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now when she opened the box and showed
     the ring to Michael and he oohed and ahhed and she wept and neither one of them even looked at R.J., R.J. felt a little awkward.
    Michael held the box up and showed the ring to the gathered group, and everyone said “oooh,” but R.J. still couldn’t see it
     because Sadie was still standing and blocking her view. She just smiled to cover her discomfort. Then Sadie took the box back
     from Michael and, after what seemed a very long time, handed it to R.J., who stood, trying to ignore the fleeting thought
     that the three of them probably looked like “the puppet family.”
    Then R.J. looked at the ring, looked at Sadie, and could get out only the words
thank you
because she had to put her face into her hands to cover her reaction, which was so overwhelming that it embarrassed her.
     Everyone thought she was crying. Thank heaven they thought that, because really what she was doing was laughing like a lunatic.
     She had never seen anything so appallingly gaudy in her life.
    After the party, when Michael took her home, the two of them laughed in the car until the tears came. About the ring. The
     cocktail ring from Grandma, with clusters of tiny diamonds set in platinum, arrayed in some strange disorder that made it
     look, as Michael described it, like a chandelier in a Miami Beach condominium.
    “Michael,” she said, “I don’t mean to be ungrateful. Your mother was so sweet, and she meant so well… but what do I do?” R.J.
     opened and closed the ring box, hoping each time that maybe when she opened it next, the ring would have changed.
    “You take it to a jeweler and have the stones taken out,” Michael said. “Then he puts them into a plain band, and we get me
     a gold band the same width, and we’re all set.” They had pulled up in the driveway of her house and he stopped the car. Now
     he moved toward her, took her in his arms, and kissed her.
    “Did you have a wonderful time at our engagement party?” he asked, kissing her all over her face.
    “I did,” she answered. “Thank you so much, Michael. It was so romantic and wonderful. Are you sure it will be all right?”
     she asked again.
    “What?”
    “Changing the ring. Taking the stones out and starting again. Are you sure?”
    He had laughed. “Of course I’m sure.”
    The next day on her lunch hour she had gone to a jeweler named Jay Marden, who was highly recommended by Dinah. The jeweler
     shook his head when he opened the box and saw Sadie Rappaport’s mother’s ring.
    “They don’t make ’em like
this
anymore.” Then he looked at R.J.. and said, “No offense.”
    He liked the plan of using the diamonds to make a plain wedding band, even made R.J. a little drawing of how it would look,
     and told her he would use the platinum from the existing ring to make the band for the new one. R.J. signed a paper saying
     she had left her diamonds there, gave him a deposit on the work, and went back to the office. Ten days later when she got
     the call saying that the ring was ready, she was ecstatic.
    Mr. Marden stayed open a little later than usual so R.J. could pick up the ring after work. She decided to sneak out of the
     office a few minutes early, feeling so guilty that when she passed Harry Elfand in the hall she coughed a fake cough just
     in case he was about to ask her where she was going.
    “Feel better,” Harry mumbled.
    “Thanks,” she said.
    The new ring was perfect. So beautiful it made R.J. melt when she saw it. Married. She was going to be married again. Be a
     part of a family again. And Jeffie would have a father. Maybe eventually she’d even have another child.
    “Want to try it on?” Mr. Marden had asked her.
    “Oh, no.” R.J. was too superstitious to put the wedding ring on before the wedding. If she did, the wedding could come to
     some bad end. Bad end. After Michael’s smoky announcement to her that day at the school fair, R.J. had taken the wedding list
     and she had