It was the first time I saw that bewitching smile on Chris' face -- happy with a tint of embarrassment, but full of his boyish charm. "Hey, little lady with the flower dress! Come here." I was happy to see Chris finally out of his black hole of a room. And so was the team. I watched a bit of Forrest Gump with him and the others. I could see how much Chris was enjoying his human company of people who had suffered, differently yet not unlike himself in more ways than one. There was Louis (name altered again) who had ADD (Attention deficit disorder) and was HIV+ due to mother-to-child transmission. He loved basketball, though he was a dwarfish character with loads of hyperactive genes. And Melvina (changed name) whose mother had "raped" her by sodomizing her with bottles and broomsticks. She was also HIV+ in the same way that Louis was. Except that she loved to cut herself and leave her blood on cotton balls so that others could get the virus from her. Melvina had become a threat o others and was constantly trying to hurt herself. She was also bipolar -- suffered depressive lows and manic highs in her moods that often left her completely incapacitated, just like a village ravaged by a tornado. She called me into her room one day. "Hey Shorty, come to my room. I need to talk to ya," she said. At 13 she was 5 feet 8 inches and considerably taller than I was and of a much bigger build. She loved to hug me, often stifling me with her hug and refusing to let me go. She said I was very "snuggly" just the way my little sister in Nepal says that about me. Yet, for some inexplicable reason, I wasn't afraid of her violent hugs. "Yes, Melvina? What did you want to speak to me about?" "Close the door, will ya?" "You know that's not allowed. You can't close the door when someone else is in your room, Melvina." "Why? Cuz they think I'm gonna rape you or something?" "I don't know." "You think that's how you get raped? If you wanna know about rape ask my mother. That b*tch. She gave me this ugly disease. No one wants to be my friend cuz they say I got AIDS. No one wants to touch me." There were heavy tears in her eyes. She was in the throes of her depressive mood, I could see that. "Well, I been thinkin'. I been askin' God what I did wrong to get this rotten life. I am glad I got AIDS. It means I ain gonna live long." "I think you're very sweet," I tried to smile. "Ya, right. I don't want no lies no more. If I was sweet, I would've been ....luckier." She came toward me for a hug. It smothered me and hurt me, but I knew how important that hug was for her. Touch is the alpha and the omega of love, I had once heard. And both in my undergrad and graduate study in psychology, I've come across several studies confirming how touch can have a healing effect on an ailing mind and body. But reading about something is far from living it. Melvina wasn't asking much, just a hug, and her long suffering body and mind at the tender age of 13, found some respite. Months later, when she left the unit for a foster home, she was put on a stretcher, with her arms strapped down because she had recently tried to slit her wrists. "Shorty," she called out to me. "I just wanted to tell you before leaving that I had a crush on you," she smiled. I returned her smile and said, "Thank you."