The stranger I became

Intro

I used to think the monsters lived

Under beds and in the dark

I never thought they'd build a home

Inside the chambers of my heart

Verse 1

I wake up every morning

Put a smile upon my face

Tell the world that I'm still standing

While I'm barely in the race

Everybody sees the surface

Nobody can see below

All the silent devastation

Buried where the flowers grow

I became a master actor

Learned to wear a perfect skin

While a stranger in the mirror

Slowly started settling in

Pre-Chorus

No warning signs

No flashing lights

No demons screaming through the night

Just quiet storms

And whispered fears

Growing stronger through the years

Chorus

There's a stranger in my shadow

Learning every part of me

Speaking with my voice

While stealing everything I used to be

He knows every insecurity

Every scar and every flame

And nobody around me notices

The stranger I became

Verse 2

It started as a passing thought

A fleeting doubt inside my mind

Then it spread like ivy roots

Wrapping everything it could find

Every dream became a question

Every step became a fight

Every room felt ten times darker

Even standing in the light

Friends would ask me where I've been

I'd laugh and simply change the subject

Never knowing I was drowning

In an ocean they couldn't suspect

Pre-Chorus

No broken bones

No blood to show

Just hidden wounds that never close

No battlefield

No battle cry

Just surviving one more night

Chorus

There's a stranger in my shadow

Learning every part of me

Speaking with my voice

While stealing everything I used to be

He knows every insecurity

Every scar and every flame

And nobody around me notices

The stranger I became

Bridge

Some wars don't make a headline

Some scars don't leave a mark

Some people fight their hardest battles

Completely in the dark

Some prisons have no fences

Some chains remain unseen

Some people lose themselves so slowly

They forget where they have been

I spent years avoiding mirrors

Terrified of what I'd find

Only to discover

The enemy was hiding in my mind

Instrumental Break

Final Chorus

There's a stranger in my shadow

But tonight I know his name

He's the fear I kept avoiding

He's the guilt I couldn't face

He's every tear I buried

Every truth I tried to hide

Growing louder in the silence

Living somewhere deep inside

But the story doesn't end here

And the darkness doesn't win

Because the moment that I faced him

Was the moment I began again

Outro

The world may never know

The battles I survived within

They only see who I became

Not the war that I had to win