A throat clears behind me and I turn around, then jump when I see Nick. “Oh!” I say. “I didn’t know you were still here.”

“So . . . that guy, huh?” Nick asks, staring at the door, even though Mikey is long gone.

“Uh, I mean . . . he’s a guy, and I know him and . . .” I shake my head. Why do I care what Nick thinks? I don’t need to stammer my way through a defense of my actions. “He’s whatever. It’s Mikey. He’s perfectly nice and he doesn’t expect anything from me and I like that, okay?”

Nick smiles, but this is a smile I’ve never seen before, one I can’t decode. “I can tell,” he says, then tosses his dish towel on the counter and walks toward his office.

“What is that supposed to mean?” I ask, but he ignores me and keeps walking. I mutter, “Ugh. Why do you have to look so good when you’re walking away?”

A noisy slurp draws my attention to Gary, who’s staring at me and shaking his head as he drinks his coffee.

“What?” I cross my arms. “Would you like to critique my choice of partner, too?”

“I’m minding my own business,” Gary says. “But I heard you’re giving out cookies.”

I sigh, then reach into the case and pull out a cookie for him. He walks up to the counter to take it. Adjusting his hat, he says, “Thanks. How about instead of money, I pay you in advice?”

I scowl. “That’s not an even trade, Gary.” But I listen anyway. After all, Gary seems like a happy person. He spends most of his retirement here, eating delicious (some might say great) baked goods and drinking the best coffee in town. Clearly he knows something about life, and although I fear he’s going to say something offensive about who I should or shouldn’t hook up with, I’m willing to give him a chance.

“You should really allow animals in here,” he says. “Even a fish tank. A bird cage! It would brighten the place up.”

I pat his hand as Nick walks back to the counter. “Go sit down, Gary.”

The bell above the door jingles again, but this time it’s a cute girl with long wavy hair and a heart-printed dress that I would kill for. I let Nick handle our first real, non-Gary customer of the day as I go back to the kitchen to get the rest of the bars for the case—if Gary’s enthusiastic response is any indication, we’ll sell out quickly.

When I come back out, I see that Heart-Printed Dress Girl is still talking to Nick, despite the fact that her coffee is already in hand. As is sometimes the case, I’m confused as to whether I want to be this cute girl or whether I want to make out with her.

She smiles, her eyes crinkling at the corners and her head tilted, and that’s a move I recognize all too well. That’s a move you do when you’re flirting with someone. I watch as Nick smiles back at her, a real Nick smile, the kind he gives me when I’m lucky enough to have made him laugh.