My Daughter Was 15 When She Finally Looked Me in the Eye and Whispered, “I Don’t Tell Dad When I’m Hurting Anymore. He Says I Only Do It for Attention.” The Next Afternoon, I Checked Her Out of School and Drove Her to the Hospital Without a Word to My Husband. Halfway Through the Scan, the Technician Went Completely Quiet.

“Could you quit looking worried every time I move?”

“That’s a fair deal.”

Both of us broke it in under fifteen minutes.

Karen brought the sketchbook, and Paige started drawing little scenes from the ward.

She turned the nurse’s rolling cart into a chariot and the hospital bed into a ship.

When one of the nurses asked what she was working on, Paige said it was the voyage of a volleyball player who had been turned into a pirate for a while.

The nurse asked if she could be the ship’s navigator.