The script - remix

[INTRO, sparse, almost spoken, single funky tone underneath] My script was written before I knew I was reading from one.

[VERSE, internal monologue, funky and spare] I feel too big. I think too much. I am too much. I am bad.

Not my words. Someone else's. Handed to me before I knew I could put them down.

But I believed them. Because children believe the ones who are supposed to love them.

[VERSE, the performing begins] So I learned to perform.

If I am bad I will act good. If I am too much I will make myself useful.

Perform goodness. Feel safe. Perform goodness. Feel safe.

But the moment I slip — the moment I'm not kind not patient not selfless enough — something old comes rushing back.

I am bad. Hide it. Perform louder.

[PRE-CHORUS, the disconnect landing] And the gap keeps growing. Between who I think I am and who I need you to believe I am.

I can't let you close to the hidden part. Because the hidden part is the proof of the script.

So I perform. And you see the performance. And I feel completely alone.

[CHORUS, DROP, funky and visceral] I am good. I am bad. I am good. I am bad. Both scripts. Same body. Same breath. Same moment. Performing one. Hiding one. Believing neither. Same hands. Same chest. Same breath. Splitting. Splitting. And running. And running.

[VERSE, compassion for the performer] And I want to say something to the part of me that learned to perform.

You were trying to survive. You performed your way to safety. And it worked. For a while. It worked.

You were so small. And the script was so loud. And performing goodness felt like the only way to make the bad parts matter less.

I see you. I know what you were doing.

[PRE-CHORUS, something cracking] But I can't do it anymore.

Not the performing. Not the hiding. Not the gap between who I am and who I need you to believe I am.

And everything gets very quiet.

Just me. No script. No role. No audience. Just me.

[CHORUS, DROP into stillness] I am not the script. I am not the split. I am not the performance or the thing it was hiding.

I am the one who was watching the whole time.

Presence. Remembering something it had almost forgotten.

Not good. Not bad. Not performing. Not hiding. Just here. Just this. Just here.

[BRIDGE, the grace arriving] And then something shifts. Not dramatically. Not all at once. More like waking from a dream and realizing the dream was never real.

The script was never true. It was just a story. Handed to me before I knew I could put them down.

And I can put them down. I can put them down.

[FINAL CHORUS, full drop] I am not the script. I was never the script. I am the one who believed it until I didn't.

And the part that performed — I see you. I know why you did it. You were trying to bring me home.

The script was never me. The script was never me.

[OUTRO, warm, dissolving] Someone handed me a story. I believed it. I performed around it. I hid inside it.

And then one day I woke up.

And put it down.

Just here. Just this. Just me.