NOTHING LEFT TO LOSE

After what felt like an eternity, Laney finally built up the courage needed to insert the album into the CD player her mom had gifted her for Christmas. Track upon track, it hit her like a high-velocity train, but what affected her the most was Dave's cynical tone, his voice blasting through the speakers with almost too much indifference and casualty for someone who lived through all of what his music conveyed.

Maybe that was his way of showing her that he was over it, and over her. That it didn't hurt anymore. Or maybe it was the exact opposite. Maybe it showed how much it hurt, how much she had torn him. Maybe that was his way of punishing her for everything that they went through. Or maybe it was both or none at all.

Whatever the case it was, the truth was that Laney could hear herself portrayed in the words he sang, moments and memories of their brief, but intense, time together broken down into melodic poems. Reminding her of how good and right it had felt, and of how she had ruined it when she opted to put herself, and herself only, first.