“Need help?”
I turn. A woman about my age is loading sugar into her cart. She has kind eyes and the particular expression of someone who’s watched a man drown in baking supplies before.
“Yeah,” I admit. “I need to get baking supplies for someone. She stress-bakes. I have no idea what I’m doing.”
The woman’s smile widens, warm and uncomplicated. “Okay. What does she like to bake?”
“Cookies, I think.” I adjust my watch, aware that I probably look exactly as out of my depth as I feel. “She mentioned peanut butter chocolate chip.”
“Good choice.” The woman starts pulling things off shelves, her movements confident and practiced. “All-purpose flour, that’s your baseline. White sugar for sweetness, brown sugar for chewiness and depth. You’ll want both.”
I grab the sugars. Follow her down the aisle like a duckling imprinting on the first helpful thing it sees.
“Butter,” she continues. “Get the real stuff, not margarine. Baking is chemistry, and margarine messes with the ratios. Baking soda, baking powder. They’re different, she’ll need both. Vanilla extract, and don’t cheap out on it, the good vanilla makes a difference. Salt. Eggs are in the dairy section, get a dozen.”
I’m loading my cart, trying to remember everything she’s saying.
“Chocolate chips.” She points to a wall of options. “Semi-sweet is standard, but get a few kinds. Dark chocolate if she likes it bitter, milk chocolate if she wants sweeter. Peanut butter chips too, for the peanut butter cookies.”
I grab all of them. Every kind of chocolate chip they have.
She pauses. Looks at me with something like curiosity. “Does she like nuts in her cookies?”
“I don’t think so,” I say.
“What about you?”
The question catches me off guard. “What about me?”
“Do you like nuts in cookies?”
I haven’t thought about my own preferences in a long time. Haven’t had to. “Yeah, actually. Pecans or walnuts. Either’s good.”
“Get both then.” She nods toward the baking nuts. “You never know. Maybe she’ll make you some.”
I grab the pecans. The walnuts. Stand there holding them, feeling warmth creep in that I wasn’t expecting.
“She’ll need equipment too,” the woman adds. “Mixing bowls, measuring cups, measuring spoons. Cookie sheets. Get two, so she can rotate. Cooling racks if they have them.”
By the time she’s done with me, my cart looks like I’m stocking a small bakery. All the ingredients, mixing bowls in three sizes, a full set of measuring cups and spoons, two cookie sheets, a cooling rack, and a spatula the woman insisted was essential.
It’s too much. I know it’s too much.
I don’t put any of it back.
At the checkout, the woman is at the register next to mine. She catches my eye as I’m loading bags, and her smile goes soft.
“She’s lucky,” she says. “Whoever she is.”
I don’t know what to say to that. I just nod and finish paying and carry everything out to my car.
The drive back takes twenty-three minutes. I count every one of them.
When I arrive, Stevie stares at the bags.
I’ve made three trips up the stairs, and her small kitchen counter is covered in grocery bags, overflowing with everything the woman at the store told me to buy and a few things I added myself because they seemed right.
“Saul.” Her voice is strange. “This is...”
