If she hadn’t been in the treatment center, I would never have known she was a cancer-patient too. Everything about her sang of life. It was easy to like her, with her honest smile and fiery eyes, and even easier to love her. A simple squeeze from her hand before I entered each chemo-session was enough to say, “I know, it’s awful in there. I’ll be out here when it’s over.” She always was. That delicate little bird fluttered into my life with all the excitement and joy I had heard always accompanies true love. It seemed a cruel joke to find such joy amidst such disaster, like some pathetic attempt to soothe a third-degree burn with cold water. But she did soothe me. Soon, she was me, and I was her, and as the snow melted from persistent poppies, we felt ourselves bud into life.