It’s a slow morning. Joy calms down. We all walk somberly to the deck.
Justin suggests that maybe instead of a healthy breakfast, she’ll eat pizza just this once.
Suzy makes a face. “He can’t teach her to eat her emotions,” she whispers to me, but keeps mum. She’s no doubt going to talk to him about it later.
Joy’s mood is dark and gloomy as she eats in silence.
“You know it means nothing’s changed, right?” Justin tells her as she eats her second slice.
Joy looks down. “You still can’t remember me.”
Justin nods sadly.
“I’m still different from everyone else,” she adds.
Justin puts his hand on his forehead. “Yah,” he says.
“All the kids are over there and I’m over here.”
Justin sighs. “Yah. I get it. Okay. Still, you get a life no one else has, right? I can make anything you want! What do you want? Today is your day!”
Joy thinks about it. “Show me the real world.”
“Huh?”
“Show me your life. Show me your home. Show me Toronto. Show me the subway. Show me your phone. Show me the real world.”
Justin considers it. Then he says, “Okay. Good idea. But I won’t show you ‘the real world’, I’ll show you ‘the waking world’. Remember the difference?”
“Okay.”
“Say it.”
“Show me the waking world.”
Justin smiles and goes to the wheel. “Off we go to Planet Toronto, where we will see the waking world!” he exclaims. And with that, Bonny’s Revenge rises from the sea and lifts off to, apparently, Planet Toronto.
(To be continued…)
—Told by Grampa Walt