The Four | a character project

Before & After

Inspiration: "Used To Be" - Matt Nathanson

Everything seems the exact same.

He still has the same old things from back then - the same phone, the same number, the same car, the same actions, the same everything.

And with every routine completed, every ritual done again, it was almost like there was something else behind his intentions.

Like every time he ran through his normal route, his morning routine, the car ride to school, walking the same places, tracing where he used to walk, it was for something deeper than that.

And even though he no longer said hi to her friends, and he merely passed her locker instead of hanging around, it seemed the same. He still walked by where her friends would be, still walked by her locker. He still did those things, even when there was nothing to follow up with those actions.

It was almost like he wished things would go back to the way they used to be. To a time where nothing was different or changed, a time where everything was normal.

A time where no one had to worry about the drastics, where everyone was just fine. They were just kids, without a care in the world. They were just living.

They weren't too attached.

They weren't worried about losing someone.

All he had to do was ignore the somber atmosphere, the quiet, hushed whispers from those who hadn't known her, the silence that hung in the air for where she would be there.

All they could do was write her story for her, because she was no longer there to write it herself.

All they could do was speak for her.

All they could do was be her, explain her, tell her life, because she simply couldn't survive long enough to do it herself.

All he had to do was ignore all of that, and then it might feel like it could go back to the way it used to be.

Because, simply put, everything had changed.

It was all different now.

And it was only because she was no longer there, because she had taken her life just this past June.