Not every ending is sad.Some are defiant.Many are probably saying ‘no more’ after years of swallowing everything.This one ...this one is that.It’s a shrug, a cigarette, and a half-smile that says, ‘I’m not perfect, but I’m done pretending I’m not pissed.’
“A Song for You”—Donny Hathaway
This is a confession left on the doorstep, unsure if anyone will ever come to the door.Hathaway offers a devastating moment of truth.
The piano doesn’t accompany so much as reveal.Every note sounds like it’s been carried in his chest for years, worn thin from being unsaid.It lands gently but leaves bruises.The melody doesn’t move with urgency—it moves with memory.It pauses where grief lingers and drifts through silence like someone replaying a goodbye they never got to speak.
His voice—tattered at the edges, barely holding together—doesn’t beg to be heard.It assumes it won’t be.And that’s where the heartbreak lives.He’s singing for someone who’s already gone, or maybe was never fully there.There’s an aching “I loved you,” spoken without punctuation, without expectation.
This is the sound of someone sitting in the aftermath—not trying to rebuild, not trying to explain—just wanting to be honest one last time.It doesn’t ask for closure.It is the closure.Not clean.Not easy.But human in its rawest form.
This song breaks you in places you thought time had stitched over.It doesn’t rip them open—it touches them like it remembers.And suddenly, so do you.
Endings suck.
They’re rarely graceful, never clean.They show up uninvited, too soon or too late, and rip the ground out from under you when you’re still mid-sentence.They take your hope and leave you with questions, silence, and the ache of what almost was.
But eventually—after the dust settles, after the grief softens—you start to see it.
That maybe it was for the best.
That maybe losing something saved you from losing yourself.
Endings aren’t elegant.
They just happen.
And all you can do is sift through the wreckage until you find the sliver of light.
There’s always one.
Even if you have to bleed a little to find it.
If it helpsto hit repeat through the list, do it.
If it helps to scream into the pillow, do that too.
This playlist won’t fix anything.
But maybe it’ll remind you that even endings deserve a soundtrack.
Let me know if you want the lights back on after this.
Or if we stay in the dark for a little longer.
ChapterFifty-Two
Private Message | EchoZone Internal Chat
From: DeadStrings
To: StringTheory27
Date: May 16th, 1997, 12:44 AM
Subject: Light, revised
You brokeme with that message.
