“I have to go feed Emma,” I said.

“Call Mark before twelve,” Denise said.

At eleven I brought a plastic cup of applesauce into Emma’s room.

The fluorescent lights in the pediatric wing buzzed over her narrow bed.

A nurse in blue scrubs had carried in a tray of soft foods earlier.

Emma was sitting up, twisting her hospital socks around her little ankles.

“Are we going home today?” Emma asked in a very small voice.

I peeled the foil lid off the applesauce.