Then she grins knowingly. “Sucker.”
I chuckle. “That was a meaningless crime if I’ve ever seen one.”
“Not for me, it wasn’t. What if you hadn’t protested strongly enough?”
“What, you would have kicked me to the curb to face the storm alone.”
“Alone? Pfft. You’re a famous athlete. Someone would have let you in their car.”
I grit my teeth playfully. “You are something, Liesel Fischer.”
“I am, aren’t I?”
“So, now that we’ve established that we both like each other, is that kiss back on the table?”
“No. My nausea hasn’t subsidedthatmuch.”
“Ouch.”
She laughs. “You know what I mean.”
“I do.”
Liesel leans forward and bumps her head against mine. She reaches her hand up to fiddle with her earring, but then she drops it. “My earrings!”
“They were in the pocket of your jeans,” I say. “Remember?”
She checks her pockets, and then her eyes go wider in panic. “They’re not here! Where could they be?” She pulls her bag from the backseat, careful not to disturb the Christmas cookies she was supposed to transport to her family’s Christmas Adam party. She rummages quickly, throwing her volunteer shirt out and inspecting everything inside. But there’s nothing. I find myself holding my breath that they’re there and not sitting in a bag on the bathroom floor of Feeding Futures, where an unobservant custodian could throw them out.
And then it hits me. “You climbed over the seat! In the car, when we switched spots!”
We both spin in our seats and look around the gear selector and cup holders. Our hands dart down to that dead zonebetween the seat and center console. Liesel flips in her chair and feels something, and she gasps. Then her hand snakes deeper under her seat and comes out triumphantly. “Got it!”
She pulls the small baggie out and fumbles as she tries to open it. I put a hand on her elbow. “Can I help?”
“Please.”
Her voice is so small. I take extra care opening the bag, and I give her one earring at a time. When she slides the last one into her ear, she exhales loudly.
“I can’t believe I almost lost them.”
“You didn’t, though. You misplaced them for a minute, but they were always there.”
She climbs back into the passenger seat, dropping like the weight of her fear has exhausted her.
“The earrings were a ‘push present’ from my dad to my mom when my brothers and I were five.”
“A push present? Isn’t that for when women give birth?”
“Yes, it is.” She sniffs. “They used to joke about that a lot. But he said that, in his uninformed opinion, raising triplets was way harder than giving birth to them, and it was the least he could do.”
“The very least,” I say with a snort.
“That’s what she always said.” Liesel’s smile is wistful. “She wore them everyday. When she couldn’t put them in by herself anymore, the home health nurse or I did it.”
“They look as good on you as they did on her.”
“Thanks.”
