All in Told by Grampa Walt
It’s been a few weeks since Joy’s seventh birthday and Justin appears on the deck of Bonnie’s Revenge.
Joy is on the island with Suzy and me. Master Mind is on the ship.
“Justin!” Suzy calls out to him. “We need your advice on something.”
Justin goes to the ship’s wheel as if he hadn’t heard his mother.
Land appears in front of the island and, in its center and not too far away from us, sits a grey castle.
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Charlie had just tried to summon his father, and even with Joy’s help - I don’t know if that actually helps or not - but in any case, he failed. And then Joy said it was her fault.
“When I met Eddie,” Joy begins to explain, clearly feeling horrible, “we played, and I… I touched him. I wanted to play with him so much! So he became real! And then he died…”
Charlie shakes his head. He doesn’t understand.
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“I can see him,” Charlie says. “I can see him in my mind. I’m trying to bring him back.”
“Go ahead,” Joy says. “You can do it!”
Charlie seems to be straining. “Just the dad who plays with me, just the dad who plays with me, just the…” he sighs and opens his eyes. “I can’t do it!”
Joy puts her hand on Charlie’s shoulder. “Try,” she says. “I’ll help you!”
Charlie closes his eyes and now so does Joy.
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“You do it,” Joy tells Charlie and gives him the large iron key.
Charlie takes it with reverence. He puts it in the lock of the iron bar door and twists it.
It twists and his jaw drops. “It’s easy to open!”
“Now open the door,” Joy tells him.
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“Watch, Charlie, Grandma, Grampa,” Joy holds the shackles of one of the six Martian Space Pirates, who are just standing there on the deck of Bonny’s Revenge, and points in the direction of the doorway next to her cabin. “All you have to do is point and they go.”
“That’s right,” Justin says. “At this point the villains never resist. And Joy just leads them.”
Joy leads the prisoners. Charlie walks next to her, his eyes sparkling with excitement. Justin, Suzy and I walk behind them. Master Mind stays on the deck.
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“Grampa, Grandma! Want to help me put the Martian Space Pirates in prison?”
Suzy and I are sitting on the porch of our apartment on a small island in Justin’s dream, when Bonnie’s Revenge returns from adventure. Joy leans over the railing and shouts at us.
Joy, Charlie, Justin, and Master Mind had gone off on an adventure to find and imprison the Martian Space Pirates. Apparently, they’d been successful.
Suzy looks at me, then up at Joy. “Why, of course, we’d love to!”
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“Dad! What did you mean there’s a dream where you can’t get back out?”
Justin’s mind seems clearer now. He bends down and looks Joy in the eyes. With his scariest voice says, “It means there’s no exit, Joy. There’s no way to leave it! You can never ever ever go there because you can never ever ever get out!”
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Joy hugs the stem of the Shroom for an hour before something happens. The stem leads to the Shroom, which holds the tunnels, which lead somehow, impossibly, into Justin’s dream which seems to be infinite in size and in which anything can happen. And yet the stem has only enough room for ten people at most, and that is if they stand uncomfortably close.
After about an hour, Charlie’s Shroom falls.
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We wait for hours, but the Shrooms don’t fall. Joy and Charlie insist on not letting go of the Shrooms’ stems in all that time. Joy is holding on to the stem of Justin’s dream, and Charlie holds on to the stem of his dream.
At some point I decide to sit down on the small surface of the Shroom. I still hold Master Mind’s hand. I am still afraid I might fall when the Shroom collapses.
They spend the time talking to each other by yelling from Shroom to Shroom.
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I ask Master Mind to hold my hand. I am really afraid. I’m the only one who is.
Joy, Master Mind and I, are standing on top of Justin’s Shroom. The tunnels that lead back inside are on two sides of the stem and Joy is hugging the stem between the tunnels.
Joy has to be sitting down while hugging the Shroom since the Fairy Flies have taken Justin’s stem to be their home. Over the last few months they have gathered and come to rest on the stem at the height of Joy’s head. Possibly this is their nest, but who knows. They don’t talk.
Two meters below us and ahead is Charlie, standing on his own Shroom, hugging his own Shroom’s stem.
“Ready, Joy?”
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When the door opens, we are only a few centimeters from the tunnel. In the middle of the sun, it’s not that bright, as the edge of the tunnel shines outwardly, filling Charlie’s dream with light.
“We’re going to your dad’s dream, right?” I ask.
Joy nods. She’s the boss. I’ve learned that we can’t make her do anything.
The tunnel, slimy, with strange pock marks, always makes me feel woozy. The fact that it seems to be shrinking slightly and expanding slightly doesn’t help. The fact that I have to lower my head to walk in it also doesn’t help. I really hate these tunnels.
We come out to stand on Charlie’s Shroom. I look around, feeling disoriented. The Shrooms are not in the same position as they were when we came in.
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I go to sit next to Charlie, who for the last ten minutes has been watching from one of the pool chairs.
“Charlie, this must be boring for you. I would think you just want to play with Joy.”
“Are you kidding?” he looks at me all excited and I see his eyes are dancing. He is happy. “Joy lives in a dream! Anything can happen! And she’s awesome! Look how strong she is! She’s Superman!”
“Hmm. Yeah, well,” I mutter. “She’s hardly Superman.”
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Joy comes out of the changing room.
“I’m ready!”
Madelyn has been waiting for her at the edge of the pool, not standing on the small stumps of her legs, but rather sitting.
“Come here, Zhoy,” she says. “You will be here. I will be here.”
Joy nods and stands in her own lane, next to Madelyn’s lane.
“Ready?”
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“Do you speak French, Joy?” she pronounces the name ‘Zhoy’.
“I don’t know,” Joy answers happily. “What’s French?”
Charlie peeks from behind Joy. “She doesn’t speak French, miss,” he says.
Madelyn takes a deep breath. “Then it is harder.”
Both Joy and Charlie are looking down at her. Even though Madelyn is clearly a tall woman, standing without legs she is shorter than them.
“Zhoy,” Madelyn speaks slowly, choosing her words. She knows English, but it is hard for her. “Do you know what it is like to… to win?”
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There are only a handful of people walking or sitting in the pool in Madelyn’s dream. They all have regular shadows, which means they’re all dreams.
I look around and there are no people with movies in their shadows, like the shadows of Justin and Charlie.
“There!” Justin points out. “Swimming in the pool! The tall woman!”
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I stand at the edge of the tunnel, which is one of the suns in a completely new dream, and I look down.
“I don’t know what that building is,” Justin confers with Master Mind and Joy, with Charlie watching. “But I don’t see any monsters or dangers.”
Justin has to make sure this dream is safe for Joy to go into. After all, any dream can kill her or harm her. But in this case, I think he doesn’t have to.
I laugh. “Justin, I can’t believe how little French you know.” Seriously, I’ve told him this all his life. We live in Canada!
He looks at me, eyes crinkled. “Just say what you know, Dad.”
“It says ‘Piscine du Grand Parc’ right there on the sign. It’s a pool, Justin.” I smile at them, “I’m afraid we’re not in North America anymore.”
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“What is it?” Justin says.
“It’s like a tiny fairy with really big teeth,” Charlie says. “Is it going to eat me?”
“It’s just a fly,” Joy waves at it dismissively. “General Hawk and I saw a cloud of them. They don’t do anything.”
Justin reaches out with an open palm, inviting the creature to land on his hand. But the creature flies up, circles around Charlie’s head, then flies towards the stem behind us. The Shroom’s stem is thick, thrice as thick as Justin’s body. And I can see a handful of these glowing creatures are already resting on the stem.
“They’re are quite cute,” Master Mind says with his robotic voice. “Petting them would bring me pleasure. As would crushing them between my fingers.”
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Joy is the proof that this place is real. The Dream is real! Dreams happen in a real place! Because Joy lives here. Joy can make dreams like me real, she can make us stay. I have never thought, never believed, never supposed…
If there was a way to get this information to the outside world, to other scientists…!
“They’re called Shrooms,” Joy said. “I named them!”
“That’s my Shroom over there!” Charlie points down. “It was above us when I came here.”
Now it’s a couple of meters below us and to the side.
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Justin goes first. Joy follows him, holding Charlie’s hand. I try to cross, but as soon as the plank wobbles, my legs shake and I almost lose my balance. Master Mind grabs me, then just jumps into the tunnel.
As the group continues to Joy’s first authorized ‘outing’ into other people’s dreams, I look back through the tunnel at Suzy, standing on Bonnie’s Revenge’s deck.
She waves at me.
I know that face. She’s afraid for us, she’s afraid one of us isn’t going to make it, and she’s trying to hide it.
I want to tell her we’ll be fine. But right now my heart’s beating fast, and I’m not as brave as I thought I would be.
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“Dad! I’ve been on adventure a million times!”
We are all standing on the deck of Bonny’s Revenge and everyone’s excited.
“Last time you went to other dreams, I almost lost you forever,” Justin tells Joy. “And the dreams I went to, some of them you would never have survived. So: Let’s go through our checklist. Does everyone have jetpacks?”
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