Brooke Johnson is a magician of sorts, for she manages to conjure Pierre Elliott Trudeau out of thin air. She tells her real-life experience of being befriended by the former prime minister while still a student at the National Theatre School. She wrote the piece as a way to come to terms with his death and with the fact that she had allowed their friendship to dim in the years before it. The details are impressive, and Johnson slips easily between her younger self, her older self and Trudeau and his famous mannerisms. It is a story that will appeal specifically to anyone who lived through the Trudeau years, but also more generally to anyone who has experienced the loss of someone dear to them.
