How to Kill a Rock Star

by Tiffanie DeBartolo

Remember I’ve always been more afraid to die than I ever was to live

Like a benevolent god, a good song will never let you down.

“Magician, musician. Same thing. A little hocus-pocus and a whole lot of faith, right?”

Tell me what you listen to and I’ll tell you who you are.”

Lying next to Eliza, I had the feeling I’d just found something I didn’t even know I’d lost.

“I’d be a sucker for a guy who wrote me a song,” I said. “Like Beth or Rosanna or Sara. Or Sharona. Is that too much to ask? To be somebody’s Sharona?”

“For what it’s worth, I think happiness is a fleeting condition, not a permanent goddamn state of mind. I’ve learned that if you chase after moments of bliss here and there, sometimes those moments will sustain you through the shit.”

“Personally, I don’t like inherently happy people. I don’t trust them. I think there’s something seriously wrong with anyone who isn’t at least a little let down by the world.”

But when I left that girl in the window I was sure I’d never felt more godforsaken in my life.

Eliza has the sky in her eyes and I’ve always wanted to touch the goddamn sky.

For the record, if I were Superman, a pale, scrawny guy holding a guitar would be Kryptonite.

Swear to God, for someone so obsessed with music, she’s borderline tone deaf. But trying to describe how I felt watching her dance around and sing would be like trying to build a skyscraper with my bare hands. It made me want to marry her. Made me want to buy her a magic airplane and fly her away to a place where nothing bad could ever happen. Made me want to pour rubber cement all over my chest and then lay down on top of her so that we’d be stuck together, and so it would hurt like hell if we ever tried to tear ourselves apart.

“Fate is just another word for people’s choices coming to a head. Destiny, coincidence, whatever you name it. It inevitably lies in our own hands.”

I am of the theory that all of our transcendental connections, anything we’re drawn to, be it a person, a song, a painting on a wall—they’re magnetic. The art is the alloy, so to speak. And our souls are equipped with whatever properties are required to attract that alloy. I’m no scientist so I don’t really know what the hell these properties are, but my point is we’re drawn to stuff that we’ve already got a connection to. Part of the thing is already inside of us.

Fate is the magnetic pull of our souls toward the people, places, and things we belong with.

“Bottom line, Eliza—you’re my home and my family, and I don’t want to lose you. I could lose everything else, and as long as I still had you and a guitar I know I’d be all right. Do you get what I’m saying?”

Note to self: Always remember how lucky you are to wake up next to someone who thinks you’re the shit.

I hate that word, CAN’T. I wish it had never been dreamed up, spoken, or defined. I wish the concept of CAN’T could be eradicated not only from language, but more importantly from the psyche of a girl who I know is filled with so much CAN it seeps out of her pores and scents the air.

There’s nothing worse than falling in love with a person over and over every time you lay eyes on them, especially when you hate their goddamn guts.

There are things we never tell anyone. We want to but we can’t. So we write them down. Or we paint them. Or we sing about them. Maybe we carve them into stone. Because that’s what art is. It’s our only option. To remember. To attempt to discover the truth. Sometimes we do it to stay alive. These things, they live inside of us. They are the secrets we stash in our pockets and the weapons we carry like guns across our backs. And in the end we have to decide for ourselves when these things are worth fighting for, and when it’s time to throw in the towel. Sometimes a person has to die in order to live. Deep down, I know you know this. You just can’t seem to do anything about it. I guess it’s a sad fact of life that some of us move on and some of us inevitably stay behind. Only in this case I’m not sure which one of us is doing which. You were right about one thing though. It’s not fate. It’s a choice. And who knows, maybe we’ll meet again someday, somewhere up above all the noise. Until then, when you think of me, try and remember the good stuff. Try and remember the love.

I’ve got my girl and my guitar, and for me that’s enough.