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I nodded. “Yes, the books in the snug. Who shelves books by color?” I exploded. “What kind of harebrained order is that? By color? Seriously? How’s anyone supposed to find anything?”

He pressed his lips together, and my heart sank like a stone into my stomach. I’d been right to keep my criticism to myself. What was the point of upsetting him with something so trivial? Then the corner of his lips twitched. I frowned.

“Are you… laughing?” I asked, incredulously.

Art pressed his lips harder together as he nodded, his eyes widening with the effort of keeping his laughter contained.

“I’m upset, and you’re laughing?” I blinked at him, not fully understanding what was happening.

He shook his head violently, his eyes wider than ever. “Oh, no!” he cried, waving his hand “no” emphatically. “I am very much not laughing at you. I promise. It’s just that I told Viv you’d hate the color-coded shelves, but she insisted. Something about it being better for Instagram.”

I threw my arms in the air. “And that’s another thing! How could you tell her it was okay for her to start an Instagram account without telling me or asking my opinion?”

The laughter faded from his eyes, and he frowned as he stared at me, unblinking, for a long moment.

Instead of the panic I expected, all I felt was relief to finally have it all off my chest. He might be angry, but at least I wouldn’t be carrying this weight around that kept getting in the way.

“I don’t understand,” he said, his voice terrifyingly soft.

“She said you told her it would be fine for her to start an Instagram account for the shop,” I explained, wondering for the first time if maybe Viv had made up that part of the story.

“No, that I know,” he said, waving my explanation aside. “I’m sorry about that. You’re right. I should absolutely have discussed it with you when she first brought it up. What I don’t understand is why you haven’t said anything all this time. That was weeks ago.”

He pinned me with an unwavering gaze as I squirmed, trying to come up with the right answer.

Oh, child. He asked you to be honest. Maybe you should give that a try? Grandma drawled from the top of the fridge, where she sat, watching our exchange, her cigarette holder firmly clenched between her index finger and thumb again. To my relief, the cigarette dangling from the end wasn’t lit, so I didn’t have to worry about the cookies tasting faintly smoky. I’m not a barbarian, I’ll have you know, she sniffed, vanishing abruptly.

I sighed internally, then shrugged to myself. What was one more person mad at me at this point? But I had to concede that she was right. He had asked for honesty, and I had nothing to lose by giving it a shot.

“I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want to upset you.” His frown deepened. “Things were going so well, and they were little things. It wasn’t worth rocking the boat,” I explained.

If anything, his expression darkened.

“Meg, I wasn’t kidding when I told you that I don’t need you to manage me. If I do something that upsets you, I want to know. And if it hurts my feelings, I’m a grown man, I’ll get over it. Especially if the alternative is you keeping things that matter from me.” He smiled grimly. “I’ve been in a relationship where I barely knew my partner, and it was the loneliest experience of my life.”

I froze, unsure how to respond. For two decades, Jim had made me responsible for everything he felt. Anything that upset him was my fault, which made it my job to make him feel better again.

“You can’t censor yourself to spare my feelings without hiding huge chunks of yourself from me. I can handle being upset. I can’t handle that. Not that being told that you hated how I shelved the books or that you wished I had handled the Instagram thing differently would have upset me, for the record. My ego is not quite that fragile,” he said, grinning at me in a way that made my heart beat again. I smiled back, shyly. “Are you sure about that?”

“Hundred percent,” he replied, nodding firmly.

“I’m really glad to hear that,” I replied. “Because you’re icing those cookies all wrong.”

“Oh? Am I?” Art asked, arching an eyebrow.

“Completely wrong. I’m not even sure how you’re doing what you’re doing,” I said, shaking my head.

I frowned as he picked up the small spatula that I’d given him to spread the frosting smoothly to the edges of the cookie and scooped up a giant glob of icing.

“Is this how it’s done?” he asked, leaning across the table to dab the icing on the tip of my nose.

“No!” I cried, laughing as I wiped it off. “It’s done like this.” I spread the blob of icing from my nose across his cheek. “See? Nice and even from edge to edge.”

“Ah, yes.” Art nodded sagely. “I think I’ve got it now.” He scooped another glob of icing with the spatula and smeared it smoothly across my forehead. “Like so?”

“Exactly,” I laughed, wiping my forehead clean with my index finger and bringing it to my mouth to lick clean.

“Oh, no, no, no,” Art laughed. “That is most assuredly my job.” He grabbed my hand and sucked my finger into his mouth where he teased it gently with his tongue.