There's nothing better than having a baby. I've always loved

Host: The rain had stopped hours ago, but the air still carried the smell of wet asphalt and earth. A soft mist hung over the narrow street, glowing under the dim lamplight. Inside a small, old apartment above a closed bookstore, a single lamp cast a golden halo across the room, illuminating scattered records, paintbrushes, and the faint trace of smoke from a burnt-out candle.

Jack sat on the worn couch, an acoustic guitar resting against his knee, the strings still humming faintly from a recent chord. His eyes, grey and faraway, were fixed on nothing — just the space where memory lived. Jeeny sat by the window, wrapped in a shawl, watching the soft flicker of lights from the street below. Her hands cradled a cup of tea, though she had long stopped drinking it.

From a nearby radio, an old recording played — the voice raw, cracked with emotion:
"There's nothing better than having a baby... Holding my baby is the best drug in the world."
— Kurt Cobain.

The room fell into a thick, intimate silence.

Jack exhaled, his voice barely above a whisper. “The best drug in the world,” he said, repeating it like a confession. “Strange thing to hear from him. From a man who lived and died by the edge.”

Jeeny: “Not strange,” she said softly. “Honest. He wasn’t talking about escape that time. He was talking about arrival.”

Jack: “Arrival?”

Jeeny: “Yes. All his life, he ran from himself. But when Frances was born, he stopped running — just for a moment. He found something that held him still.”

Host: Jack rubbed the back of his neck, his expression clouded. The faint hum of rainwater dripping from the roof punctuated the silence. He looked toward the guitar, as if searching for words that weren’t his own.

Jack: “And yet he still left her. That’s the tragedy, Jeeny. He found the reason to live… and still couldn’t stay.”

Jeeny: “Maybe that’s not contradiction. Maybe it’s proof of how deep the pain went. You can hold the sun and still be lost in the dark.”

Host: The lamplight flickered, a faint tremor in the electric hum. Jack leaned forward, elbows on knees, staring at the floor like it could offer answers.

Jack: “You make it sound poetic, but it’s just cruel. How can love — real love — not save you? If holding your own child isn’t enough, what else could be?”

Jeeny: “Sometimes love doesn’t save you. It just reminds you of what you could have been.”

Jack: “That’s a hell of a reminder.”

Jeeny: “It’s the most human one there is.”

Host: She sipped from her cup, her hands trembling slightly. Outside, the mist began to lift, revealing the faint glow of city lights reflected on wet pavement.

Jeeny: “You think being a parent makes you better, but it just makes you more aware — of how fragile you are, how easily you can fail. Cobain wasn’t overwhelmed by love; he was terrified by it.”

Jack: “Terrified of love?”

Jeeny: “Yes. Because love demands that you live. And he wasn’t sure he could.”

Host: The sound of the old recording hissed as the track ended, replaced by static. Jack reached over, turning the dial until only silence remained. He sat back, staring into the muted darkness, his voice low.

Jack: “I used to think people like him — artists, dreamers — were just weak. Too fragile for the world.”

Jeeny: “And now?”

Jack: “Now I think they were too honest for it. Too aware. They feel everything — the beauty, the ugliness — like skin peeled open.”

Jeeny: “That’s what he meant by ‘the best drug.’ Holding his daughter didn’t numb him. It made him feel everything even more. It gave him a glimpse of heaven, but it also showed him how far he’d fallen.”

Host: Jeeny’s voice carried the tone of both sorrow and reverence. Jack looked up at her, studying her face, the quiet conviction in her eyes.

Jack: “You ever think that maybe love and pain are just two sides of the same coin? That the deeper you love, the more it hurts to exist?”

Jeeny: “Maybe that’s the price. Maybe it’s supposed to hurt. That’s how you know it’s real.”

Host: The room grew quieter still. Even the street below seemed to hold its breath. The lamp buzzed faintly, its light dimming to a mellow gold.

Jeeny stood and crossed to a small shelf, picking up a framed photo of her and her younger sister, taken years ago. The glass caught the light like a tear.

Jeeny: “When my sister had her baby, she told me something I’ll never forget. She said, ‘I didn’t know my heart could live outside my body.’ That’s what Cobain meant too. He wasn’t talking about joy. He was talking about surrender.”

Jack: “Surrender.”

Jeeny: “Yes. When you hold your child, you surrender control, pride, ego — everything. You become small so that something else can be infinite.”

Jack: “And yet, that kind of love can destroy you.”

Jeeny: “It can. But it’s still the most sacred destruction there is.”

Host: Jack looked down at his hands, turning them slowly, as if trying to remember something he’d once held and lost. The sound of his breathing filled the quiet.

Jack: “You know, I’ve never had kids. Maybe that’s why I don’t understand. I always thought life was about building something — a legacy, a name, something rational. But what you’re describing… it’s not reason. It’s surrender.”

Jeeny: “That’s why it’s real. Reason builds walls. Love dissolves them. You can’t calculate the weight of a heartbeat.”

Jack: “And Cobain — he couldn’t carry both, could he? The genius and the gentleness. The artist and the father.”

Jeeny: “No. But maybe, for a while, he found peace in holding her. And that moment — that single, fleeting moment — mattered more than all the pain.”

Host: A quiet hum filled the room — the vibration of something unseen, like the memory of a melody long gone. Jack picked up his guitar, plucking a soft, uncertain chord.

Jeeny turned toward him, smiling faintly.

Jeeny: “Play something.”

Jack: “I don’t know what to play.”

Jeeny: “Then play what you feel.”

Host: He began, slowly — a simple, raw tune, fragile as glass. The notes hung in the air, trembling between melancholy and tenderness. Jeeny closed her eyes, letting the sound wrap around her like memory.

Jack: “You think he’d still be here if he’d found a way to keep that feeling alive?”

Jeeny: “Maybe. Or maybe it wasn’t meant to last. Some souls burn too bright to stay.”

Jack: “And what about the rest of us?”

Jeeny: “We carry the flame.”

Host: The music faded into silence. Outside, the first faint light of dawn broke over the rooftops, spilling soft gold into the room. The mist lifted, revealing the wet shimmer of a sleeping city beginning to wake.

Jeeny set her cup down and crossed to the window again.

Jeeny: “You see that light? That’s what it means to love something. It’s not about forever. It’s about shining, even after the storm.”

Jack looked at her, then at the faint glow painting her silhouette — fragile and whole all at once.

Jack: “You know, you might be right. Maybe holding someone — even once — is enough to change everything.”

Jeeny: “It always is.”

Host: The city exhaled. The rain had stopped. The world, for one still moment, seemed to remember its tenderness.

Jack set the guitar aside and leaned back, closing his eyes.

And in the quiet that followed — the kind that comes only after confession — there was no music, no grief, no argument. Only the simple, unspoken truth that Kurt Cobain had known for a heartbeat of eternity:

That love, when held close enough, is both the wound and the cure.

And that holding life — fragile, fleeting, sacred — is indeed the best drug in the world.