Diamond Girl

16: Bingo

{Lily's POV}

She should have been listening to BB and his thoughtful questions, but Lily's tired mind was spinning. She told herself over and over not to look to see if Aaron was drinking his tea, but it was hard. So, she looked down at her fingers instead. She had washed her hands numerous times but swore she could see tiny white powder flecks on her skin.

It had occurred to her, in the eon of time in which she'd waited for Aaron, that she could have gotten her revenge in about a hundred different ways that did not leave so much incriminating evidence. In fact, if it had to be this, she should have simply slit a tiny hole in his tea bags and placed the laxatives in there, nestled among the leaves. Then she wouldn't have had to speak to that pharmacist or pound pills into powder in her office and mix it into another medicine with diamond tweezers.

But how fast did laxatives dissolve in hot water? Enough in 4 minutes time? Or would she have had to place several pills in-

"Am I correct that there are several methods of setting gemstones in the rings? When I was looking over the inventory, they don't all look the same to me." 

Lily blinked back to the present. He'd been asking about their men's band line, several of which had small gemstones imbedded in the design.

"Um, yes actually. That's a really great question! Stones can be set in several different ways, and for several different reasons. In men's bands you most often see bezel or channel setting, it's rarer to see any type of prong setting."

BB let her have a spare paper from the binder.  She drew two round stones. The first she completely encircled in metal and labeled "bezel set", the second she drew two parallel bars of metal that looked to squeeze the stone between them and labeled it "channel set". BB dutifully copied the drawings into his binder.

"Why don't men's bands have more prong settings? I was told it lets more light into the stones?"

Lily drew a third round stone and placed four prongs of metal evenly spaced around it and labeled it "prong set".

"Prongs are like metal fingers gripping the stone, and yes, they allow for more light to enter and refract inside the stone. Prongs also make it easier to clean the stones... but also make it easier for the stones to fall out." She gave a little grimace. "With men's rings we aren't looking for flashy settings as much as we are looking for sturdy, reliable settings. It also has to do with what materials we are working with. Women's rings are typically a type of gold, or - more rarely- platinum. Men's bands however..."

"There are so many listed here." BB flipped expertly through his tabs until he had another of her old charts before him. "There's Tungsten, Titanium, Zirconium, Tantalum, Ceramic, Cobalt- then all these inlay materials... Why do men need all these options?"

Lily could hear Aaron and Lars softly arguing on the other side of the room. She wanted so badly to look over, but instead took a deep sigh and focused on the topic at hand. She worked with bridal far more often than men's, but she thought she knew the main reasons.

"Men often have a completely different mindset than women when it comes to their wedding rings. They think more often of loss and durability. Since men, generally shy away from anything thin or dainty and usually opt for something with more girth, we are dealing with a lot more weight in base materials."

 "Ah, so I take it these other metals are significantly less expensive than golds or platinum?"

"Exactly. Combine a high price with the mentality most guys seem to have that they will immediately lose their ring, or beat it up, and they decide they don't want something too expensive." Lily playfully rolled her eyes, adding conspiratorially, "Aside from price concerns, I think they find the colors of the other metals to be more 'manly'. Plus, their significant others always perk up when you mention that some materials, unlike gold or platinum, won't scratch if their man leaves it on while lifting weights at the gym, so there is literally no excuse to take it off.... like, ever."