"Car Radio"

Chapter Six: "I Need Something."

Pacing back and forth, my rug began to look like someone drug something incredibly heavy across it. Only, the heaviness seemed to sit inside my own mind. Weightless, except for the transference of my own feet, using the soles of my shoes, to grind the carpet against the ground, as if they were finely ground coffee beans. It'd been three days since I'd written my untitled song, and my mind was still drenched in confusion.

I didn't know what bothered me more, the fact that I was curious enough about God, to talk to him through this piece of paper, or Furious to scream these lyrics out loud for no one to hear. Either way; I was still constantly in this battle; of choosing what's right and what's wrong. I wanted to love myself, but I couldn't; I felt like I was becoming a lost cause. Of course, my parents would give me the basketball, and shove me outside when they knew I was bored, because it'd help me. Basketball helped me learn a lot about self-worth, angles, precision and being the best.

But was it really what I was meant to do?

This struggle sat on top of my head for the next few years, until I finally happened to come across two guys who seemed relatively interested in the aspect of playing music for fun. Occasionally I'd look at them with this look of excitement, but they would shoot me down, as if this wasn't something they were interested in doing in front of people.

Suddenly, I didn't mind being the center of attention. I wanted people to know my story, even if they didn't know me. What's the worst that could happen? They'd boo us off the stage and give us the finger? So many musicians have done that in the past, and look how they turned out.

I continued to write, in my spare time, keeping tons of half-written in journals for safe keeping and further use, possibly later in life. Even though I was in a good space, my head wasn't. I was beginning to think negative thoughts that were darker than the darkest night. I couldn't handle myself, but I was trying so hard.

That night, I walked out to our porch and sat on the steps with my journal, the wind was timid and shy, and was barely noticable, but you could feel the chill when it passed through you, almost like the ghost of an old friend. My eyes closed as I hung my head, shaking it absent-mindedly. I was thinking too much. Just like I always tend to do, but this time, the lyrics weren't coming to me.

I glanced over to the side of the porch and noticed a rope laying over the side of the railing, and my heart skipped a beat, and made it hard for me to swallow. Something about that image, made me uneasy, not because I was afraid.

It was because I wasn't.

I began to hum a slight melody in the back of my throat and for the first time, I noticed something bubbling inside of me that I hadn't recognized before. I was being honest about death. Even if it was just a few words jammed between the spaces and lines on the paper before me. It was there to show that I was ready to leave.

I wrote these few lines, and grunted, Everything around me seemed to stop, all I could hear was the swaying and creaking of the rope on the porch railing. Taking a deep breath I walked over to the railing, and picked up rope, which seemed almost too heavy to pick up. I was being ridiculed. Mocked, by my own mind.

I tossed the rope over the side of the porch railing and grabbed my journal and walked back into my room, not paying any notice to anyone that was awake in the house at that time. I looked at the book, and glanced down at the page I'd just written in, The title of my newest poem.

"I need Something To Kill Myself."

Not just something. Anything. I needed an excuse. I needed a reason to believe in God, a reason to believe in myself. I was hungry but I wasn't finding anything to stave off my starvation. I was incredibly alone, even though my house was full.