She smiled. “No thanks, buddy. My tummy doesn’t like those.”
She grabbed a box of the gluten-free knockoffs. They were heavier, denser, and tasted faintly of sadness and tapioca starch. In the car, she opened them. The first cracker crumbled into dust before it reached her lips. She ate it anyway. It was fine. It was not a Ritz. are ritz gluten free
Ingrid closed her eyes. She pictured her niece and nephew, fingers sticky with peanut butter, little teeth sinking into the salty, flaky discs of her former life. She pictured herself sitting across from them, nibbling her sad, dense impostor cracker, pretending not to watch. She smiled
He looked at the cracker, then at her, with the brutal honesty of a five-year-old. “That’s sad.” They were heavier, denser, and tasted faintly of
A young mom with a cart rolled past, tossing a family-size box of Ritz next to a jar of peanut butter. Ingrid felt a sharp, irrational pang of jealousy. She doesn’t even know how lucky she is, Ingrid thought. She can just… eat.