We Made You || An Eminem FanFiction

Walking In Memphis

"You know I have been known to be compared to Elvis myself" Marshall announced, walking into the living room shirtless in nothing but basketball shorts.

I had been strumming of Walking In Memphis while I was sitting cross-legged, on the rather large plush sofa of the apartment living room that was rented for him in LA.

"Because you're the king of rap?"

"I, well-" he said and cocked an eyebrow "I like to think it's why the honor is bestowed to me, but it's more... Racial then that, and it's not overly a positive reason either"

"Oh, well I would take it as the first reason" I shrugged as he moved around the living room.

"You only say that because you are literally dubbed the "Queen of Country" He said sitting down next to me "Guess I'm the King by association"

"I believe Dolly is still technically the Queen, I am but a humble princess, and I was told you were the King of Detroit"

"I am, that's true" Marshall rolled his eyes "I think even Dolly would admit to having passed on the throne, don't be so modest"

"Sure," I said and went back to strumming.

Marshall stood up again and paced the living room.

He was acting very erratic.

I placed the guitar next to me.

"Are you okay?"

He nodded and started to dig through the backpack on the couch.

"Are you sure?"

He pulled out a notebook and pen, sat down, and started to scribble like a maniac.

I sat and watched him as he scrawled across the pages with his left hand, line after line in the most curious of manners.

He wrote his lyrics exactly how I expected his creative mind to work, intricate and meticulous.

"Why do you write like that?"

He looked up as he finished writing it down.

"So people can't steal my shit if I lose it, I have like a system, I know what I'm reading and how to read it"

"You're the most fascinating person I've ever met," I said in awe.

It was true.

Marshall was unique.

Being in the industry I had heard a lot about him, mostly bad.

But getting to know him as a person opened my eyes.

For most of my life I've had to pretend and be what everyone else wanted me to be, on what people told me to do, and act like everyone wasn't lying to my face.

Marshall had taught me one thing since knowing him and that was nothing is what it seems.

They called him arrogant and misogynistic.

He was far from that, perhaps slightly overconfident, but I wouldn't exactly call him arrogant in person, that was all part of the act.

That was Eminem.

Cocky, self-aware and sure of himself.

Eminem was the showman.

Slim Shady was the one who spoke his mind.

And Marshall Mathers was the heart and soul of his music.

Sometimes I thought maybe I should take on a persona.

But then I realized, I have been playing one my whole life.

"This is nice" Marshall said, breaking me out of my thoughts.

"It is?"

"Yeah, I love my girls, but the silence is nice with you"

I looked at him confused "How so?"

"You're easy to be around, it's hard to explain, I'm a pretty meticulous person, and a lot of people tend to interrupt me, wanting to know what I'm writing, what I'm feeling in the lyrics, you don't, as soon as you see me start to write you kina just, do your own thing without question"

"You can thank my mother for that" I said with a chuckle "I came from the all famous children can be seen and not heard type of parents, so when people are busy I'm wired to be quiet and work on something else"

"That sounds awful, there is nothing I love more than hearing those girls laugh and be themselves," He said moving closer to me leaning back on the couch, resting his pen and pad on his lap "You're one of the most interesting and complex people I've ever met"

I blushed and turned away from him "You think I'm complex?"

"Yeah, I do, and you don't?"

"I have pretended to be somebody else my whole life, I'm not even sure I know who I am myself"

"Trust me, who you really are is impressive, your traumas have defined you, but in a way to compliment your intelligent gentle nature, after everything you've been through, you didn't come out a victim, you still came out a survivor"

"I never thought of it that way before"

"I observe a lot, I call it as I see it, you've been playing a role so long you sometimes forgot, I get that, I got lost in Slim Shady for year's and it's taken some time to shake him, he gave me fame and also destroyed my life, he's still there, but I have control over him now, well, as long as I keep him caged at the back of my mind," He said and then picked up his notepad and flipped to a page and handed it to me "I kinda wrote a song about him, it's called Monster, I'm not sure I want it on the next album, it doesn't quite fit, but ill keep it on the vault"

I glimpsed at the notepad, and started to read the lyrics.

'Cause I need an interventionist
To intervene between me and this monster
And save me from myself and all this conflict
'Cause the very thing that I love's killing me
And I can't conquer it
My OCD is conkin' me in the head, keep knockin'
Nobody's home, I'm sleepwalkin'
I'm just relayin' what the voice in my head's sayin'
Don't shoot the messenger.

"He's no good for you?" I questioned.

As farfetched as it would have sounded to someone on the outside looking in as Marshall and I spoke of made-up personas as if they were real.

The fact was that they were very real, they were the parts of our personalities.

They were the real person, the one we were afraid to see the judgment of, the ridicule that would follow, so we pretended to be someone else that no one would argue with.

Or they were made up of the parts that were the darkness in our mind, that we were too afraid to voice ourselves because the world couldn't accept the honesty otherwise.

They were the voices in our head in the end, the only person we trusted because we couldn't trust anyone around us anymore, they were the soothing voice of reason even when they were sometimes poisonous.

They were an eating disorder.

Or the anxiety of never being enough.

"He was fun in the beginning, but fame changed me, then came the infidelity, drugs, and alcohol, I kinda slipped into a harsh reality that all my demons were real, and the thing I loved the most, my music, was killing me, and almost succeeded"

"We are our own worst enemies I guess, you and I" I sighed, laying my head on his shoulder "And the terrifying thing about that is, with all this fame and all these people who think they could end us, the irony of it all is that we're the only people that can be our ultimate downfall, we are both proof of that"

Marshall sighed and I felt him nod slowly, his hand reaching down mindlessly stroking my arm.

"Atleast we're now in this mess together"