The nice guy in the bookstore

Today was a day of running errands, most of them exceedingly tedious and all of them crowded into the space between rush hour and where lunch would have been, had I not been running around like a headless chicken.

By the time I entered the last shop I needed, I was ready to drop. And if what happened next is anything to go by, I suppose it showed. I was in one of a chain of bookstores, hereinafter "W". The guy at the till was friendly and chatty, and we had quite a long conversation about one of the books I was buying, which happened to be a staff pick he had recommended. Anyway, while I was punching in my PIN, he suddenly said, "I don't mean this in a bad way, but you look really tired. I have a break coming up - would you like a cup of tea?"

I said yes, and the nice man made us each a cup of tea, then we sat between the stacks at the back of the store, sipping Earl Grey and talking about books. Fifteen minutes later, we said goodbye and that was that. The nice guy had no motive; he was just being nice. He made my day, that man, by offering a cup of tea to a stranger just because.