Coldness

Savannah

I was a daddy’s girl.

Even with my independence, I was still very much a daddy’s girl.

My first ever guitar lesson was done with my dad and this beat-up Aria Pro strat style from 1978 in this off-white eggshell color I hated.

I covered it in stickers to prevent me from seeing the awful color.

My dad was waiting on the porch when I got off the bus with it in his hands and my first ever guitar pick.

It was green and orange.

I gave it to Reid Daniels during one of my shows years ago.

He sat with me for hours on our porch teaching me the strings and having me play all kinds of songs.

We would sing together, and even though he was off-key and sounded like he was more screeching than hitting a high note, I didn’t mind.

I would sing even higher and louder, we would fill the outside with our voices. My cheeks would hurt from all the smiling, my sides would pinch from all the laughter and giggle fits.

My dad would try to mimic whoever the singer was.

I can’t unhear him singing along to Willie Nelson and his breathtaking performance of Stevie Nicks.

We spent countless hours out there on that porch swing going over every genre and covering thousands of songs together.

My dad was my first audience.

My first and last bandmate.

My number one fan.

My sponsor.

My manager.

My merch guy.

My hype man.

My dad was everything he needed to be for me.

My mom would have to come out and force us back in the house when dinner time came and we were still going.

Dad and I would go to shows together on the weekends when mom had to work late or early mornings.

When it was just us.

The first competition I was ever in was because of him and a dare.

My dad signed me up—he was the one who coached me to be the performer I am.

That I ~was~.

I remember being so pumped for my first show and twirling the yellow dress my mom spent forever and a half making for me from one of her old ones.

I remember the sudden bolt of fear that hit me when my music started to play and I needed to walk out on stage, how I had lost all my nerve and thought I was going to puke my guts up.

I wanted to hide and run away.

It was my dad who got me to go out.

He was the one who made my band T-shirts and swore I was going to be taking the world on just to sing my songs on a grand stage.

He would tell me Madison Square Garden was in my future. That he would be in the front row of every show. No matter how old he got or where in the world I went.

He never once doubted me.

My mom supported me in her own way too. She made all my costumes and gave me sound advice for whenever I went too far or not enough.

If you can believe it, my mom was always keeping me on that line between too young to be doing this and not just yet.

I did wild shows like I wanted.

I had fun.

It was because of them.

My dad raised another man’s child and never, ever made it known. I was his daughter from my first cry, wasn’t I?

Not his stepchild. Not his wife’s kid.

I was his.

But I’m not ~his~.

***

The wind in my face, I can’t feel the chill of the cold that is laced within the childish dance it foxtrots on my skin.

Waking up in a cemetery was not something I ever want to experience ever again.

I haven’t been to my family’s tomb yet.

When I came out of a coma, my family was already buried. I went through weeks and weeks of recovery before I could get out of the hospital.

When I did I was casted and freshly cut open.

I couldn’t shower by myself—there was no way I was getting drugged up worse than I already was to be taken to my family’s crypt so I could see their death dates on tombstone plaques.

I was on suicide watch.

I can’t say for certain that I wouldn’t have tried something if I had seen it.

I wasn’t in a good place mentally.

Not that I am now.

But back then I was sure I was supposed to have died with my family.

I’ve never asked to go.

I never wanted to see it.

I knew they were dead.

I didn’t need to read the last sentence written for them to get some kind of ending for a story I never wanted to read in the first place.

I think that’s where I was going but didn’t make it, or maybe... I don’t know.

I can’t remember anything after I read the letter and the lights went out.

I don’t know what I was doing, or maybe going to do? I’m not sure where I am right now. Something’s wrong with me.

My hands are bloody and cracked open to show I’ve been punching something, maybe someone. I can’t see my face but it feels busted up too.

When I touched it, I flinched back from some open wound there. I know I had sweatpants and Damon’s T-shirt on, not to mention shoes and a helmet before it all went dark.

Now I’m in a tank top and my boy shorts.

My thighs have slashes along the tops that I have no doubt came from a razor blade from my hand. I don’t remember doing it.

They’re deeper than what I used to do.

Some are barely closed from the dried blood that’s stopped flowing. I have pathways drawn down to my ankles in flaky crimson. I look like someone used my legs as a drying stock for a freshly used red paintbrush.

My bike is fine.

I don’t have my helmet, but other than that it’s in good shape.

My jacket?

~Oh fucking damn it, where’s my jacket?!~

I didn’t even think about it when I ran out of the cemetery.

~Fucking shit shit shit.~

I need to go back. I need to find my jacket.

The sun’s up, high in the sky, though I think it’s still early morning. The grass is mopped in wet, glistening dew. The birds are chirping loud and singing their morning praises.

I keep taking lefts and rights, trying to figure out where I am. To come to some kind of sign to tell me where to go, but I keep finding nothing.

No houses, no churches, no gas stations or anything else.

~Where the hell am I?~

I take more turns, more roads.

My knee is starting to hurt bad enough I’m grinding my teeth together to relieve some of it. The lack of my morning meds, proper sleep, and food is starting to get to me.

With the stress and all of this, I don’t see how I am going to get home unnoticed.

Damon is probably up.

If I could get to biker country and clean myself up in time, no one will know.

I could sneak in through the bar and use Damon’s room before getting back home. I could say I wanted to get an early jump on my morning duties.

My bike starts to sputter and cough.

“No no no. Please no. Don’t do this to me. Just get me in town and I’ll take it from there.”

I talk to my bike, but it doesn’t help. The gas has been depleted and I don’t know what the fuck to do.

I’m in the middle of God knows where.

No. No. No.

~What do I do?~

~What do I do?~

I’m cold.

I’m alive.

I’m alone.

~Where am I?~