((Malibu Beach. His home before it was yours...his head between his hands...fingers running through thick black hair...face and eyes down...staring at...))

November: If I trip, stumble, and fall...and they do turn away from me one by one like it seems they've been doing for the last five-years...I'll still love them. I am one of them, but not in that way.

((...at...at...what is that?))

It's like I'm there. I can always see myself just right there. I was there on the third of September when we shared our grief with the world...and I knew I belonged with them, and most of the time I don't think about it too much, but then there are those moments when I realize that while I may belong because of my last name...I'm really not one of them. Yeah, sometimes it's even confusing to me. How they can look my way with a smile...a really convincing smile, but the truth...the truth is in their eyes...

They scream of disapproval and disappointment. Why didn't I try to be a little something more? Why didn't I try to steal this...or steal that...or in the very least make my presence known on some other level. Screaming, screaming, screaming...But that was them, and this is me. 

I'm steady.

The others they run and jump ahead, just like you, looking for something...anything to make them stand out. Just looking for some way to steal a slice of the spotlight. They don't look deep enough or hard enough at what it means to be it or even a true part of it. All you know is the fame and prestige that comes along with it...but they all forget...they all forget that Jeff, with the name, waited two-long years...in the shadows...for his chance to be.

He was steady.  

((...oh my God...it's a shadow. His shadow. I'm sitting in his shadow....))

You have to want it for what it really is. You have to look back past the Jeff's and the Shawn's...you have to look all the way back to my uncle...because it is his name. Most people tend to forget the story of how we all came into existence. Today the story seems to start with Shawn, and even in some circles Jeff, but they forget just like you'll never know that it started with one man and his pain. And how he called upon those he loved to help him kill that which he hated...they all forget that story. They forget that its a lot more then a few clichés thrown together in a nicely decorated package...it's about history, tradition, and loyalty...

And that's why I belong...because I don't forget. Because I still send Despair a Christmas card every year, because I can still find significance in the word crimson, because only I can still remember why I chose November for my name, and because I'm the only one left whose ever outshone Drake. And he knows it.

I know what I am, and what I can be. I hear it all the time in my left ear...they, not them, telling me who I am...what I should be....where I should go...asking me questions they aren't allowed to know. I hear it all in my left ear and then listen to my own voice in my right.

Just be steady.

((...no wait...that isn't his shadow, but I recognize it...whose shadow is that?...))

And so I am...and so I belong, but I'm really not one of them. Because there are always those looks...those looks that make me flinch and look out to the west. The whispers behind my back that keep me guessing. I've wanted to be a part of them for so long, and just not belong. Five-years, and I've come a long way, but sometimes I feel like I'm right back where I started. Don't say the wrong word...don't make the wrong move...don't disrespect the family...don't breathe too hard...

Pins and needles...pins and needles...

And everything you want to be rides on this match...? Try looking past it...see if you can handle the pressure of those disapproving eyes always on you...forcing you to be perfect...to be great. Try rising to my level, and then maybe you'll understand what this all means.

((oh...oh I get it...I've been sitting in my own shadow...))