Mr. Slander — "I Heard From Someone..."

Lyrics

[Intro]
He doesn’t arrive with thunder.
He drifts in on the recycled air,
finds you by the powdered creamer.
A little lean, a shared secret.

[Verse 1]
His voice is a careful thing, pitched for concern.
He lowers his Styrofoam cup.
“Now, I probably shouldn’t even be saying this.”
He builds the nest before he lays the egg.
“And you didn’t hear it from me.”
The little disclaimers, a soft place for the poison to land.
He looks both ways down the hall.
“But I was talking to someone…"

[Chorus]
“…and I heard.”
And just like that, the air in the room gets thick.
A third person is standing with you now, a version of them you can’t un-see.
Falsehood flies, and the truth, poor thing, is still looking for its shoes.
He strikes three with one stone.
The one who speaks,
the one who hears,
and the one who is now a ghost by the microwave.

[Verse 2]
He takes his coffee, a little nod.
“Anyway. Just thought you should know.”
And he’s gone. Back to his desk.
And you’re left there, holding this… thing.
This warm, ugly little story.
You look across the cubicles at David from accounts.
And you see it.
The thing he heard.
He never painted the picture.
He just handed you the brush.

[Bridge]
It’s a masterpiece, really.
Hammurabi would have had him drowned for it.
But here, on the fourth floor, it’s just… information.
He never says “I know.”
He says “I wonder.”
He never says “It’s true.”
He says “It’s a real shame, if it is.”
Plausible.
Deniable.
The perfect crime, with a body in every inbox.

[Outro]
By lunch, it’s common knowledge.
By three, it’s a fact.
And he’s just the man who passed along a kindness.
A warning.
Something he heard.
From someone.