• He was Seven. That’s it. Seven. Seven years of age. Only seven years living on this Earth; and it’s not like he even got seven good years.
    I walked through those halls each and every day. I saw their faces. The faces of the men, women, and children. The faces of despair, of distraught. Of hope. Of anguish. Faces that have given up. And faces that kept fighting.
    I worked in the Hospital. The place no one ever wanted to be in. I was a volunteer. I type of candy striper, only not. I helped kids. Entertained children who’s lives had made into chances. Chances of living. Chances of dying.
    It was summer when I met Joey. He was small. He looked four instead of seven. he didn’t have the usual scowl or frightened puppy look they usually have. His eyes lit up at the sight of everything. He took the world in wonder, and seemed happy to be where he was. The man and woman who admitted him told me his story. Apparently, he had been abused, and then abandoned. When the police found him and got him checked out, the doctors found he had cancer and sent him here. It was severe.
    I moved him to the window room. The rooms with views were for the kids who would most likely not make it. I held his hand, it was tiny, and frail. It was like holding a baby bunny, I felt like I could snap all the bones in his hand. After I got him situated in a hospital gown and put him in the bed, he didn’t turn on the T.V. or play with anything. He just sat there, staring outside. I felt bad for him and asked him if he liked the outdoors. He didn’t say anything. I figured he must still be getting used to things, and started to walk out to do other jobs. When he spoke, the frailty and strength of his voice surprised me.
    “Its nice. The sun shining, the birds singing. The world carries on, even though bad things, horrible things, go on in the world. The day still turns into night. And night still turns into day. Things grow older and die, and new things are born. But no matter what happens, the world still moves on, it doesn’t stop to dwell on anything… I’m sorry if I bothered you with that thought.” he finished meekly. I stood, mouth agape. All of that had come from the mouth of a seven year old boy with cancer. He had produced words that were way beyond the wisdom of someone in their seventies.
    From that day on, I always visited Joey. Sometimes we would carry a conversation for hours, and sometimes we just sat in silenced and relished the sunshine. He always seemed cheerful, even though he had known what the doctors had said. Known that he had mere months to live. It didn’t seem like it bothered him. Not one bit. He was just a happy child. He smiled, and laughed. You couldn’t tell he had been abused either.
    He never talked about death, I always thought he’d bring it up one day. That maybe it was hiding in some corner of his mind. That ever impending doom of his. Such a burden for a small boy. He always talked about things like life and other joyful matters. He wanted to know how my other patients were. How they were doing, if they were getting better. Never once did he ask if the doctors had said anything about his condition. And naturally, I didn’t say anything.
    He caught me off guard one day. We were having a quiet day today. Just enjoying each others company. I was writing in my journal, and he suddenly asked, “Do you write?” I looked up, startled, and then slowly nodded. “Will you read what you write to me?” he asked, with an innocence only a child pure of heart could pull off. I agreed with a smile and from then on, would read my poems to him. He said he wanted to be a writer when he grew up, and when he had said that, it made my heart sink. “I think it would be cool to just be published in the newspaper!” he said one day. He was getting some hair back from the chemo. It was dark brown and soft, I made fun of him some days, telling him he had peach fuzz on his head. I wished and prayed his dream would come true. That he’d have the time to make it come true.
    After I’d visit him, I’d go to the chapel and just sit. It was calming. The candles lit from various visitors. Each looking for peace. Each praying, hoping, for some kind of miracle in amidst all of the sorrow and bad news. I could hear the mothers sobbing for their children. The husbands and wives asking god to spare their spouses. The children asking for their parents health. The dads praying for everything to just be ok. I always questioned god. I knew I shouldn’t, but I did. It was an effect from working where I worked. While I prayed, the question ran through my head once again. ‘if there is a god, why does he do this to his people, why does he make them suffer like this? Why does he let children die before they have yet to live?’
    My life outside the walls of the Hospital was uneventful. I rarely went out. There was no school, so I mainly devoted myself to the hospital. I went out with friends sometimes, but it wasn’t a lot. Since my outfit was made of comfortable clothes or hospital scrubs, I didn’t go to the mall. There were no movies I wished to see, why waste my time with fantasy when I could contribute to reality. Mainly, when I was home, I wrote. I wrote wonderful things. Stories about my volunteer hours. Poems. Anything I could write, I did. I enjoyed writing even more now that I had Joey to read my works too. He enjoyed them too. It seemed to make his day even brighter.
    “How do you write something?” he asked one day. I asked him what he meant and he bit his lip. He seemed to be deep in thought, searching for the words he wanted to use. I had to laugh, mainly because he looked like a little old man. He seemed to have found what he was looking for and cleared his throat. “How do you come up with a topic to write about. How do you choose something that you know will make the words flow off the pages?” I sat there for awhile, thinking about my answer.
    “You need something you’re passionate about. Something that makes you think, something that induces feelings within you, so much that you just want to write these feelings down in danger they will explode within you.” I replied. Thinking thoughtfully while staring out the window, out at the street below. Joey nodded and looked to where I was staring.
    One day, the therapy dogs came for a visit. I was sitting with Joey when a middle aged woman walked in with a scraggly puppy. The puppy was wriggling around and seemed like it couldn’t contain itself in it’s joy. Joey grinned at the sight and held out his arms. Before I could let out a protest the puppy jumped in his arms and licked his face. The mask blocked the lower part of his face started to fall and I picked up the puppy. Then, with my other hand I fixed his mask and put the puppy down. I then held it with a short lead, and let Joey pet the puppy. He looked happy and I gave the little dog a pat too. The puppy seemed so happy. Even in this place of desolation and despair, the puppy seemed to be the happiest dog in the world. It reminded me that the hospital wasn’t all that bad, miracles did happen.
    When the therapy dog left Joey sat back. He looked tired and I was about to get up and carry on with the rest of my work when he gave out a weak ‘wait.’ I turned around and gave him a curious look. “that dog, will it come back? It was nice. It reminded me of this stray that hung out at my house. It was starving, just like me, when there was no one to take care of me. I had to fend for myself, and I couldn’t. neither could the puppy. Then one day, the puppy ran into the street. I tried to call out after it, but someone had dropped a McDonald’s bag with some food in it in the middle of the street. It was a busy street. A car didn’t see him… he was so tiny… he didn’t even yelp.” I thought he was going to cry, but he didn’t. He just stared impassively out the window.
    “I’ll see what I can do.” I said, and left.
    Joey had made friends with the other kids, though he was mainly confined to his bed. He couldn’t play with the kids with the less severe cases of cancer. They had some energy, but Joey didn’t. They visited him sometimes. He’d tell them stories. Amazing stories. I would sit in and listen to them. He tell stories about dragons and fairies. And sometimes he would tell stories about monsters hiding under kids’ beds. Then, when he wasn’t in such a lighthearted mood, he told stories about a bird. Trapped in a cage. It was an interesting story.
    “Once upon a time, there was a beautiful sparrow trapped in a golden cage. This sparrow had the prettiest brown feathers ever. But the sparrow’s owners took advantage of the sparrow. They yelled at the sparrow when it didn’t act right. And they threw objects at the cage. The sparrow’s wings were bounded too. The owner’s had done that from keeping their beautiful bird from escaping. But one day, the sparrow got really sick, and all of it’s beautiful feathers started to fall out. One by one, till they laced the bottom of it’s cage like ripped pillow. This made the owners very mad, because to them, their sparrow was good for nothing. Therefore, they left it. Abandoned it.” Joey told. I remembered the story from before and was slowly memorizing the words. Then Joey continued, and looked at me and smiled. I was surprised; I couldn’t remember any more to the story.
    “then, one day, the sparrow cried out really hard and was finally heard. An angel in all white appeared before the sparrow. The angel took pity on the sparrow and nursed it back to health. Soon, new feathers were growing in place of the old. An the sparrow continued on a slow recovery…” Joey finished. There was more to the story, but he was still making it up. But this new part interested me. I was intrigued, and wanted to know who this angel was.
    I told my friends about Joey one day. They sat and listened, interested in my new found friend. One of my friend started to tear up. She said it was such an inspirational story and she would pray for him.
    A couple months had gone by. It seemed like forever, but I didn’t fret. I saw that Joey was loosing his brightness. Slowly, but surely. His friends had either died, or when home with their parents. He didn’t cry. I never saw him cry. Not once. He was a strong kid. I asked him if he was sad, “why should I be? I’m happy for them, they got better, and now they can go home. I would never wish for them to be stuck here and getting worse just so I could have friends to play with. And I have you and the rest of the nurses. I’m content. And those who died, I am saddened by their deaths. But I will not dwell. Never live in the past, it can eventually lead to your demise.”
    The nurses he did have. The nurses and the doctors. Everyone in that hospital loved Joey. He could light up anyone’s day. I sometimes saw the doctors, when they were stressed, just go and sit in his room and talk to the small boy. The nurses would always walk into his room with a smile, even though they had all had rough and long days. He commented on it one time, “I think it’s quite amusing that adults seek the refuge of a small boy with severe cancer to help them through their hectic days. Not that I mind. I quite enjoy their company. It’s calming. And I like listening to their problems. Listening is one of the best things in the world. Listen and you’ll never have to speak. When you listen all the time, then whenever you say something, it comes straight from your heart. Because, whenever we talk, we lie. Sometimes without even knowing it. But if we almost never talked, we wouldn’t set ourselves into lying. Therefore, everything we’d say would be true to ourselves and our hearts.” I laughed at him when he said this.
    “If we all never talked, who would we listen to?” I asked.
    “everything. You don’t just have to listen to someone talking. There’s all kinds of things to listen to. Most people just never notice them because they’re so quiet. People tend to not notice things when they’re small and insignificant.” he said sadly. I enveloped him into a gently hug.
    After Joey came to the hospital, many of the doctors stopped smoking. And the nurses stopped drinking so much coffee. It was like his mere pressence in the building was enough to keep everyone going like the energizer bunny. I always waited to see if I could hear the beat of the drums.
    As time passed, Joey grew paler. He seemed weaker. The chemo was a lot. And he was only seven. He didn’t seem seven. He seemed so much younger, and so much older all at the same time. He was so weak. So weak. He never got out of his bed, and I had the therapy dog stop visiting because it was becoming too much for him.
    I was hanging out with friends when it happened. My phone went off. We were hanging out at a café. I knew it was the hospital. The ringtone was sirens for a reason. I picked up and heard a nurse speak urgently on the phone. I replied with ‘uh huh’s and ‘I see’ and then said I’d be right there. One of my friends was able to take me over to the hospital and I burst through the doors. I was in a frantic rush, and I followed a nurse in a quick jog to the window room.
    I heard the sounds of he oxygen machines. Pumping air, in and out of his small, weak lungs. He looked so frail, frailer than when he first arrived and I thought I was going to crush his hand. He looked up at me and smiled. His hand groped around for something and I saw his tiny fingers clasp around a piece of folded paper. He lifted it meekly and handed it to me. “Read it, tell me what you think.” he rasped out. “and don’t go easy on me because I’m dying.” the last line sent chills down my spine. I willed the tears to go away, and slowly unfolded the paper. My body shook and I tried to still myself. Nurses and doctors awaited eagerly, and I guessed that I was supposed to read the paper out loud. I cleared my throat and began.
    “there’s a monster following me,
    Keeping me caged,
    Its big and massive,
    With an evil grin,
    It won’t let me escape,
    It says I’m its prisoner,
    No keys can open the lock,
    And free me from this demon,
    No matter how hard I cry,
    I am not heard,
    So with a final breath,
    I cry once more,
    A lonely cry,
    A longing cry,
    And for some reason,
    It is answered,
    By an angel in white,
    With a kind smile,
    Kind face,
    I don’t mind my fate,
    She patches me up,
    But she still can’t free me from the monster,
    It’s bound to get me,
    But the angel makes it bearable,
    I like this angel,
    And I hope,
    I’ll see her in heaven.”
    I finished. My voice wavering. I tried desperately to still it, but I failed. “it was amazing…” I say, and look at him. He’s breathing heavily and clears his throat.
    “Will the angels be like you?” he asks, his final breath drawn. I never answer the question. His eyes close, and the smile stays on his face. I hear the quiet sobbing behind me, as nurses and doctors embrace. I hold on the piece of folded paper tightly.
    I exited the room slowly. Exited the hospital even slower. I called a couple people, and got a few favors. When I got home, I’d email the poem to a journalist for the paper. After my calls, I went back into the building. I don’t know what caused me to go to the chapel. But I did. A priest was there. Or a preacher. I wasn’t really sure. I sat in the front pew with my hands folded. I thought about what I had just witnessed and tears rolled down my cheeks like hot magma. The priest/preacher noticed and sat next to me. “Something troubling you, daughter?” he asked.
    “father, why, why does god take the lives of children. Why does he take the lives of those who haven’t even begun to live, those innocent, and keep those who do horrible things, and evil and corrupted things, and let them live?”
    “it’s a hard question. God is mysterious that way. I’m afraid I can’t answer your question. No one can. It’s not our place to answer. The best I can give you is that is was his will. And that is all.” then he got up and left. I remained, watching the candle melt the wax into a pool.
    Joey’s poem was in the paper. Front page. Along with his obituary. The paper was passed down through the hospital, and everyone bought one. I was happy though, I had made his final wish come true, though I was saddened that he couldn’t be here to experience it.
    Joey touched a lot of people at that hospital. His never-ending enthusiasm inspired people who had no hope before. I knew he would never be forgotten within those walls. I helped many more kids. And spent many more hours within the window room. But I could always see Joey. Smiling and looking out the window. It was unfair. A child of seven, with his life taken away. But I knew he didn’t mind. He was being taken care of by angels, and it wouldn’t surprise me, if he had become and angel as well, sent to watch over the other children, abused and without hope. And maybe his puppy was with him, helping him get through the days in heaven.