The Whole-Brain Child

the park, about cutting bark with Ryan, and so on. When he said,
“Then Ryan picked up a root and started to cut it,” Eli broke in.
“Pause.” He said it quietly, but with plenty of force.
David said, “OK. Now let’s fast-forward to the hospital.”
“Farther.”
“To Ryan coming home?”
“Farther.”
“To when he came over to our house that evening?”
“OK.”
David then narrated the happy reunion between the friends—
how they had greeted each other, then disappeared to go play
video games. David stressed that Ryan and his parents had
emphasized that they weren’t upset with Eli and that they viewed
the whole episode as an accident.
David looked at his son. “So that’s the story, right?”
“Yup.”
“Except there’s that piece we left out.”
“I know.”
“Let’s rewind and go back to where we paused and look at what
happened. And remember, we’ve already seen that the story has a
happy ending.”
“OK.”