[Verse 1] She met him on a rainy night, Beneath a flickering streetlight, He smiled at her, she smiled back, And something clicked that night. He walked her home but never spoke About the place where he called home, She thought perhaps he liked his space, Or maybe lived alone. He never opened any doors, They seemed to open on their own, He never ordered food or wine, But she’d never seen him eat alone. And when her friends were gathered round, They’d talk as though he wasn’t there, She’d laugh and say, “You’re being rude,” But no one seemed to care. [Pre-Chorus] And every little mystery She pushed away with time, Until the things she couldn’t explain Started playing on her mind. [Chorus] Who was the man who held her hand? Who was the shadow by her side? She’d fallen for a stranger She could never quite describe. He never crossed the threshold, Never stayed until the dawn, And every time she turned around, He somehow would be gone. She thought he’d stopped loving her, She thought he’d changed his mind, But she didn’t know she’d fallen for A ghost from another time. [Verse 2] She’d never seen his bedroom, Never knew where he slept, He’d walk her to her front door And vanish in the depths. She started thinking maybe There was something he concealed, Perhaps he’d done something terrible, Perhaps his smile wasn’t real. She told herself, “He’s dangerous,” Then told herself, “He’s shy,” But something in her whispered, “Girl, you’d better find out why.” So she followed him one evening Through the rain and falling leaves, He turned the corner up ahead— And disappeared between the streets. She ran around the corner, But there was no one there, Just an empty road beneath A cold and silver moonlit glare. [Pre-Chorus] She searched the names of criminals, The missing and the dead, She searched through every recent case That newspapers had said. Then something made her wonder What the older papers knew… So she searched back through the decades— And found a photograph of you. [Chorus] There was the man who held her hand, There was the face she knew so well, A photograph from years ago And underneath it, “Dead.” Nineteen fifty-two, A crime that went so wrong, A young man killed by circumstance, His life forever gone. She stared into his photograph, Her blood ran cold with fear, Because beneath the faded ink Was the face she’d come to love that year. [Bridge] “Victim of a crime gone wrong, Young man found dead at dawn, No family could explain the case, No reason to carry on.” But she knew that face. She knew those eyes. She knew the voice she’d heard at night. And suddenly every little thing Was shining in a different light. He never ate. He never drank. He never opened doors. Her friends never spoke his name— Because perhaps they saw him no more. She ran back to the place they’d met, Calling out beneath the rain, And there he stood beneath the streetlight Just the same. He looked at her and softly smiled, As if nothing had gone wrong. “Why are you crying, darling?” “I’ve been waiting for you all along.” [Male Rap Feature] Back through the paper, back through the years, A black-and-white face with a headline of fear. Twenty-three, no alibi, no goodbye, Now he walks beside her though the records say he died. No plate on the table, no key in the lock, No footsteps behind her when she checks the clock. She calls his name and the cold air replies, Two different dates in the same pair of eyes. [Final Chorus] She took his hand beneath the moon, And whispered, “Now I know.” He looked confused, he looked afraid, He said, “Where did you go?” She told him what she’d found that night, The newspaper, the date, He stared at his own photograph And whispered, “That’s not me…” But the photograph was unmistakable, The face, the eyes, the name, And suddenly he couldn’t remember How he’d ever got here in the first place. [Outro] Some say she followed him that night, And never came back home. Some say she walked away from him And chose to live alone. Some say she couldn’t bear a world Where he could never stay, And others swear they saw her Walking down the road at break of day. But no one really knows the truth, And no one ever will… Did she take her own life Just to find him once again? Or did she leave the ghost behind And walk into the morning rain? And sometimes, late at night, When the streetlights flicker low, People say they see two shadows Walking where the old road goes. One from nineteen fifty-two… One from years unknown… And neither one is living, But neither walks alone.
