COOS BAY - It wasn't a wedding or an engagement ring. Nor had it come from a beloved friend or relative. But when Linda Lyons' diamond-studded gold band went missing one day, the sense of loss hit her just the same.

“I'm not a crying person, (but) I was upset,” said Lyons, a Fred Meyer checker, recalling a busy day in February when her ring suddenly disappeared at work. “I thought ‘Oh, I've lost my ring!' It was in somebody's bag. I knew it was in somebody's bag.”

Hoping to find the little treasure she had first discovered at a pawn shop, Lyons searched the store, telling coworkers and customers it had been misplaced.

“I asked for a couple weeks, but then I quit asking, because I resigned myself that I had lost it for good,” Lyons said. She bought the trinket about a year ago for $100. An appraisal later revealed a value closer to $2,000.

Nearly two months later, the 5-foot Coos Bay woman can once again admire the sparkling ring on her middle finger, thanks to a very unexpected birthday gift from a local teenager and his stepmother.

Michael Urso, 13, of Coos Bay, and a friend, brought the ring to the store. He returned it the day before Lyons' 60th birthday.

Like something out of a J.R.R. Tolkien story, the ring remained forgotten and undiscovered in a Fred Meyer bag, until last Thursday, when Michael reached beneath the sink for a satchel, and felt something hit his hand.

“I reached in there and grabbed it. I thought it might have been a piece of trash,” the seventh-grade Sunset Middle School student said. “I was going to keep it, but Shannon saw it.”

Shannon Urso, Michael's stepmother, said it wasn't his to keep and reminded him of how horrible he felt when someone stole his wallet. Whoever lost the ring probably missed it terribly, she said.

“I told him it's too bad that someone else didn't do the right thing and return (his) wallet,” said Urso, who has embraced the event as a parable and life lesson for her stepson. “We talked about it and we decided the right thing to do was to bring (the ring) back to Fred Meyer.”

“It wasn't mine. I'm proud that I did it because it made that person happy,” said Michael as he played with his little sister at home.

Lyons already had left work for the day when the ring was returned, but a coworker called to tell her that two boys had just brought in a ring.

“I was excited because how often would something like that show up that looks like that?” asked Lyons. “It was a wonderful birthday present to get my ring back.”

After she was reunited with her ring, Lyons called Urso to thank her and Michael. Although the woman offered a reward, Urso turned her down.

“I said ‘... The biggest thing is that Mike needed to know how good it feels to do the right thing,'” Urso said.

Although she was willing to give Michael $25 for returning her ring, Lyons agreed the whole scenario is a good way to teach a moral lesson.

“The mother has really raised him right,” Lyons said. “I do (think he learned a lesson) the lesson to be honest and truthful always.”

Now that the ring is back in her possession, the 23-year employee of Fred Meyer is showing off her ring to anyone who asks. She now wears another gold ring on the same finger to keep it locked in place.

“I haven't taken it off since I got it. I love it. It sparkles,” Lyons said.