Birds of a Feather

one

 I'd like to start out this story by documenting my life before all the weird stuff happened, right when my life was as normal as it gets. And by normal, I mean shitty.

 My room was dark, the blinds closed and all the lights were off. Even though it was four in the afternoon. My body was a huddled mass under my covers, and I was still asleep, and going on 15 hours of it. Not for much longer, though. My dad entered the room quietly, and stepped over weeks worth of laundry to reach the edge of my bed, where he sat down very cautiously. I felt his large, warm hand on my leg and my eyes fluttered open.
"Dyl, it's four. You should get up," he whispered.

Grumbling, I rolled over to look at him. I rubbed at my swollen eyes and propped myself up against my headboard.
"Yeah, you're probably right," my voice was scratchy from lack of usage.

His bushy eyebrows were drawn up in concern, and he gently rubbed my leg to console me.
"Dylan, it's been three months. You've gotta start... doing something. It'll help to talk to someone. I'm always here." His words were strained. I could tell that he hated to see me this way. I was so depressed that I rarely ate or saw the light of day. I hated it too. But I had no idea how to snap out of it.

"I have nothing to talk about," I shrugged. I reached to my blue and green strands of hair and smoothed them down from their mangled state.

I watched my dad go from worried, to heated. His brows furrowed together and his eyes took on a new glimmer.

"Don't you lie to me. I know it's hard, but shit! Dylan this is affecting your life. You don't have a job, you failed your classes last semester and honestly, you're scaring me and your sisters. You need to get the hell up whether you feel like it or not!"

This, I was not expecting. I sat, dumbfounded at my father's words. And my immediate reaction was... to cry. No, not just to cry. To sob. My body began to wrack with grief and anxiety as it had been every day. My emotions were intangible. I felt anger, pain, betrayal, and the most confusing of them all; love.

Through snot and tears I managed to choke out a reply, "When the love of your life leaves you for your best friend, and your mom leaves you, and your closest friends decide to skip out, all at the same time, then you can talk to me about 'feeling better' and 'getting over it',"

His expression softened, but only to that of a straight-faced statue.
"She left me too, Dylan. But life goes on. You have to start sometime,"
He got up stoically, and left my room. This time, he didn't bother to step around the mess.

As you can tell, your humble narrator was not in the best state of mind during the "before" part of this tale's events. But that day was the day that I decided to get out of bed, and the rest is history.

The sun had never been so bright, even though it was setting, it seemed like it a flashlight was shining in my eyes. I had managed to comb out my mangy hair and even apply some makeup. My neighborhood was so still, as if it was afraid I might run back into the safe confines of my bedroom if any sudden movement was detected.

My old bandmates had called me up and convinced me to play a last minute show in the city, probably could thank my dad for that. The world outside my bedroom seemed so different. My life, everything that had seemed so finite and solid turned out to be the complete opposite. You can put all your love and trust into people, but at the end of the day, it doesn't really mean shit. People betray you, and they leave you when it is most convenient. It just so happened that I discovered this about my boyfriend of a year and a half, my best friend, and my mother all at the same time. I had to find some sort of purpose without them. So, I figured throwing myself back into my music was the best way to do that.