Right before I wanted to go to sleep, Ari put his computer on the table. “I wanna show you something,” he said.

We both stood, waiting for the machine to boot up. What could it be? An order confirmation? Then Ari clicked on a desktop icon that looked almost like the gemach logo, but I couldn’t be sure, he moved too fast.

“I want you to approve and tweak it before I put it on your laptop. It would have been cool to just find it there — like, whoa — but you wouldn’t know how it worked anyway.” Ari was rambling, not his type. Was he nervous? He’s usually so quick and excited, like with that horse and buggy ride. A pit settled in my stomach.

The program opened. It looked very clean and polished, but I had no clue what I was looking at. I peered at the screen.

“Filigree.” Under the name of the gemach was a list of menu options: Log, Inventory, Comments, Repairs, Reorders.

“I wasn’t sure what features you needed, so I added whatever I could think of, I can easily fix it.”

He looked so eager, yet anxious — for my approval. I hadn’t smiled at him yet. Why hadn’t I smiled and thanked him?

“It’s amazing, Ari.”

The furrow around his eyes receded. He leaned forward and clicked on inventory. “This is the best part.”

The screen opened. On the left were square pictures lined up in a column. After each picture was an item number, then a description, a column labeled “Quantity,” and a button you could click labeled “Status.” I moved in closer to see the pictures, they couldn’t be what I’d first thought they were, because that would be too much, this system would be too good, it would have taken too much effort.

But it was what I’d thought — pictures of each item I currently had in the gemach. Each picture was of a piece of jewelry arranged on a studio white backdrop, simple and classic.

I staggered back.

“Ari—” I started, but I was dumbstruck. How do I react to Ari doing something so huge and so good and so complete for me? And did I know that he was such a good programmer, with such a clean eye and strong design aesthetic?

“Do you like it?” he asked, hands clasped together.

“Like it?” I shook my head in disbelief. “I love it, it’s amazing, better than any version of this than I ever imagined. How did you get the pictures?”

Ari chuckled.

“You’re not the only busy person working late. I had Mommy pack up a bunch of stuff every night or morning, depending on your gemach schedule, and leave it in a bag on the front porch, and I’d work on it during my lunch break and after hours — there’s a great corner in the break room at work where I took all the pictures. Then I’d return the pieces so you wouldn’t notice them missing, and pick new ones up the next day.”

“Wow.” Again, I had nothing to say. He took those pictures? How did I not know he was this good? And has anyone ever done something like this for me, given me something that showed that they entirely understood me?

“Thank you.” My voice broke. Am I really crying over a gift?

(Excerpted from Family First, Issue 630)