Inside Out Junior Novel

by Suzanne Francis

  Mom sat down next to Riley and gave her an update on the moving van: it was going to take even longer to arrive.

  “Toot, toot, toot!” Anger shouted.

  Joy sighed and backed away from the console as Mom went on to explain how stressed Dad was about his new business venture. Anger stepped up to the console, gearing up for some major scowling action.

  But Mom surprised them. “I guess all I really want to say is thank you.”

  The Emotions were confused. Mom talked about how pleased she was that despite the rough situation, Riley had continued to be their happy girl. “Your dad’s under a lot of pressure, but if you and I can keep smiling, it would be a big help. We can do that for him, right?” asked Mom.

  Joy stepped up to the console proudly. She walked past Anger and took control. “Yeah, sure,” Riley said, smiling.

  “What did we do to deserve you?” Mom asked, kissing Riley on the forehead. “Sweet dreams,” she said as she walked out and closed the door.

  All the Emotions smiled as they looked toward Joy. “Well,” Anger said, “you can’t argue with Mom. Happy it is.”

  “Team Happy! Sounds great,” Fear said.

  When Riley was finally asleep, the screen in Headquarters turned black. “Looks like we’re going into REM,” said Joy. Joy was on Dream Duty, which meant she had to stay up and monitor Riley’s dreams. She’d also take care of sending the important memories to Long Term. “Great day today, guys. Sleep well, Team Happy!” Joy called to the other Emotions as they headed off to sleep.

  Then she took her place at the console. “All right,” she said, looking up at the screen. “What’s on tonight, Dream Productions?” Joy couldn’t wait to see what the movie studio in Riley’s Mind World came up with for that evening.

  The dream began with Riley’s family happily flying through the sky in their car. Then the car landed in front of a frightening haunted house with a mouse ghost. The mouse looked like a zombie as it eerily said, “Come live with me, Riley.” Then it keeled over and died!

  “Who’s in charge of programming down there?” Joy said, frowning. “I know I’m not supposed to do this, but…” She ducked behind the console and messed with a few wires and switches, resetting the system. “We are not going to end the day like this,” she said.

  Then she recalled a memory of Riley showcasing all of her ice-skating moves on the lake with her parents. Joy rigged it so the memory played in Riley’s mind like a dream instead of what Dream Productions had put on. Joy skated around Headquarters, mimicking Riley and reliving the happy memory. She promised Riley that tomorrow would be another great day.

  The next morning Joy was bursting with sunshine and positive energy. She played her accordion throughout Headquarters, trying to rouse the rest of the Emotions with a tune. “Hello! Did I wake you?” Joy yelled over the piercing sound of her instrument. The others were not so enthusiastic.

  “Okay, first day of school!” Joy said, tossing her accordion aside. “Very exciting!” Riley was starting her new school today, and Joy had to make sure it went perfectly. Right away, she began getting everyone organized by assigning tasks. She asked Fear to come up with an extensive list of all the possible negative outcomes on the first day of school.

  “Way ahead of you there,” Fear said, scribbling in his notepad. “Does anyone know how to spell ‘meteor’?”

  “Disgust,” Joy said. “Make sure Riley stands out today…but also blends in.”

  Disgust was on it. “When I’m through, Riley will look so good the other kids will look at their own outfits and barf,” she said.

  As Joy continued to prepare Headquarters, the Train of Thought chugged by and dropped off a bag. “Right on schedule,” said Joy, smiling. “Anger, unload the daydreams. I ordered extra in case things get slow in class.”

  “Might come in handy if this new school is full of boring, useless classes, which it probably will be…” Anger said as he walked toward the bag.

  Sadness came out of the break room. “I have a super important job just for you,” Joy said, approaching her.

  “Really?” Sadness said.

  Joy led Sadness to the back of the room and placed her in a special spot. “What are you doing?” Sadness asked.

  Joy knelt down and used a piece of chalk to draw a circle around Sadness’s feet. “This is the circle of Sadness,” Joy said. “Your job is to make sure that all the Sadness stays inside it.”

  Sadness was confused. “So…you want me to just stand here?”

  “Hey, it’s not MY place to tell you how to do your job,” Joy said, nudging Sadness’s foot so that it was inside the circle. “Just make sure that ALL the Sadness stays in the circle.”

  Joy knew that if the day was going to go well she had to keep Sadness as far from the controls as possible.

  Sadness stood inside the circle, looking a little lost and confused. “You’re a pro at this!” Joy cheered. “Isn’t it fun?”

  “No,” Sadness said quietly as Joy walked back to the console.

  “All right, everyone, fresh start!” Joy sang. “We are going to have a good day, which will turn into a good week, which will turn into a good year, which turns into a good LIFE!”

  Riley was ready to go to school. She had her backpack on and was walking toward the front door.

  “So, the big day!” Mom said, encouraging her with a smile. “New school, new friends, huh?”

  “I know! I’m kinda nervous, but I’m mostly excited! How do I look? Do you like my shirt?” Family Island was lighting up and working like crazy as Riley chatted away.

  “You want us to walk with you?” Mom said.

  Disgust quickly made the call on that one. “Mom and Dad? With us in public? No, thank you.”

  Joy took care of the situation by pressing a few buttons on the console.

  “Nope! I’m fine,” Riley said, upbeat. “Bye, Mom! Bye, Dad!”

  “Have a good day at school, monkey,” Dad said. Riley and her mom made monkey sounds as she walked out the door, which caused Goofball Island to power up.

  Riley walked to her new school and stopped in front of the gate to take in the scene. There were tons of students, and the school was so big. “Are you sure we want to do this?” Fear said.

  “In we go!” Joy said, totally ignoring Fear.

  Riley smiled and walked up the steps to the school. Once she got inside, she found her classroom and sat down at a desk. The Emotions checked out the different groups of kids scattered around the room.

  “Okay,” said Disgust. “We’ve got a group of cool girls at two o’clock.”

  “How do you know?” asked Joy.

  “Double ears pierced, infinity scarves…”

  “Whoa,” said Joy. “Is she wearing eye shadow?”

  “Yeah, we want to be friends with them,” said Disgust, who actually seemed excited.

  Fear approached Joy. He was almost finished with his very long list of potential disasters. “Worst scenario is either quicksand, spontaneous combustion, or getting called on by the teacher,” he said. “So as long as none of those happen…” His voice trailed off as the teacher addressed the class.

  “Okay, everybody,” she said, motioning for Riley to stand. “We have a new student in class today.”

  “Are you kidding me? Out of the gate? This is not happening!” Fear yelled.

  Then the teacher asked Riley to introduce herself in front of everyone.

  “Nooooooo!” Fear cried, flipping out. “Pretend we can’t speak English!”

  “Don’t worry,” said Joy. “I got this.” She stepped in and pushed a lever on the console.

  Riley smiled as she stood up and spoke to the class. “My name is Riley Anderson,” she said. “I’m from Minnesota. And now I live here.”

  “And how about Minnesota?” the teacher asked. “Can you tell us something about it? Well, you certainly get a lot more snow than we do,” she said.

  Joy slapped her knee and laughed. “She’s hilarious!”
she said, turning a lever on the console.

  Riley smiled as she told the class about Minnesota. She told them about the lake and how it froze over in the winter. She talked about being on an ice hockey team called the Prairie Dogs and playing with her friend Meg. Joy recalled a memory of the family skating together and played it on the screen.

  Riley smiled, thinking about the memory, and continued to talk about playing hockey and how it was a family tradition. But then something very strange happened…the image on the screen that the Emotions were watching turned BLUE.

  Riley’s smile faded and her brow furrowed. Suddenly, she felt very sad. Joy and the other Emotions looked around confused until their eyes landed on Sadness, who was guiltily touching the memory sphere, which had also turned blue.

  “Sadness!” Joy said, shocked. “You touched a memory!”

  “Oh yeah, I know. I’m sorry,” Sadness said.

  “Get back in your circle,” Joy snapped. Then she tried to eject the memory, but it wouldn’t come out!

  “Get it out of there, Joy!” Fear shouted.

  “Cool kids whispering at three o’clock,” Disgust said, pointing to the screen.

  Inside the classroom, Riley was sniffling and some of the kids were whispering. “Did you see that look?” Fear said, panicking. “They’re judging us!”

  Joy, Fear, Anger, and Disgust all tried to get the memory out, but it wouldn’t budge. Riley’s eyes welled up with tears as she continued. “But everything’s different now,” she said. “Since we moved…” Her voice trailed off and she was unable to speak.

  “Oh no!” Fear shouted. “We’re CRYING AT SCHOOL!”

  Joy turned to the console to see SADNESS DRIVING! “What? No!” she shouted. Finally, she yanked the memory out and pulled Sadness off the controls. PING! A new memory had been created, and it was bright blue.

  “Whoa!” Anger said.

  “It’s a core memory!” Fear shouted in awe.

  “But it’s blue!” Disgust said.

  The bright blue memory rolled down the track as the core memory holder whirred into action. “No, wait!” Joy said, trying to stop it. She jumped and slapped her hand on the holder, popping the memory up and grabbing it. Then she leaned over and pressed the end-of-day Memory Dump button, causing the vacuum tube to come down from the ceiling. Joy got ready to send the blue core memory up, hoping it would be like it had never existed!

  “Joy, no,” Sadness said, running to save the memory. “That’s a core memory!”

  “Hey! Stop it,” Joy said.

  As the two struggled over the bright blue sphere, they bumped into the core memory holder and all the core memories fell out! Fear, Anger, and Disgust screamed as the Islands of Personality went DARK.

  Joy quickly tossed the blue memory aside and scrambled as she tried to collect the core memories rolling around the floor like marbles. Sadness snatched up the blue core memory and moved to place it in the core memory holder, but Joy lunged and caused it to slip out of her hands. Then the powerful suction from the vacuum started to suck the blue core memory up through the tube!

  Joy tumbled backward and dropped the memories she had gathered. Then the suction began to pull one of the gold core memories toward the tube. “No, no, no, no!” Joy shouted. She reached in to try to grab the memory and was sucked up with it! The intense suction pulled Sadness in, too!

  Fear, Anger, and Disgust watched helplessly as Joy, Sadness, and the core memories were vacuumed up into the tube!

  Back in the classroom, the teacher thanked Riley for sharing. Riley wiped her tears away as she sat down and awkwardly buried her head in her book.

  Meanwhile, Joy and Sadness rocketed through the vacuum tube, clutching the core memories. Because they had never been out of Headquarters, they looked around in awe at parts of Riley’s Mind World. As everything outside raced by, they couldn’t help wondering: Where were they going to end up?

  BLAM! Joy shot out of the tube and landed in a basket of memories. Sadness fell out next, crashing hard against the ground next to Joy. The core memories rolled in different directions. Joy frantically gathered them up. “One, two, three…okay. Where are we?”

  Joy looked at the shelving units that surrounded them, and suddenly she realized they were in Long Term Memory. Grabbing the core memories, Joy hopped out of the memory basket. She could see Goofball Island in the distance, silent and dark. Beyond Goofball, the other islands were dark and lifeless, too.

  Sadness walked up slowly behind Joy. “Riley’s Islands of Personality. They’re ALL down! Oh, this is bad, this is very, very bad,” she whimpered.

  “We—we can fix this,” Joy stammered. “We just have to get back to Headquarters, plug the core memories in, and Riley will be back to normal.”

  With a sense of urgency, Joy and Sadness hurried toward Headquarters. “Riley has no core memories, no personality islands, and no…” Sadness stopped suddenly and gasped.

  “What is it?” Joy asked.

  “You!” Sadness declared. “YOU’RE not in Headquarters. Without you, Riley can’t be happy.”

  Joy realized that Sadness was right. Together they crossed the bridge toward Goofball Island. She knew that if she could make it to the lightline, she could walk the power line that led from the core memory holder to the Islands of Personality, all the way back to Headquarters. “I’m coming, Riley,” Joy said, determined. Headquarters loomed in the distance, the tallest structure in all of Mind World. It was going to be a long journey back.

  That night, when Riley sat down to have dinner with her parents, she was quiet and distant.

  Fear, Anger, and Disgust stood in Headquarters, stumped, as they looked at the empty core memory holder and the dark Islands of Personality.

  “Riley is acting so weird,” Disgust commented.

  “What do you expect?” Anger demanded. “All the islands are down.”

  Disgust flipped her hair. “Joy would know what to do.”

  The three Emotions looked at one another as they came to a decision. They would do what Joy did until the missing Emotion returned. But there was a problem. None of them knew how to be happy.

  “Hey, Riley,” Mom said. “I’ve got good news! I found a junior hockey league right here in San Francisco. And get this: tryouts are tomorrow after school. What luck, right?”

  “Pretend to be Joy,” Fear said, quickly pushing a reluctant Disgust toward the controls.

  “Won’t it be great to be back out on the ice?” Mom asked.

  Disgust rolled her eyes as she pushed a few buttons.

  “Oh yeah, that sounds fantastic,” Riley replied sarcastically.

  The look on Mom’s face showed that she was clearly taken aback.

  “What was that?” Fear asked. “That wasn’t anything like Joy.”

  “Uh, because I’m NOT Joy,” Disgust said.

  Inside Mom’s Headquarters, her Emotions were scrambling to assess the situation. “Did you guys pick up on that?” Mom’s Sadness asked. Her other Emotions nodded. “Let’s probe,” Mom’s Sadness said. “But keep it subtle so she doesn’t notice.”

  “So, how was the first day of school?” Mom asked.

  “She’s probing us,” Anger said.

  “I’m done,” said Disgust. She turned to Fear. “YOU pretend to be Joy.”

  “What? Uh…okay,” Fear said, awkwardly stepping up to the controls.

  But Fear wasn’t any better at helping Riley act like herself than Disgust. Riley continued to sound strange, and her mom noticed.

  Inside Mom’s Headquarters, her Emotions decided to take a different approach. “Signal the husband,” Mom’s Sadness said.

  Mom tried to signal Dad, but inside his Headquarters, his Emotions were busy watching a hockey match. Finally, Mom’s signal worked. “Uh-oh,” Dad’s Anger said. “She’s looking at us.” He clicked off the hockey game and tried to pay attention.

  Mom raised her eyebrows at him, signaling him again as he stared at her blankly, wondering what s
he was trying to say. Finally, he got it. “Ahhh, so, Riley! How was school?” he asked.

  Inside Riley’s Headquarters, Anger had had enough. “Move,” he said, marching up to the console. “I’LL be Joy.”

  “School was great, all right?” Riley’s voice was full of attitude.

  “Riley, is everything okay?” Mom asked, concerned.

  Riley rolled her eyes and let out a dramatic groan.

  Inside Dad’s Headquarters, his Emotions finally noticed Riley’s odd behavior. “Sir, she just rolled her eyes at us,” Dad’s Fear said.

  “Riley, I do NOT like this new attitude,” Dad said.

  “Oh, I’ll show you attitude, old man,” Anger said, steaming up.

  “No!” Fear said, trying to stop Anger from exploding. “Stay happy!” But Anger shoved him away and forcefully hit a button on the console.

  “What is your problem? Just leave me alone,” said Riley.

  Like a soldier, Dad’s Fear reported “high levels of sass,” and his Emotions took it to DEFCON 2, the highest level of alert before things got really bad. The siren inside Dad’s Headquarters blared and his Emotions prepared to “put the foot down.”

  Inside Riley’s mind, Anger had really worked himself up. “You want a piece of this, Pops? Come and get it!” he yelled, and with all his might, he pushed two levers as far forward as they would go.

  “Just shut up!” Riley yelled.

  “Fire!” yelled Dad’s Anger, like a sergeant.

  “That’s it!” Dad yelled. “Go to your room! Now!”

  Riley pushed her chair away from the table and stomped upstairs to her bedroom.

  “The foot is down! The foot is down!” Dad’s Fear announced. All the Emotions inside Dad’s mind cheered.

  “Good job, gentlemen,” Dad’s Anger said. “That could have been a disaster.”

  Mom’s Emotions sighed with disappointment. “Well, that was a disaster,” Mom’s Sadness said.

  Once Riley got to her bedroom, she slammed the door behind her.

  Joy and Sadness had finally made it across the bridge to Goofball Island and stepped carefully onto the lightline. Joy looked down into the deep darkness of the Memory Dump that loomed below her.