Jeff Smith, left, comforts Malissa Durkee after her fifteen-year-old brother Michael Brewer was doused with rubbing alcohol and set on fire in Deerfield Beach, Florida. (Carline Jean/Sun Sentinel/MCT)

MIAMI – (MCT)

Callers said they were moved by the story of 15-year-old Michael Brewer, the Deerfield Beach, Fla., boy set on fire Monday by five classmates. And each told the family and hospital staff they wanted to help.

The boy’s brother-in-law, Danny Martinez, said each call began the same way.

“The first thing they say is, ‘How is Mikey?’ ” Martinez said. “Everybody has been so helpful. We’re overwhelmed at how everybody has come together to help Mikey.”

Thursday morning, the boy’s mother, Valerie Brewer, and a University of Miami-Jackson Memorial Burn unit doctor made the rounds of the major television networks to talk about the boy’s grim medical prognosis and the family’s ordeal since Monday.

The seventh-grader was burned by five schoolmates who attacked him that afternoon in a dispute over a video game and a bicycle, according to authorities. One boy doused the boy with rubbing alcohol, and another set him ablaze.

Doctors say the burns cover 65 percent of Brewer’s body and that his recovery will take months.

Appearing alongside Valerie Brewer on CBS’ “The Early Show,” Dr. Nicholas Namias said the teen “is doing as well as we can hope for someone with his condition.”

“But don’t mistake that for being good,” said Namias, the burn center’s director. He said the next week would be crucial to Brewer’s recovery as doctors prepare to fight infections and monitor him for possible organ failure.

“Burn patients really start to get sick four, five, six days into it,” he said. “This is part of the long process of dealing with a major burn.”

In a later interview with McClatchy Newspapers, Namias said one factor helping Brewer was his age.

“That’s the key thing going for him,” Namias said. “Young people tend to do better.”

The teen’s mother, saying she was “disgusted” and “angry” about the attack, said she is positive that her son will recover.

The story shocked people across the country. Rachael Brown, a 38-year-old mother of two from east Texas, heard the story Wednesday morning and wondered what her family could do to help.

“I have two boys about that age,” Brown said, “and it just made me think about what if somebody did that to them.”

Closer to home, a Broward charter school organized a fundraiser to help Brewer and his unemployed parents.

Art students at the Hollywood Academy of Arts and Science are working on cards for Brewer, said principal Donte Fulton, and next week all students will be asked to wear white and make a donation.

The students will also talk in class about the importance of not bullying each other. It was a message Valerie Brewer also spoke about Thursday.

“It’s not just my son. It’s everybody’s children. This could happen to somebody else,” Brewer said on “The Early Show.”

“I don’t wish this agony and torture on anyone,” she said. “We have got to do something to stop this violence today.”

All five boys accused of being involved in the attack remained in juvenile detention Thursday.

According to investigators with the Broward Sheriff’s Office, Brewer was cornered by the boys Monday afternoon, a day after one of them, Matthew Aaron Bent, 15, allegedly tried to steal a bicycle from the Brewer home in the 1400 block of South Deerfield Avenue. The Brewers called the police, and Bent was arrested and detained overnight.

According to the sheriff’s office, Bent was trying to take the bike as payment for a $40 video game that he had sold to Brewer. The Brewer family said they know nothing about a video game.

Michael Brewer stayed home Monday from Deerfield Beach Middle School, fearing retaliation. His school’s resource deputy heard about his concerns and told Valerie Brewer to come in early Tuesday with her son. They planned to talk about how to keep Michael Brewer safe, according to the sheriff’s office.

But that afternoon, Bent and four other boys spotted Brewer while he waited for someone at an apartment complex. They surrounded him. Denver Colorado Jarvis, 15, covered Brewer with rubbing alcohol as Bent said, “Pour it on him. Pour it on him.” Jesus Mendez, 15, took a lighter and held it up to the teen. Brewer went up in flames.

Two other boys — Jarvis’ brother, Jeremy, and Steven Shelton, 15 — stood by silently, according to BSO.

Brewer ran to a swimming pool and jumped in — a move that doctors said may have saved his life.

Mendez is charged with attempted second-degree murder; Bent, Shelton, Denver and Jeremy Jarvis are charged with aggravated battery.