I woke to the rooster crowing. For a few seconds, I didn’t even know why I was on the farm, but then I remembered. Robin was hurt. She could even be dead.

I hid underneath the covers while the accident played inside my mind like a horror movie. Robin’s body slammed against the pavement; the siren wailed. I curled up like a ball of yarn. Maybe if I rolled up tight enough, I’d feel safe.

Granny pulled the covers back and gathered me into her arms. “Sssh,” she whispered. “Don’t cry. It’ll be all right. Everything will be all right.”

When I finally quieted down, Granny said, “Robin’s still unconscious. They’ll know more about her head injury when she wakes up.”

Robin was alive! Those words were as sweet as an angel’s singing.

“I want you to get dressed,” Granny said. “I’m gonna teach you to make my prizewinning biscuits. Ain’t nothing in this world more soothing than making biscuits.”

Granny walked over to the cupboard by the sink and took down a wooden recipe box. “Grandpa made this for you a while back,” she said. “I’ve been waiting for the right time to give it to you.”

The box was made of maple wood and had Sarah’s Recipes carved on the lid. “Grandpa did a beautiful job. I’ll always keep it.”

“I’m glad you like it,” Granny said. “I thought you would.”

Following her directions, I sifted two cups of self-rising flour. I threw in a dollop of lard about the size of a hen’s egg. I worked in the lard, then slowly added buttermilk.

Granny peered over my shoulder. “Buttermilk’s the secret to good biscuits,” she said.

Getting the dough just right was harder than it looked. First my dough was too gooey, and then it was too dry.

“Don’t get frustrated,” Granny said. “Find your rhythm. Focus on your hands and the dough.”

Making biscuits relaxed me like a warm bath.

Once the bread was in the oven, I had a question for Granny that had been gnawing at my insides. “How do I get through something this awful?”

Granny turned from crumbling sausage in the skillet for gravy. She stared at me a while before answering. “Every sorrow is different, but you get through ’em the same way. Plenty of rest, good food, and keeping your family and friends close by.” She paused for a minute. “A lot of prayer doesn’t hurt either.”

I thought about all Granny had said. I knew she prayed for us every single day, but that didn’t stop bad things from happening. Nothing could.

The screen door banged shut, and Grandpa carried in a full pail of milk. With every footstep, he tracked mud and manure across the kitchen floor. Granny grabbed her broom. “Look at those muddy brogans,” she scolded. “Out, out of my kitchen.”

I cracked a smile. Grandpa almost never remembered to wipe his feet.

At the sound of crunching gravel, Granny hurried over to the window. “It’s your daddy,” she said.

I knocked over my orange juice.

Dad’s eyes settled on each of us gathered around the table: first Grandpa, then Granny, and finally, on me. “The doctors didn’t expect Robin to make it through the night,” he said, “but she proved them wrong. Robin’s always been a fighter.”

I gripped the oak table so hard my knuckles turned white.

Steam rose from the stove, and Granny bustled over to turn off the burners. “Have mercy,” she said. “I almost ruined breakfast.” Though nobody had much of an appetite, she broke open a biscuit and spooned sausage gravy over the top. She placed the plate down in front of my dad. “Charlie, not another word until you get some food in your stomach.” She filled more plates and told Grandpa and me to eat too so we’d keep our strength up.

Dad took a couple of bites, but mostly he just sipped coffee. I kept my grip on the table, and my eyes never left his face. “There’s no easy way to say this,” he said. “It’s a bad sign that Robin’s still unconscious. And the longer she is, the more serious it looks.”

Granny pulled a handkerchief from her apron pocket and wiped her eyes. “What else?” she asked.

“She has a collapsed lung,” Dad said. He sounded like he was reading from a medical encyclopedia. Dad was a lot more comfortable talking about car engines than dealing with doctors.

“What are they doing about it?” Grandpa asked.

Dad raked his hands through his light-brown hair. “The doctor put a chest tube in.” Then Dad patted his thigh. “And her femur is broken. That’s the big bone right here.”

I thought about how much Robin liked to run and jump and climb. “But the leg’s not a big deal, right? Can’t they just put a cast on it?”

Dad looked down at the table. “It’ll take a year or more for her leg to heal. But right now, the leg doesn’t matter much. What matters is that she opens those beautiful brown eyes of hers.”

I knew that a year would seem like forever to Robin. “Dad, when do the doctors think she’ll wake up?”

He kept looking down at the table and didn’t meet my eyes. “There’s no way of knowing,” he said. “No way at all.”