[Intro: Sparse, slow trap beat with kick and snare. The sound of a ceiling fan whirring. A warm, slightly detuned synth pad holds a single note. A PowerPoint click.] [Verse 1: Defensive, weary speak-singing] Alright, so the projector's bulb is dying again Gives everything a reddish, failing tint Just like the sun will, in about five billion years First it expands, then it swallows Mercury and Venus My personal Mercury was that band van we painted matte black My Venus was the girl who swore she’d never move back Now they're just spectral lines in a memory And I'm a middle-aged star, getting incrementally [Pre-Chorus: Voice strains, first hint of guitar] And that's the expected process, obviously The inevitable stellar mortality (Gravity always wins) [Chorus: Full band crashes in. Midwest-emo guitar melody, heavy with reverb. Voice rises to a strained, emotional peak] I'm in my Red Giant phase, burning through my core Swallowing the planets of who I was before The fusion's slowing down, the light is turning red Expanding into nothingness instead But stable—so brilliantly stable [Verse 2: More agitated. Trap beat gets a heavier 808 bass drop] The parent-teacher conferences are Thursday night A different kind of celestial alignment, getting the orbits right Between expectations, disappointments, and little Jason's grade A main-sequence marriage, slowly starting to fade We communicate in low-energy photons now Short texts about the groceries, a passive-aggressive "wow" The kids are like dwarf planets, circling in their own far-out lanes And I'm just trying to remember all their names [Instrumental Break: A deliberately cheesy, sad Casio keyboard "space" sound (twinkling stars setting) over the same unwavering trap beat. It lasts just a few seconds too long, creating awkwardness.] [Bridge: Whispered, voice cracking. Beat reduces to just the kick drum, like a heartbeat] On a cosmological scale, my light’s too faint to see From any other star, there's nothing left of me Just a slow expansion into cold and empty space A temporary, slightly warmed and well-mapped place The alarm goes off at six-fifteen each day A supernova couldn't blow this routine away [Verse 3: Resigned, speak-singing returns. Beat fills back in lightly] So when my daughter asks me "Daddy, will the sun explode?" I want to say "Yes, and everything we built will be erode And all your gold medals and all your gold stars Will just be elemental dust on Jupiter or Mars" But instead I say "Not for a long, long time, sweetheart" And feel another little piece of my core break apart A solar flare of grief, kept tightly held within The stable, burning giant with a reassuring grin [Final Chorus: Stripped back. Just a clean, aching electric guitar and weary vocal. The trap beat has vanished.] I'm in my Red Giant phase, burning through my core Swallowing the planets of who I was before The fusion's slowing down, the light is turned to red Expanding into nothingness instead But stable... God, we're stable. [Outro: Spoken, from the perspective of a spouse/partner. The sound of dishes being put away in the next room.] ("You were staring off into the backyard again.") ("The grill's off, right? You turned the propane off?") ("It's just... you get so quiet.") ("It's fine. It's just a phase. Everything's fine.") [Fade out with the sound of the ceiling fan and the faint, high-pitched hum of the projector's dying bulb.]
