"Around here, you never know," he points out, but there's a hint of a smile as well. "Well... Why do I suspect that would raise the cost of your paintings? Or maybe not," he says, shrugging as he thinks about it.

He grins kind of crooked at that, ducking his head to hide it as he looks away. "She is. She's been there for us all, and when everything changed? Her heart only got bigger." He won't ever mention that time in between, the changes. They were fixed now.