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When I stopped to say hello, the young lady beamed. The softness of her voice invited me to stay. That smile was absolutely huge, but it was not as big as the awful, unexpected truth she shared.

“My baby’s dad broke my nose?”

Right there in the frozen food aisle - right in front of passing customers - right in front of God and everybody, she spoke of an unspeakable wrong. She admitted that it happened before.

Suddenly my grocery shopping became more listening than cart pushing. There was a definite irony in our being in the coldest section in the store.

The freezer doors were clear. The frozen meals behind them were neatly stacked. There was no frost to distort the packages or to blur the view of what was available inside the tall, chilly compartments. Had I intentionally reached inside to grab a box, my hand would have felt the same tremendous drop in temperature that I felt inside my chest.

Instead, it was my heart that sensed the coldness of a human experience I had brushed against without warning. The why’s and how-could-someone’s became piles of blurred interrogatives in my head and heart. Somewhere in my soul anger and sorrow and confusion stirred.

Those emotions did not surface. They did not rage. Just as she had been beaten before, I had heard similar stories too many times. Unfortunately, I had also spotted the discoloration of uncontrolled anger in other encounters. Her mask provided a smile as she quietly conveyed details of the attack. My mask let me listen without interrupting her need to cover the brutality of the beating.

Calls had been made. Officials were involved. At least temporarily a safety net was in place. For the time being they were separated, and I hoped that whatever distance was between them would not make her heart grow fonder of a man who would do that to his baby’s mother.

I did not purchase any frozen foods that day. I had not intended to. But neither had I planned to contemplate the inner ice storm that brews within a frostbitten heart. Prolonged exposure to that kind of cold can damage a person for life. Is it possible to rekindle a warmth that has been lost?