Toby's grocery shopping day was Monday. He'd go early in the morning, before any of his patients, when the supermarket was still uncrowded and he could leisurely walk through the aisles and avoid endlessly-long checkout lines that would come later in the day. He was normally good about getting enough food for the week but, one Friday in mid-October, he found himself at his apartment, hungry and staring at a nearly-empty fridge.

It was five o'clock on a weekday, the busiest of grocery-store times, but he wanted to eat something homemade. So, bracing himself for the crowds, he drove to the nearest Vons.

"Mommy, look how ugly that man's shirt is!"

Toby looked up from the can of split-pea soup in his hand and turned around to see a young girl pointing at him. A woman about his age was standing over her, examining the label of some cream of mushroom; the woman turned at the sound of her daughter's voice and looked at Toby.

"Grace, don't say- Wait a minute, that actually is a really ugly shirt."

"Excuse me?" Toby said, throwing the split-pea soup into his cart and walked over to the pair.

"Sorry, dude, but that shirt looks awful. There are holes in it."

"Well, not that it's any of your business-"

"I mean, it kind of is - you're making me look at it," she interrupted.

"But," Toby continued as if she hadn't spoken, "I've had this shirt since medical school. They gave it to me at Harvard."

The woman didn't offer that wide-eyed look of impressed-ness most people did when he mentioned his alma mater; she replied without skipping a beat.

"I don't care if you got it on the moon; it's ugly either way. Who puts orange with pink?"

"Delta Gamma, when they're making tee shirts for their annual football game."

"Fraternities play football games?"

"Delta Gamma is a sorority, thank you very much."

"Oh, were you in it?"

Toby glared at her and wrinkled his nose.

"No, I was not. I'll have you know-"

She cut off what was going to be a pretty impressive monologue. "You weren't in the sorority, okay, whatever. I have to get her home. Have fun with your ugly shirt."

The woman walked past him and turned out of the aisle, holding her soup in one hand and leading her daughter with other. Toby stuck his tongue out after them and then went back to shopping.

It was three months later when he saw her again. He'd almost forgotten about their exchange in the supermarket - though, now, when he went to put on that sorority shirt, he always got a twinge of something like embarrassment - when he caught sight of her sitting in one of the booths at Kovelsky's, a half-dozen stack of papers laid out in front of her. He wasn't planning on stopping for lunch but, when he saw her, he couldn't help but duck into the restaurant.

"Toby!" the host said when he saw him. "Need a table?"

"No thanks, Rick. My friend's waiting for me."

Toby went past Rick and slid down into the woman's booth, sitting on the bench across from her.

"Um, excuse-" she started. "Oh, you're Ugly Shirt Guy!"

"Is that really who I am to you?"

She shrugged. "My daughter likes calling you that."

"Well, there are worse things to be called, I guess. But I'd prefer Toby." He stuck out his hand. "Dr. Tobias M. Curtis."

The woman eyed his hand but didn't offer her own. "What are you doing here?" she asked.

"You know, when someone introduces himself, it's nice to tell him your name."

"My name's Happy. What are you doing here?" she repeated.

"I saw you through the window. This is actually my favorite diner."

"Mm. I like it too."

"Really? I've never seen you here."

"Yeah, well, I don't get out much."

He motioned to the papers in front of her. "What's all this?"

"Some stuff for work."

"Where do you work?"

She frowned at him. "Is this what you do? You find women sitting alone in restaurants and flirt with them?"

"You thought that was flirting? Oh, honey."

She rolled her eyes at him. "Whatever. Can you let me do my work now?"

"And where is it that you work, again?"

She sighed. "I'm a mechanical engineer. I work for a consulting company."

"So what are these the plans for?"

"An automated conveyance system for a company out in San Diego."

"Mm. Sounds complicated."

"It is. And it would be a lot easier if no one talked to me while I was working on it."

"So where's Grace?"

"At school. It's the middle of the day on a Wednesday, where do you think?"

Toby held his hands up innocently. "Hey, hey, I don't have kids. I don't know what they spend their mornings doing these days."

Happy went back to writing on her papers.

Toby waited a minute before asking, "So, what about Grace's dad?"

"What about him?"

"Is he a mechanical engineer too?"

"Couldn't tell you."

"You don't know what your daughter's father does?"

"Not that it's any of your business-"

"I mean, it kind of is - you're making me look at it," he quoted from their last meeting. It didn't really make sense in the situation; it made her pause.

"What?"

"That's what you said to me in-"

"I know. How do you remember it?"

"I have a good memory. I'm guessing you do, too?"

She shrugged without speaking.

"But Grace's dad?" Toby asked again.

"Look, I don't need to be talking about this with a stranger."

"If you don't tell me," he warned, "I'm just going to guess."

She looked at him skeptically, so he continued, "So I'm guessing he's not in the picture. Dead? No. Divorced? No. So never married. He must've just left you. Recently? No. When Grace was little? Oh my goodness, before she was born? Oh, poor Grace."

"Don't say 'poor Grace'. You don't know Grace."

"She knows me - well enough to have a nickname for me."

"You still don't know her. She has a fine life."

"I didn't say she didn't."

"You implied it."

"How? By saying that her dad left her?"

"Look, my boyfriend got me pregnant and then got scared and ran away and I haven't seen him since. That doesn't mean Grace has to suffer for it."

"A lot of people wouldn't have kept the baby in that situation."

"What was I going to do? Terminate the pregnancy?"

"You could have. Or you could've given her up."

"So she could spend her childhood bouncing between orphanages? Yeah, that would've been better." She bristled with anger as she said it.

"You were given up as a child, too," Toby concluded.

"What are you, some kind of stalker?"

"Just good at reading people. I'm a psychiatrist. It's what I do."

Happy stood up abruptly and started gathering her papers.

"Oh, no, don't leave," Toby said.

"I have to work on these. If I can't do it here, I'll find another restaurant."

With that, she turned and walked out the door.

Toby spent the next two weeks eating three meals a day at Kovalsky's, hoping to see Happy again. She never showed up; he honestly would've been surprised if she had. Finally, he gave up running into her and started trying to find her online. He searched through the employee records of consulting firms based in LA, but there were thousands, and he didn't even have a name to look for. By the time twos months passed since their run-in at the diner, he had started to resign himself to the reality of never seeing her again.

One Thursday night, after three hours of sifting through the records of a consulting firm in Pasadena, he decided to take a walk to clear his head. It was a nice night, cool but not cold. He ended up circling further from his apartment than normal; he soon found himself at the park that was three miles away.

There was a small girl huddled on one of the benches there. He almost wrote her off as homeless; when he got closer, though, he recognized her.

"Grace?" he called out. The girl looked up.

"Who are you?"

"Do you remember me?" He came up next to her. "I'm the man with the ugly shirt from the grocery store a few months ago."

"Ugly Shirt Guy?" she asked softly.

"Yep, that's me. Are you okay?"

She shook her head. "I'm lost."

"Were you out with your mom?"

She shook her head again, lip trembling. "I went for a walk. Mommy said I'm not supposed to go without her but she was working late and I was so bored and I was so sure I could find the park near our house, but I got lost."

"Is this the right park?"

"No. The park I want has swings." With that, with the mention of her favorite playground structure that she had tried and failed to find, she started full-on sobbing. Toby sat down next to her and wrapped an arm around her small shoulders.

"Grace, it's okay."

"I'm never going to my mommy again, am I?"

"Oh no, of course you are!"

"Really?" She sniffled, the sobs quieting.

"Really, truly. We're going to get you home. Do you know your address?"

She thought hard for a moment. "117 Green Street."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah. Is that really far away?"

"Actually, it's not; I know where that is. It's only about a half mile from here."

Grace turned out to be a talkative kid, unlike her mother. She chattered on about all manner of little-kid things - school and friends and peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches - while they walked; they got back to Happy's apartment in half an hour.

Grace led Toby up to the fourth floor and knocked on apartment 4C. Happy pulled open the door immediately.

"Grace! I was about to call the police."

"I was lost, Mommy!" Grace allowed herself to be enveloped in a hug by her mother. "But then Ugly Shirt Guy found me and took me home."

"Ugly Shirt…" the woman looked up, seeing Toby. "How did you find her?"

"She was at Stanley Park. I was out on a walk and saw her."

Happy looked sternly at Grace. "Don't do that again, okay?"

Grace nodded solemnly.

"Good. Now, go brush your teeth. It's past your bedtime."

Grace rushed off into the apartment. Happy looked back at Toby.

"Well," she said. "What are you waiting for?"

"A 'thank you' would be nice."

"Thank you. I'm glad she made it home safe. Goodnight."

Happy started shutting the door but Toby stuck his foot and stopped it from closing.

"What?" Happy asked.

"Look, I'm sure it's been tough being a single mom-"

"Oh, please spare me the fake sympathy. I have better things to do than to listen to that."

"Okay, okay, no sympathy. But I just want to say one thing, okay? One thing, and then I'll go."

Happy nodded reluctantly.

"I know," Toby said, "that you want to prove that you can do this on your own. That you don't need her dad or anyone else, that you can be for Grace what no one was for you."

"Don't do that - don't shrink me."

Toby held up a finger. "I'm not done. I see that you're trying to do this all on your own for her, and that's really admirable. But it's okay to ask for help sometimes - to call your friendly neighborhood psychiatrist and ask him to watch your daughter while you work late, for example."

"I don't need your help."

"I know you don't need it, strictly speaking. But it might make your life easier, right? That's what friends are for - making your life easier."

"And we're friends?"

Toby shrugged. "We can be."

Happy looked at him for a moment before saying a curt, "Fine," and slipping back into the apartment. Toby waited until she reemerged, holding a slip of paper.

"My phone number," she said, handing it to him. "I don't give it out much - only to friends."

Toby smiled. "Alright then. Goodnight, friend."

"Goodnight."

Happy shut the door, and Toby started making his way home.