***
Several minutes later we finally walked toward the hospital entrance again.
Without planning it, the entire staff followed us outside.
Nobody spoke.
They stood together beneath the awning, smiling as Martha stepped into the afternoon sunshine.
She stopped halfway down the sidewalk. Then began hopping over every crack she saw.
I laughed. "What are you doing?"
She looked back with the biggest grin I'd seen in years.
"I missed sidewalks, Mom."
The nurses covered their mouths.
Angela leaned against Mr. Howard because she was crying too hard to stand straight.
"I missed sidewalks, Mom."
Not because Martha had beaten cancer.
Because she was finally worried about something only a 10-year-old would think about.
I squeezed my daughter's hand. She squeezed mine back.
Then she looked over her shoulder and waved both arms wildly at the people standing in front of the hospital.
Every single one of them waved back.
As we reached the parking lot, I turned for one last look.
She was finally worried about something only a 10-year-old would think about.
Through the glass doors, I could still see Martha's fresh blue handprint drying among hundreds of others.
For two years, I'd believed I was carrying my daughter through the hardest journey of our lives.
I wasn't.
I carried her home each night.
They carried her through every day.
They carried her through every day.
And as Martha skipped toward the car, carefully avoiding every crack in the sidewalk like it was the most important mission in the world, I realized something that made me smile through tears.
The greatest miracle wasn't hearing her treatment was over.
It was watching my little girl worry about ordinary childhood things again.
That was the future we'd been fighting for.
The greatest miracle wasn't hearing her treatment was over.
