“This is good.” Canon starts pacing and tugs at his bottom lip the way he does when a scene isn’t going the way he thinks it should. He’s in full director mode. “Dr. Okafor, you start with the transplant list. I’ll get the word out to the cast and crew and my network, which is pretty broad. Neevah, baby, I know you don’t want to, but you’ll have to ask your mom and sister.”
“Um, thank you for the marching orders,” Dr. Okafor says dryly. “But I’ll take it from here, general.”
Unbelievably, in the midst of the worst news I’ve ever received, I snort. Chuckle. Snuckle.
Canon looks at me, his eyes softening with the tiniest glint of humor, and I know he’s thinking the same thing—of our first conversation, a chilly autumn night on a New York sidewalk. In the relatively brief time we’ve been together, we’ve made our own history. I don’t have the aerial view to see where and how it ends, but right now we are in the thick of it, and it feels good. Somehow, even in the muck of my life right now, having him still feels good.
“Sorry for his bossiness,” I say, walking over to sit on the bed because that bone-deep exhaustion is no joke. “He’s a director.”
“He’s right. We’ll have to take swift action,” Dr. Okafor says. “We already started the prednisone, which should help some, but you’ve got a long road ahead. We have other drugs that can help do the work your kidneys aren’t right now. If that doesn’t work, we may have to do dialysis until we find a donor.”
“Wait. I can’t get on dialysis.” I arrow a look between the three doctors. “I have another month left on my movie.”
“The hell you do,” Canon says harshly. “You’re not coming back on my set until she says so.”
“Canon.” I gulp back tears. “You know the whole production shuts down if I’m not there.”
“You think I give a damn about that?” His scowl deepens. “This is your life we’re talking about, Neev. Nothing . . . there’s nothing more important than that.”
“I don’t think Galaxy Studios will agree.”
“You let me handle Galaxy and anyone else who tries to give us shit. Here’s what you’re missing,” he says, grabbing my hand. “I’m the boss. Galaxy may have funded this movie, but it’s mine, and I hold all the cards, and they’ll do whatever the fuck I want.”
He glances at Dr. Okafor. “You were telling us about the dialysis.”
“It may not come to that,” she says. “We may be able to manage this with good eating habits, exercise, and pharmaceuticals until we find a kidney.”
I glance at Dr. Ansford onscreen, who winks, knowing I balk at any kind of drugs, but at this point, don’t have much choice.
“You said exercise.” I lean back into the pillows. “I can still work and be active?”
“We encourage patients to remain active. It only helps, but I’ll be frank.” Dr. Okafor sits on the bed, meeting my eyes. “You have lupus for life, Neevah. Even giving you a new kidney won’t change that. And stress will always be a possible trigger for a flare. You may need to reassess how you do what you do. Not that you can’t be a performer, but this disease will exploit every weakness and go after your organs the first chance it gets. Sometimes that is unavoidable, but there are lifestyle adjustments you can make to give your body the best shot.”
I nod, processing everything and looking for any silver lining I can find.
“We’ll work on getting you stabilized so you can resume some of your normal routines while we search for a viable kidney,” Dr. Okafor says. “But let me be clear. When I say you can go back to work, that’s when you go. Not a minute before.”
“Agreed,” Canon says. “I may be the director, but Neevah’s health is my priority, too.”
“You know, he is bossy,” she tells me, offering her first wide smile since she came bearing this awful news, “but I like him.”
I take in the contrasting hollows beneath his cheekbones. The fiery eyes that dare me to challenge him on this. The full lips pulled into a tight, level line. He is formidable, and right now, the doctor may like him, but I do not.
But I think I love him.
And how two such opposite moments—realizing I have a life-threatening illness and realizing I’m in love—can exist in the same hour, in the same room, is beyond me, but stranger things have happened. Or maybe it was always supposed to be this way. Maybe my love and this threat have been on a collision course since the beginning. Since the day a woman in a wheelchair on a rotting pier in the last rays of a dying sun stared the camera down, asking if we would live, or just wait to die. That day I only saw the words she was gifting me as inspiration to make the most out of life. Something to scribble on a sticky note and pin to my wall. Now, as Canon watches Dr. Okafor intently, noting everything that must be done over the next few months, things I’m too numb to even absorb right now, I realize there was a greater gift she was leaving me.
Her son.
But is it a gift I should refuse?
This isn’t what Canon expected. Hell, it’s not what I expected, but I have no choice. He does have a choice, or at least he should. After what he went through and witnessed with his mother, he should have a choice about going down this road again. What if he doesn’t feel he can step away from me now, even if this is too much? I couldn’t handle it if he stayed with me out of some misplaced sense of nobility or loyalty. That would be an insult to what we’ve been. An insult, in the future I can’t even see right now, to what we could be.