Summary: An engagement ring (still in the box) is found on the office floor of JAG. When the owner is hunted out, three men look guilty, but nobody claims the ring.
Update Note:
I just dusted off The Ring and started a reread. I laughed out loud at the first line. I completely forgot about the poor spider! It's so much fun when you can laugh at your own stuff. In the immortal words of Goose: "Geez, I crack myself up."
I am sorry this took me so long to finish. The drama on the show got ahead of me and it has taken me a while to get back into JAG. It is as I kept saying: if Tiner goes OCS, I just can't bring myself to watch the show anymore. They have shunned the enlisted one too many times, and I'm gone.
I finished Lord of the Rings and cleared the corkboard for the next project, which means I took down all the Hobbit pictures (except for one particularly yummy Scot), and my most faithful reader, Jenny, on cue, reminded me that I have a promise to keep here. So here I go again. This shouldn't take but a couple of days to complete and post.
Keep in mind that I began this before the Admiral proposed to Meredith and I just can't bring my self to change it, so accept the Admiral/Meredith romance as it was for the near season finale of 2003, but that whole part about Harm resigning and Mac going for Webb? What were they thinking!???? Chuck all that from you mind.
Thanks for being patient with me.
Cassandra
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JAG: "The Ring." by Kesselia Banta (Cass Eastham)
**JAG Headquarters. Falls Church, VA. April 2003**
There was a stowaway in the JAG office over the winter, but nobody noticed him until after he was dead.
A tiny spider had crawled into the building from the cold and found a place to settle in for the winter. But the snow melted and the sun shone and, eventually, the air conditioner came back on. The spider was forced from its home in the vent to search out a new place to build its web when it strolled onto the JAG office floor in the middle of the night.
He explored the office for a few hours before deciding to find the quietest wall corner, and headed toward a likely wall when the lights came on and people walked in.
The spider scurried into the nearest shadow, watched and waited. The smell of coffee filled the air more people came into the room. The noise level rose with television reports and voices. There were dozens of giant feet shuffling back and forth by the desk he was hiding under, but all the shoes were black.
It walked its eight little brown legs closer to the foot of the desk and watched the shiny dress shoes and shiny pumps step, shuffle, stop, turn… The spider got tired of waiting for them to leave. He got ready to make a dash across to the wood framed office door, and looked for an opportunity to make his break.
Another pair of black shoes stopped in front of the spider, they were big shoes with big black slacks drooping all the way to the shoelaces. The feet shuffled, paused, turned a little as a pair of pumps strutted by, and then started to move away again.
Then the shoes bumped into another pair of shoes, paused again, and a dark blue velvet box fell to the ground. The fuzzy monolith bounced as it rolled. The spider didn't have time to get out of the way before the thing smashed him against the foot of the desk. He died a miserable death as the towering ring box fell to a stand still.
The shoes shuffled away, oblivious at the moment, but two month's pay stuffed into a little blue box was noticed missing in a matter of hours. A coat was frantically groped, then a car was searched thoroughly until the man pulled a jelly bean from last Easter out from under the seat.
It wasn't long until he realized he'd dropped it at work somewhere, but searching the office without being discovered would be a trick. It just felt kind of wrong to have everyone in the office know he was going to propose before he managed to pop the question.
The next day, he managed to case the entire office floor with innocent strolls to talk to one person or the other without anybody noticing he was scanning for something. No luck. The velvet ring box was cuddled up so closely to the foot of the desk that nobody was going to see it unless he or she got down on all fours and looked.
But, before the man narrowed in on how to manage such a strategy, a pencil fell onto the floor, bounced on its eroded eraser, and rolled with a rattle into the ring box. A pair of heals paused and a pair of hose-covered knees slowly lowered to the floor. A feminine hand groped under the desk to find it….
Petty Officer Tiner was more sobered these last few months and had easily been managing his duties without a stutter, a shuffle, or a fearful glance at anybody. He kept remembering the title of Tin Man, and every 'yes sir' and 'no sir' gave him more of a twinkle in his eyes than he was supposed to have. This only made him look guilty and he knew it. His thoughts wandered off as he stirred sugar into his coffee but he was shaken from them when Commander Rabb stepped into the tiny kitchen to pour his own.
"Good morning, Tiner."
"Good morning, sir."
Commander Rabb didn't look any more innocent these days than Tiner did. It called attention when he casually received the instruction to take the bad-tasting side of a case yesterday, but no one approached him about it. He made certain he was the same pain in the ass the Admiral was accustomed to, just so his boss wouldn't notice anything different about his performance. He poured milk into his coffee wondering if it was working, and wondering if it mattered. He glanced up when the man walked in, smiled as casually as he could muster, and stepped away.
"Good morning, Admiral."
"Good morning."
The Admiral's mouth was small and stiff when he poured the black coffee into his mug and turned around to walk out.
"Good morning, Tiner."
"Good morning, Admiral."
"EEEKS!" Harriett squealed, "A spider!"
All three men glanced up from their coffee to see the woman jump back in a moment of girl-ness and then grit her teeth to stomp on the already dead spider like a true soldier.
After she recovered from her small battle, she turned and lifted it her new find almost to her nose. She opened it gently and her eyes filled with a million sparkles as she lost her breath at the beauty inside. "Oh my gosh!"
Bud was standing at her desk in the same place the man had dropped it two days before. "What's that?"
Simms shuffled over to him to show him the ring. "Did you drop this?"
Bud's eyes widened as his head bounced back in surprise at it. He smiled and lifted his brows at her. "It's an engagement ring, Harriett."
Her eyes were still filled with hope and beauty.
Bud pointed out comically, "We're already married."
"Well if you didn't drop it? Who did?"
Bud glanced up, sighed a little and looked around for the Admiral to report the find. He called loudly over the office noise. "Admiral? Someone dropped an engagement ring!"
The usual office hubbub quieted instantly. Sturgis halted his conversation with Petty Officer Coates and looked over. Mac's eyebrows rippled as she emerged from her open office door and leaned against the door jam.
The Admiral, the Commander and the Petty Officer First Class were still standing at the door of the coffee mess. All three were frozen in the middle of their sips of coffee and all three had widened eyes on Bud and Harriett.
Bud and Harriet looked around at the suddenly silent office. "Did somebody lose an engagement ring?" Harriett held up the blue velvet box, but the response was silence.
Eyes shifted to one another and eventually someone let out a quiet 'cluck' with their tongue.
Lt Simms stepped over to the Admiral to show him. "I found this under my desk."
The Admiral lowered his cup and thought quickly. He put a hand out before Lt Simms opened the box for him to see. "Lieutenant, are you absolutely certain it's an engagement ring?"
Here eyes flicked to the other two a moment, just because she was thinking back on the ring, and nodded at the Admiral again. "Yes, sir."
The Admiral disciplined himself not to glance at anybody as he gave this order. "I'm going to guess," he flickered a grin, "that the owner of this ring doesn't want to make a scene when he retrieves it."
Lt Simms lifted her chin with understanding. "Yes, sir."
He knew he already had the attention of the office. The Admiral chewed on his lip as he thought for a moment. "Lieutenant, I want you to swear that you never reveal the owner of the ring, not even to your husband."
Lt Simms smiled at this and put up a palm in the air. "Yes, sir. I swear."
"And I'm going to assign you to keep the ring in safety until someone comes to you and describes it correctly."
"Yes, sir." She smiled wide and stepped away.
The office was still paused until their staring interrupted the Admiral's next sip of his coffee. His face soured when he blat at them, "Carry on!"
The activity in the office got moving again. Sturgis chuckled and turned back to Coates. Mac unfolded her arms and chewed away a smile when she disappeared into her office.
The Admiral sipped his mug and glanced over at Tiner and Rabb… and then those two men jumped into action to slide quickly to their respective desks.
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The buzz about the ring made it to everyone's ears by knock off. The news even reached the other floor of the building. Petty Officers laid small bets on whose it was. The Commanders and Colonels in the Judges chambers were shaking their heads at the possibilities. No one suspected for a moment that Lt Simms revealed the owner. Instead they argued that, if the answer was 'yes', the owner would make himself known sooner or later by wedding invitation.
Bud had a doctor's appointment that afternoon, so they came in two different cars. This made it easy for Harriett to stay late and make her self conveniently and discretely available. She was dying to find out who it was so she could blush and giggle about it, in privacy at least. She did some back burner work at her desk until all the bodies filtered out the door.
"Good night, Harriett," Mac said as she closed her office door with a briefcase in one hand and her raincoat in the other.
"Good night, ma'am," Harriet said brightly.
Mac shuffled up to the desk and lowered her voice. "Has anyone picked up the ring yet?"
Harriett shook her head.
Mac flicked her chin, "Can I see it?"
Harriett thought on this, then rippled her mouth at the wisdom of it and shook her head again. "It's probably not a good idea, ma'am." Her eyes flicked to the only office with a light on.
Commander Rabb was still sitting at his desk as he scribbled out his job on a legal pad.
Mac glanced that direction and lifted her chin. "Good night, Commander!"
Harm was shaken from his thoughts. He looked, smiled strangely, and waved.
Mac let her eyes drag on him as she stepped away. He looked at his watch and put down his pencil. He started getting up to leave for the day. Mac turned quickly and strutted out.
The place was so quiet that the Admiral's door made a lot of noise when it opened. "Really? Where's it at?"
"In Alexandria, sir," Tiner told him. "It's a two bedroom one bath with a big yard and a cherry tree."
The Admiral smiled at that as he put on his hat. "Why is she moving out before the semester's over?"
Tiner's brows flicked. "She's not, sir. She's just bringing the household goods. We're getting an address now so that when she applies for college in the fall, she won't have to pay out of state tuition."
The Admiral nodded approval at this plan and glanced at the approaching Commander.
Rabb was bright, "You got her to move here! Congratulations."
Tiner nodded, quiet and reserved. "Thank you, sir."
"Call me," the Admiral told him as he put on his raincoat as he groaned about it a little. "Meredith wants to bring over some cookies on move-in day."
Tiner blinked surprise at that and nodded, "Yes, sir."
Rabb angled his head. "She's coming with the movers?"
Tiner winced as if the idea was insane. "Movers? No, sir. She and the kids are driving over in a Ryder truck. They should be… somewhere in Nebraska right now."
Rabb chuckled at that, adjusted his briefcase in his grip and patted Tiner on the shoulder, "Call me, too. I'll bring pizza."
Tiner chucked at the strange invitations and stepped back to get his raincoat. He was still smiling when he plopped his snoopy bowl on his head and deliberately cocked it slightly to the side. He smiled at Lt. Simms. "Good night, ma'am."
"Good night, Tiner."
Lt Simms watched the three men march out one by one, and the three mumbled more until the elevator closed their voices out.
Harriett angled her head in thought and swiveled back around to her desk.
Her mouth twisted and her eyes glanced from side to side, verifying that, yes, she was the last one in the office.
Finally, she sighed with disappointment and pulled the ring box out of the drawer. She stood, slid on her raincoat, grabbed on her cover, and pushed the chair back into the desk.
Ding
Her back was to the hall when the elevator emptied someone out. She heard the big shoes click on the tiled floor and approach her from behind. She stood straight and let her eyes shift to the side as the man stepped to her side.
She looked.
He held up a small piece of paper. It had a single fold, like a little card, and a small sketch of the ring inside.
She beamed and pulled it out of her coat.
He put his fingers to his lips.
She nodded, twisted her lips shut with her fingers, and handed it over.
'Thank you,' he mouthed sincerely, pocketed it, and hurried away.
Harriett waited until he was gone before she let herself ball her fists and squeal.