Had Enough of Silly Love Songs?

In his practice studio at the college, Matthew sat at his piano and tried to compose a song, a funky little thing for his girlfriend. As he toyed with the keys, playing whatever came into his head, he made notes on the piece of paper. His heart told him that the message was simple: this woman he loved to distraction was the only other person, besides himself, he cared about in the whole world.

The more he toiled, the more confused he became: love shouldn’t be this complicated, so why was writing this love song so difficult? He lost all track of time, never wore a watch; the room was soundproofed and had no windows. He was studying piano and music composition; this was his life’s work, he’d never failed to produce something wonderful for all those who had commissioned works from him before.

Why should this be any different? It wasn’t the subject matter; he’d written love songs for all his other girlfriends, all eight of them. Sure, most of those songs had been pretty esoteric, some of them bordering on impenetrable code instead of love poetry. Two girls had broken up with him over what he’d written for them. He only thought about them when those songs played on the radio because the record company for a boy band bought them, recorded them and sent him royalty checks once a quarter.

Maybe that was the key: what would NKOTBSB do in a situation like this? Something like go to a bar, have a drink or two, joke about the old days and make plans for the future that included their wives and kids.

And as that thought fled, the words came to him: she was absolutely going to love him even more for this song…if that was possible.