CHAPTER 8
The Meeting
Madison had returned to Penn two days early to see Jackie’s first Ivy League game. But she also wanted to be on campus without obligations, to know what it felt like to walk through the streets, across the quad, without a grueling workout to get to—or even a class. Perhaps she would see Penn differently, fresher somehow. She wanted so badly for this semester to be different. She had made herself a promise: bring a different attitude to second semester.
That night, Maddy opened the notes application on her repaired iPhone and typed out her mantra:
new mindset
new everything
i can do this
you CHOOSE your fate
willing to give it another chance
DON’T LOOK BACK
LOOK FORWARD
SETBACKS ARE NEEDED TO GET STRONGER
transferring is not an option
And if this forced positivity didn’t work, somewhere on the back burner resided a different solution. But maybe Maddy wouldn’t need that. Quitting track, she believed, would change everything, would be the jump start she needed to see the world differently. And not even drastically differently, just more like the way she had before, in high school.
She closed the notes application. She had said goodbye to her dad at the game, said goodbye to Ingrid a few hours later, after they’d watched the men play. Now she was back in her Penn dorm room—alone. It was nearly midnight on Saturday night.
She opened her MacBook, launched Pages, and began typing.
Although this has been extremely difficult to put into words, I’m going to do my best to explain my first semester at Penn and where it’s led me.
Before I begin I just want to say I have the utmost respect and admiration for you as a coach and a person and that I know I wouldn’t be at this school if it weren’t for you. I also want you to know that you aren’t at fault for anything negative I’ve felt over the past couple months in any way.
Here goes.
Yesterday was the first day since early September that I felt genuinely happy, that I actually felt like myself again, and that I felt like Penn MIGHT actually be the right place for me and that I felt excited to be here.
Yesterday was the first time since late October that I actually enjoyed running and really really wanted to run.
Yesterday was the first day in many, many months that I woke up feeling faithful and optimistic about my future since I knew I had reached a decision.
Maddy named the file “for dolan” and saved it to her Documents folder, alongside the papers she had written during first semester. In that folder there was also a document named “good quotes” to which she contributed whenever she stumbled upon a quote or poem she wanted to remember. The first entry on the page was from Helen Keller: “Life is either a daring adventure or nothing. Security does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than exposure.” The next two on the page were similar, about how only those who leave home or get lost ever really find home or themselves. The final quote on the page was from Anne Frank: “Think of all the beauty still left around you and be happy.”
In the Notes application on her iPhone, Maddy usually wrote down songs she wanted to remember. The list started in the summer of 2012 with “Dare You to Move” by Switchfoot. A week later she added “Still” by Matt Nathanson, and a few days after that, the song “Sort Of” by Ingrid Michaelson, followed by “I Will Follow You into the Dark” by Death Cab for Cutie. Maddy wrote down song titles throughout the summer of 2012, but then wrote nothing for sixteen months. Then, four months into her first semester at Penn, just before winter break, she again started listing song titles, but the sentiment behind these choices appears to have taken a drastic turn, from angst-filled love songs to something else entirely. On December 17, 2013, Maddy entered “Jesus Take the Wheel,” and a day later she typed out “When I am lost, god is there,” which wasn’t a song title but rather a phrase she wanted to keep in mind.
As first semester wore on and her mind became more and more cluttered, Maddy had started going back to church. Maddy was losing control, spending so many nights tossing and turning, so she returned to the one place that preached peace and calm. And over the holidays, she changed the bio on her Instagram to include verse Matthew 17:20. According to the New International Version of the Bible, the verse reads: “‘You don’t have enough faith,’ Jesus told them. ‘I tell you the truth, if you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it would move. Nothing would be impossible.”
That first night back in the dorm alone, Maddy reached for her phone and texted Emma.
Maddy: HERES TO NEW BEGINNINGS THIS SEMESTER
Emma: Seriously though. Totally different mind set!!
Maddy: YES
Emma: A no fucks given attitude
Maddy: hahahahaah yes.
The upcoming meeting with Dolan was all Maddy could think of. She had never before quit anything, let alone her dream since she had started playing sports at age seven. The words needed to be perfect. She needed to show Coach Dolan the depth of her consideration, in the hope he would understand that she hadn’t arrived at her decision lightly. Deciding to quit pained her deeply, more deeply than however that decision might affect anyone else in her life. But she had looked at this thing from all angles, and it was the necessary step. Maddy needed to convey that kind of urgency, to make the decision airtight, no loopholes. Because she didn’t trust herself to speak with the same conviction with which she wrote, she kept writing and revising, and then writing more, until she felt she had achieved the right tone in her letter.
She did this on Sunday morning, again on Sunday night, and once more on Monday morning, the day Stacy and her sister Mackenzie would drive down to Philly and join her for the meeting with Dolan. Maddy had asked her mom if she could be there for support. Tapping on her MacBook, Maddy constructed sentence after sentence, carving out a letter that would detail what she believed was unavoidable: she needed to stop running.
In total, the past couple months have been an experience almost completely opposite from what I expected of college. For the most part, my experience at Penn so far has been a complete and total challenge. It’s been a mental struggle which has led me to a place so low that I never ever thought was personally attainable. I never thought it was possible to sink so low, so drastically. I don’t know how or when this all started, but everything seemed to get worse and worse as the first semester progressed. I’ve thought about leaving Penn for good. I’ve had difficulty sleeping, concentrating, making decisions, studying, and just overall have not been feeling like myself. Although I’m giving Penn a second chance, this semester made me very very unsure about whether or not it is the place for me. Through the daily routine of waking up and going to class, going back to my room and starting homework, going to practice then going to dinner and showering and heading to study hall, and coming straight back to my dorm to shower and do more homework before bed, the primary emotions I felt throughout the past couple months were overwhelmed, anxious, desperate and for the most part, lonely. Before coming to Penn I absolutely LOVED to run. After soccer practices ended in high school I would come home and run more just for the fun of it. Just because it served as sort of a mental therapy for me, a way to clear my mind and get a break from the daily responsibilities and obligations that life brings. Before coming to Penn I was beyond excited to run cross country because I have never done it before. I don’t know where things went wrong, but ever since the middle of cross country season, my life seemed to be hurtling downwards and early on in the year I began to feel completely and utterly lost… as if I was in a whole other world and as if I no longer could recognize my purpose here, not my purpose as a part of the team, but my purpose in life. As hard as I tried to complete my workout packet over break, and as badly as I wanted to WANT to run, I just couldn’t make myself do it. The running over the past couple months has taken a huge toll on me mentally, emotionally, and physically.
Writing this letter created in Maddy an emotion she hadn’t recently felt: hope. She became increasingly convinced that quitting was the right decision. The hope began to gain momentum, a kind of high, and she started focusing on additional ways she could improve her quality of life during second semester. By Sunday night she was practically giddy with a mix of excitement and nerves.
From: Madison Holleran
Date: Sun, Jan 12, 2014 at 8:25 PM
Subject: open room?!—306 Thomas Penn?
To: REDACTED
Hi! I’m Madison Holleran, a freshman at Penn and I live in Hill College House. I am on the track team and I am currently rooming with one of my teammates. However, I have not been enjoying track at all recently and am planning on quitting the team very soon. I applied for a room change during the room switch period during first semester but did not end up getting a new room. One of my best friends just moved into 304 Thomas Penn and I noticed that there is an open room right next to her, 306 Thomas Penn. Is there any way I could move into that room?? Thanks, hope to hear back from you soon!
1/12/14 9:42 PM
Maddy: So nervous for tomorrow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Emma: Talking to the coach???
Maddy: Ya betch
Emma: What time
Maddy: 11
Emma: Omg are you def gonna quit
Maddy: Attempting
Maddy: Lolz
Maddy: Ya betch
Emma: I’m happy for you
Emma: And proud
Maddy: Ahahhaahahaaah I love u
1/12/14/ 9:40 PM
Maddy: Hi sweet mother of sweetness I’m doing well thanks!! Proud of Jackie and so happy I got to witness the first points of her college career 
she must have been so excited
Susie Reyneke: I hope you can stop putting so much silly pressure on yourself and just start enjoying your time there! I really liked your school!!
Maddy: Yeahh I know. Penn is a really fun and good place with a lot to offer, I just really don’t enjoy track at all anymore.
Madison continued to write, to perfect the letter, working late into Sunday night, then again on Monday morning, as Stacy and Mackenzie made the drive south from Allendale to Philadelphia.
During high school after I made my decision to bail on Lehigh soccer and commit to Penn track, I was 100 percent sure it was the best decision I have ever made since my track times were peaking and I reached more success than I had ever thought was possible,” she wrote. “After running the 1200 leg at Penn Relays I could not wait to compete for Penn. Then how did I end up here right now, wanting to leave the team and not competitively run anymore? How did I end up wanting to quit the team almost a month into school? How did I end up being as overall unhappy as I have been for the past four months? Before coming to Penn I was confident, focused, motivated, silly and mainly just a happy girl…
On Monday morning, Madison finished the letter. She printed out a copy, then sent a text to Ingrid and another of her friends at Penn, Alex:
Maddy: Just finished the letter to my coach. 
I’ll update you guys when I get out of the meeting.
Alex: Good luck!! 
1/13/14 10:17 AM
Maddy: Meeting with my coach in 40 mins. HELLLPPPPP scared
Gabb: Good luck
As Stacy and Mackenzie arrived in Philly, they stopped at Starbucks and got Maddy her favorite, a vanilla latte, then drove to her dorm room, collected her, and the three of them went to the grocery store.
Although Mackenzie was confused about how Maddy could dislike college so much, she wasn’t particularly worried. Mack had played a lot of sports while growing up and now also in high school, and she had wanted to quit before, so she could relate to how Maddy was feeling about running. She had been surprised at how distant and sad her sister had seemed over break. She remembered one night when the three sisters had been in Maddy’s room, sitting on the bed, and that when Ashley left the room, tears started pouring down Madison’s face.
“I’m not happy,” she said, then kept repeating the same question: “How can I be happy? How… how?”
Mackenzie kept offering solutions: stop running, join a club, join a sorority, play soccer, go out more. “It’s gonna change,” Mack said. “It’s gonna get better.”
Now here they were in Philly, about to make the first of those changes. At the store they stocked up on healthy snacks for the fridge in Maddy’s dorm room. They bought her baby carrots and hummus and organic peanut butter. There wasn’t much time before the meeting with Dolan, so they quickly dropped off the groceries and all three went to the track offices. Maddy had her letter with her—two single-spaced pages—and she planned on reading the letter aloud to Coach Dolan.
Both terrified and thrilled by the statement she was holding, Maddy felt confident that the ideas she had expressed in the letter were urgent enough that Coach Dolan would understand why she had to make this change. Still, she needed to make absolutely clear to him, both in how she presented the letter and how she expressed her feelings, that no other choice existed. The meeting would change everything. She would no longer be the star athlete who could clear every hurdle, push through every obstacle. She would become Madison Holleran, student, normal in all the ways she had never been normal. The cost of this change would be high, but she had already run it by her friends and family, and although her identity seemed to be shifting dramatically, almost everyone had appeared to understand. And anyway, the truth was, the cost of staying inside her current identity—Madison Holleran, Ivy League runner—was steeper.
Maddy, Stacy, and Mackenzie walked into the athletic offices. While they waited in the lobby, Maddy showed the pages of the letter to her mom and sister, detailing the gist of what she wanted to say: she was unhappy; she needed to quit. When Coach Dolan appeared, waving them into a conference room, Maddy turned to her sister and said, “Can you stay here?”
“Oh, okay, yeah,” Mack said. As her mom and sister went into the room, Mack found a chair. She pulled out her iPhone and began looking at prom dresses. The dance was still months away, but Mack had already started looking at options, and she would want her sister’s input.
Mack wished she could be inside the conference room, mostly because she wanted to know specifically what Maddy’s letter said. Nevertheless, she thought she understood what would happen behind the closed door: her sister would quit track. She knew that’s what her sister wanted, and her sister had always been good at getting what she wanted.
Stacy remembers the conference room and its center table feeling big, but the three of them sat together in a corner. The coach wasn’t sure what this meeting might hold, but over the years he’d had hundreds of similar meetings, listening as so many young athletes worked through the pressures of the college transition. Dolan led off the conversation by saying he didn’t think Maddy was struggling as much as other athletes he had coached, and he thought she and Penn were a perfect match. From his vantage point, she had made one of the smoother transitions he had witnessed: She was in the team’s top five on the cross-country course, she worked out great, she did well in school. In person, she seemed to be smiling, happy. And he hadn’t heard differently from anyone—neither teammates nor coaches. “We saw this successful, well-liked person,” Dolan said later. “It was fun to watch her excel and be excited.”
The idea of burdening others, of dragging down her family and her teammates, appalled Maddy. The wilderness of her internal life, the constant waves threatening to overwhelm her, was her terrain—and hers alone—to navigate. In fact, the letter in her hands was more self-revelatory than she was used to being. But the change she hoped to spark was drastic, and she knew it required exposing more of herself than might be comfortable.
The three of them exchanged pleasantries. They spoke of winter break and holiday celebrations and rest, and how Maddy was feeling (the blood tests, which she and the coaches had e-mailed about in December, showed nothing alarming). Dolan shared with Maddy how well she had done first semester, how impressed with her he had been. None of this was particularly relevant to Maddy, but it was to Stacy, who hoped her daughter could hear the praise and reassurance, the validation. Couldn’t she see? Her panic about first semester was a monster of her creation; she had given this monster life, and she could kill it, too.
Dolan circled back to the point of the meeting: how Maddy was feeling after first semester.
“I actually wrote a letter that I want to read,” Maddy said, pulling out the two pages. “I wanted to make sure I said everything clearly.”
She took a deep breath, then began: “Although this has been extremely difficult to put into words, I’m going to do my best to explain my first semester at Penn and where it’s led me…”
Tears began spilling from Maddy’s eyes, rolling down her cheeks. Stacy began crying, too, for very little in this world is more painful than seeing your child in pain. “I felt so bad for her,” Stacy said. “I had never really seen her so distressed.” Maddy continued reading the letter to her coach:
“How did I end up being as overall unhappy as I have been for the past four months? Before coming to Penn I was confident, focused, motivated, silly and mainly just a happy girl. But over the past couple months I’ve felt lost. And this feeling has accumulated and built up into so much more, and that’s why I decided that something has to change. For as long as I can remember sports have defined me, but now I think it’s time for another path. Now I think it’s time to define myself. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to compete for Penn and be a part of Penn track, but right now, I’m really not ready to compete. I don’t know what is the right choice for me here at Penn, how to be ‘happy’ again, but I know something needs to change. And if I could pinpoint one aspect of my life leading to where I am now, it would probably be track. Trust me I would LOVE to run for you. I would love to run at Heps, at Penn Relays. I would love to run a 4:40 mile. That was my goal coming into college. But everything seemed to be thrown at me so quickly that I feel like I’ve dug myself so deep and at this point, right now there isn’t any coming back. While I feel as if leaving the team would be a huge disappointment to you, my high school coach, my parents, my team and maybe even to myself, I’ve thought long and hard about this and feel that I just need to take the semester off to figure out what I really want in life and who I really am. As I said sports have always defined me, but here it hasn’t brought me happiness. And it’s time to define myself. All I need is a new beginning here and I think this semester will give me a chance to start over.
“Coach Martin gave me a book to read over break and it made me want to run even less, but I read some of it. One part particularly stuck out to me:
On the third day his outlook would begin to darken. For one thing, he was getting very, very tired. No particular day wore him out, but the accumulation of steady mileage began to take its toll. He never quite recovered fully between workouts and soon found himself walking around in a more-or-less constant state of fatigue-depression, a phase Denton called ‘breaking down.’ The new runner would find it more tedious than he could bear… at that point most of them would drift away. They would search within themselves somewhere along a dusty ten-mile trail or during the bad part of a really gut-churning 440 on the track, and find some key element missing. Sheepishly they would begin to miss workouts, then stop showing up altogether. They would convince themselves: there must be another way, there HAS to be. The attrition rate was nearly 100 percent.
“I hope you understand. I’m sorry to put you in this position and I don’t expect you to be pleased to hear this, but the only thing I really want is a break. Maybe taking this semester off will make me realize I want to be on the team again and compete next year, but as of right now I strongly believe that isn’t the right choice for me.”
Maddy exhaled. She had said it—all of it. She put away the letter.
Often, quitting is a mistake. So much is learned through perseverance. Nearly every college coach has been in this situation: sitting across from a student-athlete who no longer wants to compete. Occasionally this is precisely what that young person needs. But more often, if student-athletes push through the discomfort of the first year, they grow stronger, and later, those thoughts of quitting come to seem like the notions of someone else entirely. They end up being thankful to the coach who saw a different path, one that kept them steadily directed toward their goals. How does a coach know which athletes to let walk away and which ones to fight for? They don’t; they can’t. Not for sure, anyway. They just do their best. “As a coach and a person who works with young people, the most important work we do is supporting people during that transition and to help them adjust to a new place, a new team, new academics,” Dolan said. “It’s always been important to me.”
That morning inside the conference room, Dolan offered Maddy a different path, one that Stacy assumed her daughter couldn’t see, or hadn’t considered. Maybe her future on the team didn’t have to be black or white. Perhaps they could take it slowly and she could call the shots, deciding over the next few weeks when and how she wanted to train. He had heard her: she needed a break, absolutely. But perhaps they could build that break into the larger structure of track, so she didn’t have to quit entirely. In an effort to empower Maddy and restore her ownership of her athletic future, he turned over all decision making to her. “He said, ‘If you’re not happy with Coach Martin training you, I’ll train you,’” said Stacy. “‘If you’re unhappy where you’re living, I’ll help you move.’ He said she could stay on the track team and just train and not compete, or she could even pick the events she wanted to run. He was just so sweet and accommodating.” But Maddy may not have felt empowered; she may only have felt the walls of the cage taking a new shape around her.
After offering all these new options, Coach Dolan placed the decision in Maddy’s hands. Stacy, too, thought these new options might help soothe Maddy without stripping her of her athletic identity. Dolan even offered an additional olive branch: taking it easy for the next few days, and then meeting again at the end of the week. Added Stacy: “He said, ‘If you want to quit track, that’s your decision, but obviously I would love for you to stay.’”
The two adults looked at Maddy.
Was there another choice? Was there a way to form the words “I can’t keep running” and then, even harder, make those words come out of her mouth? She couldn’t imagine it, so she said the only thing she could picture herself saying: “Okay, I’ll try.”
They say quitting is easy, and sometimes it is. Other times it’s not. Other times it’s the hardest thing of all—impossible, really. “You see someone young and talented and successful as Maddy was, and you care for her, and you’re seeing this bright future,” Dolan recalled. “And you can’t fathom that she felt differently about things than anything we can see.”
Because still, there on the horizon, looms another truth: depression and anxiety are not cured in a moment, with a single decision, though sometimes it can feel as if they might be. Even if Maddy had followed through on her decision to quit, other hard decisions would have followed. No matter how assiduously she had laid the groundwork for leaving, she hadn’t yet experienced what that would be like.
On the way out of the office, Maddy took the letter, tore the two pages in half, and dropped them in a wastebasket. Mackenzie saw her mom and sister appear, and stood up. “What happened?” she asked.
“Wow, he is one fabulous coach,” her mom was saying to Maddy as Mackenzie joined them. “Not many coaches would be like that, especially after how hard he recruited you.”
“Are you still on the team?” Mack asked.
“Yup,” Maddy said.
“Wait, you are? But… can I read the letter?” Mack asked.
“I already threw it out,” replied Maddy.
The three of them walked over to the quad, where they met Ingrid, then went to her dorm room. “What happened?” Ingrid asked. “Did you quit?” They had planned to quit together, Maddy and Ingrid, both of them convinced that more free time would make them happier. Problem was, only Ingrid had followed through; only Ingrid had actually quit.
Maddy recounted the meeting. Dolan had offered her the world. And she couldn’t disappoint him, you know? Plus, he had solved so many of her problems. She could make this new arrangement work; it was the best of both worlds. “I would say Madison seemed a little less troubled than before and during the meeting,” Stacy remembered. “Almost like she felt better after expressing her feelings to us. However, looking back on it, I recall something felt amiss: when I said goodbye to her that day, I hugged her and of course I cried. I can’t remember if she cried also, but in retrospect, her relief did seem short-lived.”
A never-ending struggle: watching your child fumbling, forging a path, becoming an adult, and not being sure when they need you to hug them and keep them safe, and when they need you to let them be.
Once Stacy and Mackenzie had left, Maddy and Ingrid went over to a friend’s dorm room.
1/13/14 8:13 PM
Maddy: Drinking w girls in Annabelle’s room
Mack: No parties?
Maddy: Nopeeeee
Mack: Why
Maddy: Not a lot of people back on campus
Maddy: Mack I don’t wanna do track at all anymore
Mack: Why?
Maddy: I hate it
The following morning, Maddy sent a message to a Penn friend who was on the football team, as well as to Trisha, a good friend from home. The day after that, she received an e-mail from Dolan laying out the plan for the upcoming week of training. So what, exactly, had changed?
1/14/14 10:04 AM
Maddy: Heading back today!?!
Logan: About to land 
Logan: How’d meeting your coach go?
Maddy: Ehhh. As of now I’m still on the team but I’m meeting with him again on Thursday. I feel bad because he is soooo nice and so awesome and genuine and pretty much one of the reasons why I came to Penn in the first place so I feel really bad disappointing him. But I just don’t enjoy training anymore. Like IDDDDDDKKKKKK I hate this so much
Logan: Did you say you wanted to leave the team? How are you still on it? Lol
Maddy: Yeah I did!! I legit wrote a two page letter about it. 2 pages!! But I’ll explain the whole thing in a little when I get to the nail salon hahah
Maddy: Hi. Okk so pretty much told him my feelings about everything and was 100 percent honest about how I was feeling and he basically like felt guilty but also felt like I should have told him how I was feeling earlier. But he said that he would love to be my main coach so he just wants me to give it a shot for the rest of the semester instead of taking the semester off as like a break. So I’m meeting with him on Thursday again. But I went to practice yesterday and really just didn’t enjoy it. Like I don’t think things are gonna change. I just don’t know how to express that to him without feeling guilty or like a disappointment to him.
1/14/14 11:38 PM
Trisha: U looked like you were having fun in yo Snapchat
Maddy: Yeah I went to da bars but I’m still on the fence about track. The meeting went so well but like my coach (the head coach) is so friggin nice and awesome and a genuinely good person and I feel like it’d be a huge disappointment to him if I quit. I know I have to make this decision for me and do what’s best to make me happy here but I just honestly feel like I’d be letting him down. And my parents.
Maddy: But I really don’t enjoy it anymore
Trisha: Yeah I get what you mean but like you said you can’t be unhappy just so you don’t temporarily disappoint other people. Your parents will get over it I promise and the coach goes through stuff like that all the time he literally signed up for it when he became a coach. It’s your life you need to do what makes ya happy ya feel
On Jan 15, 2014, at 1:00 PM, “Stephen Dolan” wrote:
All,
We have the Air Structure reserved today from 3:30 to 5:00. Let’s plan to meet there at 3:15 for practice. The plan is to take a distance run locally and meet back at the Air Structure at 4:30 for an organized team strength training circuit.
Here is the general plan for the next few days:
Thursday: Van out from Dunning at 3:15
Friday: Meet at Air Structure at 3:15 to warm-up for the workout (Weather permitting we will run the workout on the outdoor track) (5-6 x 1000 at 5K pace w/ 2:00 rest)
Saturday: OYO for cross training or a recovery run and some core work
Sunday: Van out to the park at 10:00 AM
Goal setting for 2014
Also, as I mentioned in our full team meeting on Monday, I feel that it is very important to set some concrete goals as we embark on the track season. I’d like each of you to take a few minutes to write down 2-3 specific competitive goals that you have for this year on the track. At least one or two of these goals should be a specific time that you are dreaming about running. I’d also like to see you brainstorm in regard to what are the key things that you need to do to achieve your goal. For Example: “I want to break a 5:00 mile and I see my sleep schedule and better consistency with my strength training as important areas in which I can improve to help me chase this goal.”
You don’t have to share your goals with me but I would love to hear one or two of them if you are willing to share so I have a better understanding of what you are dreaming about. Please send me a short goals e-mail if you would like to share. I’d love to help you achieve your goals and want to have fun in the pursuit.
Proposed Haverford Meet Entry
Men’s 3000: VA, WM, CN, Bsh, JT, NT, LW
Men’s Mile: TA, ED, CP, TS, CSh, BSm
Women’s 3000: KJ, Cleo, Clarissa
Women’s Mile: SMc, EG, AM
TBD: MD, AD, EQ, MH, NG
Dreamscapes
It is the middle of the night. I am suddenly awake. Or have I been awake for a while but it was so dark I believed I was asleep? I don’t know where I am. But I’m not concerned.
I reach for my computer. I don’t usually do that. But there is something on there I need, though I’m not sure what. I pull my silver Mac from the bedside table and onto the sheets. The room is ink black. I open the laptop, and a halo of light appears.
The artificial glow is jarring. I rub my eyes. I blink.
What am I looking for?
I scan the icons on the desktop. None are what I want. I look at the dashboard, scroll through the applications. I carefully consider each. I’m definitely looking for something. My mouse scrolls over Reminders, then Notes, then FaceTime.
I pause. FaceTime. Is that what I want?
I launch the application. The icon bounces on the dashboard. It seems like it might not start. I bring my mouse to the top left corner of the screen so I can quit the launch. I am impatient. If this isn’t what I’m looking for, something else is. I must find it.
Just before I scroll down to Quit FaceTime, the app opens. I almost quit anyway. But I don’t. The green light goes on above my camera. A black box appears on my screen. I expect to see myself.
But I don’t.
I see Maddy.
She is wearing a Penn track jacket. Her hair is pulled back. She is smiling and talking to someone, but I don’t have audio. Why am I getting her FaceTime feed? It is as if we are screen mirroring, or as if someone—Was it me? Did I do this?—hacked her computer, rerouted everything to mine.
I consider ending the call. But I do not. I am mesmerized. She is so bright and full of life. She is in a hotel room. She is sitting on the bed. The headboard is behind her, a piece of bad art above. I try turning up the volume, but it is already on max. Maddy is telling a story. She gestures a lot. Then she laughs. I know that it is a good sound even though I cannot hear it.
What magic has brought this to me? I don’t care. I don’t move. I don’t want a single molecule disturbed.
Maddy listens to whoever is on the other line. She speaks occasionally. She nods. After a minute, the conversation starts winding down. I can tell. And it makes me sad. Maddy is leaning forward. She smiles, waves.
Then she hits the end button.
I realize I have been bracing for her disappearance. But she doesn’t disappear. I don’t understand, but I know instantly that Maddy is unaware the camera is still on. She has ended the call. The camera should be off. But it is not.
I lean forward.
She inhales deeply. As she exhales, the brightness leaks from her face. Her elbow is on her knee. She raises her hand to her forehead. I can’t see her eyes. A minute later, her shoulders begin to shake. She wipes tears from her eyes. She is staring just off camera, at something much farther away than could be possible.
My heart begins thudding. I play with the settings. I turn on my microphone. I call her name. I touch the screen.
She still cannot hear me.
Tears keep falling from her eyes. So many that she stops trying to wipe them away. She seems to have forgotten she is crying. It’s like she’s not even there, not really.
I thought I was getting closer to her. I thought I was closer than I had ever been. I could finally see her. She was right there, right there on my screen. Wasn’t this intimacy?
But then it struck me as I quickly closed my computer:
She had never been farther away.