Tales From the Dragon Cave

Gold • D a n

"If you could go back to our first year, would you?"

It's Ben who poses the question, while we're editing a song about the general shittiness of my social life and I'm having pretty shitty day anyway. My social life has really always been shitty, but the mind has a way of telling you hey, that year wasn't so bad and but damn, this year is the fucking worst. Anyway, it's a relevant question.

"I wouldn't," Platz says. "I'm still not too fond of being starving."

"I would," Wayne says.

"Dan?"

"In a heartbeat," I mutter.

"Why?"

I shrug. "I was happier. Why wouldn't you? We were all living together off Taco Bell playing for six hours every night."

"Have you forgotten the tears and not having heat and sleeping on the floor and being mugged?" Platz says.

I smile a little to myself. "Eh. It wasn't that bad, was it?"

I remember our house. A tiny kitchen with barely enough room for Ben to stand to make us a small dinner some nights. A living room with guitars and lyric sheets always strewn about. Wayne and I shared a laughably small bedroom and I think for quite a while we didn't even have beds. I have a distinct memory of waking up and feeling a mouse run across my feet in the middle of the night, then promptly shrieking and waking the whole house up before Ben came in and killed the thing, calling me a fucking wimp as he did. There are other memories too, less funny middle-of-the-night memories, but I block those out now.

There were bad parts to it, I guess. It was in a bad neighborhood and we got mugged so many times I lost count. We would lock our door at night and huddle together on the living room floor when we heard dangerous noises outside, trying to comfort each other when we were scared shitless ourselves. And slowly, through that and other bad experiences, we kept getting closer and closer. I remember back when I was still young and afraid of getting hurt and I pushed people away like I'd done all my life and Wayne was the first one who ever pushed back, who said don't shut me out like that, tell me your dreams, tell me what scares you, tell me what keeps you up at night and what keeps you going when you don't want to push on, tell me who you are.

Of course we all loved each other. Of course we were closer to each other than other people. But making connections is the key to getting anywhere, so we did. We ran around the city making noise and friends. After a few years I had nearly convinced myself I wasn't introverted. Everything was about being loud, noticeable, captivating, interesting, charismatic.

But now I just want to curl up in the corner of my room with headphones in like I'm an anxious teenager again.

Every friend I made in those years and even years before is gone. And not even out of losing touch or drifting apart. Just out of me avoiding people because friendships make me sick now. I second-guess everything. I feel as nervous around people I used to call my best friends as I do in front of cameras and interviewers. Everything's a test. I can't make a wrong move.

"Dan?" Wayne says a little loudly.

"Huh?"

"Well, your ADD is just as bad as it was back then," Ben says, laughing a little.

"And everything else is worse," I mutter.

They all quiet again.

"What do you mean?" Platz says after a bit of silence.

I shrug. "I feel worse. I don't have any friends anymore. I feel like no one actually likes me. I don't see why anyone should."

Wayne puts his hand on my shoulder, rubbing a little circle on my back with his thumb. "People like you."

"I don't know though. Maybe it's just because of the band. I don't know if anyone actually cares about me. And I'm not even fun to hang out with anyway because I'm depressive as hell and ruin everyone's fun, so even if I have friends now I won't for long."

Wayne's looking at the lyric sheet in front of him. "Who can you trust..." he murmurs to himself. "Dan, no one's been giving you a hard time, right?"

"No. Just me." I can tell he would've jumped right up and murdered anyone I said though.

"We like you," Ben says. "You're no different to us. Same little loser we liked six years ago."

I lift my head to look at him.

"I know we're not much, but we're never ever leaving you," Wayne says, still rubbing my back a little. He does it so much when he feels like I'm stressed that I barely pay any mind to it anymore. Just a background comfort.

"Yeah, I know," I say quietly.

"Do you really?"

I think for a while on that one. I know what they say to me. But do I believe it? I don't know. I still kind of feel like they don't really need me, or like they just feel bad for me, or like they wouldn't give a crap about me if I couldn't sing and write for them...

Which is so stupid because they're the sweetest guys on the planet and they'd never ever use me like that.

"I don't know anything," I finally answer.

Wayne leans closer to my ear. "I love you with every fiber of my being just for who you are and that's never going to change."

Ben and Platz nod their agreement.

"It's not just you," Platz says. "We've all lost some people."

"This is the part where we all thank God we're not solo acts because this way we'll never be alone whether we like it or not," Ben says.

I smile a little and bite back my insecurities for a minute.

"I love you guys."

"We love you too," Wayne says.

"Nerd," Platz adds. My smile grows.

"Ben, you never answered your own question earlier."

"Good point. Well, my answer is that I don't give a damn what year it is as long as I've got you guys onstage with me. Nothing else matters."

"Awww," we all chorus.

"Group hug! Group hug! Group hug!" Ben chants as I end up in the middle of a pretzel of hairy musician arms, laughing even though under five minutes ago I wanted to crawl back into bed.

So I guess really, nothing else does matter. At least, nothing else matters quite as much.

Who can you trust...?