It had long been a joke between them that she didn’t have lupus but had, in fact, been bitten by a vampire bat. Ever since her illnesses, her internal clock had gone haywire. True, she did tend to sleep more during the day than at night, often wandering around the house in the dark. No matter what she did to change that, forcing herself to stay up when the sun was out, she went right back to the same old pattern.

Maybe Andrew was right. It would be nice for some super vampire powers to kick in.

“I should probably drink some blood to activate them,” she said.

Andrew looked at her as if she’d just spoken a foreign language. “What the heck was that?”

She covered her mouth, giggling, “Just thinking out loud.”

“I don’t even want to know what goes on in your head.”

“No, you don’t.” Patting his chest, she said, “Now, go outside and get Buttons out of that car. Find a place to eat. I’ll call you when they come in with my discharge papers, and you can whisk me the hell out of here.”

“You sure? I could stay. I’ll find a kid or someone to watch Buttons.”

“Oh yeah, just offer our dog to any kid that comes along. Get out of here and watch our baby.”

He reluctantly got out of the bed.

“Promise you’ll call me the second they tell you you’re free.”

“Cross my heart.”

Andrew chuckled. “Pick a more reliable organ.”

Kate shrugged. “Sorry, I ain’t got one. You’ll just have to trust my poor, enlarged, overtaxed ticker.”

She hated to see him go, wiping away a few silent tears. But it was going to get too hot for Buttons to stay in the car, and Andrew looked like he needed some sustenance before he ended up in the bed next to her.

After turning up the television to drown out the beeps and chirps of the heart monitor, Kate turned onto her side, wishing she had her Mooshy to cuddle.

* * *

Kate was groggy but happy to leave the hospital. They were handed a slew of written instructions about following up with her doctor, who was only three hundred miles away. The most important thing was rest.

“That’s one thing I do well,” Kate said from the wheelchair.

The drive back to the cottage was quiet, Andrew expecting her to say her chest hurt at any moment. Last night had scared him more than he’d let on. It might not have been so bad back home, but up in Maine, where they didn’t know the local hospitals or if there even was one where they’d been at that moment, it was terrifying.

He wanted to carry her inside but she refused.

“I’m not that bad…yet,” she said.