“Three!” Master Mind ends his count.
Justin’s face is all clenched in anger at the traffic jam in front of him, the one he had created.
It doesn’t seem that Master Mind is having any influence on him.
Master Mind lowers the rope ladder. “Grab the rope, Little Pirate,” Master Mind says loudly enough for us to hear. “I will take you to safety before this gets out of hand.”
Joy looks at the rope hanging just to the side. She takes Justin’s hand in both of hers. “Calm down, Dad. Calm down. Let’s have a birthday party.”
Justin’s clenched face seems to waver for a second.
“Let’s have a birthday,” Joy says. “No traffic. No problems.”
Justin seems to deflate. All the anger seems to leave him. “All right. Okay,” he tells Joy. “Master Mind, I’m fine, everything’s cool!”
“I am glad to hear that, Pirate,” I hear Master Mind’s voice. “But I will be watching you closely.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Justin sits down in the back of the limo.
“Dad!” Joy, leaning down to sit next to him, looks at him in shock. “What’s the matter with you?”
I gasp. His hair has turned white.
“What? What?” Justin says. But he’s talking slower than he usually does. His hair begins to just disappear from the top of his pate.
Joy is staring at it with eyes as wide-open as I’d ever seen them.
“You’re bald!” Suzy says and laughs. “You’re bald!”
His face is now all wrinkly, like my father’s was when he died.
“My god, you look older than I am!” I tell him.
“What? What?” he says desperately, as his voice cracks.
Joy looks freaked out, and Suzy laughs and laughs.
(To be continued…)
—Told by Grampa Walt