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loved, not abandoned, but that just made her miserable to be around. Oyster could see it clearly now. He had to learn to understand people. Maybe he could do that. Maybe.
    â€œYou’re just lucky I’m not dead! But we’re still lost! How is Leatherbelly going to get his teeth cleaned and possibly get braces now? How, I ask you? This is all your fault!”
    Oyster shook his head. “No, we aren’t lost,” he said.
    Because from his view here, looking back, he saw a sign in the sky above a building at the back of the parking lot. Dr. Fromler’s sign. They’d made it after all! Dr. Fromler! The famous Dr. Fromler who was all-good, all-loving, all-glittery smile—he’d shined his glittery love down on Oyster for all of his life. Oyster would have recognized those glowing teeth anywhere.
    Standing there in the bright sun, staring at the nunnery van and Mrs. Fishback with the tissues up her nose, he wondered what he would do with his stolenmap. If he imagined his green yard and his house and his swing set and his parents and the boy with the blue umbrella clearly enough, with more detail, would the map become big enough for him to slip into that Other World? Maybe if he imagined more rigorously, his map would grow and he could meet his parents on the other side, by the swing set, with his friend from the Dragon Palace.
    Oyster felt strong, almost hopeful. He pointed up at the sign, the giant, glittery teeth smiling down on them. “We’re here,” he said.

C HAPTER 4
D R . F ROMLER’S D ENTISTRY FOR THE Y OUNG (AND A GED )
    T he walls of Dr. Fromler’s waiting room were striped red and white like a circus tent. Instead of chairs, there were merry-go-round horses. Oyster had never been to a circus or seen a merry-go-round, except in books. He’d never really had much in the way of toys. So Oyster liked the first horse he saw, a bright blue horse with giant white teeth. All of the horses had giant white teeth. There were pictures of clowns and cowboys and train conductors all with giant white teeth. There were puzzles of teeth, and helium S MILE balloons on strings, bobbing overhead. Oyster wanted to sit on the merry-go-round horse, but he knew Mrs. Fishback would yell at him, so he just petted the horse’s ears with one hand. The other was in his pocket. He was holding on to his map, not willing to let go of it for a moment.
    â€œStop it!” Mrs. Fishback said. “This is a dentist’s office, not a petting zoo!”
    The only things that resembled ones in regular offices were the small coffee tables—adults can’t have a waiting room without coffee tables of some sort—but oddly enough, on each coffee table was an enormous candy dish.
    From his bedroom window, Oyster had seen such a thing on the counter of the Dragon Palace. When the door was perched wide open, he could make out the cash register and a bit of an indoor fishpond with orange blobs roaming around in it. There was a candy dish on a little stand in between. Oyster understood that someone might want to take a candy after eating a Chinese meal, but in a dentist’s office? Candy was the enemy, wasn’t it?
    On one wall there was a miniature version of the billboard, its smile lit up with Christmas lights. Oyster loved the smile, because it seemed like the smile loved him.
    Mrs. Fishback knocked on the glass window for the receptionist, Leatherbelly hooked under her arm.
    â€œWho is it?” a voiced cooed wearily.
    â€œWe’re here to see Dr. Fromler,” Mrs. Fishback said.
    The glass window slowly squeaked open, and there appeared a young man wearing a tightly knotted necktie and thick glasses that slid down his beakishly sharp nose. He had very pursed lips as if he were trying to hide his teeth. He puffed his cheeks, too. Oyster wondered what he’d look like if he weren’t making such astrange face. “Dr. Fromler is in a fragile state,” he said,