Betsy’s eyes slowly opened as she gave a great big yawn. Stretching her limbs, Betsy broke free of her blanket which was wrapped around her like rope.

“Honey, it’s time to get ready for your doctor’s appointment.” Betsy’s mom yelled from the kitchen.

Betsy didn’t reply. She simply walked to her closet to pick her clothes out for the day.

Ten minutes later, cereal bowl in hand, Betsy was sitting in the backseat of her mother’s car, driving to the doctors. She busied herself by eating and drawing designs on the fogged up windows. By the time she arrived at the doctor’s office, Betsy had completed a masterpiece and was sad when she started seeing her beautifully written name fade. Betsy was sad a lot lately.

Walking to the doors that led to the cold office, Betsy started feeling scared. Last time she was here, her whole world was turned upside down. Last time she was here, she had two pigtails and a grin on her face. This time, neither one of those things could be found.

While Betsey’s mom checked her in, Betsy ran up to the fish tank that has been in her doctor’s office for as long as she can remember. She searched and searched for her favorite fish, the one she called Blacky, due to his black color. After many minutes of intense searching, Betsy finally found him, and a little bit of her worry went away.

Betsy’s mom, Mrs. Brown, smiled at her daughter from across the waiting room. She had always loved animals. “Honey, why don’t you come here and sit with me until it’s our turn to go in?”

Betsy turned around, focusing her attention on her mom, rather than on the fish and her face faded to a frown. Her hand slipped off of the cool tank. Betsy waved goodbye to her favorite fish as she crossed the room.

Betsy took a seat next to Mrs. Brown. “Mommy, can I ask a question?”

“You can ask me anything.” Mrs. Brown quickly replied.

“How do you pronounce the type of cancer I have? Because all my friends at school want to know why I don’t have hair, and I can’t tell them because I don’t know how to say it.”
Mrs. Brown was very surprised by this question. “Oh honey, I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you earlier. I didn’t think you wanted to know more. What you have is a kind of Leukemia. So it’s pronounced like the name “Luke”, then like “key”, and then like the name “Mia.” Luke-key-Mia.”

Betsy nodded and took her mother’s hand, but did not say anything else. Mrs. Brown grew very sad and her eyes started filling with tears. She felt o guilty that her little seven year old had to go through cancer treatment, and that she couldn’t just make it go away, as much as she wanted to.
A few minutes later Betsy’s name was called and a nurse with clean fingernails took Betsy and her mom into the room. Betsy’s hand started trembling and tears filled her eyes.

For the next five or six days Betsy felt pretty terrible. Her bones felt weak yet heavy at the same time, and her stomach was an amusement park of swirling feelings. The week after a Chemo therapy treatment, Betsy never felt well enough to go to school. But on the Monday after her third round of Chemo, Betsy felt physically well enough to return to school.

Betsy woke up in her pink and purple bed, and started brushing her teeth and packing her backpack. She was just about to change into her school uniform when her mom walked into her room.

“Honey, I’m not taking you to school today.”

Betsy was very confused.

“Because we are going on a field trip.”

Betsy looked at her mom with a quizzical gaze.

“Well hurry up and get dressed silly!” Mrs. Brown poked Betsy in the stomach, but instead of laughing and poking her back like she used to, Betsy simply turned around and started getting dressed.

Mrs. Brown piled Betsy and a bag for lunches into her car and started driving. The whole ride Betsy was silent.

When they finally pulled up to SeaWorld Mrs. Brown couldn’t contain her excitement any longer. “Honey, look! We’re going to SeaWorld. Aren’t you excited? You’ve never been before.”

Betsy looked up when her mother spoke to her and her eyes glazed over when she saw the famous SeaWorld sign. Betsy’s head swiveled right and left as she tried to take in all of her surroundings. The smallest smile anyone has ever seen crossed Betsy’s lips.

Mrs. Brown paid for two admission tickets and off they went.

Betsy wanted to see everything. She wasn’t interested in rides or roller coasters-they wouldn’t be good for her with her Chemo therapy treatment anyway-but Betsy did want to see every animal possible. They fed sea lions together even though the stench of fish lingered on their hands long after they had thrown the fish to the seals. They watched a show where a gigantic Orca whale did flips. They even saw pink flamingos hopping on one leg. Mrs. Brown could tell that Betsy was having a good time, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that Betsy wasn’t truly happy. She hadn’t smiled all day. She hadn’t laughed all day. Mrs. Brown was started to think that Betsy was never going to smile or laugh again.

Betsy was slowly running out of energy due to the Chemo therapy, but she didn’t want to go home just yet. Mrs. Brown allowed her to pick one more animal to visit. Betsy’s face scrunched up in concentration and after a couple of minutes Betsy’s thin finger pointed to an exhibit on the map.
“You want to see the penguins?”

The penguin exhibit was unlike anything Betsy had ever seen before. For starters, it was huge! It was also open to the public, meaning that instead of putting the penguins in a cage, there was simply a short wall separating the humans from them. The wall didn’t go all the way past Betsy’s head though, in fact, the wall barely stretched past Betsy’s waist. Betsy’s mouth dropped open in shock at the realization that she was mere inches from a real live penguin!

Mrs. Brown put a comforting arm around Betsy’s shoulder as she stared at the penguins which were within her reach. They had been standing there for a little while, simply soaking in the experience when three penguins started waddling over to them. Mrs. Brown watched them intently. These penguins were black and white with bright orange beaks and a glint in their eyes that made Mrs. Brown feel like these penguins liked Betsy just as much as Betsy liked them.

The three penguins didn’t stop a foot away from the wall like all of the other penguins in the exhibit did. No! These penguins came right up to the wall and jumped over it! Betsy jolted back in surprise, but the penguins just came closer to her. Mrs. Brown was startled and worried that Betsy would be scared, but as soon as she looked down she saw that her daughter was not scared in the least. Her daughter was happy.

The penguins were surrounding Betsy. There were probably two dozen penguins in the exhibit, and twice that many people looking at them, but these three penguins chose Betsy. They looked her up and down, flapping their little wings. Then a great big “BAAAAAA!” screeched out of one of the penguins beaks. A chorus of “CAAAA’S! And BAAA”s!” came flying out of all three of the penguins. These three penguins ignored everyone else, every normal looking person in the exhibit, and instead gave their attention to Betsy. Betsy looked up at her mom. She was smiling.

Mrs. Brown was laughing but she also had tears in her eyes. She watched as her daughter laughed so hard her eyes started to water and her stomach started to cramp. She watched as everyone in the exhibit turned their eyes to her little girl, and smiled. She watched as her darling was finally happy again.

“I think they think you’re their mom.” Mrs. Brown told Betsy. Betsy turned her smiling face towards her own mom and laughed.

“I think it’s because I’m bald.” Both Mrs. Brown and Betsy started laughing their heads off as the penguins continued to screech.

Betsy hadn’t been this happy in a long time. Betsy had never been proud of her lack of hair, or even accepting of it, until three misfit penguins thought that she was their mother because of it. Betsy smiled again, and Mrs. Brown smiled back. Betsy was going to be fine. She just knew it.