Chapter 64
Chapter Sixty-Four
DeadStrings: Are you there?
DeadStrings: We have to prepare for the new week?
DeadStrings: I take it your friend is resting.
StringTheory27: Or partying. She left on Thursday with a friend, and I haven’t heard from her since.
DeadStrings: Should you check on her?
StringTheory27: I did, and she said: We’re taking the weekend off. One of the guys she was with cut the conversation, telling me to go get laid. The nerve.
DeadStrings: Does she know you’re going through a breakup?
StringTheory27: No, but when I tell her she’s going to wanna celebrate. She hated my ex. She called him perfect and not in a nice way.
DeadStrings: Was he perfect?
StringTheory27: I . . . maybe on paper. He was that reliable guy who wouldn’t hurt you.
DeadStrings: Safe?
StringTheory27: Exactly. Have you ever dated a safe girl?
DeadStrings: I didn’t date after I broke up with my . . . she was everything, you know?
StringTheory27: Never dated?
DeadStrings: Nope. I fucked around, but that was the extent of it. I love her too much to know that I can’t ever fall that way again. What about you?
StringTheory27: I loved someone like that, but I did try to date after him. I got crushed. Not because I was in love, but because I realized I was used by every man I went out with. Tragic, really.
DeadStrings: Is this why you’re trying to read self-help books?
StringTheory27: Yep. I bought a new one today.
“How to Stop Loving Your Ex and Start Loving Yourself.” Cheesy title, but the first chapter slapped me across the face—in a good way.
Said something like, “The people who leave aren’t always villains.
But that doesn’t mean they get to take up space in your head forever. ” I dog-eared that one.
DeadStrings: Sounds like it hit a nerve.
StringTheory27: More like a truth I’ve been avoiding. I keep trying to fix myself so I can be “better next time,” but maybe there’s no next time. Perhaps it’s just me learning to like being alone and not treating it like a punishment.
DeadStrings: You think being alone is the same as being lonely?
StringTheory27: Not always. But sometimes. For example, when I make tea, I realize I’m the only one drinking it. Or when I hear a joke and my first instinct is to tell someone, I realize that there’s no one by my side to listen to it.
DeadStrings: That feeling never really goes away. Even if you move on. Wanting to reach out and say ‘hey, look what I just read’ or ‘listen to this new song.’
StringTheory27: That’s what scares me. What if we never stop loving the people who wrecked us? What if the wreckage becomes part of who we are?
DeadStrings: Maybe it does. Maybe you just build around it?
StringTheory27: That’s what the book says. That healing isn’t erasing—it’s renovating. You keep the broken parts, but you change the layout.
DeadStrings: You sound like you’re trying.
StringTheory27: I am starting. Today, it even felt like I was getting somewhere.
DeadStrings: You should keep his toothbrush in sight, like a warning sign.
StringTheory27: That’s dark.
DeadStrings: So am I.
StringTheory27: You know what I need? A song that makes me feel like I survived something. Got one?
DeadStrings: You want triumphant? Or quietly victorious?
StringTheory27: Something that says I’m working on it. I’m not healed, but . . . I’m still here.
DeadStrings: “Street Spirit (Fade Out)” —Radiohead. It doesn’t celebrate. It endures. That counts for something.
StringTheory27: Since you’re a Radiohead geek, you’ll understand this. “Creep” came on the radio while I was clearing out my closet earlier. Not the metaphorical one—my actual closet.
It caught me off guard. I’d forgotten how raw it is. Right as I’m dropping all those raggedy t-shirts I’ve been saving for years, I’m listening to Thom. I didn’t even realize I’d sat down until the last note faded. The line that hit me, when he says he wants her to notice when he’s not around—God.
It’s not even about love. It’s about worth. About wanting to be seen when you already know you’re not the one they’ll choose. I used to think it was a sad boy anthem. Now I think it’s a human anthem.
Everyone’s been there. Wanting to be enough and knowing you aren’t. Anyway, I tossed out his hoodie too. Finally.
DeadStrings: That one wrecks me every time. But you know what? If we’re talking “Creep,” I’m gonna swap versions on you.
StringTheory27: You’re not going to say TLC, are you?
DeadStrings: No. Stone Temple Pilots.
Their “Creep” is a different beast. It concedes. That lethargic drawl, the murky guitar—Scott Weiland sounds like a man already halfway underground, and the shovel’s in his own hands.
That chorus where he’s saying he’s half the man he used to be . . . fuck. It’s a punchline to a joke no one laughed at. It’s resignation. But with rhythm.
Feels like Sunday mornings where you stare at the ceiling and know damn well you’ve got to change—but not today. Today, you just exist with the ache.
Maybe that’s survival too.
You cleared your closet.
That’s something.
Let’s just call today an STP day.
And maybe tomorrow, we pick a fight with hope again
StringTheory27: Are you planning on picking a fight?
DeadStrings: Fight for myself, yes. It’s time that I figure out what I’m going to do with myself. Maybe I can even get a new driver’s license.
StringTheory27: Right, you lost yours. Are you ever going to tell me how?
DeadStrings: Nope. I’m not proud of it—and I don’t remember much. Yes, you can judge me. I was a fucked-up mess.
StringTheory27: Maybe instead of half a man, you might become whole. Go against Scott Weiland.
DeadStrings: Go against Scott Weiland? That’s sacrilege. But I get what you mean. Half a man is still breathing. Whole means waking up and actually trying.
I’ve been hiding behind lyrics too long. Maybe it’s time I start writing some of my own again—without pretending they’re about someone else.
StringTheory27: That would be a good start. Just you. Raw and uncomfortable. Let it bleed a little—just enough to know it’s real. And if it helps, I’ll read the lyrics. Won’t critique. Won’t quote Nietzsche. Just . . . listen. I might even add a melody to them if I feel frisky.
DeadStrings: You always do. Even when I don’t know how to speak. It’s strange how someone you’ve never met can feel like the only one who doesn’t look away. Melodies are good. I haven’t been able to play anything good in a long time.
StringTheory27: I don’t look away because I know how it feels when everyone else does.
That’s why I stay. And maybe because I’m curious about the song you’d write if you weren’t trying to sound clever—or pretending for the rest of the world. If you just . . . told the truth.
DeadStrings: It wouldn’t rhyme.
It wouldn’t chart.
But maybe it would feel like standing up straight for the first time in years.
StringTheory27: I’d listen to that. Even if it’s just one verse and a messy bridge that goes nowhere. Especially if it’s that. We’re all a bit off-key these days anyway.
DeadStrings: God, I wish I could hug you through this damn screen. You’re like a sad song that still makes me smile.
StringTheory27: That’s the best compliment I’ve had all week. Now write your damn song—or rest so you can find the life you want to live. If you do write a song—or an album—you can title it “Reckoning at the DMV.”
DeadStrings: Reckoning at the DMV. Track one on my redemption arc. Stay tuned.