When Morgan called home from jail, she begged her mother not to post bail.
“What are you talking about, Morgan?” Angie asked.
“Don’t pay the money. Don’t bail me out.”
In spite of everything, Angie laughed. “Well,” she told Morgan gently, “you can rest assured we don’t have half a million dollars.”
“I think she was still afraid of Slenderman at that time,” Angie later decided, “and I think she was afraid that if she came home, he was going to find her there, or find us.”
“I love you,” Angie said, before the call was disconnected. “I love you, no matter what.”
Several days after Morgan’s arrest, after Tony submitted the necessary paperwork, Matt and Angie were finally able to visit Morgan. In the visiting room at the Washington County Jail, they stared at Morgan through scratched Plexiglas and bars, forbidden to touch her. Matt’s body cracked in half with giant sobs. Morgan looked unwashed. She fidgeted.
Morgan’s eyes snapped to her mother.
Angie gently explained that Tony had warned them the trial process could take a lot of time—and they already had so many pets at home, and Angie worked so much. The guinea pigs had been Morgan’s responsibility. “I had to sell Thor and Loki,” she apologized, “to some church people.”
“I hate church people,” Morgan said. “What are you doing here? Why did you come?”
“Well, I wanted to see you,” Angie said, feeling confused. “I wanted to see how you’re doing. I miss you.”
Morgan laughed and started talking to herself. Her pupils were dilated, her gaze lost. She cocked her head and let her eyes wander upward, as if watching something crawl across the ceiling—and finally, after years of denial, Angie knew. Morgan was sick.
Separated from their daughter by bars, she and Matt watched helplessly as Morgan dissolved into helpless laughter and babbled incoherently. Later they would learn that stress can trigger or escalate psychosis. The trauma of the stabbing had sent Morgan’s symptoms into overdrive.
How had they missed it? Angie wondered. She worked in health care. Matt had passed his days tending to Morgan, brushing her hair, tucking her in at night. They spent Angie’s weekends off cuddling as a family in front of the television, watching movies and playing video games, in the condo that Angie had emptied of mirrors so that Matt could avoid looking at himself—and perhaps because of that, because Matt would not look at himself, he had not seen himself in Morgan. Neither of them had, and now it was too late.