This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 2019 by Sarah Skilton
Cover design by Kerri Resnick. Cover copyright © 2019 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.
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First Edition: April 2019
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ISBNs: 978-1-5387-4798-8 (trade), 978-1-5387-4799-5 (ebook)
E3-20190215-DA
Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Part I 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
Part II 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
Part III 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
Acknowledgments
Also by Sarah Skilton
About the Author
Newsletters
For Kiana and Sarvenaz, of course
God, make me famous.
If You can’t, just make it painless.
—“Creature Comfort,” Arcade Fire
Part I
1
House lights up.
Enter stage right.
Test the microphone.
Find an audience member, lock eyes.
Connect.
“Something weird happened to me when I was a kid. I was on a TV show, and afterward, everyone on it became famous except for me.
“I don’t mean ‘famous in their hometown’ or, like, ‘runs a successful blog.’ I mean global-domination famous. Sold-out stadium tours. Oscar nominations. Golden Globes. Emmys. Grammys. MTV Music Awards. Number-one hit singles. Unauthorized biographies. Clothing lines. Perfumes. Paparazzi.”
That got their attention.
“Anyone know what I’m talking about? It was the early ’nineties, and the show took place at the San Diego Zoo. It had song-and-dance numbers and comedy sketches, except educational because it was on PBS…” (Switch to announcer voice.) “…‘filmed in front of a live studio audience.’
“Even if you never saw it, you’ve probably heard of it, because it’s where this little girl got her start.”
Music cue: The instantly recognizable opening chords from “Sock Me in the Face (Right Now)” burst forth. A blistering piano riff, followed by a drum kick and low bass. The beat, tempo, and pop vocals—aye aye aye aye—sent everyone back to the late ’90s. (Even if they hated the song, it would now run through their heads the rest of the day. Heh-heh.)
“What does that song even mean, right? ‘Sock me in the face’? Right now, by the way. Not later.”
The audience laughed, warming to me.
“Fun fact: Melody Briar didn’t write the lyrics. I know, you’re shocked. The song was written in Sweden, by Swedish people who thought they were using American slang. That’s why it doesn’t make any sense. They tried to play it off as an homage to Goldie Hawn on Laugh-In, because, you know, they’re both blondes. Or, wait—no, how did they put it? A callback to Aretha Franklin. That’s right. ‘Sock it to me, sock it to me, sock me with the truth.’ Anyway. Here’s another person who was on the show with me…”
Multimedia cue: 15-second film clip from the Journal, in which a baby-faced Ethan Mallard in a World War II uniform kisses his beloved in the pouring rain.
A passionate speech: “I know I’m just a farm boy and I can’t give you a big house or fancy clothes, but I can give you my heart, and my soul, and they will be yours forever.”
“Everyone knows who that is, right? Ethan Mallard single-handedly resurrected cheesy romances for a new generation. And after he got his first Oscar nomination, he announced he was quitting show business to buy a llama farm. Which, to be fair, he did. For about six months. Let’s see, who else? Anyone used to watch Honeypot, with Kelly Hale, on the WB?”
Multimedia cue: 10 seconds of Honeypot, a coming-of-age TV show about a college student at Virginia Tech who moonlights as a CIA agent. The heroine of the show has endless spirals of curly hair and an introspective voice-over that suggests nostalgia in present time, for events that are currently happening.
In every episode Kelly runs like a jacked-up cheetah, down a long hallway, chased by goons from the Russian mob, her elbows stabbing the air.
Voice-over: “It was then I realized…the code to the safe was in me. It always had been.”
“And then there’s Brody Rutherford…”
Multimedia cue: Pop vocals again, this time male. Although the singer might be the whitest boy ever, he sings and dances as though he’s the fourth coming of Michael Jackson, while the chorus for “Bubblegum,” an early-2000s number-one hit, plays. “You’re stuck on me, I’m stuck on you…” Pivot, stomp, drop to one knee like a proposal, hop back to both feet and stick the landing.
“And lastly, don’t ever call her ‘the token African American’ of the show. Tara Osgood is British, ladies and gents, and she could out-sing all those white kids.”
Multimedia cue: An attractive black woman gives a powerhouse vocal performance in Broadway’s Dreamgirls. Cut to: Her clothing line for Target selling out.
“With this chic and affordable new look, everyone’s in the spotlight.”
“This year marks the twenty-fifth anniversary of Diego and the Lion’s Den. In two months, there’s going to be a celebration, with live music and a Q and A at the place that started it all: the San Diego Zoo. Tickets go on sale next week and it’s expected to sell out within minutes because it’s the first time the entire cast will be together in one place since becoming superstars.”
At that point, I paused and gasped for air.
Dizziness washed over me, making my insides roil. I feared I would fall off the stage. For good or ill, whatever remained of the child actor I once was
insisted on a proper conclusion to the tale I wove.
“Well, almost the entire cast. One person was overlooked. One person didn’t get an invite. Can you guess who?”
Awkward silence.
A cough, followed by the rustling of a chair.
Then a lone voice from the crowd shouted “Booooo” between cupped hands.
It was that guy: the one who told me, “Pretend it’s your nightclub act,” before I got up to speak.
The guy with short hair and a three o’clock shadow: three o’clock of the following day. He leaned back in his chair, long legs in ripped jeans stretched in front of him, hands behind his head, with medical-grade, black-Velcro wrist guards strapped on tight.
His idea had worked, for a while. I’d practically seen my name on a marquee. Live, one night only, at the Comedy Club in Redondo Beach. Two-drink minimum.
I sliced the air with my finger. “They may not want me there, I may not be good for ratings, but I’m going. Ohhhh yes. I’m showing up. I’m not going to be written out of the story. Not this time.”
I breathed hard, thirsty for air, trying not to sway.
The facade had slipped, the spell was wearing off.
It was not nighttime
I was not in a nightclub
I was not even onstage
I was in fucking Minnesota
In a windowless room, standing in front of five patients and a therapist, who sat around a long table
I had just impersonated my former friends and castmates, possibly twisting my ankle during the “Brody’s dance routine” component
I wore sweatpants without drawstrings because drawstrings represented a threat to myself and others
I couldn’t cue any music or multimedia presentations because my iPhone was in lockup on the other side of the country
Most importantly, this was how the “nightclub act” ended:
“So, yeah. Learning about the anniversary sort of messed with my head. I spent a little time—okay, a lot of time—online when I should have been working, or taking care of myself, or, you know, showering and leaving the house. My name is Holly Danner, and I’m an internet addict.”
2
Reddit/AMA
I’m the “missing” cast member from Diego and the Lion’s Den. I grew up with Kelly Hale, Brody Rutherford, Ethan Mallard, Melody Briar, Tara Osgood, and J. J. Randall. AMA.
(self.AMA)
submitted 34 days ago by HollyD
5,073 comments
share
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[–]DevilOmelette 3 points 7 hours ago
Why aren’t you famous? Are you ugly?
* * *
The one thing everyone on Reddit wanted to know (besides which rumors from the last twenty years were true, which I wasn’t touching) was, “What were they like, before? How did they change?”
That was tricky to answer. As far as they were concerned, they were normal before and they had stayed normal. (Villains never see themselves as villains.) It was everyone else who changed. Everyone else who got weird.
Except me, they liked to say. I never treated them differently. I knew them before and after, and I never sold a single article to the tabloids about them. Everyone else turned against them, including their own family members.
I alone stayed the same.
3
What I wrote down on my Prevail! Individualized Internet Treatment Plan Intake Form:
Name: Holly Danner
Occupation: Former freelance writer, former nanny, former actor
Age: 36
Why you are here: Lost my job due to internet use
What I wanted to write down on my Prevail! Individualized Internet Treatment Plan Intake Form:
Name: Irrelevant
Occupation: Day Cryer
Age: Middle
Why you are here: I am afraid I have wasted my life
If you wound up at Prevail! you were probably sleep-deprived. I slept for twenty straight hours when I arrived, like a cat. That was part of the treatment plan. Sleeping, and learning about sleep. How to do it better. How to get enough of it.
Our sleep lecturer, Tiaran, looked a little too well rested. He wore a black-and-white Adidas tracksuit and bounced on the heels of his feet, as though he might bolt outside and run a marathon at any moment. It made me nervous.
He had smooth skin, no bags under his eyes, and loads of energy. It was enraging, like sleep was his superpower and he’d learned to harness it while the rest of us were, ironically, too lazy to do so. Internet addicts like myself tended to sit around all day doing nothing much physically while our brains got scrambled, toggling between six screens and even more identities. We were internally frantic and externally slothful.
It was sad because I used to love sleep. For a long stretch in my early twenties, before I flunked out of showbiz for good and decided to give college a try, it was all I wanted to do. This eventually became known to whomever I was dating. I probably lost three boyfriends to my sleep habits, and even more jobs since I only scheduled auditions after two p.m.
But I digress. Before we could start cognitive therapy and group sessions at Prevail!, they wanted to build us back up to functioning humans from the shells we’d become, or the rest of our therapy wouldn’t take. Rebuilding us included an all-day seminar on the concept of objective truth, catfishing, and how to disengage from trolls and bots, which eventually led to a discussion about the psychological toll of being collectively gaslit by the US president. Those whose primary addiction was hate-reading Trump’s Twitter feed were siphoned off into a different treatment plan altogether. The rest of us stayed at Prevail! and tried our best to become sleepologists.
“In an average lifetime,” Tiaran explained, “a person will spend approximately twenty-five years asleep…” (Pretty sure I’d been on track for at least thirty.) “…and will have three hundred thousand dreams.”
Even with that many dreams to draw from, I couldn’t recall a single time I’d dreamed about my own stardom. I dreamed about them all the time. (Yeah, I know: me and half the world.) Not even in my dreams was I the famous one. My brain couldn’t imagine a world in which our fortunes were reversed.
Tiaran taught us about circadian rhythms, the twelve-hours-on, twelve-hours-off light cycle, and how electronic screens had disturbed our natural ability to induce and regulate sleep. Even forcing ourselves to pass out via alcohol or drugs didn’t count because it wasn’t truly restful; it was the kind of sleep that came on like suffocation.
But illicit substances had never been this group’s problem. We were separated from the drug addicts because our treatment was experimental, full of trial and error. As the head counselor, Lisa, had explained it to me, “Our program is the first in the country to address internet addiction as a separate category of addiction. We don’t subscribe to the Twelve Steps utilized by AA or NA. While that’s effective for many, we don’t share their goal of abstinence. How could you function in today’s society if you never used the internet?”
What it boiled down to was that the substance abusers had a TV and we didn’t. The sun-faded game room walls in our wing of the hospital boasted a tacked-up Monet haystack poster where a flatscreen used to be, but it was lopsided and I could see the original color behind it. Way to taunt us with screens we couldn’t have.
If you find yourself idly wishing you were a drug addict, it’s safe to say something in your life has not gone according to plan.
Not that I ever really had a plan.
To pass the time before bed (lights out at nine), we were encouraged to write letters.
The only person I could imagine writing was Renee. Besides our parents, no one else knew I was here. My social circle had dwindled to immediate family the last several years. She’d booked the flight and sat beside me in the exit row and when we landed at Minneapolis/St. Paul, she bought me paperbacks, a thermos, a neck pillow, and a lavender-scented eye mask. (“I’m so sorry I won’t be able to send care packages! Pretend th
ese showed up at regular intervals with the most amazing thoughtful notes attached.”)
I think it made her feel good, looking out for me for a change. To be the capable big sister again, handling all the details and assuring me everything would be okay.
Dear Renee,
Welcome to the Twilight Zone. I know you were curious about this place when you dropped me off, but there’s not much to see. Devoid of any and all computer, laptop, iPad, or iPhone screens, the general theme is Empty. For the first time in years, we’re not looking down, but in the meantime, everything to look at got up and left. Probably due to neglect.
I’ve been here more than a week, but it’s hard to tell because my cohorts aren’t adjusting well. Two days ago, I saw a woman swipe her finger across the window to change the view. She burst into tears when it didn’t work and I was at a loss for how to comfort her.
You know that moment when you can’t find your phone, and even though you don’t need it right that second, you’re going to need it eventually, possibly soon, and the fact that you can’t feel it in your pocket or see it in your purse, and you can’t recall where it is, and whether you might have left it at the store, or in a public restroom, or at a friend’s, sends you into a preemptive panic? Imagine that sensation of dread, times a thousand, and you’ll understand how it feels to be at Prevail!
The only way to combat it is to not be conscious anymore. My bedroom is sparse, with only three things in it: a dresser/desk, a mirror, and a king-size bed with all the Posturepedic, memory foam trimmings. It’s glorious. It’s sateen. Best sleep I’ve had in years.
On the con side, here’s a mystery for you: Our entire hospital wing smells like meat loaf, but I’ve never seen them serve it. Unnerving.
This morning, day nine, was my first time to talk. When I got up to introduce myself, some jackass told me to pretend it was a nightclub act. I ended up talking about Mel, Kel, Brody, Ethan, and Tara instead of myself. I may have…impersonated them. Somehow, I don’t think I’ll mention this when I see them at the anniversary.
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