Chapter 4: What She Said to Iron Man
"I told him I was scared," Alice said.
I pulled back just enough to see her face.
"What do you mean, baby?
Told who?"
She was looking at the Iron Man figure on her IV pole.
She reached up and touched it gently with one finger.
"I wrote him a letter," she said.
"A long time ago.
Before I knew about the card or any of this.
I told him I was scared of the treatments and I asked him what he did when he was scared."
The room had gone quiet again.
I could feel the nurses listening.
"When did you write it?" I asked.
"After my third chemo," she said.
"I didn't tell you because I didn't want you to feel bad."
That sentence went through me like something cold.
She had been seven years old, three rounds into chemotherapy, and she had sat down and written a letter to a superhero because she was frightened, and she had hidden it from me because she was trying to protect me.
Dr.
Reeves crouched down beside the bed again.
"Alice, did you send the letter?"
"I gave it to Nurse Dana," she said.
"She said she'd try."
Every head in the room turned toward the nurse near the door.
The one dressed as Wonder Woman.
Dana.
Dana pressed her lips together.
Her eyes were very bright.
"She gave it to me in February," Dana said.
"I sent it through a fan mail contact I had.
I didn't know if it would reach anyone.
I didn't tell Alice's mom because I wasn't sure anything would come of it."
"Did he get it?" I asked.
Dana looked at Alice.
"Do you want to tell her?"
Alice reached under her pillow.
She pulled out a folded piece of paper.
She held it out to me without saying a word.
I unfolded it slowly.
It was printed on plain paper, but the message was short and handwritten at the bottom in blue ink, above a signature I recognized immediately.
*Alice — being scared doesn't mean you're not brave.
It means you're paying attention.
Keep going.
I'm paying attention too.*
My hands were shaking by the time I reached the signature.
"He wrote back," I said.
It wasn't really a question.
"Dana brought it to me last week," Alice said.
"I've been sleeping with it under my pillow."
I looked at Dana.
I didn't have words.
"She asked me not to tell you," Dana said quietly.
"She said she wanted to keep something that was just hers for a little while."
I looked back at my daughter.
Seven years old.
Needles and nausea and days too weak to sit up.
And she had been carrying a secret kindness under her pillow for a week, taking care of it like it was something precious, because it was.
"Alice," I said.
"Don't cry, Mom," she said.
"It's a happy letter."
I laughed.
I couldn't help it.
Dr.
Reeves stood up and looked around at the room full of superheroes — his staff, his team, the people who had come in on their day off or stayed past their shift just to be here.
"I think," he said, "we should probably let Alice eat some birthday cake."
Alice sat up very straight.
"Is there cake?"
"There is absolutely cake," said a voice from the hallway.
May you like
And the door opened.
But it wasn't cake that came through first.
