Amahle feels around with her hand once Joy comes back from her cabin, having put her toothbrush and toothpaste in place. “Joy,” Amahle touches her cheek, then her shoulder. “I want to do something nice. I want us to have fun! Can you get excited for that?”

“I want to go,” Joy says. “It sounds like a thing you do in the waking world.” 

“It is,” Madelyn says. 

“On special occasions,” Amahle adds. “This is a special occasion.”

“But why only girls? What kind of adventure is it? Why can’t Charlie come? I mean, he’s a dreamer. So it doesn’t matter that he’s not as strong as a girl.” 

Amahle and Madelyn laugh. 

“I’m serious!” Joy insists, not understanding what they are laughing about. “He could be as strong as me eventually!” 

Amahle laughs more. 

Suzy looks at the women. “She’s right,” she says. “Joy only knows strong women. Madelyn, there’s hardly anyone stronger than you, physically or mentally.” Madelyn nods, sitting in her wheelchair. “And Joy, you’re the strongest child I’ve ever seen.” 

“Ha ha!” Joy raises her right arm and flexes her muscles, which she does have.

“I meant emotionally,” Suzy says.

“And you’re strong, Suzy,” I add, knowing she won’t add herself. Suzy begins to shake her head, but I don’t let her deny it. “You know what you want. You do what you want. And you’re strong in how warm and empathetic and open you are to help people and to take in their pain.” 

“I’m just a regular girl,” Amahle says. “I sing and I write songs. I’m not Olympic like Madelyn or strong like Suzanne or an adventurer like Joy.” 

“Ce n'est pas vrai,” Madelyn says. “I have heard how you survived Justin trying to kill you and eventually to forgive enough to…uh…how do you say… become his friend. And Zhoy’s friend. I have seen you handle walking around on Shrooms without seeing. Going to adventures blind. Insisting on what you can do and what you can’t. You are stronger than you think, Amahle.”

Amahle laughs in embarrassment. “You give me too much credit.” 

“So Charlie isn’t as strong,” Joy returns to her point. “Grampa is. And Dad is. Why can’t they come?”

“There are some things, Joy, that are easier to talk about when it’s only women.”

Oh, my. I think I know what Amahle is going to talk about. It has to do with her boyfriend, Sandile.

Joy, though, is utterly confused. “Like what?”

“We will talk on our girls’ night. Let us go! The limo awaits!” 

Suzy throws me a look and points to her ring finger. She’s thinking the same thing I am. Sandile and Amahle are going to get married. 

As the women and Joy go to the edge of our small island and the beginning of Johannesburg, the limo driver appears. He lifts Madelyn off her wheelchair and puts her in the limo. 

As Amahle, Joy, and Suzy enter, the wheelchair disappears. 

Master Mind, on board Bonny’s Revenge, begins to raise the ramp. 

“Master Mind, wait for me!” He’s going to follow them from the sky, make sure Joy is protected. 

“Apologies, Pirate Father,” he says. “No men allowed.”

The limo disappears into the Johannesburg streets. Bonny’s Revenge follows from up high. And I am left alone in my garden, in my suburban Toronto house, in the middle of the ocean, next to Johannesburg, a city which in the waking world, is not near the ocean.

(To be continued…)

—Told by Grampa Walt

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