She has relapsed twice. Her family is always nearby, getting snacks from vending machines or making a run to the hospital cafeteria or restaurants during the hours and hours of treatment. The Porter family of Baton Rouge arrives by van one April morning and spills onto the sunny sidewalk and marches, smiling, into the rosy confines of St. Jude Children's Research Hospital.
Someone grabs a camera for some quick snapshots for the family scrapbook.
They go to the second floor, where the triangular nurse's station is bathed in the diffused glow of sunshine from the skylight overhead. About 180 children are treated every day at St. Jude as outpatients, and there are 56 inpatient beds. Stricken by catastrophic diseases, these children are frequently misshapen by growths beneath the skin. Many wear surgical masks over their noses and mouths. And parents, haggard, worried and hopeful all at once, hold their children's hands and swap chemotherapy and surgery tales with the other mothers and fathers they encounter in the hallways.