored in little suede drawers by women with better bathroom lighting and less student debt.
But this seemed like a one-of-a-kind find.
It also, for some inexplicable reason, felt like mine almost immediately, which I fully recognized as irrational. I gathered my hair over one shoulder and fastened the chain around my neck.
The coin was cool against my skin, a small, unexpected weight just below my collarbone.
I looked toward the dark window over the sink, where I could make out my reflection if I tilted just right.
Oh, it was really lovely, and so striking. But then, antiques usually were striking.
Max let out a low, pleased grumble and climbed onto the couch beside me without requesting clearance, which was a little rude.
I put a hand over the pendant. “Do you approve?”
He nudged the coin with his nose, then my throat.
I smiled. “That’s what I thought.”
He leaned harder into me, seventy pounds of retired military devotion. I wrapped an arm around his neck, scratching behind his left ear until his eyes glazed over.
“Look at us,” I said. “Matching again. You’ve got your collar, I’ve got mine. Very chic. Very codependent.”
His tail hit the couch cushion twice.
I kissed the top of his head, getting a whiff of dog shampoo and salmon treats.
“Thank you for finding it, and for being so diplomatic at the hot dog cart.”
I sat there with him, fingers resting lightly on the coin, and let the day unspool in reverse.
My life wasn’t easy or especially graceful. And tomorrow I would go back to the firm and fetch coffee for people who made more in a week than my parents had made in some years. I would smile like it was all part of a bright, upwardly mobile plan.
Some of it was, but mostly it was just endurance with lip gloss.
But days like this, these little pockets of beauty, made the grind feel less like the whole story.