Page 86 of The Love Haters

But I doubled down and texted her a photo.

I’ll tell you something: my admiration for that pinkie was sincere. The proportions were great. The nail shape was elegant. The knuckles were… cute? Everything about that little digit, once I started paying attention, met with my approval. And, now that I was defending my choice to Beanie, I couldn’t help but notice that Ialsoadmired my ring finger and my pointer.

“That’s a three-fer,” I declared. “Stop complaining.”

“What about your middle finger?” Beanie challenged then, like it was being snubbed. Then: “What about yourthumb?”

I wasn’t sure why my middle finger hadn’t made the cut, but the thumb was easy. “My thumb is a little stubby.”

“That’s your homework right there,” Beanie said then.

“Homework?” I said, likeWhat is this, school?

“Find something to admire about that thumb,” Beanie said, “and add it to the list.”

So that’s what I did while I waited in the Starlite parking lot for Hutch to pick me up. I felt strangely nervous to see him again after all the sharing and night bicycling and… smooching… and so I hyperfixated on that thumb.

This homework was hard. What is there to admire about a thumb?

Itwasa little stubby. That was just a fact. What was I supposed to do, lie to myself?

And yet, I also agreed with Beanie. I couldn’t let that negativity stand.

The Gottmans said the magic ratio was five to one: for every one negative interaction between partners, it took five positive ones to cancel it out.

So I forced myself to list five things I admired about my thumb.

Obviously, the nail was the headliner. A well-proportioned blend of rounded and square. I appreciated the little crescent moon of the nail bed, now that I thought about it. I enjoyed the way it tapered in between the knuckle and the base of my hand. How many was that? Two more to go. What else? The stripes of my knuckle wrinkles? Nicely arched? Okay, now I was reaching. But it counted. I turned my thumb around to look at the pad of it. Smooth and soft.

Done.

I texted Beanie my list of five things with a GIF of a cartoon thumb. Then, with great seriousness, I kissed the knuckle and saidto my thumb, “I should never have called youstubby. Youarestubby, but you’re also many other beautiful things,” just as Hutch was pulling up in his truck.

We’d deal with the middle finger later.

Did Hutch see me kiss my thumb?

We’ll never know.

Because even before I’d opened the door, I could see his usual frown was different today.

It wasn’t the earnest, concerned, lovable frown I was used to.

This frown was… sharper? Darker? Harder?

I didn’t know how to read it. Was he irritated? Vexed? Enraged about something?

After that life-changing kiss from the night before, I’d assumed things would be a little different… butin a good way. I’m not sure I was expecting anotherkiss, but a warm smile, if nothing else.

But instead… as I climbed in, I got nothing except that frown.

No warmth. No camaraderie. No unspoken intimacy.

No eye contact, that was for sure.

There he was, in his Coast Guard–issued navy-blue T-shirt and shorts, with his hands on the wheel, his eyes straight ahead, and a cartoon scribble of angst above his head.

So, no: I did not regale him with a funny little anecdote about kissing my own thumb.

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