15
The New Patient
October 1945 — EmikaThe room smelled like antiseptic, medicines, and other things that stung Emika’s nose. Unfamiliar noises surrounded her—nurses talking, charts flipping. She could hear the different kinds of shoes making contact with the floor—that one a heavy step, this one light, that one stopping next to a patient’s bed. With her eyes closed, she could still see the room because every sound gave off a picture.
The music box was magic because when it played, she didn’t have to see the ugly green hospital walls, or the bandages, needles, and silver trays of medicines. She could close her eyes and listen to the music and imagine her mother’s face.
Her father brought the music box to the hospital after her first treatment, and when Emika’s very bones seemed to cry
