Chapter Text
How could you conceivably have been out of garlic? When did you even last use it in a dish? It's truly one of the great mysteries of the universe. Another unsolvable mystery is how you just dropped a glass jar of it which smashed all over the floor of this Tesco.
They should have called you Butterfingers. (Wow, mind. Thank you for your word association cooperation at this time.) The glass jar of garlic has been obliterated on the floor. If it just had a crack or chip, you could have put it back on the shelf and not worried about it until five years later when the guilt resurfaces at three in the morning.
You wish you could go back to when you didn't have to care about this shit. You could have just snapped your fingers and made it go away. But no, that life just had to be too much for you to handle. Well, you wouldn't have been buying your own garlic anyway. Were you this bad at things the last time you were this age?
Did you seriously regress so far into stunted development that-
You are pulled out of your stupor by a tap on your shoulder.
"Hello? D'you need some help?"
Standing next to you is a forty-something year old woman. She's looking at you with a knowing smile. Upon her head are a pair of gaudy-ass heart sunglasses. She also has really big brown eyes…
"Um. Yes. I do need some help."
"I knew it!"
She pulls a bunch of paper towels out of her satchel and fearlessly bends over and picks up all the garlic and broken glass. Then she just shoves the whole garlicky mass back into the satchel. This strikes you as a very unwise idea. You reach for her bag.
"No, let me take all that. You're going to cut yourself."
She positions her body in order to block you. Her expression conveys wonder that you would even care. Less towards your benevolence and more towards the notion that it would be a problem. The equivalent of shaking your head and saying you've got it all under control, man.
"Well, hang on! You're reaching into my bag and I don't even know your name!"
"It's John."
There's something implacable about her. You know you have all the pieces, but they seem blocked up. Something in her eyes, her brows, her (fairly deep) voice, and the way she carries herself.
She smiles. "I know."
"What? But you just said exactly the oppos-"
It's a different tooth. She somehow knocked out an entirely different tooth. It clicks, suddenly, and realization grabs you in a headlock and pulls back.
Oh fuck. You aren't having an emotional breakdown in the goddamn grocery store. Bending over with your hands on your knees, you hope to hell that no employee sees you and kindly tries to help, because that would be absolutely horrible.
She pats the top of your head in a way that is too much like patting a dog for you not to look up.
"You've still got that silly dome haircut."
"Is it actually the real you?"
Clearly, your priorities are a little different.
"Yes, it's me, you-!"
"Twat?"
You take her hand.
"Yes. That."
She stands a little taller as if she had come up with it all by herself.
"I missed you so much."
"Of course, I missed you too."
The two of you embrace. If you could just stand in this aisle and hug her forever, that might be good enough for you.
Suddenly, you notice some poor guy at the end of the aisle who's looking at the both of you bewildered. How much did he see? Does it matter? No.
You both abandon your shopping carts and head for the doors.
"So you got reincarnated as a woman?"
"A dashing lady, thank you."
"Oh, of course. My mistake."
"It has been…a journey." She huffs.
"Me too, Moonie. For me too."
"You can call me Kathy, you know."
"Oh. All right, I didn't know what you wanted."
"I don't know if I should go into this in the-"
As soon as you exit the doors you nearly get bowled over by the wind. Where'd this gale come from?
"In the Tesco parking lot, Christ!"
One of her hands flies up to mitigate her fluttering hair, (partially dislodging her sunglasses), and the other sort of clutches around her waist.
You pull her into another bear hug.
"Get off me!"
You both laugh. Oh. Oh, you love her.
***
You take the bus back to her house. Back at the car park, she'd announced she didn't have a car with an odd air of triumph.
Now, you're both at the back of the bus, looking comically like, well,
"So I'm Dustin Hoffman, and you're Katharine Ross."
"Then why isn't The Sound Of Silence playing?"
"Kathy, I'm lost, I'm empty and aching…"
"That's not the right song."
"Oh, come on."
"You've got to yell 'Elaine' now. But do it like Peterman."
"Who?"
"From Seinfeld!"
"I don't know which character that is!"
She rolls her eyes. The bus comes to a halt.
We're home.