Our family was flying on a Make-A-Wish trip for my sick son — halfway through the flight, the pilot said, “Mike, there’s one thing about this trip that you and your parents know nothing about.”

treatments, frightened children received boarding passes to beaches, castles, dinosaur parks, and planets no adult had ever heard of.

The passes did not make the needles hurt less.

They gave the children somewhere else to place their minds.

Mike leaned toward the aisle.

“That was just our game.”

The captain seemed to answer him.

“Mike never realized what continue reading …