Lucky Broken Girl

Mrs. Sarota, Ruthie’s teacher, comes to see Ruthie and seems horrified by the extent of Ruthie’s debilitation. She tells Mami she will do “everything in her power to help [Ruthie]” (63). Ramu puts a note for Ruthie under the door and Ruthie can smell the good aroma of the Sharma home on the paper. Ramu writes that he misses Ruthie and will sneak out to see her when he can, since he is not allowed to socialize with anyone after school hours.

Ruthie writes back to tell Ramu she misses him as well. She makes Izzie promise to deliver the letter directly to Ramu at school. Izzie kindly offers Ruthie chocolate milk; he brings water when she asks for that instead, and he fetches a straw from Aunt Sylvia so that Ruthie can drink more easily. Ruthie smells the grass and outside world on her brother and notes how quickly he can run off on two good legs. The next day Izzie brings a hidden treat to Ruthie: a samosa from Ramu. 

The school sends a teacher to work one-on-one with Ruthie each day. Ruthie thinks the young woman looks like a hippie in her bell-bottom pants and peasant-style blouse. She tells Ruthie to call her by her first name, Joy. Joy has Ruthie spell words aloud and write a response essay to a fairy tale by Hans Christian Anderson. She tells Ruthie she is smart and doing very well; Ruthie is glad to hear it but wonders if Joy’s compliments stem somewhat from pity. Ruthie remembers playing on the beach in Cuba and wishes for legs to run on again. She also wishes she could see out her window, but the window is behind her. Ruthie thanks God for sending Joy but mentions that she would pick the remedial class over not being able to walk, if given a choice.

Ruthie is excited to see Zeide come to visit her, but when he gives her prune juice, she spits some out from the bad taste. Mami comes in, angry that Ruthie did not drink the juice and somewhat frantic that Ruthie has not had a bowel movement in two weeks. Zeide leaves; Mami flips Ruthie over and gives her an enema. Unfortunately, Mami does so without the bedpan at hand, and Ruthie cannot control her bowel function after the enema. Mami yells in disgust, “You’ve held it in for weeks! Why can’t you wait a minute now?” (77).

Ruthie cries and begs Mami to change the soiled sheets, but Mami leaves to make coffee for Zeide. Ruthie overhears Mami’s complaints about “being cooped up all day” (78). Zeide reminds Mami that Ruthie is trapped as well when she would like to be outside playing. When Zeide leaves, Mami changes the sheets, but Ruthie thinks, “[S]he looks at me like I’m the most disgusting creature in the world” (78). Ruthie waits all day for Mami to return, not calling for her despite thirst and loneliness. Finally Mami brings a light lunch. Ruthie asks if Mami still loves her. Mami says she does, but Ruthie hears a snapping tone in her voice.

Friends and relatives of Mami’s and Papi’s from Cuba come to visit the Mizrahis, and Izzie takes them to Ruthie’s room to say hello. She feels like a “piggy in the barn” as they leave quickly after greeting her and seeing the cast (81). Baba feels guilty about the accident because she was holding Ruthie in the backseat of the car when it happened; Ruthie tells her it wasn’t her fault and asks Baba to tell her about the trip to Cuba from Warsaw, Poland in 1925. Baba says she loved her new life in Cuba, where “no one said a bad word to [her] because [she] was Jewish” (83). Baba and Ruthie concur that they must be patient with Ruthie’s healing the way Baba was patient on the long ship crossing.

Danielle comes to visit but stays only a minute, revealing that she only stopped by because her mother insisted. She goes pale at the sight of the cast, and Ruthie wonders if Danielle thinks her condition is catching. One day Izzie, Dennis, and Ruthie play catch with a ball in the bedroom, but Mami makes them stop despite Ruthie’s pleas. 

Worry and fear that Ruthie’s healing will not progress set in. Ruthie cries at night; she devises a “tent” by pulling her sheet over her head and keeping a flashlight turned on beneath it. At the end of the school year, Joy brings Ruthie a stack of Nancy Drew mystery novels for the summer. Ruthie reads all of them by the start of July, then begins rereading them. She pretends Nancy Drew is there with her, eager to solve the case of why the accident happened and how Ruthie ended up bedridden. Ruthie hears summer sounds of children playing and the ice cream truck approaching and wishes desperately to be outside.