Of course, my careful avoidance of the subject didn’t matter. Krystal brought up the house all by herself. One Friday in early summer, a month or two after we’d reconnected and a few months before the lottery drawing, she started talking about money. She didn’t have enough of it, story of our lives. She had been getting headaches and missing a lot of work, and was now on probation.

“The dentist put you on probation?” I said, snorting with laughter. For some reason I thought it was really funny. The dentist-jailer.

“It’s not funny,” she said. But it was.

Krystal had been one of those overachievers in school who cared a lot about what teachers and bosses thought of her. The office where she worked was one of the fancier places, where multiple dentists glued veneers on rich people. They also offered spa treatments to patients. For a regular dentist appointment. You could go in, get a hot rag on your forehead and a hand massage while Dr. So-and-so drilled your teeth. The comforts some people could afford, my god. We used to laugh about stuff like that, but now her face was serious.

“I think I might get fired.”

“Well, go to the doctor. For your headaches, I mean.”

Get your shit taken care of, dummy, is what I wanted to say, but I was her friend, and ever since I’d pushed her in Geannie’s house (yes, she had fallen down, she told me later, showing me a blood bruise on her shin that wouldn’t go away), I’d been trying to be nice.

“I went to one, but he says it’s just nerves.”

She got up and cleared our dishes, which is how I knew she was lying. She could never look at me when she lied.

“Are you going to throw all of that out?” I asked as I watched her carry her bowl over to the sink. She had heated up some chili and her bowl was almost full. It was the closest I ever got to acknowledging her new eating habits. She shrugged. I told her to pack it up, I would take it home. I knew better than to suggest she keep it for later; I had seen the moldy specimens lingering in her fridge.

“I think I have to sell the house.” Her voice was small.

I kept my mouth shut. We had been having a nice night, no major tiffs, none of her whiny-piney bullshit. Now the mostly full bowl of chili was irritating me. I watched her crimp foil around the bowl’s edges. Like, she couldn’t even put it in a Cool Whip tub or something? Now I’d have to be careful to wash and return the bowl, which would probably spill over in my truck.

She said, “My aunt wants to sell it and I can’t afford to buy it, and I was wondering: Would you help me pack it up?”

I watched her put the bowl to one side on the counter. It sat there, still warm, and she did not put it in the fridge. We still had our usual routine ahead of us, watching TV on the couch or the walk. How long does it take for foodborne illness to take hold? Two hours at room temperature? An hour in more heated conditions? For the life of me, I could not understand why she was being so fucking careless.