Sing Me a Story

My hands shook a bit as I picked up my guitar from the nearby stand. I positioned myself, my fingers on the frets while my other hand was on the strings already strumming the beginning of the song “Lullabies by All Time Low”. A hush fell over the crowd as my lips brushed the mic; then I sang.

Make it a sweet, sweet goodbye -
it could be for the last time and it's not right.
"Don't let yourself get in over your head," he said.
Alone and far from home we'll find you...

Dead - Like a candle you burned out;
spill the wax over the spaces left in place of angry words.
Scream - To be heard, like you needed any more attention;
throw the bottle, break the door, and disappear.

Sing me to sleep, I'll see you in my dreams,
waiting to say, "I miss you. I'm so sorry."

Forever's never seemed so long as when you're not around
it's like a piece of me is missing.
I could have learned so much from you but what's left now?
Don't you realize you shot this family a world of pain?
Can't you see there should have been a happy ending we let go?

But as I sang, my mind was elsewhere…replaying the night my life changed forever and the reason I was singing this song.

The roars of the crowd brought me back to reality as Jasey, the vocalist, finished singing “Breaking What’s Right”. Jason from behind pounded on his drums and Ethan plucked the strings of his bass. My left-hand fingers were still glued to frets of my guitar but my right hand reached for the mic so that I could speak into it.

“Thanks for being such a great crowd! You guys rock!” I shouted into the mic then strummed some notes on my guitar before we were escorted backstage.

“Guys! What a great show!” Jasey yelled over the noise that the next band was performing. Ethan and Jason high-fived each other than me and Jasey.

“Hey! I think we should celebrate or something! Have a party or a movie night!” I yelled out suggestively as I raised my red bull high into the air.

“Totally! That’s an awesome idea, Liz!” Jasey agreed.

“For sure!”The guys said in unison.

We began packing all of our belongings and put the instruments on the back of the van that we had rented. Our manager, Crystal chose to drive the van and we made way to the motel that we were staying at. Hopefully my twin brother, Garrett wouldn’t mind the noise that was about to blast through the room that both of us were sharing at the time. Garrett was sort of like me, curious and caring, though he was an extreme introverted person and hardly spoke his mind. But he opened up to me and would tell me his thoughts, his dreams, and his nightmares. He didn’t like really loud noises, except for his music, and was fascinated with painting.

Unlike me, the writer and musician, he was the dreamer and the artist. His way of painting was his way of expressing himself and he took it seriously. At the time that I and my band mates were touring, he tagged along because I begged him. He agreed reluctantly but didn’t seem so excited about traveling to many places and meeting new people, instead he stayed back in the our van or he hid somewhere inside the venue while we performed. I didn’t mind, as long as I had my twin brother with me, I was fine with him wanting to be alone.

We arrived at the cheap motel that were staying at for this night and began walking towards the four rooms we had checked into. Crystal, our tour manager and Jasey, Ethan and Jason in another, our merch guy Josh and our guitar tech, Bryan in another room, and lastly my brother Garrett and I in one room.

“Me and Ethan are going to go get some drinks, and not beer so don’t start nagging Liz and Jasey, just red bull, some sodas and some chips.”Jason announced then they left.

I trudged towards my room, tiredly, with my guitar case and messenger bag over my shoulders. But before I could open the door, Jasey came up to me.

“Oh dude, I guess this party isn’t going to stay too late since we have an interview in the morning.”She sighed,” Ahh, I wish they gave us a day to just relax and enjoy life.”

“I know what you mean. I’m beat. I hope the guys get here soon so that we can start the movies early.”I said then opened the door. I peeked in and called out to Garrett, dropping my stuff on the entrance.

“Hey, bro. Where are you?”I called out. No reply came so I began looking for him in the restroom, the closet, the small living room. My eyebrows furrowed when I couldn’t find my brother anywhere. Then I decided to check his room. He could have been listening to his iPod with the volume raised up too high so that he couldn’t have heard me call for him. I opened the door, shocked and confused with the sight. Garrett on the floor, his eyes closed, his black hair was wet and it draped over his eyes. His gangly arms were away from his body; on his wrists were deep gashes that seeped out dark red blood. I gasped for air, and clutched the frame of the door so that I wouldn’t collapse to the ground.

“Garrett? Garrett?!” I screamed at the top of my lungs but the words were gurgled out by the sobs that erupted from my chest. I crawled towards my brothers’ body and held him in my arms. I dug my face into his chest while begging for him to come back to me. The tears that ran down my face fell into Garrett’s shirt, soaking it wet as well as mixing with the blood that had been soaked by his clothing. My sobs and cries soon became gasps for air and pleads for him to come back to life. Time went slow, seconds felt like decades; the world seem to be dragging everything down.

I heard someone gasp from behind me then scream for help. The person tried breaking me from my brother but I clutched to his lifeless body as if for dear life. Because that was the point, my brother wasmy life.

“No! No! Bring him back! Please!” I sobbed, all the while choking in tears. The person who turned out to be Jasey hugged me while she herself was sobbing too. People barged into the room; strapped him into a gurney and took him away from me.

The last lyrics came out softly and not the way I intended them to come out.

Sing me to sleep, I'll see you in my dreams,
waiting to say, "I miss you. I'm so sorry."

Sing me to sleep.
Sing me to sleep.
Sing me to sleep.
Sing me to s...

Sing me to sleep (You've taken so much with you...)
I'll see you in my dreams, (But left the worst with me...),
waiting to say, "I miss you. I'm so sorry."
I'm sorry, I'm sorry.

I couldn’t contain the tears that had already begun seeping out of my eyes. I cleared my throat then spoke into the mic, “Though I may have not written this song, I want to dedicate it to my twin brother, Garrett, who passed away three months ago. He was the dreamer and the artist.” I looked up at the ceiling. “Garrett, if you can hear me, I want you to know that you were my inspiration, I’ll never forget you. And…I love you, Gary.”

My chest heaved slowly as I made way out of the stage. I was stopped then and there to get comforting hugs from people I knew. After that, I went outside and sat on the cement stairs that led to the backstage entrance. I took out a drawing notebook that belonged to Garrett and scanned through it. So many dreams of his that were really and truly morbid nightmares. I was blind to not notice the depression that had haunted him all 21 years of his life. Too blind to not be able to prevent it. A page fell from the book and I bent to pick it up. It was a drawing. A drawing of him and me sitting on top of the tree house that our dad had built for us at the young age of seven years old. The detail was amazing, and the drawing seem to bring out life. We looked so alike, our smiles, our noses, eyebrows and our eyes that were filled with the same amount of happiness. At the bottom of the page was something scribbled with perfect penmanship:

To the right: Garrett, the dreamer and artist. To the left: Lizette, the writer and musician.