Direction Dreamer

Chapter Two

Months passed and eventually my foster mother Robin gave up on me and let go. She left the hospital one day and never looked back. No goodbye, no emotion that I could see, nothing. She walked out on my life like every other adult had done previously. I was used to the pain of being alone in the world. I was used to being hurt. My social worker told me that it hit too close to home with her, that Robin’s daughter had passed away many years ago due to cancer. I became the property of the state of Massachusetts and lived at Boston Children’s Hospital in the oncology unit, 6 North. Chemotherapy proved to be my worst nightmare, and I suffered enough nausea and vomiting following treatment to last a lifetime and more. The first cycle of Chemo wasn’t nearly as terrible as I thought it would be, it was always the aftermath. After my first full round, I was told that I needed a second round. I could have gone the rest of my life without hearing that.

Three months into living in the hospital and almost two full rounds of chemo later, Doc Grier told me that things were looking up for me. I had spent countless hours in my hospital room drawing, playing my guitar that was eventually brought to me by my social worker as well as the rest of my belongings from my former foster home, and writing. Luckily the hospital has Wi-Fi, and my room was a hotspot. As weak as I was from my most recent treatment, my bladder has a mind of it’s own and couldn’t wait for me to feel like getting up. I shot up and ran to the toilet, did my business and despite my efforts at avoiding the mirror for months, I glanced up and my eyes welled with tears. My lush, thick hair had gone really thin from falling out, my eyes were swollen and tired, my face was pale and gloomy, and my once rosy lips were pale as the moon on a cloudy night. My appearance screamed “DEATH!” even if I was recovering. I let myself go in all of the ways that I shouldn’t have. I dialed in my social worker’s number into the cell phone she had bought me back in January for my birthday. “Callie, I need to get out of this hospital. I’m begging you. I need fresh air, my hair to be properly taken care of, and a tan or something. I look like death. PLEASE.” I begged. She told me tomorrow she’d take me out of there, today she was working with another kid. I was grateful to her for everything she’s done for me. I spent the rest of the day sitting in the Patient Entertainment Center in the Berthiaume building with other inpatients, playing the guitar and singing to them. All I wanted was to see the bright smiles and the playful imaginations brewing and coming alive. I wanted the children who never had what I did: a fulfilling life. Something to look back on if they reach my age and think “I loved being a kid.” I want them to have one of the things I always desired. Happiness.

“Mikaela, you have a visitor!” Doctor Werger announced as I was throwing on my pair of Vans. Callie grabbed my purse for me and checked me out for the day. She took me out for brunch at an iHop just out of Boston, took me shopping in downtown Boston, to the salon for a makeover that gave my self esteem a major boost, and finally took me to dinner at a little diner that my mom took me to as a toddler. Callie asked how my private tutoring was going, and I was obliged to tell her that it was great and I’d be graduating in two weeks, mid-June. It was a huge milestone for me, a huge accomplishment. Walking along in Boston, we walked by a shop with open doors that stopped me in my tracks. I walked in, and stared at the television in awe. There were five boys on stage singing a song about this girl being beautiful and how she didn’t need to be insecure. I thought it was touching and looked at my reflection in the television as the screen faded to black. Who were these guys, and why did that song make me feel like a weight was lifted from my chest? I had to dive headfirst into this.