Approaching her sixteenth birthday, Dawn Rochelle is starting high school. She hopes that at a new school with new students she can put the stigma of cancer behind her. Dawn desperately wants to keep her school life separate from her cancer life. Dawn soon realizes that her desires won't easily come to fruition. Jake Macka, the boy she's liked since 5th grade, moves back to Columbus and starts attending Hardy High. She has to turn down a date or two with Jake because of doctor's appointments and clinic visits. Then Jake, a weekend cemetery worker, sees her at a funeral. Jake tries to show concern, but Dawn rebuffs him. Later, Dawn wants to patch things up with Jake but doesn't know how. At the Christmas dance, Jake and Dawn share a dance where apologies are said and forgiveness given. Jake continues to show an interest in Dawn. He visits her during a bout with pneumonia that puts her back in the hospital. After awhile, Jake begins to understand what it must be like to see your friends die and know that someday you could die too. Dawn realizes that she can't treat him like an outsider any longer. Like it or not Dawn Rochelle and leukemia are inexorably tied together.
well rochelle is starting highschool as a sophmore and just trys to get through and hope that she will make it through high school!!! when jake, rochelle's crush from 5th grade comes back and hangs around her she is worried he thinks of her different since she has cancer and all, but later on when she discovers a rash on her body that can be a sign of a bone marrow rejection of her brothers she is scared that it is a rejection, but yet is there a possibility that its just the flu and that she might be over the cancer after all and can start planning her future in medicine so she can find a cure for cancer and learn to let go of the past and hold to the future? you need to read this book and see if she will concider that possibility or not?
