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Rebecca Orrico wasn't planning on going anywhere, no matter what the doctors said. She was just 10 years old. She loved to laugh. She loved to dance. And boy, could she light up the room with that radiant smile.

It didn't matter that she was bald and skinny and growing weaker every day. Didn't matter that she'd been battling leukemia since infancy. Didn't matter that her calendar was defined by chemo treatments and radiation therapy and bone marrow transplants. And it certainly didn't matter that, just a week after her 10th birthday, doctors told Rebecca's family she probably wouldn't make it through the night.

As far as Rebecca was concerned, she still had a life to live. And a job to do.

So, that night, Rebecca called her 15-year-old cousin, Christian singer Stacie Orrico, and made some big plans.

"Did they tell you?" Rebecca asked Stacie on the phone.

"Tell me what?" said Stacie, pretending not to know.

"I know the doctors think I'm about to die, but I'm not going to."

Stacie swallowed, holding back the tears.

"You better save a spot for me on your next tour," Rebecca continued, "because I'm going to come out and dance with you."

It was more than Stacie could bear. The tears came. She knew Rebecca would never dance again.

Moments later, the conversation ended. And the next day, Stacie was making plans to attend a funeral—not just for a sweet, brown-eyed 10-year-old who never lost her zest for life, but for her favorite cousin.

"Out of all my cousins, Rebecca and I were definitely the closest," says Stacie, now 16. "I just loved that little girl."

Questions for God
Stacie was devastated by Rebecca's death.

"It was just too much," she says. "I asked God, 'Why did you choose to take a child who impacted every person she met?' The only conclusion I could come to was that Rebecca was so special that God just wanted her to be with him."

Stacie says she never got angry at God.

"No," she says, "but that's because Rebecca had been so joyful through it all, even though she was really sick. She was definitely in pain most of her life, and I think God wanted to get her out of that. If we had to choose between Rebecca living a long life of pain, or going home to be with God when she was 10, I think we all would say she deserved not to suffer anymore. I think overall everybody felt peace about it."

That's partly because of how Rebecca lived.

"She loved to make people happy," Stacie remembers. "She never would've said her life was hard. She lived better than any person I've ever seen."

Especially when it came to dancing.

"She loved to dance," Stacie says. "She was determined that as soon as she got a little older, she was going to come out on the road with me and be one of my dancers. Every time I saw her, she had made up dances to all my songs."

And she had a way of dancing right into your heart, Stacie says.

"The moment anybody met her, they knew she was special. Not because she was sick or because they felt sorry for her. But because she was so full of life. And she wasn't going to let anything get in her way."

Shortly before her 10th birthday, Rebecca called the local bowling alley to plan her own party—without telling her parents. When Mom and Dad found out, they went along with the plan, and Rebecca and 15 friends had the time of their lives.

They had ice cream and cake and sang songs, the whole works. A week later, they went to Rebecca's funeral.

Making Dreams Come True
After Rebecca died, Stacie wondered how she might redeem a life so well-lived. Christmas was approaching, and, feeling generous, she wanted to do some shows to benefit a charity. But which one?

Stacie's publicist at ForeFront Records had an idea: Why not the Make-A-Wish Foundation, which grants wishes to children with life-threatening illnesses.

It was perfect. After all, Make-A-Wish had made a couple of Rebecca's dreams come true: They had flown her to a Seattle Mariners baseball game, and, better yet, to a Backstreet Boys concert.

Stacie will never forget what that meant to Rebecca.

"At one of the lowest times of her illness, the Make-A-Wish Foundation gave Rebecca something to be excited about," she says. "I thought the organization was incredible, and I was really excited to help them in any way that we could."

Stacie did concerts in 10 cities, donating a $5,000 check to each local Make-A-Wish chapter, making a dream come true for one child in each city. In Tulsa, Oklahoma, Stacie's donation helped a 9-year-old girl take a family vacation to Hawaii. In Columbus, Ohio, she made it possible for a 3-year-old boy to visit Disney World. In Atlanta, she helped an 11-year-old boy buy a five-piece DW drum set.

Stacie says the Make-A-Wish tour "was the most satisfying thing I've ever been a part of."

Dancing for God
These days, when the Orrico family gets together for Easter—or Thanksgiving or Christmas or whatever—it's always a gathering that's not quite complete. Not without Rebecca.

"As big as my family is," says Stacie, "when we all get together, you just feel her absence. She was the center of attention and the star of the show, and when we're all together, we look around and can tell she's missing. It's been really hard."

But whenever she thinks of Rebecca, Stacie is consoled by this thought: Rebecca always wanted to dance onstage, under the lights, in front of an audience. Stacie believes that wish has come true.

"Whenever I think of Rebecca now," she says, "I like to think she's dancing for God."

For more on Stacie, go to stacieorrico.com. For more on the Make-A-Wish Foundation, go to www.wish.org.

Read more from 'It Happened to Me'

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