[Verse 1] Family law that no one asked for Case number two The Commonwealth versus Ivan Failure to protect Enabling familial abuse Abandonment by inaction Complicity through loyalty How does the defendant plead? I loved them That's not what I asked [Verse 2] You were everything when I was small Bus rides to the city for mental mendu Saturday grocery, same shop, same haul You'd lecture me about wasting money, then buy me what I wanted anyway Tell me, "Don't listen to stupid rules," and tuck me in at the end of the day You taught me questions, taught me school, taught me how to think for myself Said, "I'm not your dad, but I'll be here as what I can" And you were, you heard every stupid story, every question, every fear I could cry on you, talk for hours, you always let me near You'd sang along to my new rubbish, even when you hated every song I knew, you Or I thought I did, then I came home And so did you, it allowed all along, all along, all along [Chorus] You loved me, I know you did That's the fucking problem Because love shouldn't have meant you stood between me and What was destroying my soul You taught me to stand up straight, then stood down when it mattered You taught me to question everything except your family So tell me, grandad, was I asking too much? Or did you love us in all the ways you knew, and failed us in all the ways you didn't? Did you see the fridge? Did you smell the rot? Did you know she slept on the fucking couch because the bedroom was lost? Did you complain? Yeah Did you stop it? No [Bridge] You threw some rubbish out, patched the hole, called it handled, then go back inside And pretend the house was still standing You gave her money, you gave her chances, you gave her excuses She's just the way she is, funny You taught me people aren't fixed by labels You taught me bad behavior has consequences But when it came to her, suddenly consequences were negotiable And when the court came, you believed their shows and them, them Like I'd willingly walked away from the one person I trusted most I didn't choose strangers, I chose you And you thought I'd chosen them [Outro] You loved me, I know you did That's the fucking problem Because I didn't need you to save me I needed you to believe me I didn't need a hero, I needed my grandad to say She's telling the truth But you couldn't, or wouldn't, and god, I needed you to [Verse 3] The funny thing is I can explain you now The routines, the repetition, the sounds you couldn't stand The smells, the particular breath, the particular knife Maybe there were things your brain simply did differently An understanding that gave me grace Because the older I got, the more I realized You weren't stupid, you weren't cruel You just didn't always understand what people needed from you You could understand a problem perfectly And still miss the human being standing inside it [Bridge] So don't misunderstand me I'm not rewriting you into a monster You weren't, you loved me, you spoiled me, you listened, you taught me You gave me a home when I had nowhere else to go You loved my husband too, you found a friend in him And I loved watching that because he got to see a part of you I'd forgotten existed So no, I will not stand here and tell the court you never loved me That would be a lie [Chorus] You loved me And you failed me Both are true So I got one question left Not, "Why didn't you protect me?" I know enough about you to understand that answer Not, "Why didn't you believe me?" I may never know I've got one question I've never been able to answer One missing chapter in this fucked up fairy tale What made you love Isobel? What did you see? What did you know? What did you give? That made all of this worth protecting Because you were one of the smartest men I've ever known You could understand things nobody else could So make me understand Human to human, granddad to granddaughter Why her? Because I've got almost every other answer [Outro] And that's the one I still don't No lawyer, no representative, no one translating my words Just me The witness Finally on the stand And this time I'm not asking for a verdict I'm asking you To tell me the truth Ayes two Verdict, kid
