If It's Bad News, It Can Wait - Empire! Empire! (I Was a Lonely Estate)

My three best friends and I planned a week-long trip

For our spring break during our senior year of high school

We were untethered and free and grown

We left before the sun rose and began the first leg

To Virginia Beach for a couple of days

Before heading out to camp on the Outer Banks

When we arrived, we spent the first night playing video games

We brought from home in our hotel room

In the morning, we ventured out into the world

And wandered around until late at night

Like spectators or ghosts

As artificial lights burned brighter than daylight

The boardwalk was teeming with youth

Brashly claiming adulthood like it was the last day on earth

We retreated back to our hotel, exhausted

The phone in our room rang out at an ungodly hour

When only bad things are on the other end

I answered and gave it to Danny

So he could hear his brother passed away

He dropped the phone and bolted out into the hall

Blind with grief

We ran out after him, unsure of what to do

He threw off our embrace and escaped down the stairs to the beach

And haunted the shore of the Atlantic for hours and hours

I waited and watched from a nearby park bench

When he came back, we got into the car and drove the twelve hours back home

And made it just in time for the funeral