“Well, that’s not it,” I say, and try not to laugh at both of their hisses of breath. “He knows I’m busy and didn’t think it would be fair for me to work to show him all this and him to just get to go along for the ride.” I scoot forward and grab the folded-up list of book titles he gave me from beside the charcuterie board. “So he gave me this list of books. He said that for each book, he’ll pair it with an activity that will convince me to be a book lover.”

“Oh my goodness!” Daisy screeches, jumping off the couch, her long hair flying all around her at the same time Elsie collapses into my couch, her body slowly sliding down.

“And you said yes!” Daisy is still jumping up and down and clapping her hands. But when I don’t answer right away, she stops jumping and narrows her eyes as she repeats herself, just a little bit louder. “You said yes, right?”

I nod. “I said yes.”

Elsie, bless her beautiful heart, with her body half on my couch, half on the floor, looks at me and whispers, “Thank freaking god.”

“But now I’m kind of regretting it and I don’t know what to do. Hence”—I gesture to my living room—“this meeting of the minds.”

“Well.” Elsie pushes off the ground until she’s nestled into the cushions. “I’m glad you called us before you made some crazy mistake like backing out of this.”

“But what—” I try to interrupt, but Elsie doesn’t let me.

“No.” Elsie points a short, unpolished nail in my face. “No buts, no what-ifs. You are doing this. If nothing else, you’ll spend time with a nice person, getting back outdoors and exploring like you used to.”

“I just—” I try again, but don’t get any further.

“No!” she says, louder this time, and I realize I might’ve accidentally woken the sleeping bear. “You’re doing this. For reasons I will never understand, you need the great outdoors to really connect with who you are. You haven’t been okay in a long time. I don’t know if you’ll be ready to take your camera with you, but you can do this. Taking over the Book Nook was a shock, and I know you’re dedicated to helping it succeed, but you don’t have to give up everything that brought you joy to do it. There’s no reason you can’t go to the mountains for a day or even a week. Dani’s completely capable of holding down the fort without you. Mona would help. I could help.”