SMITHVILLE, Mo. -- It was a Sunday afternoon. Kansas City's major league soccer team, Sporting Kansas City, was about to take the pitch for their match against the L.A. Galaxy at their home stadium, Children's Mercy Park.
As the game began, the crowd was chanting something unrecognizable. It wasn't the team's name or one of the signature Cauldron chants. It was tough to make out, even when straining to hear.
"Ay-oh-win! Ay-oh-win!"
Was it about a win? Was it some intra-league chant only true soccer fans would know?
They continued, holding pink scarves, "Ay-oh-win!"
The scarves said something: Fight like a princess.
"Ay-oh-win!"
The fans were all turned, as if toward a flag or a screen, all looking in one direction.
"Ay-oh-win!"
They were looking at a little girl.
"Ay-oh-win!"
Eowyn! Her name is Eowyn, a little girl from the north side of the Kansas City metro. Her name is pronounced, "Ay-oh-win."
Eowyn is five. She's got blue hair on this day, sporting her Sporting colors. Her mom said they don't say "no" to much these days.
Eowyn has brain cancer, and she knows it. She has only months to live.
Sitting in the Maynes family home in Smithville, Missouri, it's obvious they enjoy life together. There are board games and kids' artwork, colorful blankets, and school papers. There's a piano, a cat named Dancer -- one of a pair of cats they fostered at Christmas named Dancer and Prancer. Prancer moved on, Dancer moved in. There are photos of all four daughters hanging on the wall with that signature "school photo" blue background every parent recognizes. The girls' pictures hang across a tiny hall from a collection of Sporting KC scarves, which have clearly been collected over years, not months.
The house is not big. It is not fancy. It is lived in and loved.
The patriarch of the house, K.C. (his initials and his nickname since birth), explained how the last four months have unfolded.
In June, Eowyn fell down the stairs in their home. Both mom and dad described it as a normal fall like many kids have done. They weren't too worried, but did fear she might have bumped her head, so they took her to the hospital. Worst case, they thought, she'd have a concussion. They didn't know there was a worse worst case.
After some tests and a scan, doctors told K.C. and mom, Amanda, their daughter had a concussion. But there was more.
Doctors had seen a mass, a tumor, at the base of Eowyn's brain. Over the course of the next few hours, they learned she had brain cancer. She had a serious kind of brain cancer called DIPG, which would likely take Eowyn's life.
Do nothing, they were told, and she might have two or three months left. Treat with radiation? She might have a year.
"So we started looking for experimental things to do in the United States, and nothing was available. And the ones that were available had drastic side effects, things that we didn't want to subject her to because it wouldn't have been a good quality of life," said K.C.
So they expanded their search for treatment.
"We did find one in Monterrey, Mexico, which we heard about through another local girl who was diagnosed with this almost two years ago," said K.C.
They'd heard about kids from around the world with this type of cancer going to Monterrey.
"The only downside to that was it's really expensive," K.C. said. "So we initially had written it off entirely."
The Mayneses believed this treatment might give their daughter more time than any other option, but they were told the treatments would cost a total of $200,000. They knew that wasn't an option on K.C.'s income as a civilian government employee at Ft. Leavenworth.
But the community wasn't willing to write anything off. Right away, a friend started a GoFundMe account, recognizing the eventual need. The campaign started, like all fundraisers, with zero dollars. K.C. said it had $13,000 in 48 hours.
"That kind of woke us up a little bit, like maybe it's not impossible," said K.C.
Soon, help came from every direction.
"We had friends and local community leaders and business leaders approach us and say they wanted to do a fundraiser for us," K.C. said, explaining how the family started to believe this might be possible.
They took a leap of faith when they went down to Mexico for the first visit. At the time, they had enough money to fund the first treatment entirely, and they were on their way to having enough for the second treatment.
Eowyn would need 10 treatments total.
"We've just been raising money as we go," said K.C.
Amanda is more emotional. Her neck reddens before the tears fall, an early indicator of deep emotion.
"I worry about Eowyn a lot. I want her to have time and it's just not likely to happen. I want her to get to go to kindergarten," said Amanda.
Kindergarten is the goal. The whole family knows that might be the end game.
"They're building a new school just down the road from us where she's supposed to go to kindergarten, and I would really like her to be healthy enough to attend as a normal student at least for a little while," said K.C.
To attend, she'd need to survive 14 months from the time of her diagnosis, months beyond what expectations the doctors originally gave the family.
One of Eowyn's sisters, 10-year-old Avery, lifted her glasses and used the arm of her T-shirt to wipe tears from her face.
"I just worry that it's not going to be okay. And that it won't turn out well for any of us," said Avery, with obvious heartbreak. She wiped her eyes again.
Right now the family is focused on buying Eowyn time. They believe the treatments in Mexico are her best bet, so they keep agreeing to fundraisers, and they are thankful for so many generous people.
"It restores your faith in humanity," said Amanda, "With all of the bad going on, people focus a lot on how terrible people are, and this, to see such outpouring of love and support just really restores your faith in humanity."
The chant is spreading.
What started as a shocking diagnosis one night in June spread to a group of close friends and family raising money, to other residents of their community, to complete strangers online, to a stadium full of fans chanting her name.
"Ay-oh-win!"
The family, friends, Sporting KC fans, and even strangers have raised enough money to pay for six of the 10 treatments. The family hopes their faith in others helps them afford the rest. They hope it's all enough to get Eowyn to kindergarten.
To follow Eowyn's journey and learn more about how to donate, visit Eowyn's Fight Like a Princess Facebook page.
