The group of young girls looked over and responded affirmatively, pounding the table with their hands.

“Hell yeah!” one of them said.

The older woman sitting by herself smiled slightly, and Eggs watched with a gleeful, albeit sketchy expression.

David had walked out of the back and was watching Vanessa with an amused smile on his face. He turned to me and raised one corner of his mouth.

“I don’t think you’re getting out of this one,” he said. “Sounds to me like you’re going out tonight.”

• • •

As I walked home from the diner, I had to admit that I was just a little bit excited. Vanessa was right that it had been over a year since we’d done anything like that, and it would be good to take a night off.

It was exhausting—the long shifts at the diner, driving people all across the city, going home to take care of Keith, and getting up to do it all over again. But I didn’t have a choice. My mother had been diagnosed with lung cancer when I was nine years old, and I’d witnessed firsthand what illness could do to a family. The anger, the depression, the ever-present sadness that hung in the air—those things took a toll on even the strongest of couples, and my parents were no exception. Whereas some people were able to come together during tough times, my mother and father had retreated to their own corners of the world through what, I’ve realized with age and time, was probably a little bit both their faults. Four years after her diagnosis, when my mother’s cancer was in remission, the relationship ended, along with the family and structure I’d always assumed would be forever.

Still, all that being said, Vanessa was right.

One night off wasn’t going to make that much of a difference.

Not for the bills.

Not for the back payments we owed on the house.

And not for…

The surgery.

Keith and I would be meeting with his doctor, Ruby Bryant, tomorrow. She would most likely say that he was doing okay in therapy, but his chances of regaining full mobility in his legs were still slim to none. Then she would ask us to take note of any changes and if we had any questions.

Somehow, before the conversation was over, she’d manage to mention the surgery.

At first, like Keith, I’d been angry at her for bringing it up when we couldn’t have it, couldn’t even come close to affording it. She’d gone to medical school with a man named Christian Reveno, now a surgeon in Paris. Dr. Reveno had developed a new technique that involved transplanting cells from other parts of the body into the spine, which was showing some signs of success, at least in the limited trials that had been conducted.