"Is this yours?" roommate asks

J_____ takes out from the refrigerator a bag of collard greens that I first noticed in there a few weeks ago, although a few weeks ago for me, especially in this strange “cyclical time” we’re all experiencing right now never leaving the house, could have been several months ago. When I had first noticed that bag of what I took to be rather hardy-looking lettuce, it looked fresh to me. Now, as J_____ takes it, I notice, as I had noticed cyclically on previous days, that the leaves inside are looking dull in color and sagging.

“Is this yours?” he says.

“No, I don’t think so,” I say. “What’s the date?”

“Expired December 2019. It must be L_____’s”—his girlfriend’s. “Sometimes we cook this thing. Collard greens with bacon. She must have bought it for Thanksgiving and forgotten about it.”

As I go back to bedroom, something makes me think: I bought those collard greens, didn’t I? J_____ was covering up for me to avoid an awkward moment, perhaps doing so unconsciously, convincing himself that Yes, those must have been L_____’s collard greens. I, meanwhile, start to get vague memories, or imaginings, of having eaten collard greens somewhere, maybe at the Sony cafeteria, maybe at a soul food place (it was probably Dig Inn, maybe with J______ M_______ on one of his visits), and recalling also how R___, when I dated him, used to make collard greens and tell me they were a Portuguese staple and how great and healthy they were—and thus, I must have bought collard greens late last fall at the Key Food, with good intentions, and then never got round to cooking them.

Or maybe they were L_____’s.

There had been some already grated Romano cheese in a plastic container in the bottom of the fridge that had seemed to be there in a while, and I wondered if it might not in fact be mine. I was going to ask J_____ if that was the case (but how would I ask? “That Romano cheese in the bottom of the fridge? Is that mine, another thing I forgot about?”), and debate just taking “only a little” without asking him. I was going to be cooking a frittata again, this time with zucchini. I look in the fridge, planning to check the date on the Romano: if it’s sometime, say, from last summer or earlier, I’m ready to presume it’s mine.

The Romano is gone, and replaced with a similar size and shaped plastic container with a mix of grated Provolone and other cheese.

Now, I know I would never buy that.