second time around // zedd

The Hopeful

Anton's P.O.V.

Alone.  

That's all I was. That's all I ever felt. 

The only person I cared about, ripped away from me by inevitable circumstances. 

Fuck, I felt alone. 

I left the airport with water tides in my eyes, a slow, deathly walk and a slurred, drained, dead voice. I couldn't bear the city of Rome any more. I had to go back home to Germany immediately.  

I didn't cry, well, not stereotypically. I didn't wail or yell or scream or try to fight what it was. I just sat in my bed that night, avoiding sleep all that I could, and let the tears fall. From my eyes, down to my cheeks, falling off my face and onto a wet bed sheet. I was home now, back in Kaiserslautern, not Berlin. Too many memories there, and my parents had agreed to that. I didn't feel like going back to school, or getting up to eat, or getting up to drink, or getting up at all. I just wanted to lay in this bed, all of my memories clustering my mind at once. I wanted Rose so badly, and she had only been gone a day. Of course, I promised her, I'm going to see her again, but even my 13-year-old mind knew that the odds were against me. It was unfair to me and to her. I wanted every last inch of Rose and nothing could ever change my mind. I couldn't do anything then. I really couldn't. I just cried. I found a picture of Rose and I when we were little, circa age 7 or 8. She was hugging me around the neck and I had the biggest grin on my face as we played. I sighed and released the picture from my grasp. No, I thought. This cannot happen. This will not happen. I made a permanent pact in my mind to find her whatever it took. I didn't care if I was 34, with no job, and one plane ticket to America, goddammit, I was going to find the one I loved. That never moved from my mind. I figured that it never would.

~~ 

Monday, August 2nd, 2010. 

Los Angeles, California, United States. 

After a while I decided not to live in hope anymore. I never could let go of Rose, but damn, I needed to. I was 21 then - 8 years after 'the incident' - and sitting in a hot ass LA apartment waiting on a call back from the head of a certain Interscope Records. Ring a bell? It should. You see, about 6 months ago, I figured 'hey, why not produce music rather than play it live?' I had no money back then, and not a clue as to what I was supposed to be doing. I tried a few remixes for a few songs of a few people, under the name Zedd, and before you know it, I'm on the phone with Sonny Moore, or Skrillex, in simpler terms. I still remember the phone call that changed my life forever.  

"Hey man, your stuff's really good," he'd said. 

"Thanks, you think so?"

"I know so. You know, I think you've got potential. I've got a few connections with the people up at Interscope. You think they'll sign you?"

"Not an EDM producer. They only do mainstream acts, that I know for sure."

"Hey, you never know, maybe one day you could release a track that goes double platinum. Trends change like that."

"You're right. Are you sure about it though?"

"I've never been so sure about anything in my entire life. You're gonna go far, that I know."

"Thanks, man. Bye." 

"Bye."

In that moment the world did a backflip on its axis. That moment marked the first day of the rest of my life. But it had given me hope. Producers travel all around the world, right? Maybe this is the way I was bound to find Rose. If she even still wanted to be with me. It didn't matter either way. I couldn't wait to see what she looked like, wherter she had the same blonde hair or the same piercing blue eyes. It tore me apart to know that there was a chance that she didn't want to see me at all, but those were the kinds of risks I had to take. The end of my journey was near, and I could almost taste it.