Jackson didn’t just make me breakfast. He bought me a bottle of maple syrup.

A while back, we were in the kitchen and I was making us pancakes with walnuts and flax seeds and chia seeds. He saw me put this fancy coffee maple syrup on my pancake that I’d bought upstate when I stayed at Joyce’s AirBNB house. Back when I was so sick I came back from the trip and laid in bed for two days to recouperate from a 36 hour vacation and ants had trailed their way into the kitchen pantry from cracks in the exterior bricks.

I put a drop of syrup on the first pancake. And then I pulled out pancake syrup for the other pancakes. Jack asked me if I liked the pancake syrup better. I said I didn’t. It was just that I didn’t want to waste the good syrup…on myself. And maybe I needed to think about why I considered myself a waste.

So he make me breakfast. And he wrote a note on the kitchen tile with the dry erase crayons I keep in there. Saying congratulations for making halfway through winter. And to treat myself.

Only I didn’t go into the kitchen until afternoon. I’d had an apple and then drew and colored my hair. The whole time, Jack’s just waiting for me to go into the kitchen and be surprised by breakfast that has now gone cold. Lovely even still. Next to my French toast and bacon was a bottle of maple syrup. I unscrewed the bottle and the cap made the signature crack of a first opening. I poured the tiniest amount on my French toast and ate it on the couch while giggling.

I texted him in his room to say thanks…finally.

Later, Jack came out and told me the bottle of maple syrup was for me. So I could treat myself.

I don’t know what to do when people do nice things. This was over the top nice. Jack is incredibly sentimental. Oh, Vene, I said to myself, you’re terrible. I walked out of the kitchen so he wouldn’t see me cry.

Don’t ever tell Jack that I cried over a bottle of maple syrup. I’ll never live it down.

*I’ve used this song before. I don’t care. I love it.