I: Sick Kids — Chapter 2

Summary

• Sadie is sent out of her 13-year-old sister Alice's hospital room by her mother due to Alice’s illness and her adolescent moods. Alice is battling cancer and puberty at the same time.
• A misunderstanding about a hat comment leads Sadie to be exiled to a waiting area. Reflecting on the situation, she assumed that the comment about a hat made Alice think Sadie was remarking on her thinning hair. Sadie wishes to apologize but is told to come back later as Alice is sleeping.
• Sadie begins to resent being punished for her sister’s irrational moods, finding it irritating that her life is so influenced by Alice’s illness. Despite knowing Alice’s prognosis is positive, Sadie often finds herself imagining a world without Alice.
• A hospital nurse directs Sadie to a game room where she meets Sam, an eleven-year-old boy who is also a patient at the hospital. He is bedecked in pajamas and a set of crutches rest by his chair, indicating he may also be sick.
• Sadie and Sam strike up a friendship over video games. Sam asks Sadie if she is also a patient and she tells him her sister is sick with dysentery, but does not mention cancer. Sam tells Sadie that he was involved in a car accident and his foot is broken in 27 places, so much so that it may need to be amputated.
• The two continue to play video games and joke around with each other for the entire afternoon. As she's leaving, Sadie promises Sam that they'll talk more next time, although she's not sure when "next time" will be.
• Sharyn, Sadie and Alice’s mother, asks Sadie about Sam. Sadie says he was nice. When the nurse learns Sadie had been talking to Sam he pulls her mother aside while Sadie goes to Alice.
• During the car ride home, Sharyn tells Sadie that Sam had been in a horrible car accident and was extremely selective about who he talked to, causing Sam talking to Sadie being "a big deal". Sadie has given no thought of the cultural implications of her friendship with Sam until Sharyn suggests Sadie could use the hours she spends with Sam as community service hours for her Bat Mitzvah the following year.
• The two become one another’s constant companions, sharing game strategies, life stories and lessons. Sam creates intricate mazes for Sadie, something that surprises the hospital staff and would eventually become a career of his.
• Freda, Sadie’s no-nonsense grandmother, challenges Sadie’s ploy for community service hours by questioning whether it is ethical when Sam himself does not know he is considered a charity case. Despite Freda’s words of wisdom, Sadie continues to have her community service forms signed and briefly enjoys the praise she gets for the hours she logs in at the hospital.
• The charade comes to an end when Sam discovers the truth. Sadie’s community service logs total 613 hours over fourteen months, and on top of her exceptional community service hours she also snags an award from local women’s organization, Hadassah.