The Perfect Cookie

I'm tired.

I used to work at a gourmet cookie shop.
I closed and at the end of the day we would usually have a lot of muffins left over.
I would end up bringing them home or giving them away.
As kind of a "company bonus", every shift we could have one free muffin or six free cookies;
Which do you think i picked?

Anyways, this one particular Friday i closed up shop, lugged the garbage to the shoot, and made my way outside with a big bag full of muffins and cookies.
I sat down on a bench near the bus stop, and was waiting for my friend to pick me up when i noticed a man across the street.

He was pretty rough looking; walking with kind of a limp, i assumed he was homeless.
I knew before knowing that he was going to come over to talk to me.
(This was a few years ago, before I stopped loving people and started being scared of them- i would often get approached by different kinds of people)
He sat down on the bench beside me.

"Do you have a smoke?" he asked.

"I don't smoke," i replied... (i might have told him out of habit that he shouldn't either, but i cant remember), "I do have muffins."

He didn't look impressed.

"Or cookies. They're reAlly good... Belgian chocolate."

This, he did respond to and i passed him a cookie.

"Where are you from?" I asked.

"Up north"

We chatted for a bit.
A Native man in about his forties, he was in bad shape; his hands were a a little contorted, his face had sores, and his eyes looked like they had permanently blown vessels.

When the conversation turned to his family there were silent tears.
He couldn't go back to see them; he was ashamed and he didn't want to hurt them anymore.
I didn't know what to do, so i just told him that they were his family: they loved him.
My friend drove up and i had to go.
I don't know if he ever went home.

Sometimes I think the perfect cookie could change the world;
something with sustenance; nourishing but still incredibly delicious.

Working at the shop for three years, I met a lot of people through the cookies.
People would often turn down a free muffin.
Nobody ever turned down a free cookie.