Train

6. What does music mean to you?

"Could you guys live without music?" One of the first questions my new music teacher asked us. "If yes, raise your hand."

Nobody raised their hand.

Interesting, that means everybody in this class needs music in some way.

"Okay, so what does music mean to you?"

What music means to me? Should I raise my hand? No, I'm too anxious for that.

What music means to me? It keeps me warm on cold days, it's my home when I'm far away and alone, it reminds me of the good and the bad times, it shows everyone else who I am and who I want to be.

Some songs give me inspiration, others strength. They're what gets me going. They're a connection with other people.

Music has always played an important part in my life. I still remember every lyric of my early childhood.

I got into bands, bought CDs, went to concerts and met the most amazing people ever.

-

My second love was a boy named Matty. I was sixteen.

Now you may say that I quickly got over Azmina, but that wasn't the truth.

Matty was more of a crush than a real love like Azmina.

Of course, I admired him, he was different but still popular. I had loved to play with his curls and he was the person I smoked my first joint with. Joshua liked him, but Sarah wasn't sure if he was that great.

For me he was, he even had a band which I adored. Sometimes I would just sit in his garage, listening to him and the boys.

On our six month anniversary, I got two mixtapes from him, one was of his favorite bands, the other one from his band.

I still don't know if I fell in love with him or his music. But one of these things was like a drug to me, like the nicotine in his cigarettes.

-

Music gave and took things from me.

It nearly took my older Brother, Sam.

I was seventeen, he was twenty-one. Sam was the person who got me into rock and alternative music. He was the reason why I knew every red hot chili peppers song by heart. He was the one who taught me to play four instruments, guitar, bass, drums and piano.

Sam always joked about me being a one woman band because I could also sing pretty well, or like Brendon Urie he said, which I wasn't sure about because nobody sings like Brendon. Because he's basically a god and Satan at the same time.

He gave me a lot of confidence, even though he was an asshole sometimes but I just call that being siblings.

It was the 13th of May and it was the day of the Fall out boy concert in our city. Sam had been waiting for months to go there and I had been too.

I was at home waiting for him and getting ready, not looking what time it was when he suddenly knocked at my door and we had to sprint to his car.

He quickly pulled out of the garage and drove like a maniac.

"Calm the fuck down you're gonna get us killed!"

I wish he wouldn't have looked at me after I said that, I wish I hadn't said it, I wish there hadn't been a car coming.

Because he looked at me he hadn't noticed that we drifted more and more onto the other side of the road and that the other driver wasn't paying attention either.

All I could see was the blinding lights of the black Range Rover and then darkness.

The sounds are still in my head too, a gasp of shock, tires screeching, the sound of metal hitting metal and glass breaking.

I still don't know how long I had been unconscious, but when I woke up there was blood dripping onto my black jeans, staining the fabric slightly darker than it was, and I could hear the sirens of the ambulance coming nearer and nearer.

I didn't dare look at Sam, I didn't dare look at the driver's seat.

In that moment I wished the last things I had said to him were the words "I love you.", but no, it was my fault that we hit that other car.

Memories played in my head.

My brother trying to teach me how to ride a bike when I was five, my first day at school, scared to death but with him at my side, the day our dog died and we buried him in our backyard, fast forward to when I told him I liked girls and we danced all night to our favorite bands. And last but not least, when it was his birthday and I gave him our Fall out Boy tickets.

The blood dripping down my face got mixed with tears as the sound of the ambulance drew closer.

I felt myself getting unconscious again.

They brought us to the next hospital and I woke up to lights flying over my head as they moved my hospital bed through the big corridors.

"Is... is he alright?"

"You are Tara Jenkins?"

"Yeah..."

"We're gonna make an eeg, we think you're suffering from a severe concussion."

"But my brother..."

It was hard for me to focus on the face of the nurse but she seemed really young and somewhat familiar. That could be because we only have two high schools in our city.

"Sam?" She looked nervous. "We don't really know yet, but we already called your parents."

They were right.

I suffered a severe concussion.

Sam had it worse. He broke his right leg, nearly broke his spine and they didn't know if he would lose his memory.

To our luck, Sam had always been a fighter. He feels perfect now, but I'm still so scared something could happen again and I was sure that I would really lose him this time.
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So I decided to take this YouTube video for this chapter because it inspired me and btw my music teacher really asked us these questions and I really wanted to answer but yeah...