Isolate This Tragedy
Who: Alexander Wolfgang, OPEN.
What: In the tail end of the musical, Alexander sits down and finishes a song.
Where: Northern District Plaza.
When: Monday Morning.
Warnings: Monologues. They’re what Alexes does.
Notes: Song rights are reserved to a friend of mine and used with permission, right here.
Christ, was he tired. The liveliness that had only once momentarily invaded his adrenaline had since faded away after the passing forty-eight hours. Exhausted and weary and closing in on the holidays, though, he held off on heading back to the Pineapple for a good, long sleep. For now.
Instead Alexander bid his time trudging along the streets of the city, the heavy case of the acoustic guitar hanging over his shoulder. Every so often he would find himself a spot, take it out, and try to give the instrument a couple strums, in hopes to summon inspiration that would be enough to gather words that actually flowed. Something that wasn’t just a stroke of luck, but meant something to him; that was how his friend Zayne, back at home... how he always did it.
Alexander was not quite a musician. Sure, he played music, and he loved listening to it dearly. But the true title he reserved for those who deserved it. Alexander deserved nothing.
Dawn had since broke across the horizon, blanketing light across the city where the plaza revealed itself, and Alexander sitting on one of the benches with the guitar out. He’d been giving it many practicing strums, but so far nothing came out. He cursed himself as he tried, each attempt becoming more fruitless as the last.
Before long, however, a song began to pick up in the district, carrying an surplus sound that complimented the strings that strummed the guitar surface. For some who have spent a little more time in the city, the words and the melody may have a familiar feel to it. To anyone else, it was just sound.
The music took a life of its own, possessing his fingers and voice as Alexander stood up from the bench. The sound lifted, as did something within his chest as the man began to pace with the guitar in his hand.
And then, he began to sing, a reverb praising the tune itself while he did so:
“Days come and go,
“leave me alone.
“Nothing feels real
“But the pain that I’ve known.
“Tortured inside,
“Twisting my mind-
“Even this lie won’t save me this time.”
Had those been drums? And the other soft sounds... The additional instruments he heard now in the song chose to be different from what he had heard before. Either way, Alexander was in no position to question, as he stepped up upon one of the fountain ledges, continuing playing, and continued singing.
And it was then that he realized he had sang this song before, because the next verse was like déjà vu to him all over again:
“Come again like a light in the sky;
“Heroes fall as the day goes by.
“Life it seems is still inside here...
“Be strong the end will come,
“Does no good to rush alone.
“Even in the days to come
“You’ll see that I was wrong.
“Invading heartless stare,
“Friends you had were never there-
“One to blame was you...”
The song was much stronger than it had been the first time Alexander had sang it. And although the lyrics he knew ended at “one to blame was you” during that time, he went on like he never had before. The short, sick, emaciated, and dark-haired man with the guitar began walking, his steps in rhythm with the guitar melody that hummed to the December morning:
“Taken in vain;
“Your words keep me sane
“The Hell that surrounds me
“Is calling my name.
“Keeping the flame,
“Alive just the same.
“Fooled me for years-
“For this, I’m to blame.”
No, he was pretty sure he had never heard this part of the song before. Not that it mattered. Alexander stopped at center of the plaza, his feet tapping to the beats. His heart raced in spite of the mellow refrain, in time with the composition and the words that then flowed from his mouth:
“Take my hand and walk with me,
“To a time that was and will always be
“The most peaceful of my memories...
“Be strong, the end will come,
“Does no good to rush alone.
“Even in the days to come
“You’ll see that I was wrong.
“Invading heartless stare,
“Friends you had were never there-
“One to blame was you...”
For the next few seconds, no more words accompanied the guitar solo that Alexander played along to the supplementary that the city provided him. During these moments, his feet drifted into a slight rhythmic dance, just keeping the guitar close to him, cradling it as though it were an infant. Thoughts and memories swam about his mind; so many things as he closed his eyes and drifted with the tune.
Alexander felt light right then; he felt free. He felt as though he were running. Past a forest, through its trees; in a brief and very fleeting instant, he felt as though he were everywhere in Nautilus-no, not just Nautilus. The worlds themselves. And when his own words weren’t drowning them out, a woman’s voice chimed on the back of his mind-
But they faded away, lost in the finale of Alexander’s song:
“From the time you waved your hand
“And said goodbye
“Rain began to fall inside my mind.
“Though the wind would carry us
“Like a leaf was blown,
“In your walls you hide yourself,
“There to stay alone.
“Cold and desperate dark despair,
“A feeling so well known.
“Isolate this tragedy,
“You wish you’d never known...”
Christ, he was getting so tired. And with his eyes still closed, his thoughts still merged with the song as he hummed and hummed, Alexander sat down by the fountain. His fingers danced over the guitar strings long after the city deprived him of its backup.
Inspiration. This was more than that. It was more than he could have imagined in his entire life, for all the things that he had ever taken for granted; he just had to go and remind him of the years he had lost.
(for this i am to blame)
What: In the tail end of the musical, Alexander sits down and finishes a song.
Where: Northern District Plaza.
When: Monday Morning.
Warnings: Monologues. They’re what Alexes does.
Notes: Song rights are reserved to a friend of mine and used with permission, right here.
Christ, was he tired. The liveliness that had only once momentarily invaded his adrenaline had since faded away after the passing forty-eight hours. Exhausted and weary and closing in on the holidays, though, he held off on heading back to the Pineapple for a good, long sleep. For now.
Instead Alexander bid his time trudging along the streets of the city, the heavy case of the acoustic guitar hanging over his shoulder. Every so often he would find himself a spot, take it out, and try to give the instrument a couple strums, in hopes to summon inspiration that would be enough to gather words that actually flowed. Something that wasn’t just a stroke of luck, but meant something to him; that was how his friend Zayne, back at home... how he always did it.
Alexander was not quite a musician. Sure, he played music, and he loved listening to it dearly. But the true title he reserved for those who deserved it. Alexander deserved nothing.
Dawn had since broke across the horizon, blanketing light across the city where the plaza revealed itself, and Alexander sitting on one of the benches with the guitar out. He’d been giving it many practicing strums, but so far nothing came out. He cursed himself as he tried, each attempt becoming more fruitless as the last.
Before long, however, a song began to pick up in the district, carrying an surplus sound that complimented the strings that strummed the guitar surface. For some who have spent a little more time in the city, the words and the melody may have a familiar feel to it. To anyone else, it was just sound.
The music took a life of its own, possessing his fingers and voice as Alexander stood up from the bench. The sound lifted, as did something within his chest as the man began to pace with the guitar in his hand.
And then, he began to sing, a reverb praising the tune itself while he did so:
“Days come and go,
“leave me alone.
“Nothing feels real
“But the pain that I’ve known.
“Tortured inside,
“Twisting my mind-
“Even this lie won’t save me this time.”
Had those been drums? And the other soft sounds... The additional instruments he heard now in the song chose to be different from what he had heard before. Either way, Alexander was in no position to question, as he stepped up upon one of the fountain ledges, continuing playing, and continued singing.
And it was then that he realized he had sang this song before, because the next verse was like déjà vu to him all over again:
“Come again like a light in the sky;
“Heroes fall as the day goes by.
“Life it seems is still inside here...
“Be strong the end will come,
“Does no good to rush alone.
“Even in the days to come
“You’ll see that I was wrong.
“Invading heartless stare,
“Friends you had were never there-
“One to blame was you...”
The song was much stronger than it had been the first time Alexander had sang it. And although the lyrics he knew ended at “one to blame was you” during that time, he went on like he never had before. The short, sick, emaciated, and dark-haired man with the guitar began walking, his steps in rhythm with the guitar melody that hummed to the December morning:
“Taken in vain;
“Your words keep me sane
“The Hell that surrounds me
“Is calling my name.
“Keeping the flame,
“Alive just the same.
“Fooled me for years-
“For this, I’m to blame.”
No, he was pretty sure he had never heard this part of the song before. Not that it mattered. Alexander stopped at center of the plaza, his feet tapping to the beats. His heart raced in spite of the mellow refrain, in time with the composition and the words that then flowed from his mouth:
“Take my hand and walk with me,
“To a time that was and will always be
“The most peaceful of my memories...
“Be strong, the end will come,
“Does no good to rush alone.
“Even in the days to come
“You’ll see that I was wrong.
“Invading heartless stare,
“Friends you had were never there-
“One to blame was you...”
For the next few seconds, no more words accompanied the guitar solo that Alexander played along to the supplementary that the city provided him. During these moments, his feet drifted into a slight rhythmic dance, just keeping the guitar close to him, cradling it as though it were an infant. Thoughts and memories swam about his mind; so many things as he closed his eyes and drifted with the tune.
Alexander felt light right then; he felt free. He felt as though he were running. Past a forest, through its trees; in a brief and very fleeting instant, he felt as though he were everywhere in Nautilus-no, not just Nautilus. The worlds themselves. And when his own words weren’t drowning them out, a woman’s voice chimed on the back of his mind-
But they faded away, lost in the finale of Alexander’s song:
“From the time you waved your hand
“And said goodbye
“Rain began to fall inside my mind.
“Though the wind would carry us
“Like a leaf was blown,
“In your walls you hide yourself,
“There to stay alone.
“Cold and desperate dark despair,
“A feeling so well known.
“Isolate this tragedy,
“You wish you’d never known...”
Christ, he was getting so tired. And with his eyes still closed, his thoughts still merged with the song as he hummed and hummed, Alexander sat down by the fountain. His fingers danced over the guitar strings long after the city deprived him of its backup.
Inspiration. This was more than that. It was more than he could have imagined in his entire life, for all the things that he had ever taken for granted; he just had to go and remind him of the years he had lost.
(for this i am to blame)