Dreamboy, Episode One: Goodnight, Esmerelda

Hey hey, Jeffrey Kraner from welcome to Night Vale here.

Apart from Night Vale, we make other podcasts.

If you're already a big Night Vale fan, check out Good Morning Night Vale, where cast members Meg Bashwiner, Symphony Sanders, and Hal Lublin break down each and every episode.

Or if you're looking for more weird fiction, there's Within the Wires, an immersive fiction podcast written by me and novelist Janina Mathewson.

Each season is a standalone tale told in the guise of found audio.

Finally, maybe you like horror movies or are scared of horror movies but are horror curious, check out Random Number Generator Horror Podcast Number 9, where me and the voice of Night Vale Cecil Baldwin talk about a randomly drawn horror film.

We have new episodes every single week.

So that's Good Morning Nightvale Within the Wires and Random Horror 9.

Go to nightvalepresents.com for more or get those podcasts wherever you get your podcasts.

If you're dying for the next batch of Wednesday Season 2 to drop on Netflix, then I'll let you in on a secret.

The Wednesday Season 2 official official Wocast is already here.

Dive deeper into the mysteries of Wednesday with the Ultimate Companion Video Podcast.

Join the frightfully funny Caitlin Riley along with her producer, Thing, as she sits down with the cast and crew.

Together, they'll unravel each shocking twist, dissect the dynamics lurking beneath, unearth Adam's family lore, and answer all of your lingering questions.

Guests include Emma Myers, Joy Sunday, Hunter Doohan, Steve Buscemi, Fred Armison, Catherine Zeta-Jones, the Joanna Lumley, also show creators Al Goh and Miles Miller, and of course Wednesday herself, Jenna Ortega, plus many, many more.

With eight delightfully dark episodes to devour, you'll be drawn into the haunting halls of Nevermore Academy deeper than ever before.

But beware, you know where curiosity often leads.

The Wednesday season two official wocast is available in audio and video on todoom.com or wherever it is you get your podcasts.

Hey there, we have a brand new fiction podcast podcast premiering today, and it's going to be your new favorite podcast.

It's called Dream Boy, all one word, and it's about Dane, a spun-out musician who's spending the winter in Cleveland, Ohio.

While there, he gets swept into a story about dreams, creepy girl scouts, and a murderous zebra named Zoe.

The Guardian called Dream Boy an instant nightvale classic that's full of mystery and rich characters.

As I just said, your new favorite podcast.

After this episode, make sure you subscribe to the show at DreamboyPodcast.com or whatever podcast app you're using right now.

Just a quick warning, this show does feature adult language.

The Milky Way Galaxy

Planet Earth.

Cleveland,

Ohio.

Twelve-year-old Esmeralda looks out the window of her father's single-engine airplane.

All of Cleveland is rolling underneath her.

The trees look just like broccoli, she thinks.

And the lake looks like one of her mom's silver plates.

And it's getting bigger in her eyes.

and she smiles

now little Esmeralda doesn't know this probably but a hundred years ago or so her great great grandfather John Stonefall the oil tycoon bought all the land currently rolling underneath her for a suspiciously small sum

But rather than build on the land like everyone expected, he instead had it all dug up leaving mounds of dirt everywhere, much to the chagrin of the locals.

Petitions were signed, ladies groups had lunches.

Finally, as a compromise, Stonefall filled most of the holes, built a summer home on a small piece of the land, and donated the rest to the city of Cleveland for parks.

The Stonefalls ended up liking it in Cleveland.

Despite the controversy, they were happy there, and they bred like rabbits.

becoming more and more cousins with cleaner and cleaner money.

And that money eventually thinned and settled, became locked up in foundations, orchestras, zoos.

Many of these cousins left Cleveland, but a few stayed, their lives buoyed by the steady pumping of old trusts.

And it was one of these cousins, a guy named Roger Parring.

A man made foggy from a life of never having had to know that he had never really had, who took his little daughter Esmeralda Parring for a ride in their single-engine airplane.

Now, later on that night, they will show their flight path on the news, a single red line that ends abruptly in the solid blue section at the top of the map graphic.

Apparently, their engine began to malfunction as they were right over Pepper Heights, and people on the news later will say they could hear it.

A sound like a saw in the sky.

But while that plane was still in the air above Pepper Heights, I didn't hear it.

I was far below, sleeping late in an old bed in my friend's guest room.

Huge white clouds were racing through the sky, making the light in my bedroom change from bright to dim to bright to dim.

But I didn't notice that either.

I was deep in a dark dream.

Now my dreams are pretty fucked up usually.

Like me and my mom are astronauts and she's floating away and I can't do anything about it.

Or like the train car I'm on is full of a thousand big fat, slow black flies landing on everybody's face and lips and they don't notice.

They're just reading their Kindles, that sort of thing.

And I don't dream about sex that often, but when I do, it's always something really awful.

Like,

I'm at the deli, and the guy behind the counter is making me fuck my cousin Brian in front of a line of old ladies waiting for their hands.

And I can't get hard, and everybody's waiting.

Anyway, ever since I got to Cleveland, I've been having this strange recurring dream.

And it always starts the same.

I'm in the water, hanging suspended, and it's deep water.

And it's dark, I can't see anything.

The water is the same temperature as my body.

It feels pleasant.

My hair is just gently swaying.

And then I feel a little bit of cold on my legs.

And at first I think it feels sort of nice.

And then a little bit more cold.

And then slowly I realize

that something huge is moving underneath me.

I start to freak out and I start to try to get away.

But I can't get anywhere.

The water isn't moving and I feel the coldness coming up more and more coldness.

Like the thing is getting closer and closer.

So I start to thrash and I open my mouth to scream, but the icy water rushes in.

It hits the back of my throat and zooms down into my stomach.

I feel it fill me up.

And then it zigzags its way through my intestines like a cold knife.

And just before it gets to the back of my asshole, I wake up.

Throw off the covers and I look down.

And my dick is rock hard.

Like...

So hard that it's actually like bobbing up and oh fuck, I am late for work.

I jump out of bed.

I throw on my faded red Zen Art Corporation t-shirt and I tuck my boner into my shorts as best I can.

I run downstairs and I grab a Pop-Tart and I dump a glass of water on the counter somewhere near the plants and then boom, I'm out the door.

I usually walk through the neighborhood, Woodshire to York to Willowbrook to Cedar Ridge, and then I cut through the woods.

But now I have to run right down the main street area of Pepper Heights, Rivington Road, because I'm running late.

I get to the four-way stop, and people in Ohio are way too polite for four-way stops, so everybody just sort of sits there and goes, no, you go, first, no, you go, first, no, I know, you'll, please, I have sippy, so I just run diagonally right across the just screaming.

Now the thing about Rivington Road is it's a busy little street.

It's all these different kinds of food, an Indian, Ethiopian, a ramen place, a sushi place, a Chinese food place, a toy shop, an independent book shop, records, second-hand clothes, Peruvian imports, a head shop, a couple of bars, and even a gay bar.

All in like a a few blocks.

And it's always crowded.

And there's always so many different kinds of people.

And outside of New York, I'd never really seen anything like Pepper Heights.

It was such a mix of people, people from every country and every income bracket, all living in the same neighborhood.

It felt like some sort of lefty public TV fantasy.

All these different kinds of lovely humans right here on Remington, but not a single fucking one of them knows how to walk at the right speed.

Move!

I turn the corner right by the mirror store, and boom!

I see a truck.

I almost run into it.

Some sort of utilities truck.

It's like parked half on the grass and half in the street.

And I hear cussing coming from somewhere close.

Cocksucker, motherfucker, son of a bitch.

And it sounds like it's coming from above me, so I look up and there's a sort of crane coming up from the utilities truck to a bucket and there's a man in the bucket filling with the light pole, but I can't really see him because he's silhouetted by the sun, but he's just cussing up a storm.

I've never heard somebody cuss so blatantly and out in the open.

And I mean, this is a neighborhood.

There's like old ladies and like little kids.

Hey, a little girl comes out of nowhere.

She almost runs me over on her bike.

Jesus.

Okay.

Just a few more blocks.

And I don't have to run anymore.

I think I can just walk briskly.

I don't want to be a complete sweaty mess when I get there.

And I'm only 13 minutes late.

That's not so bad, that's close to 10 minutes, it's almost 10 minutes late.

Okay.

I get to the side entrance, this big metal building, and above the door, there's a sign that says Zenark Corporation, Shuttle Bay 5.

I stop for a minute.

I take a breath.

And then I open the big metal door.

The cold air instantly hits me.

The security guard gets up from his chair and blocks the hallway.

He crosses his arms and stands in front of me.

His eyes narrow as he demands to see my ID badge.

Really, I've worked here for three weeks.

And I'm late.

After a ridiculous amount of looking at me up and down, looking at my badge, then looking back at me, and then looking at my badge again,

he lets me pass.

Four more heavy metal doors, and finally,

I'm in the shuttle bay.

Mission log 10182135.

Project objective.

To survey the 69 known moons of Jupiter for possible helium-2 deposits.

You are to report any signs of helium-2 directly to your superiors at Zenark Corporation upon debriefing.

All 69 target moons are classified as lifeless.

But nonetheless, you are advised to keep your scanners on.

Be safe and happy hunting, miners.

Okay, hold on for a second.

I know what you're thinking.

Cleveland?

Why Cleveland?

Why did I go to Cleveland?

Well, I went to Cleveland

because I was tired.

Tired in...

tired in like a cosmic sense in like a big sense not just like day-to-day tired not like i need a nap tired but like i need a six month soul nap tired

And my friend Emily was going to be gone for six weeks.

So she said, come stay in my house, water my plants, and you can be alone.

And I thought, alone?

Alone time.

That sounds great.

It's what a gift to somebody who's been living in New York, especially a musician.

So I thought, I'll write an album.

And so I went.

I took my keyboard.

I set it up in her living room.

I turned it on.

I sat on the bench.

and grindered

and ate my way through an Amazon shipping error of Doritos, but

every once in a while my free hand would reach out and blindly finger a random cord.

Grinder, for some people, I think is fun.

Like they can just pop into it and then pop right back out of it whenever they're done.

But for me, I've never been able to stop having fun, but not in like a,

not in like a, I'm always having fun kind of a way, but in like a, like, there's so much fun that it hurts kind of a way.

And it just eats all my time.

Obsessively.

But after three days, I still hadn't gotten laid, and all my white keys were orange.

So I deleted Grinder again and started looking for a job.

But after literally walking into a mirror while dropping off my application at the American Apparel and being given what I thought was a rather gauche, but nonetheless classic, runaround by the assistant manager at the Chipotle, I was running out of options within walking distance.

But I finally scored a late-season job working at this tiny little neighborhood amusement park.

It's called the Pepper Height Zoo.

Now this place had been a risk-free tax haven since before plastic was invented.

It was like a nursing home for old oil money.

And the zoo part was a motley collection of creatures gotten cheap for various reasons.

But the most popular attraction by far, the animal in all the lunchboxes, the star, was an elderly zebra named Zoe.

Now I don't really have any experience with animals myself, so they gave me a job as a ride attendant on one of the few rides, this large indoor roller coaster called Jupiter's Lifeless Moons.

It was right next to Zoe's exhibit.

Everyone just referred to it as the moons.

It was a pretty tame ride, actually, with a rider minimum height of only 48 inches, 44 if you had an adult.

The whole idea was that it was a space shuttle that took space prospectors out to the moons of Jupiter to look for helium-2 deposits.

And my job as an employee of the fake space prospecting company, the Zen Art Corporation, was to unload the kids, instruct them to report any helium-2 deposits during their debriefing in in the next room.

And I had to use my most official sounding voice.

And the park did a pretty good job making it all seem spacey and fun.

There were flashing lights and space props.

And in line, you heard a robot voice saying the mission objective on Loop.

Mission Long, 1018-2135.

There was even like space adventure music playing from hidden speakers during the ride itself.

That was a cool thing about the Pepper Height Zoo.

They piped in music all over the park, like specifically made for the park.

A lot of it was recorded years ago by these three ladies.

They were sisters.

The

Schröderbird, the something sisters.

I don't know, but you can buy their CD in the gift shop.

Only dream boy.

Dream boy,

dream boy.

You're my only

dream boy.

Dreams fade

into the night.

But rather than die away,

why won't you stay?

Dream,

boy,

dream,

boy,

you're my

only

But they also recorded a theme song for Zoe the Zebra.

And since the ride shared its huge metal building with part of Zoe's exhibit, I did have to listen to that on loop for my entire shift.

Other than that, it was a pretty easy gig though.

I just had to stand behind my podium and say my one line into this rank microphone that Jesus smelled like a hundred summers worth of spit.

Attention all miners aboard Shuttle 5.

Please report your Helium 2 findings in the debriefing room.

The lap bars clank open and the kids scramble out.

They all run into the next room, the debriefing room.

But one girl lags behind.

She stands there beside the track.

I realize slowly that I recognize her.

She has ridden the ride several times this week.

And she's dressed like a Catholic schoolgirl, or I don't know what I think they dress like.

The lat bars slam down automatically on the coaster behind her, but she doesn't jump.

The empty car disappears into the dark tunnel to pick up another batch of kids in the next room, leaving us alone.

Are you okay?

I'm perfectly fine.

Okay, you, um...

You need to report to debriefing.

Please.

I'm nearly 60 inches tall.

Um.

I know it's all pretend.

Okay, well, you still have to leave before the shuttle comes back, though, okay?

I know.

I just thought I'd wait till they clear out a little.

The other kids.

She nodded towards the debriefing room, but she wasn't really looking at it.

She wasn't looking at me either.

And she spoke like a small adult from the 1960s in that creepy way that kids who were raised by their grandparents sound.

Her eyes settle on a far door.

I instinctively step out from behind my podium.

Then another door opens and a man enters.

He walks quickly towards me.

His nice suit makes him look completely out of place, but he stops when he notices the little girl.

Oh, hello there.

He winks at me as he walks over to her and bends down to her eye level.

So, tell me, do you have any helium deposits to report?

She says nothing.

She just glares at him.

It's the kind of glare that stays anchored on his face as she walks around him and disappears into the debriefing room behind him.

Oh,

that's a great age.

This man is Eli Kritsch, the director of the Pepper Heights Zoo.

Hello, Dwayne.

It's um, uh, Dane.

Actually.

Oh, yes, of course.

I'm sorry, Dane.

Dane, Dane, Dane, Dane, Dane, Dane, Dane, Dane, Dane, Dane, Dane.

I knew that.

Dane, Dane, how are you liking it over here at the Moons?

Um, it's fine.

Somewhere else in the building, the old roller coaster car makes a turn, and the whole building responds with a soft metallic groan.

Okay.

Well, I just wanted to give you an updated set of keys.

Changed the locks last night.

I can't be too careful.

What with the current

rig-amarole situation?

He sets a keyring onto the podium.

Two shiny new keys on it.

That's the broom closet.

That's the front of the ride.

And that should do you.

Then he smiles, and there's an awkward moment where he's just smiling at me.

And then the smile turns off like a neon sign, and he walks away.

But he stops short in the middle of the shuttle bay and turns back around.

That green shuttle-approaching light flashing on his nice suit.

Oh, and Dean,

you do know that door leads to Zoe's nighttime enclosure.

Yes.

He points at the far door.

I nod slowly.

Now I've always loved the grocery store at night.

Like a 24-hour grocery store is like my church.

And it's mostly because there are no people.

Yeah, sure.

But also because everything's been restocked and straightened and it's perfectly neat.

There's just row upon row of brightly colored boxes with little cartooned faces all peeking out the same way.

And I think it's because everything's so neat and there are no people moving around and there's this bouncy music playing that if you look for it, you can really glimpse the shape of a terrible screaming skull behind the gorgeous face that is the grocery store.

And it hits you.

You're standing in a warehouse of death.

A plant and animal morgue.

Tonight, I want a pie.

But the bakery section of the store is dark.

Like the lights were out in just that corner.

And also the pie case, I know exactly where it's at.

I can see it from here, but it has a shorted light tonight.

And it's blinking randomly, giving the whole bakery section a sort of bad part of town feel.

Now,

I'm...

Maybe a bad boy, maybe not a bad boy, depends on who you ask, but I'm certainly not afraid of the dark.

And I mean, sort of a rebel.

I even have the cart cart with a squeaky wheel, so I like

squeak right over to that bakery section.

Squeaky, squeaky, squeaky, squeaky, squeaky, squeaky, squeaky.

And as soon as I cross the threshold, I see him sitting in shadow.

Three little girls, Girl Scouts, maybe, behind a table.

About 12 years old, give or take.

They had dull eyes over thin smiles.

Good morning.

Oh,

I recognized the one girl from the ride earlier.

It's the girl that lagged behind, and she recognizes me.

And the other two are twins, but with different hair.

Uh, are you, uh, selling something?

No,

but if you'd like to donate, we'd be most appreciative.

Don't

uh oh

oh, so you don't have like you don't have cookies

or uh or anything.

I just thought, you know, bakery section, um, Girl Scouts, that maybe you have you're not affiliated with the Girl Scouts of America.

I reached into my pocket and I thought I'll just give them a dollar and be on the minimum donation is three dollars for the pamphlet.

But that's called selling something.

What's the pamphlet about?

They hold up a small paper book, the title elegantly printed in dark blue ink on cream-colored cardstock.

It reads, Friends till the end, advocating for animals.

What are you raising money for, anyway?

Zoe.

Zoe.

The zebra.

We're raising money to save her.

Apparently, the zoo is too broke to do anything about it, even though they seem to have plenty of money for that stupid new exhibit.

It's stupid!

How do you forget a whole city?

You work there, don't you?

Yeah.

Part-time.

Walking home, I couldn't stop thinking of how that little girl said the word zebra.

Zebra.

Her weird little voice and her weird little cold blue eyes, like two little hard candies that someone spat on the sidewalk.

Now I just want to get home.

It feels weird being out in the open.

And this pie is hurting my arm.

Ugh, thank God.

I walk up Emily's steps.

I open the screen door, but it hits something.

I bend down to pick it up.

What the?

It's a small cardboard box.

It feels warm in my hand.

There's a name written on top of the box in beautiful cursive.

Luke Prescott.

I don't know anybody named Luke.

I look around.

Nobody's out.

All the windows and all the houses are dark.

Then the smell hits me.

Cinnamon and cardamom.

I look down.

I open the box.

And more of that smell billows up.

It's a small spice cake.

And it smells like a thousand Christmases.

I instantly feel wrong for looking, so I close the box back up again.

I go inside and put the cake in the fridge.

I think I'll just text Emily tomorrow and be like, do you know anybody named Luke?

I get a fork and I sit down with the pie box in front of the TV.

I open it and I wait for a pillow of delicious smell to hit me, but it doesn't.

The pie seems to have no smell compared to the cake.

I take a bite anyway and turn on the news.

Some millionaire and his daughter.

crashed their plane into the lake.

Search and rescue operations are underway.

People on the news are pointing to the sky and talking at the camera.

They show a picture that the father posted to social media right before the flight.

It's the two of them standing next to the plane, her smiling really big.

And it was captioned Esmeralda's first plane ride.

I take a bite of pie and stare at Esmeralda's face.

Then I stop chewing.

I think of the bottom of the lake.

I think of that plane,

folded up like a sleeping bird down there.

And I think of that man, slumped over in the crushed cockpit, his daughter trapped in the back seat behind him.

And then suddenly I feel like I'm in that back seat, unable to move.

Looking at the back of my dad's head, his blood like

ribbons of red silk in the water.

And then I...

I just have this feeling.

In my gut.

I just know.

They're never gonna find this plane.

They will never find Esmeralda Parring.

She'll be down there alone forever.

The bite of pie is mush in my mouth.

I swallow it and turn the TV off.

And then there's only my reflection

and the dark glass

looking back at me.

Dream Boy is co-created by Dane Terry and Ellie Heyman.

Developed and directed by Ellie Heyman.

Written, composed, and performed by Dane Terry.

Featuring Cecil Baldwin, Avery Drought, Gianna Mossy, and Morgan Meadows.

Sound designed, engineered, mixed, and mastered by Chris Weingarten at Banana Peel Studio.

Creative producing and assistant direction by Ashlyn Hatch.

Editing by Alexander Charles Adams.

Marketing by Adam Cecil.

A very special thanks to Christy Gressman and Night Vale Presents.

And remember, if you want to hear more of Dream Boy, subscribe at DreamboyPodcast.com or in your podcast app.

Mike and Alyssa are always trying to outdo each other.

When Alyssa got a small water bottle, Mike showed up with a four-liter junk.

When Mike started gardening, Alyssa started beekeeping.

Oh, come on.

They called it truce for their holiday and used Expedia Trip Planner to collaborate on all the details of their trip.

Once there, Mike still did more laps around the pool.

Whatever.

You were made to outdo your holidays.

We were made to help organize the competition.

Expedia, made to travel.

I'm Amy Nicholson, the film critic for the LA Times.

And I'm Paul Scheer, an actor, writer, and director.

You might know me from the League Veep or my non-eligible for Academy Award role in Twisters.

We love movies, and we come at them from different perspectives.

Yeah, like Amy thinks that, you know, Joe Pesci was miscast in Goodfellas, and I don't.

He's too old.

Let's not forget that Paul thinks that Dune 2 is overrated.

It is.

Anyway, despite this, we come together to host Unspooled, a podcast where we talk about good movies, critical hits, fan favorites, must-sees, and in case you missed them.

We're talking Parasite the Home Alone, From Greece to the Dark Knight.

We've done deep dives on popcorn flicks, we've talked about why Independence Day deserves a second look, and we've talked about horror movies, some that you've never even heard of, like Kanja and Hess.

So, if you love movies like we do, come along on our cinematic adventure.

Listen to Unspooled wherever you get your podcasts.

And don't forget to hit the follow button.

Hi, I'm here to tell you about Good Morning Nightvale.

Welcome to Night Vale's official recap show and unofficial best friend food podcast.

Join me, Meg Bashwiner, and fellow tri-hosts, Hal Lovelin and Symphony Sanders, as we dissect all of the cool, squishy, and slimy bits of every episode of Welcome to Night Vale.

Come for the insightful and hilarious commentary, and stay for all of the weird and wild behind-the-scenes stories.

Good morning, Nightfale, with new episodes every other Thursday.

Get it wherever you get your podcasts.

Yes, even there.