The Understudy (hiatus)

Chapter Fifteen - Tydelynn (Part Two)

I was always bad at making decisions.

My tendancy to make irrational and drastic decisions based on a short burst of emotion would be the death of me if I let it. Boom, I'm angry - boom, I'll mess up a part of my life. That was the same old story throughout everything. I wish it wasn't. I really did.

I remember when I was sixteen, I met Ian. He was the Devil from the start, controlling and lying and I swore I'd leave him but that decision never went ahead. He kept feeding me the love I wanted, the love I'd neglected to find throughout my life, and I became addicted. I was a junkie hooked on love and blood, and no one could understand it. Well, I couldn't understand it. I had no one else to make them understand anyway, I had no family.

Parents? I was disowned on my sixteenth birthday. It gives you a great sense of belonging knowing that your parents never believed a word you said. Note the sarcasm. I was staying at my uncle's one night as he lived near an arena that I'd been to for a concert, and I walked in on him needle shooting. Drugs. Heroin flooding his veins right before my eyes. His face visably softening and his breathing rapidly increasing as he reached his high.

I remember screaming so loud that I'm surprised the police were never called. I begged him to stop; I told him what the effects were; how much I hated drugs; how disappointed the family would be in him if they knew. I threatened to tell my parents.

I did. But backfire was my uncle's middle name, and he spun everything around on me. Suddenly, I was the heroin junkie of the family - apparently forcing my uncle to smoke spliffs with me and help me with my needle shooting to the point where I held a knife to his throat.

Bullshit.

I was never what they wanted. From the beginning, I was the child who reached for the guitar at three years old and not the stethoscope. They wanted successfulness, they wanted me to be a surgeon or a lawyer. Something dull where I'd get paid cold, hard and greedy cash for doing something that didn't make me want to wake up in the morning.

"Mama, I want to be them! I want to sing, I want to prance, I want them to hear my lyrics. I want to wear platform creepers and studded chokers, I want to learn every instrument. I want hard work to feed my soul. I wanna do it!"

"There's nothing in music to feed your soul, Tydelynn. Turn that off and finish your trigonometry,"

We must have had that conversation at least twice a week for three years, until they kicked me out. My desire to be a musician convinced them that my uncle's story was true because it was everywhere. The music industry was corrupted with drugs and alcohol.

But why didn't they see that I wasn't?

Ian was the only thing I had when I was sixteen. He took me in, lured me in with kind words and playlists but he was morphing me, all the while, into his slave. I adjusted to the blue bruises that were splattered all over my body, I got used to seeing a bit of blood leaking from me, I accepted it all for just under two years -  because I was crazy. Because I had nothing else, not even my sanity. Or so I thought.

Then came the sun. Ian had gone away on a 'Lad's Weekend Away' so I took my chances. I went to an open mic night in a music cafe - a really beautiful one that sold vinyl in the back rooms - armed with a guitar that I'd kept well hidden from Ian. I got up in a bundle of shakes and sang for the first time in a year. Adrenaline flooded through me, my heart beat to the pulse of my song and my soul became pure gold as my voice soared through the air. I was alive again. With music came power... and with power came oppurtunities. An opportunity to leave. I did it and I made something of myself. 

I celebrated my eighteenth birthday by trading in Ian and violence with sound and tour busses. I never looked back.

However, the past never fully leaves you. I can't trust anyone. I wanted to change that because with Dan, it was different. I felt pure and worth something. He had my heart wrapped up carefully in celophane, boxed up safely with polestyrine.

I could trust Dan, I thought, as I turned over to see Matty's curly hair spread out everywhere on my pillow. If I hadn't of messed up. I could have done it.

Was a second chance going to happen here? Or was I done with Dan before I'd even been able to start?