She looked at me and said, “I didn’t leave that note to start a friendship,” she said, blunt but not unkind. “I left it because… I needed you to know it mattered. Because people are twisting it into something else.”
I nodded. “They twist everything,” I said.
Maya’s eyes glistened. “And the shelf—” she started.
“What about it?” I asked.
She exhaled. “It’s getting emptied,” she said. “Not by moms. Not by babies. By people who come in angry. They take everything just to prove a point. Or they stand there filming people who take one can like they’re committing a crime.”
My hands tightened.
Dan’s warning echoed in my head.
The shelf wasn’t just help anymore.
It was a battleground.
Maya leaned closer, voice low. “I heard the manager might take it down,” she said. “If that happens… I don’t know. People will still need things. Babies don’t stop eating because adults can’t behave.”
I stared at the linoleum.
Then I said the truth that scared me.
“I don’t know what to do,” I admitted.
Maya looked surprised.
“Everyone thinks you do,” she said.
I let out a humorless laugh. “Everyone thinks because I yelled once I have answers,” I said. “I don’t. I just… couldn’t stand there and watch.”