Alina looked at her fingers and screamed.

“Mum, hurry! Look at my nails — they are turning blue!”

Her mother rushed into her room. “What did you say?” she asked.

“My nails — they’re blue!” Alina replied with a horrified expression on her face.

Her mother scrutinised her nails and said, “Oh, my God! Yes, they are turning blue, but why?”

When they went to the doctor, her asked Alina how long her condition had been this way.

“I guess, three days,” replied Alina.

“Does your stomach hurt?” he asked again.

“Yeah, sometimes.”

“What was your body temperature when you last had a fever?”

“I had fever last night, it was 103 degrees,” confessed.

Alina’s mum looked at her with enquiring eyes, surprised that Alina had told her nothing about it.

The doctor nodded and wrote something on the notepad. Then he looked up at her mother and said: “Alina has to stay at the hospital for a few days. She has got typhoid, it needs a lot of medical care; I wonder why didn’t she tell you before?” the doctor said.

Alina looked at her mother, who was numb and staring at the doctor with stoned eyes as if she didn’t hear anything.

But she composed herself and immediately replied, “This is one bad thing we really don’t like about Alina, she never tells how she feels and what is going on; she often ignores if she has fever. We have to check on her, every time.”

The doctor then turned to Alina and said, “Dear child, your parents want you to be healthy and not sick like you are right now. And if you had come earlier, you wouldn’t have to be admitted in the hospital, and would have recovered some medicines and care of home.”

Alina looked embarrassed and said, “I am sorry, mum, I will be careful next time.”

Her mother was really in shock and just hugged her. A nurse, who had been standing there, escorted both Alina and her mum to a room.

Alina’s mother called her father, and told him everything. He also came to the hospital in no time.

Those few days in the hospital made Alina realised the importance of the comfort of a house and the significance of health in one’s life. It is easy to become careless about one’s health and only realise it when they get sick.

Alina didn’t like being in the hospital. She desperately wanted to go home. “I miss home, my room, my friends and my school,” she said to her mother and cried. Her mum comforted her.

Within couple of days, Alina got better and when her temperature came to normal and other bad symptoms warded off, the doctor permitted them to go home.

Alina’s little sister had decorated her room with a “Welcome back” poster and a few drawings she had made. When Alina saw all this, she couldn’t stop her tears and immediately hugged her sister.

Alina had to rest for another one week before she could go to school. She was really happy when she rejoined her school and met her friends. Although she had a lot of missed work, all her friends volunteered to help her.

The illness made Alina realise the importance of health and from then onwards she became very careful about her health and also told others to be careful about theirs too. After all — health is wealth!

Published in Dawn, Young World, February 3rd, 2018