My Little Friend

I had the privilege of spending the day with a little boy in the hospital. His arm is in a cast and he is bruised from head to foot from his mother's beatings. At first he didn't make eye-contact and was very quiet.

Slowly, one by one, he took toys out of a box and placed them on his mattress. A toy fell on the floor and he looked at me. I laughed. So did he. I picked it up, but it fell again. This time we laughed longer. In fact, we enjoyed it so much that we kept laughing.

When I gave him a bath, he cried but was compliant.

We took a little walk down the hallway and stopped to look at pictures on the wall. When the playroom opened, we played there for a while. The volunteers asked him friendly questions, but he only stared back at them silently.

At lunch, he broke his sandwich into tiny pieces and wanted me to feed them to him with a fork.

When he finished eating, he scooted over next to me, and playfully bumped his head against me. It was like saying, Now we are friends.