Chapter 14
Chapter Fourteen
Private Message | EchoZone Internal Chat
To: DeadStrings
Subject: You Want Songs? I Want Fire.
You know what I’m tired of?
Being told that women with pianos are “emotional.”
That we’re “too much” when we write about things that actually happened.
We sing about heartbreak, trauma, shame, power, and, God forbid, desire—and suddenly it’s “indulgent” or “confessional” like we’re bleeding for sport.
So here. Here’s your playlist for the day. But please be assured that it isn’t for crying—or sulking.
This is a girl power trip through the wreckage—fuel-injected rage and clarity.
These aren’t sad songs.
They’re songs that take sadness and weld it into something alive with rage. Into a weapon to fight against injustice and discrimination.
“Sleep to Dream” —Fiona Apple
Let’s start with a piano that sounds like it’s dragging chains across your ribs. She doesn’t ask to be heard—she demands it because it’s her right.
Her mind, body, and voice can’t be stifled by anyone’s deviant ways.
Tell me that’s not the anthem of surviving every smug bastard who thought being a wolf wearing a sheep’s skin was the same as being kind.
“Crucify” —Tori Amos
This one burns. It’s rage dressed in soft lyrics.
It’s about shame, about the grind of trying to be palatable when every part of you wants to scream.
It’s the cost of being “good” just to make other people feel comfortable.
To get the approval and love you’ve been wanting since you were told only good girls will get it.
(All lies, by the way, you don’t get shit no matter what you do.)
This song is about sitting quiet, sitting still, swallowing your voice because you were taught that survival came with silence.
And still they wanted more. They demanded everything. Every single drop of her in exchange of nothing.
She sings like someone done apologizing for existing. There’s no fragility in it—just the exhaustion of living obediently while the world keeps carving pieces off of you.
And that piano?
That piano isn’t background—it’s an uprising.
It doesn’t accompany. It interrupts.
It’s confrontation in every chord, with hands slamming down truth that no one asked for—but needed to hear anyway.
This isn’t just a song. It’s a reckoning.
And if it makes you uncomfortable, good.
That means you’ve finally started listening.
“Not a Pretty Girl” —Ani DiFranco
She’s not here to be saved. And if the guitar sounds raw and frayed—it’s because so is she.
She’s not a pretty girl, that’s not what she is. We’re tired of being looked like pretty girls. We’re equal, and we need to be listened to.
We’re not complicated. You just don’t want to take a moment to get to know a woman. It’s all about serving you—but we’re done.
“Cornflake Girl” —Tori Amos
This one’s weird on purpose.
You don’t get it? Good. It’s not yours.
It’s about betrayal from inside the circle—how women get torn apart by other women when they follow the rules too long and don’t realize they still lose.
The piano is dancing on broken glass. Every lyric is layered like secrets passed through locked bathroom stalls.
“Carrion” —Fiona Apple
She’s not asking for your approval.
She’s saying: I’m not ruined. I’m raw, and there’s a difference.
She knows she’s a mess he doesn’t want to clean up. I feel just like that. But guess what? We still walk. We stand up, dust off our knees, and keep going.
Title of this list is probably: Burn It Down and Walk Through the Ashes
Listen or don’t.
But don’t pretend you haven’t needed songs like these before.
And if you say they’re “too much,” I’ll know you weren’t listening.
Private Message | EchoZone Internal Chat
From: DeadStrings
To: StringTheory27
Date: May 1st, 1997 11:24 PM
Subject: Burn Marks
You know that feeling when you hear something that wasn’t meant for you—but it hits anyway?
That was your list.
It wasn’t just the songs—though, holy hell, that piano in “Sleep to Dream” feels like a fist to the chest—but the way you talk about them.
Like you’ve lived inside each track.
Like they weren’t written so much as carved from somewhere inside you.
I won’t lie.
I listened to every one.
Twice.
By the end of “Carrion,” I sat there for a while, not knowing whether I wanted to punch something or write a song I’ve been avoiding for years.
An apology for every fucking second I made her suffer, for never having the guts to say I’m sorry in person .
. . for still loving her and not apologizing.
I’ve written about our love, our breakup, about us.
I’ve written about the fallout, the image of me alone in a room drunk, holding onto the memory of her.
But none of them come close to the true damage—the part where I took someone extraordinary and made her feel like an afterthought.
I never gave her the song that told her she deserved better.
Not because I didn’t want to. Because I couldn’t face myself long enough to finish the verse.
Because if I said it out loud, I’d have to accept that I was the reason she stopped waiting at the door.
I should at least write a letter asking for forgiveness for every moment I made her question her worth.
For every time I turned away when I should’ve stayed.
For the silence I fed her when she needed words.
And for still loving her and not becoming the person she believed I could be, back when belief was still something she offered me without asking for proof.
I get that you’re mad.
I just don’t fully get who you’re mad at.
The world? Men? Yourself? All of the above?
There’s this fire in your voice—like you’ve spent years keeping your head down, and now it’s all coming out in one breath.
And it’s powerful.
But also—yeah. It rattled me.
Not because you’re wrong, but because maybe I’ve been one of those guys standing a little too far back, trying not to get scorched, while women like you have been walking through flames alone.
There’s something I’ve wanted to ask, and I know it might sound ignorant, but .
. . what happens when the music stops? When the chords fade and the room goes quiet—do you let the fire die down, or does it stay with you?
Do you carry it? Does it change shape or just wait for the next chorus to pour through?
Tonight, listening to those songs, I didn’t just hear a playlist. I heard a life lived under pressure. I heard a scream that finally found its rhythm. And I don’t want to forget what it sounded like. I won’t.
If you ever feel like answering, I’ll be here.
And if not, I’ll still be listening. Tell me what set it off. Or don’t. Just know—I heard you.
Most of all, I won’t forget it.
Private Message | EchoZone Internal Chat
From: StringTheory27
To: DeadStrings
Date: May 2nd, 1997, 12:08 AM
Subject: No More Silence
You want to know where the fire goes when the music stops?
It doesn’t go anywhere.
It just waits. It coils beneath your ribs. It hums in the silence. It stares back at you when you close your eyes at night. And sometimes, when you’re told to sit still and smile, it begins to smoke.
I’ve spent my whole, entire life being told to be the bigger person by men who could barely manage their tempers but expected me to manage mine.
By a father who emotionally disappeared before I was old enough to realize that his distance was a wound, and not my fault.
He loved to act as if I was the mature one—like it was my job to understand why he was cold, cruel, or absent. He still acts like that, like I should absorb his silence and turn it into forgiveness.
He insists I should apologize for needing anything. Because I’m the daughter. Because I’m the girl. Because girls don’t rage. We simmer. We apologize. We nod.
Well—fuck that.
I’m done being patient.
I'm done being “understanding.” I’ve had enough of the whole “smiling while someone else falls apart and calls it character.” I’m over men—starting with my father—who expect every woman in their orbit to play interpreter, therapist, or emotional janitor.
I’m not your confessional. I’m not your redemption arc. I’m not a goddamn container for your regrets.
And I’m not your second chance if you couldn’t love me right the first time. You asked who I’m mad at.
I’m mad at every man who told me I was “too much” after draining everything out of me.
I’m mad at a culture that romanticizes broken boys and punishes angry girls. I’m mad at being asked to stay calm when I’ve never been given peace.
I’m mad that I still want love even though I’ve seen how it leaves.
I’m mad because even now, even here, part of me wonders if I’ve said too much. If I’ve made you uncomfortable. If I’ve burned the bridge instead of lighting the truth.
And you know what?
If it rattled you, good.
I’ve rattled myself.
Maybe that’s what waking up feels like after a lifetime of being polite.
So, yeah. The fire stays. It doesn’t go out after the last track.
It walks with me.
Tonight, I’m not ashamed of it, and if by any chance anyone tries to make me feel ashamed, I’ll just write them off. I’m fucking done.
The music . . . it’ll stay with me. I’ll write it for me and share it with those who deserve it.