I opened the fridge. No milk.
Checked the bread box. One lonely heel.
I told the kids I’d be back in ten minutes and walked to the grocery store down the street. The fluorescent lights hummed. The air was too cold. Every checkout line was long.
I grabbed the cheapest bread and a gallon of milk and got in the shortest line I could find.
That’s when I noticed the woman ahead of me.
She was small and elderly, wrapped in a coat so worn the sleeves were nearly threadbare. Her back was bent in a way that told you life had pressed down on her for a long time. She placed two items on the conveyor belt.
Bread. Milk.
The clerk scanned them and told her the total. She opened a tiny wallet and started counting coins and wrinkled bills with shaking hands. After a moment, she stopped.
“I’m short,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry.”
The line shifted with irritation. Someone sighed loudly. Another person muttered that people were holding everyone up. The woman behind her rolled her eyes.
I felt that familiar knot tighten in my stomach. I knew that feeling. I’d stood at a register before, heart pounding, heat crawling up my neck while strangers judged me for not having enough.
Before I could talk myself out of it, I stepped forward.
“I’ll cover it,” I said.
The clerk looked at me. The line went quiet for half a second, then filled with murmurs. Someone said I was wasting my money. Another scoffed that people like her knew how to play on sympathy.
