The nights in Arizona usually weren't cold but as the years went by, global warming reared it's colder head into the desert land known as Chandler. A young man, 17 years old sat in his small silent room and listened to music playing at a soft enough volume to lull him to sleep. He had all kinds of music in his room, from records, to cassettes, to CD's. He had many different songs snd bands but the band that stuck out most to him was Pink Floyd.
There wasn't anything special about the classic band that seperated them from the others. He just liked the soothing vocals and guitar riffs. The social implications in their songs also fancied him. The earliest memory he had of Pink Floyd was when his father drove him to elementary school one morning and the end of "Another Brick in the Wall" came on to a station his father flipped to. The lyrics immediately connected with him and 4 hours into the day, he was sent home for screaming his educator, "HEY! TEACHER! LEAVE THOSE KIDS ALONE!" His father was obviously mad and punished his son by taking away his television set and video games. But he didn't take away his clock radio. For the next two weeks, that little boy listened to the radio until his bedtime just to catch the smallest part of that song.
A few years later he and his mother were at a record store looking for a record for his father for Christmas. They saw all kinds of records and over the distant loud speaker overhead, the song came on. His ears perked up and he went up to a cashier and begged him to tell him the name of the band and the album the song was featured on. The clerk told him and he ran to the section in which the album was and sure enough, "The Wall" by Pink Floyd was sitting there. He ran to his mom and showed her the album. Before he could ask to get it along with whatever record they were picking up for his dad, she smiled and said it was perfect for his father. His heart dropped because he knew his father never let him use the record player. But after Christmas, he had three days to himself before school started and after his parents went back to work.
He waved at his dad as he went to work but wasn't returned with one. It didn't matter at the moment because it was finally time to listen to the band that got him sent home. He carefully placed the record on the turntable and gently put the needle down. He turned the record player on and the record started turning. His heart stopped beating for 5 solid seconds that felt like 5 decades. But as soon as the first song started to play, he exhaled loudly. He smiled and pulled up a chair to sit back and listen to the magic that unfolded in "The Wall".
He woke up to the sound of nails on a chalkboard and jumped up when he saw the needle went too far in and was scratching the middle of the record. The needle was worn down to a flat surface instead of a point. He took the needle off and took the record off. The record was scratched badly but he was checking for the needle's integrity. He placed a second record down and tried using the same needle. The same effect happened, but this record was barely scratched compared to "The Wall". He panicked and put the record back in its casing and closed the record player. He ran to his room and laid down, waiting for his father to return home to a witted down needle and scratched record. At some point in time, he fell asleep to the sound of his slightly rapid breathing.
He woke up to the sound of his father cursing under his breath. Every other word he said was a different curse word and he could feel his fathers anger. He sat up and reluctantly opened his door. He walked down the hallway and saw his father pacing back and forth in the back room cursing. He opened the door and asked his dad what was wrong, trying to play it off like he was innocent.
"DID YOU TOUCH MY FUCKING RECORD PLAYER?! DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH THAT COST ME?! JESUS CHRIST WHY CAN'T YOU DO ANYTHING RIGHT?!" He opened his hand and smacked the boy for ruining his record player. The boy fell, red in the face and cried. He apologized for what seemed like an eternity and over time his father eased back on him by deep down he never forgave his son.
. . .
It is now 7 years after the record player incident and the boy is now a 17 year old teenager on the cusp of adulthood. He laid in his bed and listened to a Pearl Jam vinyl album he bought himself for his 16th birthday. He took the broken record player and had it fixed but his father already bought a newer one with the money he collected from a settlement he got after he was injured in a car accident.
Christmas was coming up and the only thing that he wanted was the only album he dreamed of but never had, "The Dark Side of the Moon" by none other than Pink Floyd. He constantly tried fitting himself in the conversation whenever his parents talked about the holidays and briefly mentioned the album. His parents only acknowledged him with a sigh or a quick glance but never anything more.
When Christmas morning came, the 17 year old youth ran to the living room and seperated the presents based off of their names. He bought his mother the slippers she said she liked and a new Kindle for her books; he bought his dad a digital picture album with old family photos. The last photo on the album was one of him and his dad at Disneyland. They stood in front of Space Mountain and it was one of the few pictures in which his father was smiling. His parents thanked him and watched him open up his presents. He received mostly clothes he would wear once and never see again and a few DVD's but he was really looking forward to one present.
There was a large box sitting out of view but his mother pulled it out and handed it to him. His heart raced and he opened it expecting there to be the album he'd been dreaming of. But he opened the box to find paper and pencils. He looked at his parents and they returned his look with an explanation. They thought that instead of going into music as a creative release he could try and write for a change and do something meaningful. He thanked them half heartedly and sulked to his room. He put all of his clothes away and sat on his bed. He threw the paper away and hid the pencils under his bed and cried. His mother came in at the sound of his sobs and asked what his problem was.
"I asked for one thing, and I told you guys I didn't care about anything else but this one thing and I spent my savings on your stuff and you couldn't listen to me just one time and show that you care!," he said between sobs.
"There are people all around you that don't get any of the the stuff you got today and you're crying because I didn't get you a CD? You're an ungrateful little brat and you don't deserve anything we got you. We didn't ask for you to get us those things, you did that on your own. Don't use that against us. Thanks for ruining Christmas."
She slammed the door and left him speechless at what she said. He laid in bed all day and stared at his closet door. He then decided a small plan in his head. He went to his parents bathroom and found leftover painkillers from his dad's accident. He put them in his bedside drawer and put on layers of clothes on. He went to the record store that he got his first vinyl. He entered and smiled at the single cashier working that day. He went to the back and made sure the clerk wasn't looking when he got near the Pink Floyd records. He put the record under his many layers and non chalantlty walked past the cashier. He smiled and said Merry Christmas and ran home before the cashier noticed the missing record.
When he got home neither of his parents cars were in the garage. They went to their families house and left him home alone. It'd be easier like this. He ate his favorite meal (a frozen chicken breast with mashed potatoe TV dinner) and brushed his teeth before getting in the shower. He put on the most comfortable sweatpants and warmest long sleeve shirt and put on socks and underwear straight out of the dryer.
He sat at the table his family used to eat at every day after his father got home from work and wrote his parents a note on the paper they got him with the pencil they got him. The note was three pages long.
He laid on his freshly made bed and put the stolen album on the record player. He sat back and closed his eyes and let the albums music travel through him. After 42 minutes and 49 seconds of pure gold through music, he took the needle off and cried. He had never experienced music like he did then and was so full of emotion that it overwhelmed him. He placed the needle back on the outside of the of the record and let it play from the beginning again. After the first song started playing, he opened the pill bottle and swallowed the remaining 14 pills his father neglected to take. It was in the middle of the song, "On the Run" he drifted into unconsciousness. He wasn't going to feel a thing.
