W

hen her cousin Alexa got married in Maine last June, not even brain surgery could keep Becca from being there. The Lilly clan was gathering -- including 43 of 49 cousins on her dad's side. Even though Becca was still recovering from her operation, and her incision still not healed, she was determined to go.

It was an upbeat, whirlwind day.

That morning at the hotel, Becca's aunt Candace helped her with her toenail polish and her hair, combing it down gently on the left to cover the stitches and the question mark-shaped scar above her ear. When Candace Lilly was diagnosed with breast cancer last year, Becca had sent her a handmade card, with three balloons on the front and a note inside.

"I think I understand how you feel," she wrote. "In a way, we're going through cancer together. Hang on, we can get through it together. . . . If you need someone to talk to, I'll be there. . . . "

The wedding was in Yarmouth, near Portland, and the reception on an island nearly two miles offshore. Becca hung out with her cousins, danced up a storm and for the first time since her surgery went all day without a nap.

B

ut the next morning she woke up with a splitting headache. She wouldn't eat. As the rest of the family relaxed over a late breakfast, she turned suddenly worse. She had an anguished look, and her neck was stiffening. A few stitches above her left ear were leaking yellowish drops.

By the time they reached the emergency room of the Maine Medical Center in Portland, Becca was feverish and throwing up. The doctors could tell she had a serious infection. Fearing the worst -- spinal meningitis -- they pumped a massive antibiotic dose into her, restitched her incision and put her in an isolation room where visitors had to don face masks.

Once again, the Lillys were camped out in a hospital -- this time, 500 miles from home.

Meningitis can be lethal if not treated promptly, and other rare wound infections can kill within hours. "That's why they loaded her with antibiotics the minute she hit the door," said neurosurgeon Steven Schiff. If they had waited for the lab reports to pinpoint the infection, it might have been too late.

The infection in her scar -- unrelated to her cancer -- turned out to be meningitis, but the antibiotics worked. Within 24 hours, Becca started to rally.

T

he problem now was how to get her home. She had to be hooked up to an IV every six hours, and the drive home might take 12.

After long-distance negotiations with neurosurgeon Schiff and Kaiser Permanente, their health insurer, the Lillys decided to fly Becca home. Immediately following her noon antibiotic infusion, Becca and her dad boarded a flight from Portland to Newark, with a connection to Washington National. To cover up the catheter in her arm -- the Lillys had been warned that airlines had a right to refuse anybody who might require intravenous treatment en route -- Becca wore her older sister's long-sleeved shirt and her brother's windbreaker. If all went right, they'd get to Children's in time for the 6 p.m. dose.

All didn't go right. They landed in Newark and got grounded by thick fog. Their connection to National was canceled. Joe Lilly called Schiff, who alerted doctors at Newark's Children's Hospital that they might have to start an IV in the airport or hospitalize her overnight.

Becca and her dad finally got on a flight that landed -- in a thunderstorm -- a little after 10 p.m. She was in bed at Children's by 11, antibiotics flowing into her arm.

Becca came through the fiasco "better than her doctors," quipped neurologist Roger Packer. "Not good for my stomach lining," he chided her.