“I have five children. I wouldn’t mind one more.” She reached out to stroke the statue’s flowing red hair.
Five kids.
That was just way, way too many.
With their sticky hands and shrill voices and their ability to forget every pleasant or educational thing you ever told them, but very clearly remember the one time you let out a string of curses… then repeat them in front of their parents.
Or maybe that was just me with my niblings.
“Well, hopefully she can help you with that. Not that you need her,” I added, taking the woman’s credit card and swiping it. She was not only paying my light bill for the month but also getting me some good take-out for dinner. “I’ll stick her in a box for you, so you don’t get jostled on the subway.”
“Oh, no need. I have a car waiting.”
She scooped up the statue and made her way to the door.
Well then.
Fancy.
“Alright, Dotty,” I called to the woman who’d been patiently waiting her turn in the back of the store. “What do you have for me?”
I knew what it was the moment she made it up to the counter, her thumb turn, turn, turning it around her finger before she could even find the words.
She was there to hock her ring. From the love of her life who’d been killed overseas while serving in the military. Sure, it’d been almost a decade ago. But she carried her grief close, cuddled like a baby to her chest.
Things must have been really bad for her to be willing to hock her engagement ring.
“It was about five grand,” she said when she saw me eyeing the ring.
When it was new.
She knew the deal.
It went down from there.
“I just need to make rent. I had a gap in jobs. I have my new one, but I just… I fell behind on everything. And the landlord wants me out so he can up the rent for the next guy. But that was our home.”
I imagine it was still their home, a shrine to the love that had only gotten three years to grow before he passed.
Normally, that ring was something I’d only offer two grand for. But this was Dotty. She’d been a regular for years.
“How about twenty-seven-fifty?”
Her eyes brightened.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. And I’ll keep it in the back case,” I said, waving behind me. “Give you a few months to get things back on track.”
It was something I was known for—using the pawn shop as a sort of loan. If I knew someone was pawning stuff just to put food in their kids’ mouths or pay a medical bill, I tried to hold onto and hide it, giving them a few months to buy it back before I put it up for sale.
It was probably why I was getting by but not exactly making bank, despite owning a pretty busy business. But I was once the person on the other side of the counter, heartbroken, pawning my precious belongings. And in my case, we never got those things back.
So when I took over the shop, I wanted a career, yes, but I also wanted to be able to sleep at night. This was how I managed that.
“Thank you. Thank you so much,” Dotty said, eyes going misty.
“Don’t worry about it,” I said, giving her a smile even as I realized not only was I not getting take-out, but my light bill might be a little late.
