He rolled his eyes and shook his head. “What complete and utter nonsense—not to mention damaging too! But Balthazar loved it, and, of course, the Council gave it their golden seal of approval. Only I could see what was really happening. Only I could see the consequence of such a thing. Those supposedly heartwarming dreamweaves were doing more harm than good. They were endangering people, making them believe in a false sense of security. Resulting in a population of delusional people, running around, taking unnecessary risks. And I think we all know that nothing good comes of that!”
There was that voice again. The one I’d heard earlier—the one that sounded like he was reciting someone else’s words.
And though I was making progress with loosening the staples on my mouth, I didn’t let on. I figured I’d stay where I was and let him lead me straight into the good stuff.
“You can send comfort but not prophecy—that’s the Dreamland motto in case you didn’t know. It’s the only real rule we were told to work under. And while it seems to make sense on the surface, while people need to make their own decisions so they can learn and grow, and all that—they also need to make those decisions with a very clear picture of just how dangerous the world is! And since no one else was willing to do that—it was up to me to show them.”
He stormed the stage, finger jabbing the air every time he said something of particular significance. And the longer he lectured, the more his voice changed, until it was no longer his own. It became someone else’s.
He continued to speak, and point, and make all manner of fear-driven statements. His eyes growing so bleary, his expression so foggy, I was pretty sure he was no longer in the present with me, but hung up somewhere in his past.
Not wanting to disturb him or lead him out of his trance, I let the words seep slowly, softly, trailing their way from my head to his, as I thought: So tell me, tell me just exactly what happened to you that made you this way.
I stood rigid, letting the thought find its way to his brain.
And because he was who he was—or at least who he claimed to be: the best assistant director Dreamland had ever seen—he decided not to tell me.
He showed me instead.
19
The projector whirred as he punched fiercely onto his keyboard. And the next thing I knew, we were dropped into a carnival scene—a sort of old-timey fair.
The kind with clowns, cotton candy, and silly games with cheap prizes that cost only a penny to play.
I gazed down at my clothes, surprised to see myself wearing a flannel skirt with a poodle stitched on it, its hem drooping nearly to the black-and-white saddle shoes on my feet, while on top I wore a snug sweater set with a matching scarf to go with it. Making me look like a character on some 1950s sitcom.
Satchel wore his same white shirt, black pants, shiny belt, and black shoes, and with his spit-slicked hair, and pasty white skin, well, even back then he didn’t fit in. Compared to the other boys with their rolled jeans, tight white tees, and sun-warmed skin, he looked more than a little weird. He stood out, in a strange-pale-funeral-director kind of way.
I stood to the side, balancing a cloud of cotton candy in one hand, as I watched him stride alongside his parents. And I have to say that the second I saw them, well it all became clear.
And when his dad began to speak, I knew exactly where that voice had come from.
I kept to their pace, walking just behind them, careful to blend in, go completely unnoticed, striving to overhear brief snippets of their conversation.
His mother kept quiet, a vague and distant expression stamped on her unhappy face—while his father, his voice hardened, authoritative, explained all of the very good reasons why Satchel was not allowed to go on any of the rides.
I shoved a wad of cotton candy into my mouth, frowning while I let the little crystallized bits melt on my tongue. Wondering why he’d even bother to take his kid to the carnival if he wasn’t allowed to have any fun.
Though it wasn’t long before I realized that Satchel had no one else to go with.
Satchel had no friends.
His life consisted only of his parents, schoolwork, and the family’s thrice weekly visi
ts to church. And if he was good—very, very good—then maybe they’d allow him to go to a child-friendly movie—an outing that he treasured above everything else. Those moments in a darkened theater, watching a story come to life on a screen, were the only small pleasures he was allowed. Which is more than he could say for his parents, whose lives seemed to hold no pleasure at all.
His mother spent long hours at the ironing board, starching the collars and sleeves of the stiff, white shirts Satchel wore to school and his father wore to work. Satchel’s father rose early each day, showered, dressed, and had a quick bite to eat before heading to work. And while Satchel wasn’t exactly sure what he did, he knew it had something to do with numbers.
“Numbers are safe—numbers are low risk,” his father always said. “If you know how to work ’em, then they always add up in the end.”
The carnival was only in town for a week, and all of the kids at school had been talking about it—though of course no one actually mentioned it to him, Satchel had merely overheard them.
He was too weird—too creepy—and he came from a really weird, creepy family—or at least those were the most quoted excuses kids used to avoid him.
But from the moment Satchel glimpsed the tip of the Ferris wheel on a rare trip into town, he wanted nothing more than to see it up close—wanted to see if it was anything like the one in the movie he once saw.
Knowing he wasn’t allowed to go on his own (he wasn’t allowed to go anywhere on his own except school, church, and the occasional movie, and even then, only during the day—anywhere else was deemed far too dangerous for a boy of thirteen), he’d made a deal with his parents. Promising that if they would just accompany him—then he would agree to not go on any rides, not eat anything made of sugar, and not waste any of his father’s hard-earned pennies on games his father claimed were probably rigged anyway.