Happy 8/8/08, globenet people everywhere!

Mallory still had not received her birthright. Her sister stole it. Stole it or lost it, under the circumstances it was all the same. Most of the blame rested on Mallory's mother. Scatterbrained as she was, she let Mallory's older sister wear the necklace while Mallory herself was too young to be trusted with it. All the same, Mallory would still sneak into her sister's room to try it on when no one was looking. Of all her sister's pretty things, that chalcedony necklace was her favorite. Even then, it was as if she knew it was meant for her.

Soon after, her sister was married, and the chalcedony necklace disappeared. Only then did Mallory find out the necklace ought to have gone to her.

"Where is that necklace?" her mother asked one day while sorting through her jewelry box.

"Which?" Mallory, then nearly twelve, asked from the bed.

"The necklace Brother Roland gave me," explained her mother. "I could have sworn it was in here somewhere."

"Eileen has it," Mallory said in a very no-nonsense tone.

Her mother looked sternly back at her over her shoulder. "Eileen?" she asked, "Are you sure?"

"It's the one with the slice of clear gray rock?" Mallory asked, "With an orange edge and black snowflakes in it?"

Her mother nodded. "Yes. Brother Roland gave that to me as a wedding gift."

"Eileen's got it," Mallory repeated, and flopped back on the feather comforter.

"Why would Eileen have it?" her mother wondered aloud. "I always meant to give it to you."

Mallory rolled over on her stomach. "Really? That one was my favorite," she said, then added bashfully, "I used to put it on my head and pretend it was a kind of crown."

Her mother smiled before turning back to her jewelry box. "I guess I'll just have to write Eileen to send it back," she said, mostly to herself, "after all, it isn't hers."

This scene repeated itself over several years. Mallory's mother would always forget to write to Eileen, then forget the whole situation, only to remember it anew the next time she sorted her jewelry box. The cycle continued for nearly eight years, when Mallory was about to turn twenty and still had not received her birthright. As the youngest, and not entitled to inherit the house or much money, she felt she at least deserved her necklace. Five months before her twentieth birthday, she decided to do something about it.

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Nothing really to say here.