This is a story that seems to mostly be about food, but is actually about The Good People.

Hello there! Come closer and sit by my crochet blanketed knees while I tell you a story. Pretend there’s a lovely wood fire burning nearby if you’d like, help yourself to a soothing nightcap and suckle upon your thumb, while I stroke your forehead and murmur to you in my slightly nasal, yet oddly dulcet tones.

Once upon a time there was a girl who suffered from many social anxieties, including, but not limited to, her fear of finding a prom baby in any public toilet with a closed lid. She grew up with a very stern school teacher mother who instilled the belief in her that she should never leave people waiting. Being late is being rude. Because this girl tends to take everything her mother says as law, and because she’s anxious, she tends to take things to extremes and rather than being on time to meet people, she is usually early. So early that by the agreed upon time to meet, she’s usually been there so long she’s started to scrape lines into the nearest brick wall with the handle of her toothbrush shiv, like she’s marking off a stretch in The Big House.

Writing in the third person is getting annoying, so I’m just going to admit it: the girl in this story? It’s me. Surprise!

Basically what I’m saying is that I’m always early, so by the time other people arrive, I’ve already been waiting for ages and for the most part I recognise this is my problem and when people arrive, I cheerfully pack away my toothbrush shiv (the back pocket is a good place, means you can quickly reach it in most situations, I also keep a comb back there in case I need to do some spontaneous backcombing now and then) and link my arm through theirs and walk in synced slow motion down the street while people turn to stare at our unusually pretty and shiny hair.

When people are late though, I can be a heinous troll. I try not to be, it’s life, people are going to be late sometimes and it’s Sydney so sometimes it’s impossible to be on time and it’s not the end of the world, but yesterday was not an ordinary day, it was actually not a very good day and I was in a bit of a low mood and the only bright, sparkling thing keeping me going through the day was the fact that I knew that I was going to be having a quesadilla and a margarita for dinner with one of my favourite people … who, unbeknownst to me, had fallen asleep on his couch and was not responding to phone calls or messages and I was standing alone on George Street in an outfit which included pants which from a distance could probably pass as a variation of loose Thai pants, but which are really medical scrubs I bought from Walmart and I started to worry that someone would mistake me for a low-paid medical professional and expect me to empty their bedpan or something and goddamn did I really need that margarita now and why was he not answering his phone?!

Not even a minute later he called back and explained the whole napping on the couch situation and before I could stop it, I felt things happening. My toes started to turn inwards and I started dragging the tip of one of my sneakers on the ground as I found myself saying stuff like “No it’s fine. I don’t even want dinner. No, I’m just going to go home. No, I don’t even really like quesadillas that much”. First, I had somehow turned into a GIANT toddler. Secondly, don’t ever lie about not liking quesadillas, because imagine how miserable life would be if suddenly quesadillas ceased to exist. Quesadillas are no laughing matter and should not be trifled with. Ever.

Jeff’s response was entirely justified. When a giant toddler sulkily tells you that they hate quesadillas aka life, you say “That’s a shame. Well if that’s how you feel, then I’m sorry, but are you sure you don’t want me to meet you for dinner before you go home?”

In thinking about this, I also remembered that the night before I had left truffles in Jeff’s fridge. Suddenly a plan started to formulate. “I guess I could eat dinner with you. You know what I would do if I were you though? I’d maybe think about bringing along those truffles because I think that would be pretty good for me”.

[Editor's note: Was chocolate not actually Jeff's idea? 
Well yes, maybe, insomuch as he said 'What if I bring chocolate?'
So ... it was entirely his idea then?
I thought he meant run-of-the-mill corner shop chocolate, not amazing truffles!
Yeah likely story ... I'm giving this one to Jeff
Fine! See if I even care! It was Jeff's idea then.
Julia? Your toes are turning inwards ...]

I rubbed my fat-knuckled baby hands together eagerly. Truffles and Mexican, I was some kind of evil baby genius!

Jeff dutifully arrived with said truffles and then pulled something out of his pocket and handed it to me across the table. It was the torn end of a box of Crunchie ice-cream bars also known as my favourite ice-cream bars ever.

I was perplexed. What was this?

“It’s a gift voucher!”

I knitted my brow into a crochet blanket; the very one I have across my knees right now. What did he mean?

“I gave ten dollars to a very confused man at a corner store and told him that I needed to tear the end off the box to give as a gift voucher to a girl I was meeting  and after having dinner with her, I would come back with her and we would pick up the ice-cream and have them for dessert!”

BLINK, I blinked and clenched my fists very tightly together to stop myself from reaching across the table and squeezing his face off.

Not only am I a fat-knuckled baby loser who didn’t deserve such niceties, but these niceties were some of the nicest niceties I’ve ever come across. All jokings aside, yesterday was a miserable day and one small, but incredibly thoughtful and spontaneous and funny thing saved the day and so one million thanks to Jeffrey Cedric for being a lovely.

And for those wondering, yes it did make for one vaguely confused corner store owner when we wander back in an hour or so later to pick up our box of Crunchie ice-cream bars missing one side, but it is so worth it.