Lyrics Girl
Learning to hear music again
Article by Tasha Finkelstein, art by Natasha Yskamp
Content Warning: Mental illness
We always said I pay attention to the lyrics, you pay attention to how the music sounds.
I don’t know how to explain what it feels like when you can’t hear what’s going on around you anymore: music, footsteps, voices. The closest thing I can think of is hide and seek; you see everything but you can’t make a sound. The sounds you do hear are either huge and scary, or so small that you ask yourself, am I imagining this? A squeak in the floorboard could be the seeker coming to get you, or a smile from a friend could be them laughing at you. It’s an everyone-for-themselves, kill-or-be-killed type of game. If someone takes your hiding spot, too bad. Find a new one.
I don’t really know how to explain the absence so I’ll try to explain the presence instead.
I’m on a new drug: Sertraline. The doctor says it takes about a month to kick in. It’s only been three weeks but I keep asking myself if I feel any different. I don’t know what it feels like to listen to music and hear anything but white noise. All I know now is that when I’m with you (on a different drug), even when I feel hot coals scorching down my throat, I know it’s going to be okay. I am not actually on fire, I will not die, and the cloud we are under is not leaving.
We’re sitting in a kitchen that isn’t ours, crouching under a stove that we’ve just met for the first time. You find a jar of chamomile on a shelf and make us tea but forget that loose leaf needs an infuser. And so, we chew on bitter tea leaves that float freely in our cups until we can’t take it anymore, losing our minds and mouths to laughter. We’re small again, the way we hide away late at night and hope our moms don’t hear us. It feels like hide and seek used to, but even in this old house, I’m not scared because the kitchen light is on and you’re right next to me. What used to be staying up past a curfew turns into eyes too red. Whatever it is, it’s the mischief that counts.
In Woodstock I couldn’t hear the music, only the genre. You put on your playlist in the car and I was glad you did, but all the songs sounded the same to me. When it’s been a while since the last time I’ve seen you, we always trade music and I’m always asking for the names of the songs you play so I can listen to them later. But here in the car, I couldn’t tell what was louder: the silence of the car speaker or the silence of my voice not asking any questions. I took my turn later and played music for us while making dinner. The speaker was too close and too loud; I couldn’t hear the music, only the volume. My ears were fine even though my head felt like it was going to explode.
What happens when we acknowledge Woodstock was weird? Not weird as in bad, but weird as in not us. I don’t tell you that maybe it was weird because everything feels weird for me right now, but I just started this pill like three weeks ago so maybe I won’t be weird—maybe I’ll feel better soon. All you have to do is say it was a little weird (a little not us) and I feel better because I know you hear me in the noise. You help me pack and we paint our toenails and it’s not weird, it’s just good.
I feel sand in my toes and I see the speckles on yours. And finally, I hear sounds that aren’t just a buzz in my ears. The waves are big and loud, and I feel like they might kill me but at least I can hear them. And the lyrics! I hear words that aren’t just someone talking to me but really talking about themselves. Sharon Van Etten is on the speaker and she’s talking to a sixteen-going-on-seventeen-year-old me who drives on the bridge and can actually see the reflection of the city on the water. This time, I’m not on a bridge but on a beach. For the first time in a long time, I see texture. When you can’t hear much, you have to rely on your sight. But what do you do when your sight isn’t reliable? What do you do when everyone around you is commenting on how beautiful the city is, but, for the life of you, you just can’t see it? It’s spring break in New Orleans and instead of noticing how charming the French Quarter is, all you can notice is how ugly the Walgreens on the corner looks. Here though, lying in the rough sand, hit by a striking sun, I know I can see clearly. Everyone around me seems to be affected by some magical glow that makes them shine just a little bit brighter. The woman sitting on a chair nearby talking on the phone isn’t annoying, it’s the most interesting movie scene I’ve ever watched. The little boy taking a nap in the sun looks so peaceful, so at ease. And we are not being lazy, or stupid, or silly, we are seeing things for the first time in a while.
We get ice cream. Lots of it. There’s a food truck in the parking lot of the beach we didn’t realize was there. For our first round of ice cream, you come back with a Chipwich for me and an ice cream sandwich for you. The cookie/cream combination is just about the best thing I’ve tasted but the sandwiches are small. Way too small. Luckily, you admit you want more. I volunteer to get it this time and end up coming back with three sandwiches for the two of us. “You just always know how to take care of it,” you tell me. It’s funny that you say that because I never feel like I can take care of anything. But you tell me how good of a problem solver I am.
“Most people would never think to just go get more ice cream and then we’d sit here and be thinking about how hungry we are. But you just decided to go take the walk and get us some ice cream.” Maybe I do know how to take care of things.
When the high wears off and we don’t want it to, we'll just go outside again. You’re a pro at this stuff, which your mom would probably hate if she really knew. It takes you longer than me to feel the effects of smoking, so I constantly wonder if we’re on the same page. I wonder if what I feel like when I’m high is the right way to be high. I wonder if I get high in the embarrassing-low-tolerance-way. You say we should take a video of ourselves. I immediately ask what of. Just existing, you say. Huh, I’ve never even thought of that.
And so for a little while, we exist. I don’t know how to act once the camera starts rolling because I know I’m going to hate the way I look and talk and move the moment I see it played back. Eventually though, I forget the phone is even there. It’s just us, talking like we always have. I don’t want to talk about anything bad or sad because these moments are precious and we only have so many. The same feeling from when we were eight years old comes rushing back: there are only so many hours of the night when our parents are asleep and the moon is in the sky.
It’s a Friday in Jenny’s class and I’m squirming in my seat, waiting for the day to be over so we can walk over to your house. You have a drawer full of snacks my mom would never buy, a TV you are allowed to use at any hour of the day, and a paper mache pterodactyl that hangs from your bedroom ceiling and protects us from ghosts. Best of all, your mom lets us use her iMac. In third grade, Photo Booth is our only other friend and iCarly is our bible. Our show is called iNillie for Billie and Natasha. We’re starting to come into ourselves, noticing what parts of our faces we like, and what parts of our faces we don’t. I’m learning the concept of “weird” and “annoying” and trying my best to be neither. But when it’s time for iNillie, all bets are off. “This is Billie and this is Natasha and you’re watching iNillie,” our squeaky voices shout into the camera. We turn into young comedians, acting out skits, singing parody songs, and dancing like maniacs in front of the camera. One of our running gags is trying to trick the audience into thinking that I am really Billie and you are really Natasha. When I see your impression of me I cringe a little and then I don’t mind it.
Watching the Woodstock video back now makes me laugh. I can’t even tell if the way I look, talk, or move is strange because I am too busy listening to the words. We are sitting in the dim light in our pajamas with our legs crossed, facing each other like talk show hosts who have very important things to say. But we are not talk show hosts; we are just high.
N: I feel like I just got into your mind and thought like you for a second.
B: You really empathized with me! And I cannot empathize. I like don’t have it. I don’t have empathy.
N: Billie! All kinds of people have empathy.
B: No, I think I have like sympathy. I like, really don’t understand people’s emotions. Lowkey, I’m a sociopath I like, can’t empathize. Like, if you are mad at me, I really don’t know why and I’m mad at you! If we’re mad at each other, I just sometimes can’t empathize. Not us...
N: No, but I feel like if you hear a story—like for example the TV show “Girls”—
B: No lowkey though, everyone’s like, “oh my god Lena Dunham only cares about herself on ‘Girls’.” I never caught that. (bursts out laughing)
N: The way you said that! That was hilarious. (laughs more) I feel like every story I tell you though, you really understand. Woah. Maybe WE just empathize.
B: Yeahhhh! I just can’t empathize with certain people. It’s a lot more rare for me I think.
N: I’m so—I think it just depends… oh my god. You just put into words something so surface level and made it so deep. It’s like, why can’t I really connect with this person? Because I can’t really empathize with them. I don’t really understand them.
B: YEAH.
N: That’s insane.
B: Also people that I empathize with less I also get annoyed at more. The ones that I really empathize with I can’t stay mad at for too long ‘cause they always get me and I get them.
N: Yeahhh cause they totally know what you’re thinking.
B: Woahhh.
N: I really want, like, Tate’s Cookies.
B: You wanna make some tea and put something on? (burps) Excuse me.
It’s the end of summer. Your mom hugs me in a doorway that suddenly feels too small for us. I don’t want to hug you because you’re my best friend, not my second mom. Tomorrow I’ll walk to the corner and you’ll meet me there so we can walk the rest of the way to school together. But for now, neither of our legs are moving. You’re at home and I’m sitting in the car watching leaves that feel too green and a sun that feels too bright for either of them to be going away anytime soon. I put in headphones because I can hear songs now. I text you a link to one of the songs that we learned on guitar together and you respond right away. You hear it and I hear it too.
I’m walking alone now, with a throat unscorched, listening to the playlist you made for me in May 2020. My Quarantine Birthday. You got us Pinkberry, a Saturday afternoon tradition continued, and we sat in the park for hours until the yogurt was no longer yogurt, but sweet soup swirling around in paper cups. I’m walking on Nevada Avenue now and couldn’t be further from the park benches. The sky is gray, no traces of blue because the whole of it is drenched in cloud. It’s hazy but there’s a little spot where a circle forms. Light gets in and a moon appears out of the shadow, a little orb glowing in the midst of grayness. I’m walking nowhere now, listening to the playlist you made for me, and I can hear every lyric.
You’re far away from home but never far away from me and it’s all for the best.
Today, you’re not far away from home. I wait for you in a coffee shop garden in a November New York City. My hands are starting to get limp and cold and I’ve finished my latte but then I spot a very familiar pair of headphones and winter coat and you walk in. Even the overhead lamps notice you! They radiate the deepest orange and the most golden brown, buzzing and making the whole cafe warm again.