You Needed to Be Right
Verse 1
I knew your numbers off by heart.
I swallowed radiation.
I kept rehearsing what I'd say
And never saying it.
What do you call your family
When "family" doesn't fit?
I had no room for more bad news.
I let the screen go dim.
Pre-Chorus
The cancer didn't take them.
That part was down to you.
I came apart much later.
You used it as your proof.
Chorus
I needed you to be my family.
You needed to be right.
I was trying to get through treatment.
You were getting on with life.
I hope the truth keeps finding you
In every quiet night.
I needed you to be my family.
You needed to be right.
Verse 2
I don't know how they take their tea,
What music fills their rooms.
You know a hundred little things
I should have grown into.
Another birthday comes around.
You ask what gifts to send.
There's a funeral in the calendar
That only I attend.
Pre-Chorus
You get to call it bitterness.
You get to say, "Let go."
You get to say it with their coats
Still hanging by your door.
Chorus
I needed you to be my family.
You needed to be right.
I was trying to get through treatment.
You were getting on with life.
I hope the truth keeps finding you
In every quiet night.
I needed you to be my family.
You needed to be right.
Bridge
I've wished you every empty room.
I've wished you every date.
I've wished you years of listening
For footsteps at the gate.
If there's a life beyond this one,
Let knowledge be the cost:
The whole of what you chose to do.
The whole of what I lost.
And underneath that furious prayer,
I'm still asking you:
I was your child before all this.
What did I have to prove?
Final Chorus
I needed you to be my family.
You needed to be right.
I was trying to get through treatment.
You were getting on with life.
I hope the truth keeps finding you
In every quiet night.
I hope you live a long time knowing
What it cost to feel so right.
Outro
If you ever understand,
Don't tell me what you meant.
Tell me what you did.