“After dinner. Maybe. What’s it going to do other than make me cold?”

He gingerly touched her knees. “Believe it or not, it will help with the swelling.”

“So I can forget all these doctors and meds and cover myself with frozen peas?”

“Absolutely! Well, we don’t want to put all our eggs in the pea basket. We should mix it up with some frozen broccoli, corn, and carrots. Maybe even a bag of Tater Tots.”

“What about ice cream?”

“Too messy. Besides, Buttons will devour it before it’s had a chance to do its thing.”

She looked over at Buttons, pizza sauce stains on his muzzle. “He does love ice cream.”

“And like any child, he hates his veggies. So how about I go to ShopRite, raid the frozen food aisle, and we can flush these meds? It’ll save us a lot of dough. And we can eat the treatment. Two birds with one stone.”

Kate took a bite of her cold pizza.

“Can we reinvest that dough into pizza dough at Milano’s?” she asked.

He raised an eyebrow. “Absolutely. You and Buttons will reek of cheese and pepperoni.”

“I’d love that.”

“You would.”

She nearly dropped her pizza when a sharp pain blossomed in the center of her chest. She hissed, eyes slamming shut. The pain passed quickly.

“You okay?”

All traces of humor blanched from Andrew’s face.

She nodded, taking a moment to catch her breath. Because her lupus had gone undetected for so long, it’d had plenty of time to do a number on her heart. Nothing save a heart transplant would erase the years of damage, and no one would put a healthy heart in someone in her condition.

“You know, if you wanted me to shut up, you could have just told me to zip it,” Andrew said, rubbing her back. She didn’t even notice that he’d taken her plate from her hands and moved the tray onto the table.

When she felt like she could breathe again, she said. “Yeah, like you ever stop talking.”

“I never talk during movies.”

“And I appreciate that. Now, can I have my pizza back?”

“You sure it’s passed?”

Keeping one hand on her chest, she nodded. “I’m sure.”

But she wasn’t sure at all. She could only be hopeful.

* * *

After dinner, they sat and watched a couple of sitcom reruns until she fell asleep. Sometime around midnight, Andrew roused her and slowly walked her into bed. He had no sooner tucked her in, given her her medicine, and gotten a cold bottle of water from the fridge than he was asleep, sawing logs.