Silly Little Piece of Plastic

Everyone always asked, every time they saw it on the shelf in her office next to her awards and degrees. "Why do you have such a cheap, silly little piece of plastic in such a fancy display case? Why does it deserve such a place of honor?" She just smiled and told them it was worth more than the others to her.

They sat down in their booth at Tony Rizzotti's, the local pizza parlor. The seats were curved, red plastic booths with scratches from years of toddlers climbing to smile at neighboring patrons and grab at the metal bars atop the dividers. Most of the coat hangers had at least one hook broken off, but they still stood on the end of each booth ready to hold your scarf and coat when the harsh Minnesota winter returned. The tables were linoleum topped with chrome edges, scuffed and beaten by generation after generation celebrating every milestone at Tony's - every child's birthday, every graduation from preschool through college, every wedding, and every funeral. Half the town was there for most of the parties. When Tony's son passed from leukemia last June, she was pretty sure the whole county crammed into the place for the funeral reception.

Margie waved from behind the bar and put in their usual order without having to ask - one large meat pizza extra cheese and a root beer float with two straws. They didn't have much, even with the extra shifts he was picking up at the tire shop, so they fit as much protein as they could on the pizza when they had their quarterly date night at Tony's. They'd each eat a slice tonight while they savored the float (the dairy in the ice cream would help a bit too) and then take the rest home to eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner tomorrow. It didn't cost much to most people at $18.75 for the meal, but it was more than they could usually spare. Making it stretch for an extra day's meals made it worth it.

"So what do you think you want to do about it?"

She sighed and turned from waving back to Margie to look across the table at him. "I just don't know. I mean, I know college is probably the right move, but how would we ever make it work? At least going to MCC I was able to take night classes and work full time at the law firm still, but I'd have to be a full-time student for this."

"But it's a full-ride scholarship, including room and board. They only offer one per year, and it doesn't even happen every year if they can't find a suitable candidate. You're brilliant, and you're going to make a brilliant lawyer. You can't turn this down."

Her head fell into her hands on the table. She knew he was right, getting a full ride to the best legal education in the state of Minnesota as a sponsored candidate of the best law firm in the state was the opportunity she'd been working toward since she was eight years old. Now that it was in her grasp, though, it felt so unattainable. They'd been living on their own since graduation, him working full-time as an installer at the tire shop and her working full-time as a receptionist at the town law firm for her late father's friend while taking classes at the local community college. Even with the two full-time jobs and him taking on as much overtime as he could get, they were barely scraping by paying for the upkeep and constant repairs on the house left to her when her parents passed her senior year. She wasn't sure how they'd continue if she couldn't bring in any income for the five years it would take her to get through the accelerated law program, but she didn't want to have to sell the home that had been in her family for generations.

"Head up, food's coming out. We'll figure this out too, like we have everything else."

She forced a small smile as she stared at him, knowing he was right. Somehow they'd kept the 300 year-old house standing these past three years together through everything it had thrown at them, they'd get through this too.

As they sucked the last dregs of the float out of the glass, he handed Margie the $20 bill to pay. She handed him the usual $1.25 change in all quarters because he liked to use it to grab some candy from the coin-op dispensers by the door when we were here - called it dessert, even though the root beer float filled the role of dessert well enough. Margie grabbed a box off the bar and gave it to her to box up the leftovers while he went to get his 'dessert'.

"See you next time, Sugar. Now don't get mad at an ol' gal for eavesdroppin', but you damned well better take that scholarship, ya hear? You're meant for far bigger things than this tiny little town, and y'er gonna make a damned good lawyer someday. I'd hire you in a heartbeat even without all them fancy degrees."

She laughed and hugged her close. Margie had watched them grow up, used to even be the History teacher and Debate coach at the High School - until she decided to retire and wound up married to Tony and working here instead.

"Thanks, Margie. That means the world." She could hear the coin-ops turning behind her, so she picked up the pizza and headed toward the door. Just as she turned the corner where she could see the little entrance vestibule where they were all at, she was stopped dead in my tracks by the sight in front of her. Usually she'd find her beloved boyfriend standing at the door, cheeks stuffed full of candy like a chipmunk, grinning from ear to ear as he chomped away on Runts and M&M's all at once like some kind of candy goblin. But this time...

He was there, by the door. But he wasn't standing. No, he was kneeling. On one knee.

Instead of a mouth filled with candy, he had a hand clutched around a single capsule. I could see he had just opened it. Inside, just barely peeking out, the neon lights from the 'OPEN' sign glared off a small shiny object. A small shiny... ring.

"Are you... are you asking me to marry you?"

He blinked up at me, seeming momentarily shocked to have found himself in this position. Slowly, he lifted the hand with the capsule - and the ring within - up toward her.

"I don't know what made me decide to do it tonight, of all nights. We've been here so many times and I see this machine every time. Not candy, but capsules with things inside - jewelry. $1.25 each, four quarters. I only had one chance, one shot to wind up with a ring instead of a necklace or earrings. But I did. I got a ring. Luck was on my side and I got a ring! Just like luck was on my side when I got you. And... I know it's not a real ring and it's made for kids so it won't even fit... and it's plastic and cheap and we have no money and we'll have even less when you go to school - because you are going to take that scholarship, and I have no idea how but we'll make it work because we're lucky just like this ring was lucky and -"

She immediately cut him off and kissed him, because that was it! The ring wasn't just symbolic of luck, and love, and a future together. It was also how they made this work.

"That's it!"

"What?"

"Marriage!"

She could see him trying to calculate how marriage made money troubles magically go away.

"If we get married before I start school, then the housing they cover can be married student housing! You can come live on campus with me, we can rent out the house so we'll have more money coming in, and it works!"

As the party died down, she made her way back to pack away the last few items from the shelves. Looking around, she could hardly believe how far that scholarship offer had taken her. She loved being on the selection committee each of the last twenty years to help choose the next lucky recipients whose lives would be changed, as hers was, by an offer to join a scholarship program like no other. It was the main reason she'd stayed with the firm for her entire career, from that first sponsored day on campus until today - the day of her retirement.

"Almost ready?"

She smiled as she turned to the doorway and watched her husband enter her office, knowing he'd tracked the second she'd left the party but given her a few moments alone to reminisce.

"Almost. Just grabbing the last few things off the shelves."

They both turned to look at what was left.

"And that's the thing that started it all, isn't it?"

"Indeed it is," she mused as she picked up the ring in its display case. "Without you deciding to try your luck for this 'silly little piece of plastic' that night at Tony's, I can only imagine how things might have turned out."

"Well thank goodness for that, then." He kissed the case, then turned and kissed her on the forehead as he took it from her and placed it into the box with her other treasured items - the degrees her scholarship got her, Litigator of the Year awards, framed thank you letters from clients - none as treasured as the 'silly little piece of plastic' in a fancy case.