Dreamland: A Novel (31 page)

Though Morgan and I
stayed in touch, the calls and texts diminished over time. In the end, it had more to do with her than with me. In the weeks following Morgan’s move to Nashville, I’d struggled to manage the farm while overseeing Paige’s and Aunt Angie’s recovery. By late autumn our life had settled a bit, but by contrast, events overtook Morgan’s life like a boulder gathering speed and power as it rolled downhill. The changes that followed the igniting of her music career left me stunned; it reached the point that when I left a voicemail, she sometimes couldn’t return my call for two or three days. It was fine, I told myself—as I’d told her, I didn’t think we should try to make the long-distance thing work, since it would inevitably come to an end. Instead, when we finally connected—often while she was in airports or between meetings, or during recording breaks—I would listen with interest and pride as she relayed the latest developments in her meteoric professional rise.

Even in her wildest dreams, she couldn’t have planned the path her career had taken. Upon arriving in Nashville, she’d spent
time in a recording studio and, with demos in hand, met with the handful of managers she’d mentioned to me, all of whom showed mild to moderate interest. At the casual encouragement of one of those managers (“Why not?”), she’d posted the video of her performance at my show to her social-media accounts. It had been edited exceptionally well by her friends, intercutting footage from her recording the song at the studio with scenes from Bobby T’s and clips of Morgan dancing on TikTok. Interest in the song sparked among some key influencers—including a few admiring stars with huge followings—erupting into an inferno. Within weeks, it was viewed tens of millions of times online, and she quickly released another video, in which she performed “Dreamland.” Naturally, her social-media following exploded, as well, and she was soon being courted by the most prominent managers and recording labels in the industry. “The new Taylor Swift” was how she was often described, drawing comparisons to female megastars like Olivia Rodrigo, Billie Eilish, and Ariana Grande.

The manager with whom she ultimately signed was admittedly a marketing genius, and he built on the early momentum, immediately packaging Morgan in a way that made her seem like an already established star. She started getting play on the radio, and a formal publicity campaign was launched that took her from city to city, with appearances on talk shows in New York and Los Angeles. Her face appeared regularly in stories about celebrities, and by the time she performed on
Saturday Night Live
in November—where she was introduced as a
global phenom
—it seemed to me as though everyone in the world had heard of her. Somehow, between all of that, she managed to find time to begin recording an album. Produced by huge hitmakers, it featured songs written by her as well as collaborations with the hottest hip-hop, pop, and R&B stars in the business.

Originally, she told me, there’d been discussions of her going on tour and opening for one major act or another, but when she released a third song on social media after her appearance on
Saturday Night Live
and in advance of her debut album drop, the song went to number one on the charts. Now there was talk of others opening for her solo tour next autumn, which was already at thirty cities in North America and counting.

She was caught up in a cyclone, so it wasn’t surprising that we were in touch less frequently. And whenever the ache of missing her became too great, I reminded myself of what I’d said on our last day together.

As for me, I hired an aide to help with my aunt after her release from the hospital; she not only helped Aunt Angie around the house but shuttled her to and from her physical-therapy appointments. The paralysis on her left side had been slow to improve; it wasn’t until Halloween that she was confident enough to finally send the aide on her way. She still limped, her left arm remained weak, and her smile was crooked, but she was back to running the office full-time and even got around the rest of the farm with the help of a four-wheeler. The farm, more than Paige or me, remained the center of her life.

And Paige…

It took her six days to fully stabilize again, after which I eventually pieced together the timeline of her crisis. As I’d suspected, she raced to the hospital when my aunt was admitted, leaving her meds and her phone behind in her haste, which was the reason she hadn’t called me as soon as it happened. And although she swore she kept intending to retrieve her meds from the house, my aunt’s condition was too serious for her to feel comfortable leaving the hospital without any family members present. Within a couple of days, the chemicals in her brain began to cause misfires, affecting her perception; not long after that, the sudden
withdrawal of her medication distorted her reality. Among other things, she was convinced that she’d called and spoken to me about my aunt’s condition, not once but two or three times; it wasn’t until I showed her my call log that she accepted that she’d imagined entire conversations. After that, her memories were fuzzy and incomplete until the delusion set in; she remembered walking out of the hospital but didn’t recall smoking weed, even though her blood tests showed a high level of THC.

After her release, she didn’t want to talk about it for a long time. As I’d known she would be, she was deeply ashamed and embarrassed. Nearly a month passed before I was able to get the whole story. It became apparent that she’d incorporated some elements from her previous psychotic episodes into the new delusions, including the bus rides and hitchhiking and the diner where she added ketchup to a cup of hot water. She explained why the house was in shambles and admitted she’d taken the guns that I kept beneath my bed and buried them near the creek. She vaguely remembered buying the Iron Man action figure from a store near the hospital; she’d intended to give it to my aunt to boost her spirits by making a joke about how tough she was. But the hardest parts for her to talk about, the ones that seemed absurd even to her, were the obvious ones: How could she not have recognized her own home? How could she not have recognized Toby, a man she’d known for most of her life, when he’d come to the house? She had no answer to those questions, just as in the past she’d had no answer to why she didn’t recognize me. As far as the rest of her delusions, we’d already lived through most of them, and neither of us felt the need to rehash the painful details.

I dug up the guns, then cleaned and oiled them, thanking God that I’d long ago equipped them with external trigger locks and always kept the keys with me, which made them impossible to
fire unless the locks were removed. After Paige’s first suicide attempt and even before she’d left the hospital, I’d taken no chances. Still, to be doubly careful in the future, I purchased a gun safe, as well, and stored them there. I also repainted the walls and cabinets in the kitchen, along with the living room, before she was released from the hospital. Orange and burgundy, the colors she’d chosen not too long before.

Once she was home, getting back to work was a necessary distraction, and thankfully, her business hadn’t suffered. Still, it was a few months before she began to seem like her old self. Though she still cooked dinner for us a few times a week, she often averted her eyes while we ate, and there were times I found her crying quietly on the porch.

“I hate that I’m broken,” she said on one of those occasions. “I hate that I can’t even control what I think.”

“You’re not broken, Paige,” I soothed, taking a seat beside her and reaching over to stroke her arm. “It was only a few crappy days in the scheme of things. Everyone has them.”

Despite herself, she laughed. “The difference is that my bad days are really, really crappy compared to most.”

“I can’t argue with you there,” I agreed, and again she laughed, then grew serious.

“Thanks,” she said, turning toward me. “For saving my life. Again.”

“You saved me, too.”

I eventually told her about my trip to Florida and Morgan, leaving nothing out. It was around the time that Morgan had posted the first video of her performance at Bobby T’s on social media, and Paige—like everyone—was floored by her talent. When the video ended, she turned to me, eyebrows raised.

“And she thought
you
were good?”

I laughed at that—Paige actually loved when I sang. But she
was also sensitive to how hard it was for me to watch Morgan drift further away over the next few months. I know Paige spotted the photograph plastered all over the gossip sites a couple of weeks before Christmas—a paparazzi shot of Morgan walking hand in hand with a famous young Hollywood actor. Paige loved to follow celebrity gossip, but she was careful not to mention the photo to me. Still, I would have had to be living under a rock to miss it.

I’m not going to say that seeing the photo didn’t hurt me, just as I’m not going to say that I was shocked. And though our lives had diverged just as I’d predicted, I never forgot the decision I’d made on the night that Morgan and I first made love, when I resolved to make changes in my own life so I didn’t end up like my uncle. While that had to wait until I knew my aunt and Paige were going to recover, I like to think I kept my promise. I’d been able to make it to the coast to go surfing four times since my trip to Florida, and I set aside times on Fridays and Sundays to do nothing but play or write music, no matter how much work remained unfinished. I reconnected with a few old friends and met up with them on the occasional weekend night, even if it still sometimes felt like
Groundhog Day.

I’d also made an effort to relax my routines from time to time, which is why I decided to change the brake pads on my truck one Tuesday morning, despite the long list of other things I should have been doing. While basic vehicle repairs might not sound like fun to most people, I enjoyed it; unlike practically everything else at the farm, it was a task with a definite finishing point. In a world where nothing ever stops, actually completing something can be very gratifying.

Thankfully, the temperature was mild that afternoon, and I pushed up the sleeves of my work shirt as I thought through the steps of the repair. But fate is a strange thing: Just after I turned
on the radio in the cab and readied myself to slide under the truck, Morgan’s voice soared out of the car speakers. It was “Dreamland,” which by then I’d probably heard a hundred times. Still, I had to admit that the song always made me stop in my tracks. Her voice was resonant and heartbreaking. She’d changed parts of the lyrics to add the wonderful hook I’d known she’d find, and I allowed myself the briefest of memories of her sitting on the porch that day.

It was about then that I heard a car approaching from the distance. I squinted, trying to make it out, and was surprised when it slowed, then pulled into the drive, coming to a stop behind my truck.

From the back seat, Morgan got out. For a moment I couldn’t move, and it was only when the Uber started backing out that I unfroze.

“What are you doing here?” I stuttered.

She shrugged, tossing a length of hair over her shoulder, and I wondered how it was possible that she’d grown even more beautiful since the last time I’d seen her.

“I came to visit you, because I was tired of waiting for you to visit me.”

Still trying to process her sudden appearance, I couldn’t say anything else for a few seconds. “Why didn’t you tell me you were coming?”

“And ruin my Valentine’s surprise? I don’t think so.”

Leaving her luggage behind, she walked into my arms as though it was the most natural thing in the world, like we’d never stopped holding each other.

“It’s not Valentine’s Day,” I mumbled into her hair, feeling her body against my own.

“It’s close enough. I’m going to be in L.A. on the actual day, and this is the best I could do.”

When we separated, I saw a familiar mischievous glint in her eyes.

“I thought you were seeing someone,” I said, trying to sound casual as I mentioned the actor’s name.

“We went out a couple of times, but it just wasn’t right.” She waved a hand dismissively. “He was lacking that special something, you know? Like…when we were together, I kept thinking about the zombie apocalypse and wondering whether he could grow food and fix trucks and all that other survival stuff.”

“Yeah?”

“We love what we love, right?”

I grinned, relieved that she didn’t seem to have changed in the slightest.

“Right,” I said. “But I still can’t believe you showed up like this. You’ve got so much going on.”

“And you don’t?”

“It’s different.”

“Everyone is busy, because life is busy for everyone. I also came here to tell you something.”

“What’s that?”

“Do you remember that big speech you made on our last day together? You know, when you were pretty much trying to end things between us while doing your best to sound all noble?”

Though I wouldn’t have described it that way, I nodded, still unable to stop smiling.

“I’ve been thinking about that a lot, and I’ve now come to the conclusion that you were a hundred percent wrong about pretty much all of it.”