The Pharmacist's Tuesday

Margaret stood before the mirror, adjusting her father's fedora. The hat smelled of wool and menthol cigarettes, a ghost of the man who'd worn it every Tuesday for forty years. Three weeks since the funeral, and she still found herself reaching for it, as if the weight on her head might somehow fill the hollow space in her chest.

The vitamin aisle at CVS was empty when she arrived at 7 AM. B12, D3, magnesium—the colorful promises of wellness that had failed him completely. She'd been buying his supplements every Tuesday for a decade, a ritual that felt absurd now but impossible to break. Her fingers trembled as she placed each bottle in the basket.

"Miss?"

She turned to find a young pharmacist watching her, concern knitting his brow. He couldn't have been thirty, with dark circles under his eyes and name tag that read 'Ethan'.

"You've been here every Tuesday," he said softly. "I thought—maybe you needed something."

Margaret almost laughed. What did she need? Her husband dead at fifty-three. Two decades of marriage reduced to a hat that didn't fit and a basket full of useless vitamins. She wanted to tell him to mind his business, but instead she heard herself say, "My father. These were his."

"I'm sorry." His voice cracked. "I lost my mom last year."

The silence stretched between them, heavy with shared grief. Then he smiled, a fragile thing. "I have a cat who keeps expecting her to come home. Every morning at six, he waits by the door. It's heartbreaking, really."

Margaret felt something shift inside her, painful and necessary. "I still make coffee for two," she admitted. "Every single morning."

Ethan nodded, understanding passing between them like a secret. "Maybe," he said, "somewhere, they're still having their coffee. Still waiting for their cats."

Margaret placed the vitamins on the counter. She wouldn't buy them today. The hat could wait too. "Thank you," she said, and meant it.

As she walked to her car, morning light spilling across the parking lot, she realized she hadn't felt quite so alone in weeks. The vitamin aisle would be there next Tuesday, but for now, this was enough.