Johnny Boy {ON HOLD}

Chapter 4- Ukulele Girl

~Tyler~

"Hey, Tyler, are you okay?" Josh asks me for the hundredth time today.

"Yeah, I'm just a little tired. Do you realize how late we stayed up last night? I'm surprised you aren't tired," I respond, and he shrugs. We did stay up really late last night, and now I'm wondering how the heck either of us are staying up today. I look over to where he is, and I see he has the piece of notebook paper that has those terrible lyrics on it. "Hey, where did you get that?"

"Oh, this? I just held onto it after the meeting. I've been looking over it to make sure I couldn't help with it or anything. But you're the lyricist, not me," he answers, and I walk over and try to take it from him. Those lyrics have set me on edge recently, and I really don't want to think about them. I don't want to think about any of that stuff on this trip. I just want to relax and it's kind of hard to do that when he brings those lyrics up.

"Josh, I don't want to look at them! I just want to throw them away and forget they ever existed! Listen, I really want to forget any of that stuff while we're here. It's stressing me out and I don't want that stress with me right now. Please, just let me get rid of them so I can forget about it and relax for the rest of the trip," I plead, but he won't give them to me.

"You know if you put your mind to it you can fix them and make them better. Why not try it?"

"Because I have no motivation or desire to! I don't want to think about making music right now. I just want to relax and let that world disappear for a few more days. Is that too much to ask?" I wonder, and when he doesn't answer me, I know I need to calm myself down before I say something I'll regret. I grab my coat, and he asks where I'm going. "I just need to be by myself for a little bit. I'll be back soon." I grab the key card and I exit the room, zipping up my coat and preparing for the December cold. It's nearly January, though. The day after Christmas is colder than Christmas day, and it's only supposed to get colder as the week goes on. As soon I exit the hotel, I shiver a little bit as the cold hits me suddenly, but I keep walking. What else can I do to clear my head for a little bit?

I want to get back to making music, I really do, but it's just that at this moment I have no motivation, desire, or inspiration to do so, and I don't think Josh truly understands that. I think he's always motivated, but me, it's hard for me sometimes. Sometimes I just want to stay in bed and do nothing all day and talk to no one and just pretend that nothing exists and yeah. I'm sure that a lot of other people have those kinds of days, but when I'm having one of those days, it feels like I'm alone in feeling that way. But I know I'm not. But, then again, other days I just get so pumped up and motivated without even really doing anything and even if I don't have the inspiration to write I clean my entire house or something like that or I hang out with all of my friends or I just want to be around people in general. Unfortunately, the first kind of day is so much more common than the second kind. Like I said, I know I'm not alone in feeling that way, and I know that there are people who have it worse than me, but at the same time...just let me be human.

At first, I had no clue what to do once I started walking around. Should I go to Central Park? Or maybe Times Square? Or should I just walk without really having a purpose to my walking? I really don't like doing things without a purpose, so I try to think of a purpose until suddenly, a purpose was given to me. In the air, I can just barely hear the chords of a familiar ukulele. I start to walk, using the music to guide my path. I follow the music in the air, still not quite able to tell what's being played or if it's who I think it is. I just follow the music as far as I can before it disappears. As soon as it disappears, I can't help but wonder if it was ever there in the first place. After all, when I was hearing it, it was so faint and quiet I might have imagined it. But why would I imagine it? Maybe I'm going out of my mind again, but I don't think so. I haven't really been worried about that since the last time, and I got through that. I stand around for a while, unsure of what to do now that I've lost the music, when quickly, it comes back again, just as quiet as it was before.