Princess Abra Kadabra

Once upon a time....

Abra and I met in the emergency room.

She had no hair and the side of her head was scarred from surgery,

but she was pretty anyway.

Soft in her voice and sweet of nature,

she was helpful as I examined her,

even though she wasn't feeling well.

Abra wore her toque elegantly, as though it were a crown.

This is the kind of child who gets cancer.

Abra had a brain tumor. Most of it had been cut out,

and what remained had been irradiated.

Now she was being given chemotherapy, a brew of poisonsmedicine..

meant to cure her.

This is what happens to a child who gets cancer.

Abra came to the hospital often.

Sometimes she was there to get chemotherapy, but at other times, she was sick.

She was burned by fevers, plagued by shingles, and, most frightening, taken by fits.

On call, I stood watch over her.

And so I came to know Abra and her parents one worried night at a time.


This is what happens to you in the hospital.


Abra had an MRI to divine the chemotherapy's effects.

I asked one of the oncologists what the scan had shown.

"It's evil," she said simply.

Knowing what I'd see, it was days before I found courage enough to look at the images myself.

When, at length, I overcame my cowardice,

I saw a monster devouring Abra from the inside.


This is when you see that she's going to die.


Abra slowly slipped away.

As she did, I began to wonder what she had been like before she fell ill.

I spent more time with her and her parents, on a quest for an idea of the real Abra. Eventually, I found that, in every way that mattered,

she had not changed at all.

Gentle as a fairy, brave as a knight, stubborn like her mother,

Abra had always been just the same.


This is seeing that you love this kid.


Abra was granted only one wish.

Somehow feeling well enough to travel, she went to Disneyland with her family.

There was, happily, no news of her while she was away.

And when she returned from that magic kingdom,

Abra wasseemed very well.


This is a lie.


Abra came back to the hospital, gasping and terrified.

Even when calm, she was confused, as though bewitched.

"Where's Abra?" she'd ask.

"Who's that?" she'd say,

having seen herself in a mirror.

She got drugs in doses that would have easily

made me forget how to breathe,

but she continued her ragged inspiration.

Sometimes these potions seemed to make her more comfortable.

But sometimes they made Abra worse, I thought.


This is feeling helpless.


Abra's voice was stolen from her, but she found other ways to speak.

"She wants you to hold her hand," her mother told me,

as I stared dumbly at Abra's outstretched palm.

She'd lift both arms off the bed if she wanted to be hugged.

She would put her head forward, just slightly,

if she wanted a kiss, a kiss that would fail to save her.


This is slowly saying goodbye.


Abra's beautiful eyes stared ahead.

Her pupils, which had nearly vanished from the morphine,

were now wide black mirrors that foretold a wide black tomorrow.


This is how you view the end.


I was frightened whenever I left the hospital,

so I didn't leave very often.

I found reasons to stay late, and I came in on my days off.

When away from the hospital, I called the ward for word of Abra.

Even so, when she died, I wasn't there.


This is when you stop being her doctor.


I ran up the stairs to the ward, ready to fight, willing to be slain.

But the battle had already been lost, and the princess would sleep forever.

I went into Abra's room and found it thronged with her family,

people who had actually known her when she was a girl,

before she was a girl with cancer.

I felt like an intruder.

My eyes began to sting and I wanted to leave, but my feet wouldn't move.

"Go on, Paul. Say goodbye to her," her mother said to me,

and then she gave me a hug.

"I'm sorry," I sobbed. "I'm so sorry."

And then, silently, I asked forgiveness for Abra's death,

and for the manner of her dying.


This is too much for you to bear.


"Goodbye, Abra sweetie," I said, and then I kissed her forehead.

This is when you hope for ever after.