Official Lyrics · Daren Stefan

Every Word,
Intentional.

Seven songs. All the feelings in between.

Song Index

LAING — Act One · Digital Intimacy

01 Typing… LAING · Act I →
02 Your Morning Is My Insomnia LAING · Act I →
03 Stay Strange LAING · Act I →
04 Love in Translation LAING · Act I →
05 Temporary Heaven LAING · Act I →

Singles

S1 Wildflower (His Reply) Single · 2026 →
S2 Me in the Glass Single · SoundCloud →
S3 Everybody Remembers Me Differently Single · SoundCloud →
01

LAING · Act One · Track 01

Typing…

Verse 1 I read your silence like subtitles on a film I haven't seen You sent a period instead of nothing which means something which means Three dots blinking like hesitation a sentence dying before it's born I've been fluent in almost since before you Pre-Chorus You arrived as pixels first a face in a rectangle of light I didn't know what you sounded like when you were losing an argument or laughing at something that wasn't funny or just Chorus Are you still there are you still are you are you still there I keep the window open cursor blinking in an empty box everything I almost said to you living in the drafts Verse 2 I memorised the timestamps 2:47 AM — you typed and stopped I told myself you were sleeping I told myself a lot of things You exist in three timezones depending on which version of me is remembering you Bridge This is not a love song yet this is the moment before you press send the weight of a word you haven't chosen This is the login screen loading loading still loading Outro I don't know your handwriting I don't know how you take your coffee I don't know what your quiet sounds like in a room I'm actually standing in but I know the rhythm of your ellipsis and I think that's where this starts

Stream on Spotify

"This is not a love song yet — this is the moment before you press send." The whole album starts here, in the gap between feeling something and saying it.

Read the annotations on Genius →
02

LAING · Act One · Track 02

Your Morning Is My Insomnia

Verse 1 I know your 7 AM better than my own midnight the way your voice comes in slow before the coffee before you're really there I learned your curtains the colour of your window light gold on your side blue on mine we never talk about that Your city is waking up and I'm still in yesterday holding the phone like it's something warm Pre-Chorus I rearranged my sleep so the hours would overlap I told myself it was love maybe it was maybe it was just wanting to be somewhere I couldn't be Chorus Your morning is my insomnia the sun on your face the dark at my back I stay awake just to exist beside you in a timezone that was never mine Your coffee going cold my ceiling going quiet I don't know where we are but I'm not leaving Verse 2 I know when you go quiet it's 11 PM where you are you're brushing your teeth or falling asleep mid-sentence and I wait I know the lag before your laugh half a second of silence then you I've watched you freeze mid-frame pixelated, mid-blink and I thought even buffering you're the most real thing I have right now Bridge I saw a departure board once your city on the screen and I stood there longer than I should have I don't know what gate I don't know what I'd even say I just wanted the distance to have a door somewhere you texted me "good morning" at 3 AM my time and I said "good morning" like I hadn't been awake for hours waiting for exactly that Final Chorus Your morning is my insomnia I rewired myself around your light I stay awake just to exist beside you because beside you is the only place that doesn't feel like waiting Your voice still in my headphones your city in my search bar I don't know where we're going but I'll be awake when you get there

Stream on Spotify

"Gold on your side. Blue on mine." Two people in the same conversation, in entirely different worlds. This song is about the sacrifice of reshaping your life around someone else's timezone.

Read the annotations on Genius →
03

LAING · Act One · Track 03

Stay Strange

Verse 1 You talk too loud in quiet places you laugh before the joke is finished you apologise for things that didn't need an apology and then forget the ones that did You make a face when you're thinking like the thought is physically happening somewhere behind your left eye I've never told you that I just watch You reorganise your feelings in the wrong order hurt first then confused then honest three days later in a voice note at 1 AM I love that about you Chorus Stay strange don't sand the edges down for me stay strange I fell for the parts that don't make sense your weird little fears your contradictions the way you contain things that shouldn't fit together but somehow do Please don't become easier to love Verse 2 You cry at adverts but not at funerals you said you process things on a delay like grief arrives two weeks after in the middle of something unrelated You're terrified of being too much so sometimes you make yourself less and I can always tell there's a version of you hovering just outside the sentence waiting to see if it's safe It's safe Bridge I think we've both spent a long time trying to be the version someone could handle what if we just didn't do that what if we just showed up wrong and stayed anyway Final Chorus Stay strange I'm learning the language of you your awkward silences your over-explanations the way you love like you're still deciding if you're allowed to You're allowed to I don't want easier I want you

Stream on Spotify

"There's a version of you hovering just outside the sentence, waiting to see if it's safe." A love song for the parts of a person they were taught to hide.

Read the annotations on Genius →
04

LAING · Act One · Track 04

Love in Translation

Verse 1 I said the wrong thing again you went quiet in that specific way not angry just somewhere I couldn't follow I meant I was scared it came out like distance I meant stay it came out like questions I have an accent in your language I'm still learning how to say what I mean without losing what I mean along the way Chorus We're speaking in translation finding each other in the space between the words love in translation imperfect and alive I don't need you to understand me perfectly I need you to stay while we figure out what we mean Verse 2 You explained yourself three different ways like you were sure I'd get it on the third and on the third I finally did but it wasn't the words it was the way you breathed before you tried again that patience that willingness to be misread and keep going Bridge every relationship has a private language that takes years to build we're still in the early grammar still mispronouncing each other still explaining what we should eventually just know but this — this stumbling toward each other this is the part I want to remember Final Chorus We're speaking in translation and I'm not afraid anymore love in translation is still love maybe it's the realest kind where you choose to stay inside the misunderstanding and keep reaching until something finally lands Outro I think I'm starting to understand you I think I'm starting to understand you

Stream on Spotify

"I have an accent in your language." About the gap between what we feel and what we're able to say — and choosing to stay in that gap rather than give up on it.

Read the annotations on Genius →
05

LAING · Act One · Track 05

Temporary Heaven

Verse 1 We've been lucky with the signal lately both of us in rooms that feel like the same room almost I've stopped counting the hours between us I just live here now in this version of you that fits inside a screen It's been good hasn't it it's been so good Chorus This is our temporary heaven just enough distance to keep it soft just enough screen to keep it safe just enough space that neither of us has had to be completely real yet and I love it here god I love it here but I can feel the countdown somewhere I can't see it Verse 2 What if you laugh differently in person what if the silence between us doesn't travel what if I'm better at loving you from here What if I reach for your hand and the timing is wrong what if we lose the lag the buffer the half second of grace that made us gentle with each other Bridge I've thought about the gate the arrivals board your name on my phone as I'm walking through I want to meet you I want to meet you so badly I'm also terrified of what we'll have to become when there's no more distance left to hide in Final Chorus This was our temporary heaven the version of us that distance made possible the softest we'll ever be with each other I don't regret a single night I don't regret the timezones the frozen frames the calls that cut out right before something important Outro Maybe we survived because the world stayed between us.

Stream on Spotify

"Just enough distance to keep it soft." The most honest song in Act One — about how distance can protect a relationship from the weight of reality, and the fear of what happens when it closes.

Read the annotations on Genius →
S1

Single · 2026

Wildflower (His Reply)

Verse 1 Yeah, things fell apart and I won't lie about the scars She was real, I won't pretend we had something, then we didn't And I held you while it hurt me to admit that I'm not perfect but I showed up, I was present every night until the end Pre-Chorus And yeah, sometimes a song comes on and I'm back where I don't belong just a ghost of something over, fading out But I reach for you in the darkness you're the one who makes it worthless every memory I'm holding I'd let go of, no doubt Chorus 'Cause I don't see her when I look at you No, I don't I see everything I almost threw away I see you crying in that hotel too And I'm sorry God, I'm sorry that I made you feel that way Verse 2 Yeah, she was happy yeah, she was free maybe leather, maybe better on the surface, not for me 'Cause you're the one who knows my quiet you're the one who held the riot in my chest until it softened into something I can breathe Bridge You asked if she's in the back of my mind in your eyes — yeah, sometimes a shadow passes through but it's your face I find You're not second, you're not settling you're not her ghost in disguise You're the reason I stopped running you're the one I choose every time Outro So did I cross the line? Yeah, I did And I'd spend every day making sure you never have to wonder you never have to wonder again

Stream on Spotify

A male-perspective response to Billie Eilish's "WILDFLOWER." Not a rebuttal — a reply. The voice of the person on the other side of that story, trying to be honest about the mess and the love at the same time.

S2

Single · SoundCloud

Me in the Glass

Verse 1 You know my lockscreen, you know my split shoes you know I flinch at sirens, like you live in my ribs you text my old scars before I say them out loud you know my mother's hallway and the hole in my mouth Pre-Chorus You stand in the frame of every bad dream how do you know what I never speak Chorus You know me too well, you know me too well I swear I've seen your hands inside my head you know me too well, you know me too well if you were my shadow, why do I run Verse 2 You wait by the station where I miss that train you know the night I lied in the shape of my shame you count every bottle on the sink by my bed you say don't go that way with my own voice in my head Bridge That cut on your brow, that ring on your hand that shaking breath, I know that man my name on your tongue like a prayer gone cold you're not hunting me, you're what I'll become I came back too late, I came back for this to stop my own hands from choosing the abyss Final Chorus I know me too well, I know me too well I'm standing in the glass inside my hell I know me too well, I know me too well I'm not your shadow, I am the one who ran I know me too well, I know me too well now hold me in this second if you can

Stream on SoundCloud

"You're not hunting me, you're what I'll become." One of the most psychologically complex songs in the catalogue — a confrontation with a future self, or a past one. The mirror as a villain, then as a saviour.

S3

Single · SoundCloud

Everybody Remembers Me Differently

Verse 1 They say my name in pieces Kind. Dangerous. I heard it from the next room Dead. Saved you. One voice says I was gentle hands open, eyes like rain one voice locks the door tight says I had a fevered face a third says I was buried long before you knew my skin and you look at me like a stranger like I'm not allowed back in Pre-Chorus So tell me what is real if every mouth rewrites me why do your memories sound like they're indicting me I reach for my reflection it answers like a glitch I blink and the room rearranges and I don't know which is which Chorus Everybody remembers me differently one says I saved them one says I broke them everybody remembers me differently and I can't find the face that stayed Verse 2 There's a photo on the table but the year is wrong again my hand is on your shoulder then it's blood on the banister The hallway changes angles every time you say my name you swear I stood there smiling then you swear I was the flame Bridge Maybe I split in the impact maybe the hour cracked in two maybe I'm only the overlap of every version you knew a version still in the hallway a version under the floor a version that died in your memory a version that came back for more if I'm all of them at once now then what am I supposed to do I keep reaching for one true body but I only find through Final Chorus Everybody remembers me differently I was the rescue I was the wreckage everybody remembers me differently so let me fade into the version Dangerous. I saved you. Dead. Saved you.

Stream on SoundCloud

"I can't find the face that stayed." A song about identity fracture — what happens when the people who knew you remember someone completely different. Who do you become when every account of you contradicts the others?