The list was Marcus's idea, written on the back of an envelope in his careful block letters. Dana had added three items in her looping scrawl at the bottom: coffee filters, batteries, whatever we need for the thing Tuesday.

"What thing Tuesday?" he asked in the car.

"Your mother's birthday dinner."

"Right." He turned onto Grandview. "So, a cake."

"She'll say she doesn't want a cake."

"She'll eat two slices."

The hardware store first, because it closed at four and they'd learned that lesson in March. Dana waited in the aisle while Marcus compared furnace filters, holding the old one like evidence. She pulled a paint chip card off the display, a green called Hosta, and slid it into her pocket without deciding why.

At the grocery store the cart had a wobbling wheel and Marcus refused to trade it. He pushed; she navigated. They split up in produce—he went for onions and she went for the apples, testing them with her thumb—and found each other again by the bread.

"They're out of the sourdough."

"The bakery kind or the regular kind?"

"Both."

She put back the rye he'd chosen and picked a different rye, and he didn't argue. In the cereal aisle they ran into a woman Dana knew from the clinic, and Marcus stood politely, one hand on the cart, while the two of them talked about a colleague's retirement for four minutes. When the woman left, he said, "You do a good impression of someone who's having fun."

"I *was* having fun."

"You were counting the ceiling tiles."

Home by two. He carried the heavy bags; she got the eggs and the cake. The kitchen filled with the noise of cabinets. Later, when the groceries were away and the filter was changed, Dana found the paint chip in her jeans and stuck it on the refrigerator with a magnet, where Marcus would see it and eventually ask.


The list was Dana's, written on the back of an envelope from the electric company, and Marcus read it aloud in the car because she was driving.

"Milk, eggs, that bread you like but I can never remember the name of."

"Country white."

"That's not what it's called."

"It's what I call it." She turned into the parking lot, which was already three-quarters full at ten-thirty, and found a spot near the cart return, which she considered a small personal victory.

Inside, they split up the way they always did without discussing it. Marcus took produce and the middle aisles; Dana took dairy, meat, and the pharmacy counter, where she picked up her refill and got stuck behind a man arguing about his copay. When she found Marcus again he was standing in front of the pasta sauces holding two jars.

"This one's cheaper but it has more sugar."

"Get the other one."

"It's two dollars more."

"Then get the cheaper one." She put the sauce in the cart herself and moved on. He followed, mildly wounded, and grabbed a box of crackers that wasn't on the list.

They got out for eighty-six dollars, which Dana said wasn't bad and Marcus said was terrible, and then they drove to the hardware store because the toilet in the guest bath had been running for two weeks. Marcus knew he needed a flapper. He did not know which flapper. He stood in the plumbing aisle taking pictures of the packaging with his phone while Dana looked at house plants she had no intention of buying.

At home they carried everything in in two trips, and Dana put the cold things away while Marcus went to fight with the toilet. Twenty minutes later he came out with wet sleeves.

"Fixed?"

"Fixed."

She handed him the crackers he'd bought. He opened them standing at the counter, and neither of them said anything else for a while.


The list was on the refrigerator, held there by a magnet shaped like a pineapple, and Dana pulled it down while Marcus was still finding his shoes.

"We need lightbulbs," she said. "The one over the sink went out Thursday."

"That's not on the list."

"I'm adding it now." She wrote it in the margin, under *eggs* and *the good coffee, not the cheap one.*

They took Marcus's car because Dana's had a check-engine light they had both agreed to ignore for another week. On the way they stopped at the dry cleaner, where the woman behind the counter recognized Marcus and handed over his two shirts without asking for the ticket. Then the hardware store, where lightbulbs took eleven minutes and a discussion about whether the soft white or the daylight ones made the kitchen look better. Dana won. Marcus carried the box.

At the grocery store the parking lot was full in the way it always was on Saturday mornings, cars circling like they were waiting for something. Marcus dropped Dana at the door and found a spot near the cart return.

Inside they split up. He took produce and the middle aisles; she took dairy and the pharmacy counter, where she picked up her prescription and a birthday card for her sister. They met by the deli. He had put three avocados in the cart.

"Those are hard as rocks."

"They'll ripen."

"They'll ripen and then they'll be bad on Tuesday when neither of us wants an avocado."

He put one back. It felt like a fair compromise.

The checkout line moved slowly. Dana bagged while Marcus paid, and in the car she read the receipt out loud and said the price of butter was getting insulting. He agreed. At home they carried everything in together, two trips each, and the milk went in the refrigerator before anything else, because that was the rule.


Saturday morning, and the list was still on the refrigerator where Naomi had left it Thursday night. Priya pulled it down, read it aloud in the car—milk, coffee, dish soap, whatever we need for Tuesday—and Naomi said Tuesday was her mother's birthday dinner, remember, so add cream and something to make the tart with.

The Kroger on Belmont was crowded, the way it always was before noon. They split up out of habit, Naomi taking the produce and dairy side, Priya heading for the aisles with the coffee and the paper goods. They found each other again near the freezer section, both carrying more than they'd planned. Priya had a bag of frozen mango she couldn't justify. Naomi had two kinds of blackberries because the first ones looked bruised and she'd forgotten to put the good ones back.

At the register, the card reader stalled and the cashier apologized twice while it rebooted. Priya said it was fine. Naomi bagged the groceries herself, arranging them the way she liked, cold things together.

The dry cleaner was next, one block over. Naomi ran in with the ticket while Priya waited in the car with the engine running and the radio low. Two shirts and the gray coat, wrapped in plastic, laid across the back seat.

The last stop was the hardware store for furnace filters. Neither of them could remember the size, so Priya took a picture of the old one before they left the house—she was pleased about that, and said so. Naomi said it was the only reason they'd survived twelve years.

They got home a little after one. Priya carried the heavy bags. Naomi put things away and started coffee, and they ate leftover rice standing at the counter, the plastic-wrapped coat still hanging over a chair where somebody would eventually move it.


The Saturday list was stuck to the refrigerator with a magnet shaped like a lobster, a souvenir from a trip to Maine that neither of them could quite remember taking. Marcus pulled it down and read it aloud while Elena laced her boots by the door.

"Milk, eggs, that bread you like. Return the library books. Post office."

"And the dry cleaning," she said. "You keep forgetting the dry cleaning."

"I forgot it once."

"Twice."

Outside, the November air had a bite to it. Marcus warmed up the car while Elena went back inside for the tote bags they'd bought specifically so they'd stop forgetting tote bags. She came out holding three of them, triumphant.

At the post office, Elena mailed a birthday card to her nephew in Tucson while Marcus stood in line behind a man buying stamps one sheet at a time. He caught Elena's eye across the lobby and made a face. She pretended not to see him, which was worse.

The grocery store was crowded. They split up at the produce section—Marcus took the left side of the list, Elena the right—and found each other again near the dairy case, where Elena was frowning at two nearly identical containers of yogurt.

"Does it matter?" Marcus asked.

"One has more protein."

"Get that one."

"It also has more sugar."

They stood there for a moment, two adults contemplating yogurt. Elena put the first one in the cart and moved on.

At checkout, Marcus bagged while Elena paid, an arrangement they'd fallen into years ago without ever discussing it. The dry cleaner was two doors down in the same strip mall, so they stopped there last, and Elena held the hangers up in the back seat so the shirts wouldn't wrinkle on the drive home.

"Told you," she said. "Dry cleaning."

"I remembered it this time."

"I remembered it. You drove."

He didn't argue. It was a fair division of labor.


The rain had stopped by the time Marcus backed the Corolla out of the driveway, leaving the pavement steaming faintly in the late morning sun. Priya sat in the passenger seat with a receipt from Tuesday flipped over, the grocery list written on its back in her small, cramped handwriting.

"Bank first," she said. "The deposit's been sitting in my purse since Thursday."

Marcus turned left instead of right. The credit union had a drive-through, which meant Priya leaned across him to hand the envelope through the window, her elbow pressing his shoulder. The teller's voice crackled through the speaker, cheerful and slightly delayed. Marcus drummed the steering wheel while they waited for the receipt.

At the hardware store, they split up. Priya took the furnace filter, since she knew the size by heart, and Marcus went to find a replacement for the closet doorknob that had been sticking since March. They met at the register three minutes apart, and Priya paid because Marcus had gotten dinner Friday and they kept a loose, unspoken ledger.

The grocery store was crowded. Marcus pushed the cart and Priya walked ahead, pulling things off shelves and handing them back without looking. They disagreed briefly about yogurt, a disagreement so old it was practically ceremonial, and settled it the way they always did, buying both. In the cereal aisle they ran into a woman Priya knew from her office, and Marcus stood politely by the cart for four minutes while they talked about someone named Dennis.

The last stop was the dry cleaner, where Marcus's gray suit had been waiting since the wedding in October. Priya held the hanger up in the back seat so it wouldn't wrinkle.

At home, they carried the bags in together, two trips, and Marcus started putting away the cold things while Priya broke down the boxes for recycling.


The rain had stopped by the time Marcus backed the Corolla out of the driveway, leaving the pavement dark and steaming faintly in the October sun. Diane sat in the passenger seat with a receipt on her knee, using it as scratch paper.

"Bank first," she said. "Then the pharmacy, then Kroger. If we do the store last the milk won't sit in the trunk."

"You say that like I've ever let the milk sit in the trunk."

"July," she said.

He conceded the point with a grunt.

The bank took eleven minutes, most of it spent behind a man depositing what appeared to be a shoebox of quarters. Diane waited in the car and answered an email from her sister. At the pharmacy Marcus picked up his blood pressure prescription and, without being asked, the cheap reading glasses Diane had mentioned wanting three weeks earlier. She noticed them in the bag in the parking lot and didn't say anything, just put a hand on his forearm for a second.

Kroger was crowded for a Saturday. They split the list the way they always did — she took produce and dairy, he took the middle aisles and the deli counter — and reconvened near the bakery, where Marcus was holding a package of cinnamon rolls with the expression of a man presenting evidence.

"They were on sale."

"They're always on sale."

"So it's always a good decision."

She put them in the cart.

At the register the total came out higher than either of them expected, which was normal now, and they made the same joke about it they'd made for a year. In the parking lot Marcus loaded the trunk while Diane returned the cart to the corral, and on the way home they argued mildly about whether the gutters could wait another weekend.

They could not, they decided. But they would anyway.


The rain had stopped by the time Marcus backed the Corolla out of the driveway, leaving the pavement dark and shining. Priya sat in the passenger seat with a receipt from March in her lap, using the blank back of it as a list.

"Bank first," she said. "Then the pharmacy, then Kroger. Otherwise the frozen stuff sweats."

"The frozen stuff has never once sweated."

"The ice cream did. In August."

He didn't argue, because she was right, and because arguing about the ice cream had already cost them twenty minutes of a perfectly good Saturday two summers ago.

The credit union took eleven minutes. Priya deposited a check from her sister — repayment for a plane ticket, finally — while Marcus waited by the little table with the free coffee and didn't take any, because the free coffee was terrible and he took it anyway. At the pharmacy he picked up his blood pressure refill and a birthday card for his mother, holding up two options for Priya to judge from the end of the aisle. She pointed at the one with the hummingbird.

Kroger was crowded. They split up near the produce, the way they always did — she took the left half of the list, he took the right — and reconvened by the yogurt with two half-full carts, comparing.

"You got the crunchy," she said.

"You wrote peanut butter."

"I meant creamy. Peanut butter means creamy."

"To you."

They bought both jars. In the checkout line, Priya remembered they were out of trash bags and sent Marcus jogging back, and he returned just as the cashier reached the last of the bread.

At home they carried everything in over three trips, and Marcus put the ice cream away first, without being asked, and without mentioning that he'd done it.


The Saturday list had been on the refrigerator since Wednesday, magnetized under a coupon that had already expired. Dana pulled it down and read it aloud while Marcus warmed up the car.

"Bank, pharmacy, that thing you keep saying you'll return, groceries," she said, climbing into the passenger seat.

"The lamp," Marcus said. "I'm returning the lamp."

"You've said that three weekends in a row."

"It's in the trunk. Physically in the trunk. That's commitment."

They hit the bank first, because the drive-through line was mercifully short and Marcus had a check from his brother that had been aging in the visor for two weeks. Then the pharmacy, where Dana went in for her refill and came out with the refill plus a bag of cough drops, a birthday card, and a pack of AA batteries.

"For the smoke detector," she said preemptively.

"I didn't say anything."

"You made a face."

"That's my normal face."

The lamp got returned. It took eleven minutes and a receipt that Marcus found, improbably, in the glove compartment. He came back to the car holding the store credit slip over his head like a trophy, and Dana clapped twice, slowly.

The grocery store was the long stop. They split the list the way they always did—Dana took produce and dairy, Marcus took the middle aisles and the bread. They met near the frozen section and compared carts.

"You got the wrong yogurt," she said.

"There were four kinds."

"There were four kinds and one of them was ours."

At checkout, Marcus bagged while Dana paid, and they argued briefly about whether the eggs should go on top or beside. In the parking lot the wind had picked up and they loaded quickly, the trunk sticking the way it had since October.

"Anything else?" Marcus asked.

Dana checked the list, folded it, and put it in her pocket. "Home," she said.


The Saturday list was written on the back of an envelope, in Miriam's small, cramped handwriting. Dev held it while she backed the Corolla out of the driveway, past the recycling bin they'd both forgotten to bring in.

"Bank first," he said. "Then the pharmacy, then Kroger."

"Pharmacy's next to Kroger."

"I know. But the bank closes at noon."

She grunted, which he took as agreement. It was October and the maples on Willoughby had gone the color of rust. At the credit union she deposited a check from her mother, who still refused to use direct deposit, while Dev waited in the car with the windows down, listening to a podcast about a shipwreck.

The pharmacy took longer than it should have. Miriam's blood pressure prescription had been sent to the wrong location, and the technician had to call the other store, and Dev wandered the seasonal aisle and came back with a bag of candy corn.

"You hate candy corn," she said.

"I hate that I like it."

At Kroger they split the list without discussing it, the way they had for eleven years. He took produce and the bakery; she took dairy, cleaning supplies, the cat's food. They met near the frozen aisle, comparing carts like generals reviewing troops.

"Did you get the good bread or the cheap bread?"

"The good bread."

"Then we don't need the crackers."

"We always need the crackers."

She put the crackers back anyway. In the checkout line, Dev bagged while Miriam paid, and the cashier, a teenager with a lip ring, told them they made a good team, and neither of them knew what to say to that.

On the way home they stopped for gas, and Miriam pumped while Dev cleaned the windshield with the squeegee, badly, leaving streaks. The recycling bin was still at the curb when they pulled in. Dev got it.


The rain had stopped by the time Marcus backed the Corolla out of the driveway, leaving the pavement dark and steaming under a bright October sun. Dana sat in the passenger seat with the list on her knee, a receipt from last week's dentist visit turned over and covered in her small, cramped handwriting.

"Bank first," she said. "Then the pharmacy, then Kroger. If we do Kroger first the milk sits in the car for forty minutes."

"You say that every time."

"Because you try to do Kroger first every time."

At the credit union, Marcus deposited a check from his brother, who had finally paid back the money for the transmission. Dana waited in the car with the windows down, listening to a woman in the next space arguing pleasantly with someone on speakerphone about a wedding venue.

The pharmacy took longer than it should have. Dana's insurance had switched over on the first of the month, and the young man behind the counter had to call someone, then call someone else. Marcus wandered the seasonal aisle and came back with a bag of miniature Snickers.

"For the trick-or-treaters," he said.

"We got four last year."

"Then we'll have a lot left over."

The grocery store was crowded with Sunday people. They split up the way they always did—Dana took produce and dairy, Marcus took the middle aisles and the meat counter—and met near the frozen section, where they conferred over two brands of waffles and settled on the cheaper one. At checkout Dana remembered the coffee filters and jogged back for them while Marcus loaded the belt.

Loading the trunk, he handed her the Snickers to hold. She opened them in the car and ate two before they were out of the parking lot, and he laughed, and she said nothing at all.


The alarm clock had already been snoozed twice by the time Renée finally pulled the blinds open. Sunlight fell across the bed in a bright stripe, and Marcus groaned into his pillow.

"We need to leave by nine if we're hitting the bank," she said, tugging a sweater over her head.

They made it out by nine-fifteen, which Marcus considered a personal victory. In the driveway, he backed the Corolla out while Renée reviewed the list on her phone: dry cleaning, bank, hardware store for a furnace filter, then Kroger.

The dry cleaner had lost his gray suit pants. The woman behind the counter searched the racks twice, apologized, and promised to call. Renée squeezed his arm on the way out. "They'll turn up. They always do."

At the bank, they deposited a check from his mother, a birthday gift that had arrived three weeks late in a card with a cardinal on it. Marcus filled out the slip while Renée sat in one of the leather chairs by the window, texting his mother a thank-you.

The hardware store took eleven minutes. Marcus knew the aisle by heart.

Kroger was the long one. They split up—Renée took produce and dairy, Marcus took the middle aisles and the meat counter—and reconvened near the bakery, comparing carts. She had grabbed the wrong yogurt, the vanilla instead of the plain, and he walked back to swap it while she found a checkout lane. They debated a bouquet of tulips at the register and bought them.

At home, they carried the bags in together, three trips, and Renée put things away while Marcus went down to the basement and changed the furnace filter, which was gray with dust and had probably been in there since spring.

Upstairs, she was setting the tulips in a jar of water on the windowsill. It was not quite noon.


The rain had stopped by the time Denise and Marcus backed out of the driveway, leaving the pavement dark and slick under a sky the color of dishwater. Marcus drove. Denise held the list on her phone, scrolling through it with her thumb.

"Bank first," she said. "Then the pharmacy, then Kroger. If we do Kroger last, the milk won't sit in the car."

"You say that like I've ever let milk sit in the car."

"Easter. Two thousand nineteen."

He laughed and turned onto Whitmore. The bank took four minutes at the drive-through, the teller's voice crackling through the speaker while Denise dug the deposit slip out of her purse and passed it across Marcus's lap. At the pharmacy she went in alone for her mother's blood pressure prescription, and he waited with the engine running, listening to a caller on the radio argue about the Bengals' offensive line.

Kroger was crowded for a Tuesday. They split the list without discussing it, the way they had for eleven years — Marcus took produce and the meat counter, Denise took the middle aisles and dairy. They met near the bread, comparing carts.

"You got the good bananas," she said.

"I got the only bananas."

She put back a box of cereal he'd added without asking, and he pretended not to notice, and then she put it back in the cart when he'd turned away.

In the checkout line, Denise remembered they were out of trash bags. Marcus jogged back for them and returned just as the cashier finished, sliding the box onto the belt at the last second, breathing hard, pleased with himself.

They loaded the trunk together in the parking lot, the air smelling like wet asphalt and someone's cigarette. Halfway home, Marcus said, "We forgot coffee filters."

Denise closed her eyes. "Tomorrow."

"Tomorrow," he agreed, and kept driving.


The rain had stopped by the time Marcus backed the Corolla out of the driveway, and Diane rolled down her window an inch to let in the wet-asphalt smell she'd loved since childhood.

"Bank first," she said, checking the list on her phone. "Then the pharmacy, then Kroger."

"Pharmacy's on the way back."

"It's on the way there if you take Ridgeline."

Marcus considered this, signaled, and took Ridgeline. Fourteen years of marriage had taught him which hills were worth dying on.

At the bank, Diane deposited the check from her mother — a birthday gift, arriving two months late as always — while Marcus waited in the car and listened to a podcast about shipwrecks. She came back with two lollipops from the teller's bowl and handed him the green one without asking, because he always took green.

The pharmacy took longer than it should have. Marcus's blood pressure prescription had been sent to the wrong location, and the technician typed with the grim patience of someone who had explained this eleven times already that morning. Diane wandered to the seasonal aisle and returned with a bag of discounted Halloween candy in November.

"We don't need that."

"It's seventy percent off."

"So it's seventy percent off something we don't need."

She put it in the cart at Kroger anyway.

They split the store the way they always did — Marcus taking produce and meat, Diane taking dairy and the middle aisles — and met near the frozen section, comparing hauls like scouts returning from opposite ridges. He'd forgotten onions. She'd forgotten the coffee filters. They went back for both.

In the parking lot, loading bags into the trunk, Marcus noticed her sweater was inside out.

"Since when?"

"Since eight this morning, apparently." She laughed, genuinely, and didn't fix it.

They drove home the long way, past the reservoir, because neither of them suggested otherwise.


The Saturday list was on the yellow legal pad Diane kept magnetized to the refrigerator, and Marcus read it aloud in the driveway while she backed the car out.

"Groceries, bank, dry cleaning, and that thing at the hardware store for the sink."

"Washer," Diane said. "It's called a washer. Don't let them sell you a whole faucet."

They did the bank first because the drive-through line was short, then the dry cleaner, where the woman behind the counter remembered Marcus and asked about the dog. He said Pepper was fine, mostly deaf now, still ruled the house.

The grocery store was crowded in the way it always was after ten. Diane took the cart and Marcus took half the list, splitting off toward produce while she went for the paper goods. They met again by the deli counter, comparing what they'd found. He'd gotten the wrong kind of yogurt, the sweet kind, and she put it back without saying anything much, just a small sound in her throat he'd been married to for thirty-one years.

In the cereal aisle she stopped in front of a box of raisin bran and thought about her mother, who had eaten it every morning for as long as Diane could remember, and who had been dead eight years. She put the box in the cart. Marcus didn't ask.

At the hardware store they stood together at a wall of small drawers while a teenage employee counted out rubber washers into a paper envelope. Marcus held one up to the light like a jeweler.

"That's the one," he said.

Loading the trunk, Diane noticed the left rear tire looked soft and told him so. He crouched, pressed his thumb against it, said he'd check the pressure at the gas station on the way home.

They did. It was fine. They went home.


The rain had stopped by the time Marcus backed the car out of the driveway, though the gutters were still running and the maple in the front yard kept dropping water onto the windshield. Priya sat in the passenger seat with a receipt on her knee, writing on the back of it.

"You're making a list on a receipt again," Marcus said.

"It's paper."

"We have a notepad. On the refrigerator. I bought it specifically."

"And it's on the refrigerator," Priya said, "which is in the house, which is behind us."

They went to the bank first because the drive-through line was short, then to the hardware store, where Marcus spent eleven minutes comparing two nearly identical furnace filters while Priya wandered off and came back with a small bag of birdseed nobody had asked for.

"We don't have a feeder," Marcus said.

"We have a windowsill."

At the grocery store she pushed the cart and he read the list aloud, and they split up briefly at the produce section, which was always a mistake. He came back with three avocados that were rock hard. She sent him back for softer ones. They argued cheerfully about whether the store brand tortillas were as good as the ones they used to buy, and settled it by getting both.

In the checkout line, Priya remembered the dry cleaning.

"It's ticket's in my wallet," Marcus said. "I've been carrying it around since Tuesday."

The dry cleaner closed at six. It was 5:52. They made it with four minutes to spare, and the woman behind the counter handed over Marcus's gray suit in its plastic sheath and told them to drive safe.

At home they carried everything in together, two trips each, and Priya put the birdseed on the windowsill in a saucer while Marcus started dinner. By full dark, two sparrows had found it.


The list was magnetized to the fridge, half of it in Denise's cramped print, the rest in Marcus's looping scrawl. He pulled it down and read it aloud in the car while she backed out of the driveway.

"Coffee. Chicken thighs. Whatever that thing is you wrote that starts with a P."

"Parchment paper."

"That's not what this says. This says 'parchmerd.'"

"Then it says parchment paper."

The bank came first, because the drive-through line was short and Denise had a check from her mother that had been sitting in the visor for eleven days. Marcus filled out the deposit slip against his knee while she inched forward, and they both watched the pneumatic tube swallow the little canister with the same quiet satisfaction they'd had about it for twenty-two years.

At the pharmacy, Marcus went in alone for his blood pressure refill and came out with a bag of gummy bears he hadn't mentioned. Denise looked at them, then at him, then said nothing, which was its own kind of comment.

The grocery store was crowded for a Tuesday. They split up in produce — she took the vegetables, he took fruit — and reconvened near the deli, where he had found strawberries that were, he insisted, on sale. She turned the container over, checked the bottom for mold, and put them in the cart.

They disagreed about the chicken. He wanted the family pack; she pointed out the freezer was already full of things he'd bought in family packs. He put the family pack back.

At the checkout, Denise realized she'd forgotten the parchment paper. Marcus jogged back for it while she loaded the belt, and returned with the wrong brand, which was fine.

In the parking lot he took the cart to the corral, and she started the car, and the radio came on too loud, the way it always did.


The rain had stopped by the time Marcus backed the Corolla out of the driveway, leaving the pavement slick and shining under a gray November sky. Dev sat in the passenger seat with a receipt from last week on his knee, using it as a surface to write on.

"Bank first," he said. "Then the pharmacy, then Kroger. Otherwise we'll be carrying the frozen stuff around for an hour."

"You put that in an order?"

"I put everything in an order. That's why we own furniture."

At the credit union, Marcus deposited a check from the neighbor whose fence he'd helped rebuild, while Dev waited in the car with the heat on, scrolling through a work email he'd decided not to answer until Monday. The pharmacy took longer than expected—a woman ahead of them was arguing gently about a copay—and Dev spent the time reading the ingredients on a bag of cough drops he had no intention of buying.

Kroger was crowded. They split up at the produce section, the way they always did, Dev taking the left side of the store and Marcus the right, meeting again near the dairy case with two half-full carts. Marcus had grabbed the wrong yogurt, the one with fruit at the bottom.

"You know I don't like the chunks."

"I know you say that. I've seen you eat them."

"Under duress."

They put both containers in the cart.

At the register, Dev bagged while Marcus paid, and they loaded the trunk in the parking lot while the wind picked up and a stray cart drifted past them. On the way home they stopped for gas, and Marcus went inside for coffee neither of them needed.

Back at the house, they carried everything in together, two trips, and Dev started putting things away while Marcus broke down the boxes for recycling. It was four-thirty. The afternoon was already going dark.


The rain had stopped by the time Marcus backed the Corolla out of the driveway, leaving the pavement steaming faintly in the October sun. Dana sat in the passenger seat with a folded envelope in her lap, reading off the list she'd written on the back of it.

"Bank first," she said. "Then the pharmacy, then Kroger. And I want to swing by the hardware store if there's time."

"There's always time," Marcus said. "That's the beauty of Saturday."

At the credit union, Dana went inside to deposit a check from her sister while Marcus waited in the car with the windows down, half-listening to a call-in show about the Bengals. She came out eight minutes later, holding up the receipt like a trophy.

The pharmacy took longer. Marcus's blood pressure refill wasn't ready, so they wandered the aisles, drifting apart and reconvening. Dana found a birthday card with a cartoon raccoon on it and showed it to him.

"That's for your mother?"

"That's exactly for your mother."

He laughed and let her buy it.

At Kroger they split the list the way they always did—he took produce and dairy, she took the middle aisles—and met near the bakery, where Marcus was already holding a loaf of sourdough he hadn't been assigned to get. Dana checked the cart, counted the eggs, and put back one of the two boxes of cereal he'd added.

"You don't eat that."

"I could start."

"You could start with the box you already have open."

The hardware store was a quick stop: a pack of furnace filters and a new washer for the leaking kitchen faucet, which Marcus had been promising to fix since August. Dana paid.

Home by two. He carried the heavy bags; she got the door and the eggs. The house smelled like nothing in particular, which was to say it smelled like theirs.


The list was on the refrigerator, held by a magnet shaped like a lobster, and Dev peeled it off while Marisol found her keys in the dish by the door.

"Bank first," she said. "Otherwise we'll have milk sitting in the car."

The Honda smelled faintly of the coffee Dev had spilled three weeks ago. He drove. She read the list aloud at red lights, adding things as they occurred to her—paper towels, the good mustard, batteries for the smoke detector that had been chirping since Tuesday.

At the credit union, Marisol deposited a check from her sister and Dev waited in the car with the windows down, watching a kid on a scooter navigate the parking lot with more confidence than seemed advisable. When she came back she was laughing about the teller who'd remembered her name.

The hardware store took eleven minutes. Dev knew exactly where the batteries lived, aisle four, bottom shelf, and Marisol wandered off toward the paint chips and came back holding two nearly identical squares of green.

"For the bathroom," she said.

"Those are the same color."

"They are absolutely not the same color."

He held them up to the light, conceded there was a difference, and put both in his pocket.

The grocery store was the long part. She pushed the cart; he ran ahead for things and came back. They disagreed briefly about brands of tortillas and resolved it by buying both. In the produce section she squeezed avocados with the seriousness of a jeweler, and he stood beside her holding the plastic bag open, waiting.

Checkout took longer than it should have because the woman ahead of them had coupons. Neither of them minded much. In the parking lot they loaded the trunk together, and Dev returned the cart while Marisol started the engine and turned the radio down to something bearable.

They were home by eleven-thirty.


The list was short: milk, bread, coffee, and whatever looked good for Sunday dinner. Marcus wrote it on the back of an envelope while Dana hunted for the car keys, which turned up, as always, in the pocket of the jacket she'd worn yesterday.

They took her Corolla because his truck needed gas. The morning was gray and mild, the kind of late-October Saturday that made the neighborhood look softer than it was. Dana drove. Marcus rode with the envelope on his knee, adding items as he remembered them.

At the pharmacy they picked up his blood pressure refill and stood in line behind a woman arguing gently with her toddler about a stuffed dinosaur. Dana bought the dinosaur for the kid when the mother wasn't looking, then pretended she hadn't, which fooled no one, least of all Marcus.

The grocery store was crowded. They split up — Dana toward produce, Marcus toward the back for milk and the good coffee, the kind that cost too much and that they'd agreed twice to stop buying. They met again in the bread aisle. She had put grapes in the cart. He put the coffee in and said nothing. Neither did she.

At checkout they debated the Sunday dinner question and settled on a chicken. Dana loaded bags into the trunk while Marcus returned the cart, walking it all the way back to the corral because she gave him a look when he considered leaving it.

Last stop was the hardware store for furnace filters, and then the bank, where the drive-through line took eleven minutes and Marcus complained about all of them.

They were home by noon. Dana carried the cold things in first. Marcus put the filter by the basement door, where it would sit until Tuesday, and started the coffee they hadn't meant to buy.


Maya found the grocery list on the refrigerator, held there by a magnet shaped like Ohio, and folded it into her jacket pocket. "Ready?" she called toward the bedroom.

"Two minutes," Dev answered, which meant five.

She waited in the driveway, scraping a thin skin of frost off the windshield with the edge of a credit card because neither of them could remember where the ice scraper had gone. When Dev finally came out, he was holding two travel mugs of coffee and the library books that had been sitting by the door for eleven days.

"Library first," he said. "Before we forget again."

The book drop swallowed them with a satisfying thud. At the pharmacy, Maya waited in line for Dev's refill while he wandered off and returned with a box of cough drops and a birthday card for his sister, holding both up for approval. Maya nodded. The pharmacist called their name wrong, the way she always did, and neither of them corrected her anymore.

The grocery store was crowded for a Saturday. They split the list without discussing it—Maya took produce and dairy, Dev took the aisles—and met near the bread, comparing carts like generals reviewing troops. He'd gotten the wrong kind of pasta. She put it back and got the right kind, and he didn't argue, because he'd learned years ago that he genuinely could not tell the difference.

In the checkout line, Maya remembered they were out of dish soap. Dev jogged back for it and returned just as the cashier reached the last item.

They loaded the trunk together in the gray November light, breath fogging. Dev returned the cart to the corral because Maya had once told him, early on, that it was a small test of a person's character. He'd never forgotten it.

"Gas station?" she asked.

"Tomorrow," he said, and she agreed.


The rain had stopped by the time Marcus backed the Corolla out of the driveway, leaving the pavement dark and shining. Priya sat in the passenger seat with a folded receipt in her lap, using the back of it as a list.

"Bank first," she said. "Then the pharmacy, then Kroger. If we do groceries last, the milk won't sit in the car."

"You say that every Saturday."

"And every Saturday you try to do groceries first."

At the credit union, Marcus deposited a check from the guy whose deck he'd rebuilt in October, while Priya waited by the window and watched a kid press his hands flat against the glass of the fish tank in the lobby. The teller asked about their dog. Priya said Rufus was fine, mostly, aside from the eating-of-socks problem.

The pharmacy took longer than it should have. Priya's refill wasn't ready, so Marcus wandered the seasonal aisle and came back holding a bag of discounted Valentine's chocolate.

"It's March," she said.

"It's ninety percent off."

She put it in the basket.

Kroger was crowded. They split up at the produce section by unspoken habit — Marcus toward the dairy and bread, Priya circling the outer aisles with the cart. They found each other again near the cereal. He'd forgotten the eggs. She'd forgotten what brand of coffee he liked, so she'd gotten two, and he said that was fine, they'd drink both.

In the checkout line, Priya scrolled through her phone and told him her sister was thinking about visiting in April. Marcus loaded the belt and said April was good, as long as it wasn't the weekend of the wedding in Columbus.

They loaded the trunk in the parking lot, wind pulling at the plastic bags. On the drive home she opened the chocolate and handed him a piece at the stoplight.


Saturday morning arrived gray and drizzling, which meant the errands wouldn't wait any longer. Dana found the list on the refrigerator, held there by a magnet shaped like a lobster, and read it aloud while pulling on her jacket.

"Milk, coffee, bread, chicken thighs. Cat litter. And we need to swing by the pharmacy."

"And the hardware store," Marcus said from the hallway, where he was hunting for the car keys. "The kitchen faucet's still dripping."

"That was three weeks ago."

"It's a slow drip."

They took his car because hers needed an oil change, which she pointed out, and which he added to the list mentally without saying anything. The pharmacy came first, a quick stop for his blood pressure refill, and Dana waited in the car with the radio on low, watching an old man struggle with an umbrella in the parking lot.

At the grocery store they split up out of habit — Marcus to produce and meat, Dana to the aisles — then found each other again near dairy. He'd added two things to the cart that weren't on the list.

"Cookies?"

"They were on sale."

"That's not a reason."

"That's exactly a reason."

She let it go. In the checkout line they bagged their own groceries because the lane was short-staffed, moving in the practiced rhythm of twenty-two years, heavy things first, eggs on top.

The hardware store took longer than expected. Marcus stood in the plumbing aisle comparing two cartridge kits while Dana leaned against the shelf, checking her phone, occasionally offering unhelpful commentary about how they looked identical.

By the time they got home the rain had stopped. They carried the bags in together, four trips, and Dana put things away while Marcus knelt under the sink with a wrench, muttering.

The faucet stopped dripping by noon.


The rain had stopped by the time Marcus backed the car out of the driveway, and Priya rolled down her window to let in the wet-asphalt smell of a Saturday morning in early April.

"Bank first," she said, checking the list on her phone. "Then the hardware store, then Kroger."

"Hardware store before groceries?"

"Because the ice cream, Marcus."

He conceded the point with a shrug and turned left onto Delaware Street.

The bank took eleven minutes, most of it spent waiting behind a man depositing what appeared to be a shoebox of quarters. Priya read the community bulletin board while Marcus handled the check from his aunt. At the hardware store, they argued mildly about washer sizes in aisle six until an employee named Dale settled it in under thirty seconds, and Marcus bought a bag of grass seed he hadn't planned on buying.

"For the bare patch," he said.

"There are four bare patches."

"It's a big bag."

The grocery store was crowded. Priya took the left side of the store, Marcus the right, a system they'd developed over nine years of marriage and never once discussed formally. She got produce, dairy, the bread he liked with the seeds on top. He got coffee, chicken thighs, a jar of the olives she pretended not to eat straight from the container. They reconvened near the frozen foods, compared carts, and made the usual adjustments.

At checkout, Priya realized she'd forgotten the cat food. Marcus went back for it without being asked and returned with cat food and a candy bar.

"We're adults," he said.

"I'm not saying anything."

They loaded the trunk in the parking lot, the sun finally coming through, and Marcus pulled out onto the road toward home, the grass seed sliding around in the back with every turn.


Saturday morning arrived gray and damp, the kind of April weather that couldn't commit to rain. Marcus found the grocery list on the refrigerator, held there by a magnet shaped like a lobster from a trip to Maine four years ago.

"Did you add coffee?" he called.

"It's on there. Bottom." Diane appeared in the kitchen doorway, pulling her hair back. "I also need to swing by the pharmacy. And the dry cleaner, if we have time."

They took her car because his needed gas and neither of them felt like dealing with it. The parking lot at Wegmans was already filling up. Diane took the cart, Marcus took the list, and they moved through the store in the pattern they'd developed over eleven years—she handled produce and dairy, he took the middle aisles and always, always came back with something not on the list.

"Cookies?"

"They were buy one get one."

"We don't need two boxes of cookies."

"That's exactly why it's a good deal."

She rolled her eyes but didn't put them back.

At checkout, Marcus bagged while Diane paid, and they loaded the trunk in a light drizzle. The pharmacy took twenty minutes—a line, an insurance question, a woman ahead of them arguing about a copay. Diane waited while Marcus sat in the car with the engine running, scrolling through his phone.

The dry cleaner had closed early, a handwritten sign taped to the door.

"Monday, then," Diane said, getting back in.

On the way home, they stopped for gas after all, and Marcus washed the windshield while the tank filled. Diane went inside and came out with two coffees and a lottery ticket.

"Feeling lucky?"

"Feeling like a dollar."

They put the groceries away together, the radio on, the whole thing done by noon.


The rain had stopped by the time Marcus backed the Corolla out of the driveway, leaving the pavement dark and steaming under a weak October sun. Dana sat in the passenger seat with the list on her phone, though she'd already memorized most of it.

"Bank first," she said. "Then the pharmacy, then Kroger, because I don't want the milk sitting in the car."

"You always say that, and it's always fine."

"It's fine because we do it in the right order."

He didn't argue. Twelve years in, he'd learned which hills were worth it.

At the credit union, Dana went in to deposit her mother's birthday check while Marcus stayed in the car and listened to the last ten minutes of a podcast about a shipwreck. She came back out shaking her head. "Two tellers. Two. On a Saturday."

The pharmacy took longer than it should have. Marcus's blood pressure prescription had been sent to the wrong location, and he stood at the counter being patient in the particular way that meant he was not, while Dana wandered the seasonal aisle and came back with a bag of pumpkin-shaped Reese's cups she pretended she'd found by accident.

By the time they reached Kroger, the lot was full. They split up—Marcus took produce and dairy, Dana took the middle aisles—and met near the bakery, where she inspected his cart and put back the second bag of tortilla chips.

"We have some at home."

"We have a *quarter* bag at home."

She let that one go.

They loaded the trunk together in the gray light, and Marcus returned the cart while Dana got the heat going. On the drive home she read him the last thing on the list—*call about the gutters*—and he said he would, on Monday, and she wrote it down again for Monday.


The alarm hadn't gone off, but Marcus was already awake, listening to Dana move around the kitchen. By the time he came out, she'd made coffee and was writing on the back of an envelope.

"Pharmacy, hardware store, and we need dog food," she said. "Also the bank, but that can wait."

"It can't wait. Your mother's check."

Dana grimaced. "Fine. Bank."

They took her car because his needed an oil change—another item that had been living on various envelopes for three weeks. The morning was gray and cool, the kind of October Saturday that felt like it might rain and then didn't.

At the hardware store, Marcus spent eleven minutes comparing weatherstripping while Dana waited, then wandered off and returned with a bag of tulip bulbs.

"We're not planting tulips."

"You're not planting tulips," she said. "I'm planting tulips."

The pharmacy line was long. Dana held their place while Marcus went to find allergy medicine, and when he came back she'd struck up a conversation with a woman about the woman's grandson, and Marcus stood there patiently holding the box, listening, until the pharmacist called their name.

The grocery store was the real event. They split up—Dana took produce and dairy, Marcus took the middle aisles—and reconvened near the frozen section, where they argued briefly and without heat about whether they already had enough pasta at home. They did. Marcus put it back.

Loading the trunk, Dana said, "We forgot the bank."

Marcus looked at her.

"I know," she said. "I know."

They went to the bank. The line moved fast. The teller was young and cheerful and complimented Dana's jacket.

Driving home, they didn't talk much. The dog food was heavy in the back, sliding a little on the turns. Dana turned the radio down when the car in front of them stopped short, an old habit, and Marcus didn't say anything about it.


Marcus found the grocery list on the refrigerator, held there by a magnet shaped like Ohio, which neither of them had ever visited.

"You added tahini," he said.

"For the dressing." Dani was pulling on her boots by the door, one hand braced against the wall. "The one you liked."

"I liked that?"

"You had three servings."

They took her car because his was overdue for an oil change, which was itself on the list of things to handle, though not today. The morning was gray and unremarkable, the kind of February Saturday that felt borrowed from January.

First stop was the pharmacy, where Dani picked up her prescription while Marcus wandered the seasonal aisle and considered, briefly, buying discounted Valentine's chocolate. He decided against it and then reconsidered in line and went back for it.

"You're ridiculous," she said when he set it on the counter.

"It's seventy percent off."

At the hardware store they bought furnace filters and a replacement fill valve for the upstairs toilet, which had been running intermittently for two weeks. Marcus asked an employee three questions. Dani looked at paint chips she had no intention of buying and put a card for "Wheat Penny" in her coat pocket anyway.

The grocery store was crowded. They split up—she took produce and dairy, he took the center aisles—and reconvened near the frozen foods, comparing carts like people comparing homework.

"You forgot the tahini."

"It wasn't where it should be."

"It's with the peanut butter."

"That's insane."

She went and got it.

At home they unloaded in two trips. Dani put things away while Marcus went upstairs with the fill valve and a wrench and, forty minutes later, came down having actually fixed it.

"It's quiet," she said.

"I know."

They ate lunch standing up, still in their coats.


The Saturday list was stuck to the refrigerator with a magnet shaped like a lemon.

"Bank first," Renata said, pulling her hair into a knot at the back of her neck. "Then the hardware store, then the market. Otherwise the frozen stuff sits in the trunk."

Marcus was already looking for his keys, patting the pockets of a jacket he'd worn on Thursday. "Ice cream's the only frozen thing we ever buy."

"Which is exactly why the order matters."

He found the keys in the bowl by the door, where they always went, and where he never looked first. Outside the November air had a bite to it. The Corolla took two tries to turn over, and neither of them commented on it, though Renata made a small note in her head to call the mechanic Monday.

At the bank she deposited a check from her sister — repayment for a plane ticket, eleven months late — while Marcus stood by the pen chained to the counter and read a flyer about home equity loans he had no intention of pursuing. At the hardware store they spent nine minutes debating the merits of two nearly identical furnace filters before buying the cheaper one, which is what they had bought the last four times.

The grocery store was crowded. Marcus pushed the cart; Renata walked ahead, checking prices, occasionally holding something up over her shoulder without turning around. He put most of it in. Once he put a box of crackers back on the shelf when she wasn't looking, and once she caught him and put it back in the cart without a word.

In the parking lot, loading bags into the trunk, Marcus said, "We forgot dish soap."

Renata looked at the store, then at the trunk, then at her husband.

"Next week," she said.

He closed the trunk.


Marcus found the grocery list on the refrigerator, held there by a magnet shaped like Ohio, a souvenir from a trip neither of them could quite remember taking.

"You added onions," he said.

"We're out." Ellen was pulling on her jacket by the door, the gray one with the torn pocket she refused to replace. "And you used the last of the coffee this morning."

"I noted the coffee."

"You wrote 'cofee.'"

They took her car because his was low on gas, which meant the passenger seat had to be cleared of library books and a canvas bag of returnable bottles they'd been meaning to deal with for three weeks. Marcus moved them to the back and buckled in.

The bank came first. Ellen went inside to deposit a check from her mother while Marcus waited in the car with the radio on, listening to a call-in show about home repair. When she came back she said the teller had asked about their daughter, and Marcus said which teller, and Ellen said the one with the glasses, and he said that didn't narrow it down.

At the pharmacy they picked up his blood pressure medication and a birthday card for his brother, arguing mildly over two options—Ellen preferred the plain one, Marcus wanted the one with a cartoon dog. They bought the dog.

The grocery store was crowded for a Tuesday. Ellen took the left side of the store and Marcus took the right, a system they'd developed years ago. They met at the dairy case. He had forgotten the onions. She had forgotten the coffee. Neither commented.

In the parking lot, loading bags into the trunk, Ellen noticed the returnable bottles still sitting in the back seat.

"Next time," Marcus said.

"You said that last time."

He shut the trunk. "And here we are again."


The Saturday list was short: milk, coffee, a birthday card for Elena's nephew, and the dry cleaning that had been hanging in the closet since Tuesday.

"You have the keys?" Marcus asked, patting his pockets out of habit.

Elena held them up and jingled them. "I have the keys. I always have the keys."

They took her car because his needed an oil change—another item for a future list. The morning was gray in the way October mornings in Ohio often were, damp without committing to rain. Marcus drove; Elena controlled the radio and settled on a station playing songs neither of them had heard since college.

At the dry cleaner, Marcus went in alone while Elena idled at the curb. He came back with two of his work shirts and her navy blazer, holding them high so they wouldn't drag.

"They got the coffee stain out," he reported.

"I told you they would."

"You did. You were right. I'm saying it out loud so it counts."

The grocery store was crowded. They split the list, which they always did and which always resulted in a negotiation in the middle of aisle seven.

"We don't need two kinds of crackers," Elena said, examining his cart.

"We need one kind for soup and one kind for cheese."

She put one box back. He waited until she turned away and put it in again. She saw him in the reflection of the freezer door and let it go.

At the checkout, they bagged their own groceries out of impatience. Marcus took the heavy bags to the car, and Elena stopped at the little display near the exit and picked out a card with a cartoon dinosaur on it, which she decided was close enough to what a nine-year-old would like.

They were home by eleven. There was still the whole day left.


Marcus found the grocery list on the refrigerator, held there by a magnet shaped like Ohio, though neither of them had ever been to Ohio.

"You added olives," he said.

"I always add olives." Dara was already pulling on her jacket by the door, keys looped around one finger. "You always ignore them."

They took her car because his needed an oil change, which was errand number three, right after the pharmacy. The morning was gray in the particular way October mornings in Pennsylvania were gray, damp without actually raining.

At the Giant on Route 30, they split the list the way they always did. Dara took produce and dairy; Marcus took the middle aisles because he liked reading labels and she found it unbearable to watch him do it. They reconvened near the bakery with two carts, which was excessive, and consolidated with some difficulty.

"Did you get the olives?"

He held up the jar without looking at her, and she laughed.

The pharmacy took eleven minutes. Dara waited in the car with the heat on while Marcus went in for her mother's blood pressure medication, which they picked up on the third Saturday of every month and dropped off on the way home. The pharmacist knew him by name now, which he found either comforting or alarming depending on the day.

At the shop, Ray said forty-five minutes, so they walked down to the diner and split a plate of fries and argued mildly about whether the gutters could wait until spring. Dara said no. Marcus said probably. They both knew she was right and that he'd get up there next weekend anyway, complaining the whole time.

The car was ready at eleven-fifty. They drove to her mother's, dropped the pills, stayed for coffee they hadn't planned on, and got home by one with the groceries still cold in the trunk.


Marcus found the grocery list stuck to the refrigerator with a magnet shaped like a lobster, a souvenir from a trip to Maine neither of them could quite remember the year of.

"You added coffee filters," he said.

"We're down to three," Dana called from the hallway, hunting for her keys. They were in her coat pocket, where they always were.

The Saturday morning traffic on Route 9 moved in fits. Dana drove because she preferred to, and Marcus read the list aloud, negotiating.

"Do we actually need two kinds of mustard?"

"You're the one who won't eat the Dijon."

At the pharmacy, Marcus waited in line for Dana's prescription while she wandered the seasonal aisle, texting him a photograph of a garden gnome wearing sunglasses. He wrote back: *no.* She bought it anyway, along with a roll of packing tape they genuinely needed.

The grocery store was crowded. They split up out of habit—Dana took produce and dairy, Marcus took the interior aisles—and reconvened near the bakery, where he'd added a loaf of sourdough that wasn't on the list.

"Opportunistic," she said.

"It was warm."

They bagged their own groceries because the self-checkout line was shorter, and Marcus stacked things poorly, and Dana rearranged them without comment.

The last stop was the hardware store for a furnace filter. Marcus knew the size by heart. Dana stood in the doorway looking at a display of tomato seedlings and calculated, out loud, how many weeks remained until the last frost.

"You say this every March," he said.

"And every year we plant them too early."

They loaded the car in the parking lot, the cardboard filter wedged behind the passenger seat. On the drive home Dana turned the radio down and said she'd been thinking about repainting the bedroom. Marcus said he could live with that, and meant it, and the conversation carried them the rest of the way.


Marcus found the grocery list on the refrigerator, held there by a magnet shaped like Ohio, though neither of them had ever been to Ohio.

"You added eggs twice," he said.

Diane pulled on her jacket by the front door. "I added eggs on Tuesday and forgot, then added them again yesterday. That's not the same as adding them twice."

"It's exactly the same as adding them twice."

They took her car because his had been making a sound she described as "expensive." At the pharmacy, Diane waited in line for her mother's prescription while Marcus wandered the seasonal aisle and returned with a bag of discount Halloween candy in November.

"That's how they get you," she said.

"It was seventy percent off."

"That's how they get you."

The grocery store was crowded with Saturday people. Diane pushed the cart while Marcus went ahead, gathering things and doubling back like a retriever. He held up two kinds of pasta sauce for her verdict. She pointed at the one on the left without really looking, and he put back the one on the right with the seriousness of a man defusing something.

In the checkout line, she remembered the dry cleaning.

"It's fine," Marcus said. "We'll swing by."

"They close at four on Saturdays."

He checked his watch. "Then we'll swing by fast."

They made it at 3:52. The woman behind the counter recognized Diane and had the shirts ready before she finished saying her last name. Marcus carried them out over his shoulder, and the plastic caught the wind in the parking lot and billowed like a small ghost.

At home they unloaded together, and Diane discovered they had, in fact, bought no eggs at all.

Marcus set down the milk. "So the list was right."

"The list was right. We were wrong."

He was already reaching for his keys.


The Saturday list was on the yellow notepad, in Denise's handwriting, with two items in Ray's: batteries and something illegible that turned out to be "birdseed."

They took her car because his needed an oil change, which was itself on the list. Denise drove. Ray held the coffee she'd made him and read the list aloud at the first stoplight, which he did every week, as though it might have changed overnight.

The grocery store first, because the frozen things. They split up out of habit—Ray toward produce and the far aisles, Denise through the middle. He texted her a photo of two brands of tortillas. She wrote back *the green bag*, and he bought the green bag. They met near the dairy case and consolidated carts, and Denise put back a box of cookies he'd added, and he put it back in when she turned to look at the yogurt, and she saw him do it and let it go.

The bank next, where the drive-through line was four cars deep and Ray commented on this, and then the hardware store for batteries and a new washer for the bathroom faucet, which had been dripping since March. Denise waited in the car with the windows down and made a dentist appointment on her phone.

They argued mildly about lunch and settled on the sandwich place near the dry cleaner, where they ate at the little table by the window and Denise pulled a thread off his collar without mentioning it.

Home by two. Ray carried the heavy bags, Denise the eggs and bread, and they put things away in a system neither of them had ever agreed to out loud. Then he went to look at the faucet, and she started the laundry, and the afternoon opened up quiet and ordinary in front of them.


The rain had stopped by nine, so Marcus figured they'd better go before it started again.

"You have the list?" he asked, pulling on his jacket.

Dev held up his phone. "Photographed it. Your handwriting's a war crime, by the way."

They took the Corolla because Marcus's truck was still making that noise. First stop was the credit union, where Dev deposited a check from a freelance job while Marcus waited in the car with the radio on, half-listening to a story about a bridge closure. When Dev came back he was holding two lollipops from the teller's bowl.

"They gave you those?"

"I'm charming."

The hardware store took longer than it should have. They needed furnace filters, and neither of them could remember the dimensions, so Marcus stood in the aisle scrolling through old photos on his phone until he found a shot of the unit from last winter. Dev, meanwhile, wandered off and came back with a package of picture hooks they didn't need.

"For the hallway," he said.

"We've had those frames in the closet for two years."

"And this is how it begins."

At the grocery store they split up, which they'd learned worked better than shopping together. Dev took produce and dairy; Marcus took everything else. They met near the checkout, comparing carts like customs agents. Marcus had gotten the wrong kind of tortillas again. Dev put them back and got the right ones without comment.

The line was slow. An older woman ahead of them was paying in exact change, counting quarters onto the belt, and Dev caught Marcus's eye and made a small gesture that meant *don't sigh out loud.*

On the drive home Dev read the receipt aloud, item by item, trying to find where the eleven dollars they hadn't accounted for had gone.

It was the picture hooks.


Marcus found the grocery list stuck to the refrigerator with a magnet shaped like Ohio, though neither of them had ever been there.

"You added tahini," he said.

"I'm making that dressing again." Dana was pulling on her sneakers by the door, the ones with the sole starting to separate. "Bring the reusable bags this time. Actually, I'll bring them. You forget."

"I forgot once."

"You forgot in March, June, and two weeks ago."

The car smelled like the cinnamon air freshener she'd bought and he'd complained about. They stopped first at the dry cleaner, where Marcus went in alone and came out with two of Dana's blazers on hangers, holding them awkwardly above the parking lot puddles.

"They didn't get the coffee stain out," he reported.

"Of course they didn't."

At the bank, they used the drive-through because the line inside looked committed. Dana deposited a check from her mother, birthday money three months late, and they both waved at the teller through the glass, feeling faintly ridiculous about it.

The grocery store was the usual negotiation. Marcus wanted the store-brand coffee; Dana held up the bag of beans they actually liked and raised her eyebrows until he put the other one back. In produce, she squeezed avocados while he checked his phone. He picked out a bunch of tulips near the register, not for any occasion, and set them in the cart without comment. She noticed and didn't say anything either.

The last stop was the hardware store for a furnace filter, size 16x25x1, which Marcus had written on his hand because he didn't trust the list.

At home they carried everything in together, two trips. Dana put the tulips in a water glass because the vase was still in a box in the basement from the move, eleven months ago now, and neither of them had gotten around to it.


The rain had stopped by the time Marcus backed the Corolla out of the driveway, leaving the neighborhood streets slick and shining. Priya sat in the passenger seat with the grocery list open on her phone, though she'd already memorized most of it.

"Bank first," she said. "Then the pharmacy, then Kroger."

"Pharmacy's on the way back."

"It closes at six on Saturdays."

Marcus glanced at the clock and adjusted his route without further argument. Twelve years of marriage had taught him which battles were worth the gas.

At the credit union, Priya deposited a check from her aunt while Marcus waited in the car, scrolling through the weather forecast for their nephew's birthday party the following weekend. When she climbed back in, she handed him a lollipop from the teller's bowl.

"They still do that?"

"For me they do."

The pharmacy took longer than expected. Marcus's blood pressure prescription had been sent to the wrong location, and Priya stood at the counter with her arms crossed while the technician made calls. Marcus wandered off and returned with a bag of peanut M&M's and a birthday card featuring a cartoon dog.

"That's for a five-year-old," Priya said.

"He is five."

"He's seven."

Marcus went back and exchanged it.

At the grocery store they split up, as always—Marcus taking produce and meat, Priya handling everything in the middle aisles. They reconvened near the freezers, comparing carts.

"You got the wrong yogurt."

"It was on sale."

"You hate that brand."

He put it back.

Loading bags into the trunk, Priya noticed the left rear tire looked low. Marcus crouched, pressed his thumb against the rubber, and agreed. They stopped at the gas station on Warren Street, where he fed quarters into the air machine while she held the hose steady, and then they drove home in the last of the afternoon light.


Marcus found the shopping list on the refrigerator, held there by a magnet shaped like a lobster from a trip they'd taken to Maine four years ago. He read it twice while Daniel searched the hall closet for the reusable bags they always forgot to bring back to the car.

"Did you write 'cilantro' or 'coriander'?" Marcus called out.

"Same thing."

"They are not the same thing."

Daniel emerged with three canvas bags and a look of practiced patience. "They're literally the same plant."

The drive to Kroger took eleven minutes. Daniel drove because he always drove, and Marcus controlled the radio because that was the arrangement they'd landed on somewhere around year three. He settled on a classic rock station and Daniel didn't complain, which meant he liked the song.

Inside, they split up. Marcus took produce and dairy; Daniel took the middle aisles and whatever was on sale. They found each other again near the frozen foods, where Daniel was holding two brands of waffles and frowning.

"The store brand is a dollar less."

"The store brand tastes like cardboard."

Daniel put the store brand back.

At checkout, Marcus bagged while Daniel paid, and they loaded everything into the trunk of the Corolla in the drizzle that had started while they were inside. Then the post office, where Daniel mailed a birthday card to his sister in Tucson and Marcus waited in the car with the engine running. Then the hardware store for furnace filters and a new washer for the kitchen faucet, which had been dripping since February.

"We should get lunch," Marcus said in the parking lot.

"We have food. In the trunk. That we just bought."

"That's not a no."

Daniel checked his watch, then pulled out of the lot and turned left instead of right, toward the diner on Woodward.


The list had been on the refrigerator since Tuesday, held by a magnet shaped like Wisconsin, and by Saturday morning Dana had added three things to it in handwriting that leaned hard to the right.

"Bank first," Marcus said, backing the Corolla out of the driveway. "Otherwise we'll be carrying frozen stuff around."

"The bank's four minutes away."

"Four minutes is four minutes."

She didn't argue, mostly because he was right and she didn't feel like saying so. At the credit union he deposited a check from his mother, the annual birthday check she still sent even though he was forty-one, while Dana waited in the car with the radio on a station playing songs from a decade neither of them had loved at the time.

The dry cleaner had lost her blazer, then found it, then apologized twice. Marcus stood by the counter reading a laminated sign about seasonal storage rates as though it interested him.

At the grocery store they split up the way they always did—him to produce and the middle aisles, her to dairy and the back. They met near the bread with two carts, which was a mistake they made roughly every other week.

"You got bananas," she said.

"You wrote bananas."

"I wrote bananas because we're out. You bought the green ones."

"They ripen."

"Not by Monday."

He put them back and got a yellower bunch, and she pretended not to watch him do it.

The line at checkout was slow. A kid ahead of them was negotiating hard for a candy bar and losing. Dana bagged while Marcus loaded, and they got everything into the trunk in one trip, which felt like an accomplishment.

On the way home he took the long way, past the elementary school, because the direct route had construction. Neither of them mentioned it. She held the eggs in her lap the whole way.


The rain had stopped by the time Marcus backed the Corolla out of the driveway, leaving the pavement dark and steaming faintly in the October sun. Dee sat in the passenger seat with the list on her phone, thumb scrolling.

"Bank first," she said. "Then Target, then groceries, because I don't want the milk sitting in the car."

"Pharmacy," Marcus said. "You forgot the pharmacy."

"I didn't forget it, it's on here. It's under Target because they're in the same lot."

He made a sound that meant she was right and he wasn't going to say so out loud.

At the credit union, Dee ran in to deposit the check from her mother while Marcus waited with the engine off, listening to a podcast about the 1919 World Series. She came back out in four minutes, waving the receipt like a small flag.

Target was the usual detour. They went in for laundry detergent and a shower curtain liner and came out with those plus a bag of pumpkin-shaped candles Dee insisted were seasonal, not frivolous, and a pair of work socks Marcus said he genuinely needed. At the pharmacy counter, the tech told them the refill wouldn't be ready for twenty minutes, so they wandered the greeting card aisle and read the funniest birthday cards to each other in bad voices until the intercom called their name.

The grocery store was crowded for a Saturday. They split up—Marcus took produce and the meat counter, Dee took the interior aisles—and met near the frozen section, comparing carts.

"You got the wrong bread," she said.

"This is the bread we always get."

"That's the twenty-two grain. We get the twelve."

He swapped it without argument.

They loaded the trunk in the parking lot, and Marcus returned the cart to the corral while Dee started the car and turned the heat on for him.


The list was on the refrigerator, held by a magnet shaped like Michigan, and Sam pulled it down while Anna hunted for the car keys.

"They were in your jacket last time," she said.

"They're in your purse this time." He held them up, jingling.

Outside, the October air had that clean, cold edge that meant frost was coming. Anna backed the Corolla out of the driveway while Sam read the list aloud: milk, eggs, coffee, something for Thursday when his sister came over. The bank first, then the hardware store, then Kroger.

At the bank, Anna deposited a check while Sam waited in the car with the radio on low, watching a woman try to parallel park a truck the size of a small building. Anna came back out shaking her head. "New teller. Took forever."

The hardware store took eleven minutes. Sam needed a furnace filter and a package of picture-hanging hooks, and Anna wandered off to look at paint chips even though they'd agreed to wait until spring. She came back with three of them anyway, fanned out like a poker hand.

"Sage," she said.

"That's green."

"It's sage."

The grocery store was busier than they'd hoped. Sam pushed the cart and Anna went ahead, grabbing things and doubling back. They disagreed briefly about whether the good bread was worth four dollars — it was, Anna said, and it was — and Sam quietly added a bag of gummy bears to the cart when she wasn't looking. She saw. She said nothing.

In the parking lot, loading bags into the trunk, Sam noticed the taillight was out. "I'll get to it Saturday," he said.

"You said that about the gutters."

"I'll get to those too."

She laughed, and they drove home with the heater running and the gummy bears open between them.


Saturday morning arrived gray and damp, the kind of weather that made staying in bed feel like a moral victory. Daniel gave up first, padding to the kitchen in socks to start the coffee. Marcus followed twenty minutes later, hair flattened on one side, already reciting the list.

"Dry cleaning, the pharmacy, groceries," he said. "And the hardware store, because the downstairs faucet is still doing that thing."

"The dripping thing."

"The dripping thing."

They took Daniel's car because Marcus's had a check engine light they'd been ignoring since March. The dry cleaner recognized them and had the tickets pulled before they reached the counter—two dress shirts, one blazer Marcus had spilled marinara on at his cousin's wedding.

The pharmacy took longer. There was a woman ahead of them arguing about a copay, and Daniel wandered off toward the seasonal aisle while Marcus held their place. He came back with a bag of chocolate-covered pretzels.

"We don't need those."

"Correct," Daniel said, and put them in the basket.

The grocery store on Fillmore was crowded, as it always was on weekends. They split the list the way they had for eleven years—Marcus took produce and dairy, Daniel took everything in boxes and cans. They reconvened near the bread aisle. Marcus inspected the cart and removed a box of cereal.

"That's forty percent sugar."

"It's fortified."

"With sugar."

Daniel put it back in when Marcus turned toward the bakery case.

At the hardware store, an older employee named Ray walked them through washer sizes with more enthusiasm than the topic warranted. Marcus asked good questions. Daniel held the little paper bag of parts.

They got home just before noon. Marcus put the groceries away while Daniel wrestled with the faucet, and by one o'clock, the dripping had stopped, and neither of them mentioned the cereal again.


Marcus found the grocery list on the refrigerator, held there by a magnet shaped like Wisconsin, though neither of them had ever been to Wisconsin. He read it aloud while Ellen laced her boots by the door.

"Milk, eggs, that bread you like, coffee. Chicken thighs?"

"For Thursday," she said. "And we need dish soap."

He added it, then pocketed the pen. Outside, the March air had that undecided quality, cold in the shade and warm in the sun. Ellen drove because she always drove, and Marcus controlled the radio, which was the arrangement they'd settled into sometime around their fourth year.

The bank came first. Ellen went inside to deposit a check from her sister, who still refused to use anything electronic, while Marcus waited in the car and answered two work emails on his phone. When she came back she was holding two lollipops, which the teller had offered and she had accepted for reasons she couldn't articulate.

At the pharmacy, they both went in. Marcus picked up his blood pressure medication and Ellen wandered the seasonal aisle, considering a garden hose that was on clearance in a way that suggested it had been on clearance since October.

"We have a hose," Marcus said, coming up behind her.

"Ours leaks."

"Then get it."

She put it back. "Not today."

The grocery store was busy for a Saturday afternoon. They took separate halves of the list and met by the yogurt, comparing carts. He'd gotten the wrong bread. She sent him back. In the checkout line they argued mildly about whether they needed more paper towels, and bought them.

Loading the trunk, Ellen said, "The car wash, or do we skip it?"

Marcus looked at the pollen dusting the windshield. "Skip it. It'll rain Tuesday."

They drove home with the windows cracked, the lollipops still in the cupholder, unopened.


Marcus found the grocery list stuck to the refrigerator under a magnet shaped like Ohio, though neither of them had ever been there. He read it twice while Diane hunted for her keys.

"You added coffee filters," he said.

"We ran out Tuesday. You've been using paper towels."

"They work fine."

"They absolutely do not."

The Corolla started on the second try, which had become normal enough that neither of them commented. Diane drove because Marcus had gotten his glasses prescription updated and hadn't picked up the new pair yet—which was errand number two, after the bank.

At the credit union, they deposited a check from Diane's mother, forty dollars for their anniversary, along with a card that said *Thinking of you both* in handwriting that had grown shakier since spring. Marcus filled out the slip. Diane signed the back.

The optician's was in the same strip mall as the grocery store, which was the only reason they'd chosen it three years ago. The new frames were tortoiseshell, and Marcus put them on in the parking lot and stared at Diane for a long moment.

"What?"

"You have more freckles than I remembered."

"That's very flattering."

"I like them. I'd forgotten how many there were."

Inside the store, they split up—Diane took produce and dairy, Marcus took the middle aisles and the coffee filters. They met at the meat counter, compared carts, and Diane put back the second box of crackers Marcus had grabbed without thinking.

The bagger was a teenager who asked if they wanted help out, and Marcus said no thanks, and then reconsidered when he lifted the case of seltzer.

Driving home, Diane took the long way, past the high school, where the marching band was practicing badly in the heat.

"They're getting better," Marcus said.

"They are not."

"They will," he said, and rolled his window down.


The Saturday list was stuck to the refrigerator with a magnet shaped like a peach, and Dana pulled it down while Marcus hunted for his keys.

"Bank first," she said, reading. "Then the hardware store, then Kroger. And I need to drop the library books."

"The library closes at five."

"It's nine-forty."

They took his car because hers still had the dog crate in the back from the vet trip. The morning was gray and warm, the kind of April day that couldn't commit to rain. At the bank Marcus deposited a check from his sister — repayment for a loan he'd stopped expecting back — while Dana waited in the car with the windows down, half-listening to a radio segment about tomato blight.

The hardware store took longer than planned. Marcus wanted a specific washer for the leaking bathroom faucet and stood in the plumbing aisle comparing two nearly identical packages, holding them up like he was reading fine print on a contract. Dana wandered off and came back with a pack of furnace filters and a birdfeeder she said was on clearance.

"We have a birdfeeder."

"The squirrels destroyed it."

He didn't argue. He put the filters in the cart.

At the grocery store they split the list, which they had learned years ago was faster and less likely to end in bickering. Dana took produce and dairy; Marcus took the middle aisles and the things that came in cans. They met near the deli counter, compared carts, argued briefly about whether they still needed rice. They did not need rice. They bought rice.

In the parking lot, Marcus loaded bags into the trunk while Dana returned the cart, and on the drive home they remembered the library books, still sitting in the back seat, and turned around.


Marcus found the grocery list on the refrigerator, held up by a magnet shaped like a lobster, and read it twice before calling toward the bedroom.

"Did you write 'cilantro' or 'coriander'? Because they're the same thing and you know it."

"They're not the same in my head," Devon said, coming out while pulling a sweatshirt over his head. "Cilantro is the leaves. Coriander is the seeds. Someone in this house needs to have standards."

They took the Corolla because the Subaru still needed an oil change, which was errand number two. Devon drove. Marcus had control of the radio, which meant they listened to a podcast about a nineteenth-century shipwreck for eleven minutes before Devon requested mercy.

At the Kroger on Broadway, they split the list the way they always did—Marcus took produce and dairy, Devon took the middle aisles and anything requiring a decision about brand loyalty. They reconvened near the bread, comparing carts like generals reviewing troops. Devon had added a bag of gummy worms that had not been on any list.

"For the drive," he said.

"It's a nine-minute drive."

"For the emotional journey."

After checkout, they dropped a package at the post office, where the line was long enough that Marcus read every wanted poster on the wall. Then the oil change place, where the technician told them the Subaru needed new wipers too, and Devon said yes before Marcus could ask how much.

They stopped for coffee on the way home, sitting in the car in the parking lot for a few minutes because the heat was finally working and neither of them wanted to move.

"We forgot the dry cleaning," Marcus said.

Devon checked the clock on the dashboard. "They close at six."

"Tomorrow, then."

"Tomorrow," Devon agreed, and backed out of the space.


The list was on the refrigerator, held by a magnet shaped like Wisconsin, and Daniel pulled it down while Priya searched the closet for the reusable bags they always forgot.

"Do we actually need buttermilk," he asked, "or is that aspirational?"

"It's for the cornbread. Which you requested."

They took her car because his was making a noise neither of them wanted to think about yet. The Saturday morning traffic on Bell Road was thick with people doing exactly what they were doing. At the bank, Priya deposited a check from her aunt while Daniel waited in the car with the radio on, changing stations every forty seconds until she came back and made him stop.

The dry cleaner had lost his gray suit jacket, or claimed to have never received it, and there was a five-minute negotiation involving a receipt Priya found in the glove compartment among ketchup packets and a tire gauge. The jacket materialized.

At the grocery store they split the list, which they had learned years ago was faster but riskier. Daniel came back with the wrong kind of tortillas and a bag of gummy peaches he pretended had been on the list. Priya let it go. In the produce section they stood together over the avocados, pressing them one at a time, disagreeing quietly about ripeness.

The checkout line was long. A toddler in the cart ahead of them stared at Daniel with open suspicion, and he stared back until the child looked away.

Loading the trunk in the parking lot, Priya remembered they still needed to drop off the packages at the post office, and Daniel said they could go tomorrow, and she said tomorrow was Sunday, and he said, "Right. Okay. Post office."

They went to the post office. Then home, where the buttermilk went in the door of the refrigerator and the list was replaced with a new blank one.


The list was on the refrigerator, held by a magnet shaped like a lobster, and Denise pulled it down on her way out the door.

"Did you grab the bags?" she asked.

Marcus held up the wad of canvas totes. "And the dry cleaning ticket."

The drive to the grocery store took eleven minutes, which was long enough for them to disagree about whether the recycling went out Tuesday or Wednesday. Neither of them looked it up. The radio played something neither of them liked well enough to change.

Inside, they split the list the way they always did. Marcus took produce and the deli counter; Denise took the middle aisles, where the coffee and the rice and the paper towels lived. They met near the dairy case, and Marcus held up two blocks of cheddar.

"The sharp or the extra sharp?"

"Whichever one isn't four dollars more."

At checkout, Denise found a coupon in her wallet that had expired in March. The cashier let it slide anyway, and they both thanked her twice.

The bank came next, then the hardware store for a furnace filter and a package of picture hangers. Marcus stood in the aisle comparing filter thicknesses with an intensity Denise found funny, though she didn't say so. She wandered off and came back with a bag of birdseed they hadn't discussed.

The dry cleaner had lost the ticket in their own system, but Denise recognized Marcus's gray suit on the rack and pointed. The woman behind the counter apologized and knocked two dollars off.

By the time they got home the ice cream had gone soft at the edges. They carried everything in together, four trips, and Marcus put the cold things away while Denise flattened the bags and tucked them back into the drawer by the sink.

"Nothing else today," he said.

"Nothing else," she agreed, and neither of them believed it.


The list was on the refrigerator, held by a magnet shaped like a lobster, and Priya took it down while Danny hunted for the car keys he'd sworn he left on the counter.

"Coat pocket," she said, not looking up.

He checked. They were in his coat pocket.

The grocery store on a Saturday morning was a controlled disaster. Danny drove the cart, which meant he drifted toward the ends of aisles and stopped abruptly to read labels on things they didn't need. Priya worked from the list — spinach, chicken thighs, the specific yogurt her mother liked because her mother was visiting in two weeks and would notice.

"We need coffee," Danny said.

"We have coffee."

"We have half a bag of coffee." He put a new bag in the cart anyway, and she let it go, because he was right and because he made the coffee every morning at six while she was still asleep.

At the pharmacy counter, they waited eleven minutes for a refill that was supposed to be ready. Priya filled out a form. Danny read the back of a box of allergy medicine out loud in a serious newscaster voice until she laughed and told him to stop.

The dry cleaner had lost his gray suit jacket, then found it, then discovered a stain they hadn't been able to lift entirely. Priya negotiated a discount. Danny stood behind her, holding the plastic-wrapped shirts, quietly impressed the way he always was.

They stopped at the hardware store for furnace filters and left with furnace filters, a garden hose nozzle, and two packets of tomato seeds neither of them had planned on.

In the driveway, unloading, Danny said, "Did we get the yogurt?"

Priya lifted the bag with the yogurt in it.

"Married the right person," he said, and carried in the heavy things.


The list was on the fridge, held by a magnet shaped like a lobster, and Denise pulled it down without reading it. She already knew: milk, eggs, the good coffee, whatever bread was on sale.

"Bank first," Marcus said from the doorway, jingling the keys. "They close at noon on Saturdays now."

"Since when?"

"Since March. I told you."

"You told the dog," she said, but she followed him out.

The bank took eleven minutes. Marcus deposited a check from his brother, who paid him back in installments for reasons neither of them discussed anymore, and Denise waited in the car with the radio on a station playing songs from 1994. When he got in, she turned it down.

"Dry cleaner's," she said. "Then the pharmacy. Then food."

"Food last is a mistake. Ice cream."

"We're not getting ice cream."

"We're always getting ice cream."

At the dry cleaner's, the woman behind the counter couldn't find Marcus's gray suit, and there was a slow, polite excavation of the racks while Denise studied a calendar advertising a funeral home. The suit turned up under the name MARCO. Marcus said that was fine, that was close enough.

The pharmacy line had one man arguing about a copay, so Denise went to grab the shampoo they liked and came back to find Marcus reading the back of a box of allergy medicine with tremendous seriousness.

"You don't have allergies."

"I might be developing them. People do."

The grocery store was crowded with people who'd had the same idea about Saturday morning. They split up, the way they always did — she took produce and the middle aisles, he took meat and dairy — and met near the registers, where he set a pint of butter pecan on top of the eggs.

Denise looked at it. Then she put it in the cart.


The alarm on Marcus's phone went off at seven, though Dana was already awake, mentally rearranging the list she'd started the night before.

"Bank first," she said over coffee, "because they close at noon on Saturdays."

Marcus grunted agreement and went to find his wallet, which turned up under yesterday's newspaper on the arm of the couch. He held it up in triumph. Dana didn't look impressed, which was fair — this happened most weekends.

They took Dana's car because Marcus's was making a noise he'd been describing as "probably nothing" since March. At the credit union they deposited a check from Dana's aunt, birthday money that had arrived three weeks late, and Marcus asked the teller about refinancing in the vague way he did whenever he wanted information without commitment.

The hardware store was next. Marcus needed a specific washer for the bathroom faucet, and Dana wandered the paint aisle while he compared packages, holding a chip called Morning Fog against one called Quiet Linen and finding no difference between them whatsoever. He found her there fifteen minutes later.

"Got it," he said.

"Do we need a new drop cloth?"

"We have three."

"Do we know where they are?"

They bought a drop cloth.

The grocery store was crowded. Dana pushed the cart while Marcus went off for produce, returning with peaches that were, he admitted, probably not ripe. They disagreed briefly about brands of coffee and at greater length about whether they had enough olive oil at home. Marcus won the coffee argument. Dana won the olive oil.

At checkout, the woman ahead of them was paying in exact change, counting nickels. Marcus caught Dana's eye and she shook her head slightly — *don't*, *be patient* — and he wasn't, particularly, but he stayed quiet.

They loaded the trunk in the September sun. Dry cleaning could wait until Tuesday, they decided, and drove home.


The rain had stopped by the time Marcus backed the Corolla out of the driveway, leaving the street slick and shining under a gray Saturday sky. Priya sat in the passenger seat with the list on her phone, thumb scrolling.

"Bank first," she said. "Then the pharmacy, then Kroger. If we do groceries last, the eggs won't sit in the car."

"You've thought about this a lot."

"One of us has to."

At the credit union, Marcus deposited the check from his uncle while Priya waited in the car with the heater on, texting her sister about Thanksgiving. The pharmacy took longer than it should have—her allergy prescription hadn't been refilled, and the technician had to call the doctor's office. Marcus wandered the aisles and came back with a bag of pretzels and a birthday card for their neighbor's kid.

"That card is hideous," Priya said.

"He's seven. He'll love it."

The grocery store was crowded. They split up the way they always did—Marcus took produce and the back of the store, Priya took dairy, bread, and the middle aisles. They met near the frozen section, comparing carts.

"You got the cilantro?"

"I got parsley. They were out."

Priya sighed but let it go. At checkout, she remembered they were nearly out of coffee, and Marcus jogged back for it while the cashier scanned. He returned with the coffee and a box of the ginger cookies she liked but never bought for herself. She didn't say anything about it, just moved the divider back so he could set them down.

In the parking lot, they loaded the trunk together, Marcus handing bags over, Priya arranging them so nothing would tip. The car smelled like wet asphalt and bread.

"Home?" he asked.

"Home," she said. "You're putting away the cold stuff."

"Deal."


The car needed gas before anything else, so David pulled into the station on Fillmore while Marcus scrolled through the list on his phone.

"Dry cleaning, the pharmacy, groceries," Marcus read aloud. "And your mother wants us to mail that package."

"It's in the trunk." David tapped his card against the reader and waited, watching a woman across the pumps struggle with a windshield squeegee. "Did we ever figure out if the dry cleaner is open on Sundays?"

"Until four."

At the pharmacy they waited eleven minutes behind a man arguing about his insurance copay. Marcus leaned against a display of reading glasses and tried on a pair of tortoiseshell frames.

"You look like a substitute teacher," David said.

"I look distinguished."

"Substitute teacher who's distinguished."

The grocery store was crowded in the way it always was on weekend afternoons, families clogging the produce section, someone's toddler shrieking near the bakery. They split the list without discussing it, the way they'd done for eleven years. David took the perimeter—vegetables, meat, dairy. Marcus handled the middle aisles and the things David always forgot, like paper towels and the specific brand of coffee they'd argued about and then settled on.

They reconvened near the frozen food.

"They didn't have the cilantro," David said.

"They never have the cilantro."

"They had it in June."

"You've been talking about that cilantro since June."

In the checkout line, Marcus noticed the flowers—cheap grocery store carnations, dyed an unconvincing blue—and put a bunch on the belt anyway. David raised an eyebrow but didn't say anything.

At the post office the line had already formed outside. They mailed the package, dropped the shirts at the cleaner's with four minutes to spare, and drove home with the windows down because the afternoon had turned unexpectedly warm.

Unloading the trunk, David found the carnations under a bag of oranges, already bruised.

"They were three dollars," Marcus said.

David put them in water anyway.


Saturday morning arrived gray and cool, and Marcus was already awake, running water into the coffee pot while Denise hunted for the reusable bags they always forgot in the trunk.

"Found them," she called from the garage. "Right where we left them last week, after we swore we'd bring them inside."

They took her car because his needed an oil change—which, Marcus reminded her, was errand number three on the list she'd written on the back of a utility envelope. First the bank, then the hardware store for furnace filters, then the oil change, then groceries last so nothing sat warm in the car.

At the bank, the drive-through line stretched four deep, so Denise went inside while Marcus waited with the engine off, listening to a radio program about migratory birds. She came back nine minutes later, tucking the receipt into her wallet.

The hardware store took longer than expected. Marcus stood in aisle six comparing filter thicknesses while Denise wandered off and returned with a small clay pot she insisted cost almost nothing.

"You said the windowsill needed something," she said.

"I said the windowsill needed cleaning."

She put the pot in the cart anyway. He didn't stop her.

The oil change went quickly. Then the grocery store, where they split the list the way they always did—she took produce and dairy, he took the center aisles and the meat counter. They met near the bread, compared carts, argued mildly about whether they still had rice at home. Marcus was certain they did. Denise bought rice.

By one o'clock the trunk was loaded and the rain had started, fine and steady. They carried bags in through the side door, four trips between them, and Denise found the rice already in the pantry, unopened.

Marcus said nothing. He was smiling, though, and she saw it, and she threw a dish towel at him.