The One I'm Not (Twenty One Pilots)

To Become Friends

The first week of college was finally finished and Josh and Tyler decided to celebrate with either of two options

1.) Go to a sick college party, or

2.) Stay in their dorm and figure something out.

Neither of them wanting to go out and socialize, they picked option number two. They sat on their beds tossing a ball back and forth pondering what to do.

"We could go out on a skateboarding night adventure?" Josh provided.

"I don't own a skateboard, let alone know how to ride one man."

"We could- OH NO I KNOW EXACTLY!"

Josh fumbled around his closet and pulled out a box.

"Guess what's in the box!?"

"Uh an alien space ship?"

"So close! Open it up!"

Tyler got up and opened the box up to reveal a N64 station, four controllers and Mario Kart to go along with it.

"NO WAY!" Exclaimed Tyler.

"Let's set it up!"

The two set it up and played for hours until their fingers were numb to the touch.

"Why did we play so long?" Asked Tyler.

"I had to beat you and I did!" Josh responded.

"I mean I could of won, if you hadn't of pulled the steering wheel!"

"I mean I guess." The two laughed and it was the kind of laugh at the dark of night where everything was funny and they couldn't stop laughing. After what seems like forever the two had finally calmed down.

"I haven't laughed like that in a long time." Josh said.

"Same, man. Me too." Tyler agreed.

Tyler then thought over and over about what he had said. Pull the steering wheel. Tyler had said that or thought of that before. 

Tyler whispered "I could pull the steering wheel." 

"What?" Josh asked.

Tyler pulled out his song journal and wrote that down.

I could pull the steering wheel.

It was when that idiot stole his car radio. Leaving him with silence. 

Sometimes quiet is violent.

Josh looked over to his friend, noticing something was wrong. He saw how Tyler was looking at his pen and how it attacked the journal with words.

"Tyler? Hey, what's wrong man?"

Tyler began to write more.

Sometimes quiet is violent.

I have these thoughts
So often I ought
To replace that slot
With what I once bought
'Cause somebody stole
My car radio
And now I just sit in silence

"Tyler?!"

Josh grew worried and shook his friend out of what seemed like a trance.

"You alright?"

Tyler looked up at Josh with a broken smile.

"Yeah, sorry I guess I was in songwriting mode."

"It looked intense. Get any good lyrics?"

Tyler hesitated. "Some pretty good ones I think, yeah."

"Mind if I look or no? Cause I completely understand if you don't want me to. You have your outlet and I have mine."

Tyler looked at Josh. His eyes showed he truly cared, that he wasn't going to hate him or judge him.

"Yeah okay, but first you should know the true story behind it."

Josh grabbed a pillow and hugged it between his arms.

"Go on."

"Okay, when I was in high school, some idiot thought it would be a great idea to steal my car radio. I didn't have enough money to pay to get a new one, so I just dealt with the silence. It was peaceful at first, but then things sorta grew weary... When you get into a car the first thing you normally do is turn on the radio, right? It's a way to drown out the thoughts, and not being able to do that, I was left with them... taunting me... It's a terrible experience."

Josh looked stunned.

"I'm so sorry that happened. Having to be left alone with your thoughts. I would've lost it."

Tyler looked dazed, and he remembered when he first thought of that lyric.

"I almost did."

"What do you mean, Tyler?"

"I was driving home one time from my job, I had worked late that night so I was driving around midnight on an empty road. My head was hurting so bad, a migraine you could say. I remember seeing a pole in the distance. My thoughts were driving me insane, I almost lost it thinking how I could pull the steering wheel right then and there straight into that pole and I could be gone. One turn and boom, gone. Not to be dramatic but, I was thinking how I could totally just end it right now as the pole came closer. Then I passed the pole and just began thinking like, why am I thinking this way, you know? Why am I gone?"

You aRe gone.

You're embarrassing yourself in front of your friend.

He probably thinks you're weak.

You're pathetic.

Blurry was back and Tyler began shaking.

"I was thinking about my family and how they wouldn't miss me. Not even the neighborhood cat would miss me, no one would."

Josh sat there taking it all in. He didn't know someone felt the same way he did.

"I would miss you." Josh said.

Josh engulfed Tyler in a hug and they stayed like that until Tyler calmed down.

"Thank you." Tyler calmly said.

"No worries, I didn't know your mind was like that."

"I seem to be the only one." Tyler laughed.

"You're not though." Josh confessed.

Tyler looked at Josh, who smiled a broken smile.

"When I would play drums at the record store back home, I'd feel so great, like I was in control of what was going on at that very moment and I felt invincible. I have really bad social anxiety and I found a way to talk through drumming. Though there were many times where the shop was closed, or I didn't get there in time, or they didn't let me play that day and my only outlet was gone. I didn't know how to deal with the thoughts. The dark voice in the back of my head."

"I don't know how I'd be sane without my outlet."

"I didn't either. I had tried playing pretend drums on my desk and whatever I could find in my room but it just wasn't the same and it was terrible. It kept me up at night, had me ponder of something terrifying. If I was really loved. If the night would ever die, you know?"

Tyler knew exactly what Josh meant and wrote some more.

I ponder of something terrifying
'Cause this time there's no sound to hide behind
I find over the course of our human existence
One thing consists of consistence
And it's that we're all battling fear
Oh dear, I don't know if we know why we're here
Oh my,
Too deep
Please stop thinking
I liked it better when my car had sound

Tyler handed Josh the journal and said

"Here's what I have so far."

Josh read over it and said, "You're a lyrical genius, Tyler."

"It's nothing really."

"No I'm serious this could be a really great song."

"I mean you helped some of it."

"We should work on it someday. Create an actual song, you know?"

"Maybe someday, Josh."

"I'm going to hold you to that."

They smiled at each other and both felt safe knowing that they, here in this college dorm room, had a friend to turn to, that even the voices in the back of their heads can't fight.