As Jeremiah got ready to go to the Kennedy Center, Jona made sure that everything was clear. “Ok, let me see if I’ve got this straight. All of the spouses/ significant others will be staying here to watch the kids while the rest of you go to the Kennedy Center to honor your Dad. Right, baby?”
“Yes. The only spouse that’s going with us is Delilah because she and Makayla are dancing after the choir bit.”
“And the choir is Miranda’s choir from school?”
“Yeah. They’re going to do ‘Remember’ a capella. It’s going to be so pretty.”
“I can’t wait until this is broadcast at the end of the year. Your Dad’s reactions are going to be priceless.”
“Oh, I know. I’ll tell you all about it when we get back. Now, I hate to do it, but I’ve got to get the hell out of here if we’re going to beat Dad and Mom to the Kennedy Center.”
She walked him to the door and gave him a kiss goodbye before he left. “Have fun, baby. I want all of the details when you get back.”
“You got it.” He checked his watch. “I can walk you up to Malachai and Mandy’s suite if you’d like. We have the time.”
She smiled. “I like that.” She grabbed her shoes and walked the hall with her fiancé to the elevator. Once they reached the desired floor, he walked her down to his brother’s room and left her with another kiss. Then, he and his siblings mobbed down to the lobby to get their limo to the building where their father was being honored for his work as a musician and songwriter.
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After fielding the minefield of reporters and fans, David and Brie were finally seated in the balcony with the other honorees and their guests. Brie wore a nice black dress that fit her perfectly, the platinum jewelry that David had bought her for their first anniversary after the war, and wore her hair straight with the ends curled under to frame her face. She took David’s hand and squeezed gently. “What are you thinking?” she asked.
“I’m thinking that this is all very surreal and I can’t believe that this is happening”, he whispered. Along with the medal that he was given at the luncheon with President McAllister, he wore a black suit with a thin silver pin stripe, a blue dress shirt and a tie. The medal was secured to the lapel of his jacket. He wore his signature double labret piercings because, technically, he was working. “I really don’t want to be here. I didn’t do any to deserve sitting in this balcony.”
“David, I love you. Suck it up. You’re here; this is happening. Whether you think you deserve it or not- whether I think you deserve it or not- SOMEONE thinks you deserve it. Just humbly accept it like you have everything else you’ve gotten over the past several years. You’re a brilliant song writer, and you’re willing to talk about things that normal people shrink from. That’s what got you where you are today.”
He smiled softly at her and brushed the back of his index finger down her cheek. “How is it that you always know just what I need to hear?”
“It’s a gift. I know you, David. I’ve been your wife for almost thirty years. Over that period of time, I’m bound to get to know you a little better than you know yourself.”
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Once the ceremony got underway, David sat in near boredom as he watched the tributes to his fellow honorees. He was going to be the last on honored and he was ok with that. He knew that there was a LOT of ground to cover as far as his career went. A career that spanned nearly forty years meant that there was a lot for whomever honored home to cover. He hoped that whoever it was that spoke in his honor knew him rather well and could have a sense of humor about what was happening.
“Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to the stage Dan Donegan of Disturbed”, the announcer said and David watched his brother and long time friend come out onto the stage with an iPad. He set the iPad on the podium. “I just wanted to ask the committee really fast if they know what they’re doing in giving this award to David and not Disturbed as a whole. You do realize that he didn’t do ANY of this alone, right?” David couldn’t help but laugh. “Now, in all seriousness, I honestly can’t think of anyone else in that balcony that deserves this honor more. David, you’re a strong, outspoken man who’s never been afraid to say what he knew needed to be said. From the first time I met you when you auditioned for the band all those years ago and told us that you wanted to do something original rather than a cover, Mikey and I knew that you were a one of a kind. Now, about forty years later, and I think we’ve pretty much achieved everything we set out to achieve and then some. Congratulations, brother. You deserve this.”
The stage when black as the tribute video started to play. The instrumental introduction from the song ‘Asylum’, also known as ‘Remnants’, played softly in the background as a montage of the many music videos he’d done over his career flashed before his eyes. Then, David heard his own voice speaking over the music. “Everyone has a struggle in their life; and the question is, ‘Do you allow yourself to be overcome by it or do you master it with unified strength and power?’ This is exactly what the music was meant to do; was to transcend your normal world, to make you set down your burden for a while; to make you feel powerful, to make you feel invincible, to make you feel indestructible, to believe in something as opposed to believing in nothing. Spread the Sickness; infect the world.” Then, his son Jacob’s voice flooded the auditorium. “Visionary, poet, prophet, Messiah… these are only a few of the words that he’s been called over the forty years that’s he’s been doing what he does. But, David Draiman hasn’t always been the most outspoken man in the nation. He hasn’t always been the Voice; the most outspoken force against the former Utopian government. At one time, he was just a young man trying to decide what to do with his life. Whether to follow the herd and do what he was groomed to do- or to stand up and strike out on his own, to be an original rather than a sheep...”
As David sat and listened to his first born son recount the events of his life and career, he felt the bite of tears stinging at the back of his eyes. He reached out and grabbed his wife’s hand and kissed her knuckles as he tried not to let the emotion he was feeling fall from his eyes.
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Miranda’s school choir did a beautiful rendition of ‘Remember’ that made David smile as he continued to fight back the tears that he knew wanted to fall. When the whole choir started rocking back and forth as they clapped the tempo and sang, David started to lip synch along with them. “If I can remember to know this will conquer me! If I can just walk alone and try to escape into me…”
After the choir sang, he watch his daughter and daughter in law give a wonderful visual presentation of ‘The Infection’. The girls whirled and twirled all over the stage as they mock fought and Makayla killed the Infection.
Then the heavy intro to ‘Never Again’ pulsed through the air as he listened to Jordan growl the famous phrase. “Ladies and gentlemen, Reckless Disregard”, the announcer said as Jordan belted out the song. “They had a frightening desire for genocide, they wouldn’t stop ‘til what was left of my family died, hell bent on taking over the world, you couldn’t hide in the shroud of conformity!”
When ‘Prayer’ was played, he finally let one of the tears that had been stinging his eyes slide down his cheek as he watched the two young men that joined his oldest daughter onstage. ‘Ten Thousand Fists’ and ‘Another Way to Die’, were the same. Then, he saw the stage started to turn when Jordan let out the maniacal laugh that opened ‘Inside the Fire’. As Ryan of the band Wrought Iron started to sing the first verse, David saw his brothers behind his daughter and her friends rather than her band. All he could do was cover his face and shake his head. At the solo, Jordan shouted out to the crowd, ‘Come one, let me see those HORNS! Give it up for the musical styling’s of Dan Donegan, John Moyer, and Mike Wengren!” After the solo Jordan and Royce harmonized in the chorus, Jordan taking the melody. “Give your soul to me for eternity, release your life to begin another time with her, End your grief with me, there’s another way, release your life, take your place Inside the Fire with her!”
Once the song ended it was subtly transitioned into “Down with the Sickness”. When the music came to an end to cue the infamous noise that had made David famous to begin with, Jordan held up a finger for a few brief moments then pointed to Ryan who nailed it. David was impressed. David sat in the balcony and sang along with a smile as he watched Jordan act a fool during the first verse. During the first chorus, the rest of his children piled onto the stage. They sang along and had a huge party on that stage in their father’s honor. He couldn’t help but laugh.
Once the song was over, David was the first on his feet to applaud, everyone else in the balcony followed suit. Using sign language- which Brie had made sure that all of her family knew- he thanked everyone on the stage with a smile. He couldn’t have been happier to be a father than he was in that moment. He knew that he had led a life and was leaving a legacy that his children could be proud of and that’s all that mattered. Even as he took a bow with the rest of the honorees, it didn’t matter. He was just proud to be able to call the ten young men and women that had been on that stage to pay tribute to him his children.
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