“Are you out of your mind? You want my mother to p…

Then I put it back in my wallet. “I’ll pay for my things,” I said, and my voice was calm, the way still water is calm. “Patricia, you can put yours on your card.”

The silence lasted exactly two seconds.

Then Daniel turned to look at me with an expression I had never seen on his face before. Not quite anger. Not quite shock.

Something that lived between them. “What?” he said. “I’ll cover our groceries,” I said.

“Patricia’s items are Patricia’s.”

Patricia’s hand, which had been reaching into her purse with the unhurried confidence of a woman who expected nothing to interrupt her, paused. She looked at me over the rims of her reading glasses. Her expression was very still.

“Are you out of your mind?” Daniel said. His voice had gone up. The cashier looked at the register.

The woman behind us in line looked at her phone. “You want my mother to pay you back for groceries? She’s a retiree.”

“I didn’t ask her to pay me back,” I said.