Ten Years and Climbing

[Verse 1]
You left your key on the counter
Dust on the frame of our old July
Ten years folded in a shoebox
I tried to drink every page dry
I learned the creak in every floorboard
Talking to ghosts in the kitchen light
Friends said time would fix the fracture
But the nights kept lasting all my life
[Chorus]
I was clawing at the concrete
Digging up a way to breathe
Thought my heart was buried with you
Somewhere under busted dreams
But I’m standing in the quiet now
And the hurt don’t own me here
I made it out of the deep end
Still I’m holding you dear
[Verse 2]
Therapy chair in a strip mall office
Coffee cooling in a paper cup
Saying your name like a foreign language
Voice shaking
Trying to grow up
Boxed your letters in the attic
Still I know each word by feel
Every goodbye you never wrote me
Taught me how to finally heal
[Chorus]
I was clawing at the concrete
Digging up a way to breathe
Thought my heart was buried with you
Somewhere under busted dreams
But I’m standing in the quiet now
And the hurt don’t own me here
I made it out of the deep end
Still I’m holding you dear
[Bridge]
I don’t hate you
I don’t blame you (oh)
Some loves just rust in the rain
You were the map and the wrong direction
Still you led me out of my shame
[Chorus]
Yeah
I clawed out of the concrete
Found a little room to breathe
You’re a chapter in the story
Not the ending over me
I’m standing in the quiet now
Sky like a sermon
Clear
I made peace with all the pieces
And I’m holding you dear
Always holding you dear

Slow-burning Midwest emo ballad with male vocals; clean arpeggiated guitars and roomy live drums, bass gluing the low end. Verses stay hushed and close-mic’d, confessional tone, then choruses widen with doubled vocals and overdriven guitar swells. Subtle lap steel lines in the second half as the arrangement opens into a cathartic, peaceful outro., emotional, ballad