CHASING THE DRAGON.

he hadn't seen them for so long.

he hadn't been able to laugh with them in a time that seemed too long.

had he ever really been able to see them? spend time with them?

it felt like this was the first time they were ever really together.

a unit.

as one.

the children he had helped to give life to were strangers to him.

he knew them, but he never really knew who they were.

they were made from his being, but were nothing like him at all.

they were a puzzle that was so difficult to piece together, & was often taken apart by life's unexpected interruptions.

he remembered when they were little.

so naive to the hateful world that they now lived in.

the hateful world that lived inside of him.

dark.

depressing.

scary.

they weren't new people to this world anymore though.

they had experienced the joy, the excitement, but mostly, the darkness.

they knew that they were shadowed by something that would always consume them.

him.

they loved him more than anyone could love a father.

maybe more even.

he was so different though.

different than any other father they had ever met.

he was the backbone of a family that never knew how to stand up straight.

that was broken over and over again, before it could ever be repaired.

he had a darkness inside of him that you could feel before you could even see him.

he was so beautiful, but his beauty could be taken away in an instant when he allowed his vice to take over.

the demons that tortured him used his past to their advantage.

he had gone through so much.

endured so much  pain.

his life was not one that could be said to be picture perfect, not even one that most would wish on their worst enemy.

his life had been one of sorrow and he didn't know anything else.

they didn't hate him for his past though.

they loved him so much.

he was their father.

he loved them as much as he loved them.

they didn't know how to show one another though.

the never knew how to get passed the darkness because he couldn't get passed it on his own.

he couldn't handle the darkness, more often than not, and had to run away from it.

he had to get away from everything that coated his life in a dark ash, so he looked for his light in the liquid of a lighter.

every inhale of the toxic euphoria brought him to his paradise.

nothing was on his mind any longer.

family.

work.

darkness.

all gone.

his darkness finally became light with every hit of exhilaration that he allotted himself.

he was always chasing the dragon.

he chased the dragon while they waited for him to find it.

hoping that one day he would no longer need to look for it.

hoping that one day they would be enough light for him.

hoping that he would see he no longer needed the lighter to illuminate his life.

time passed, darkness hovered, and it became more and more difficult for him to accept the dragon may never be able to be found.

to see that the light he so desperately wanted was standing in front of him, as four beautiful wicks that only he could light.

he couldn't see it though.

he never could.

years became decades and the light that is never turned on slowly starts forgetting how to work.

the one that is used the most constantly needs to be refurbished.

so that's what he did.

and that's what they accepted.

while he chased what he could never be find, they slowly started to become strangers.

passing by with just a hello was what they accepted as reality.

their lives were no longer entangled with one another.

their knots had slowly started to unravel.

they tried from time to time to  tie what had become loose back together, but what's once is undone is easier said than done.

he looked at his children.

he wished he had given them a different life than he had.

he hoped that he had made them happy, at least some of the time.

he loved them more than anything in this world.

they looked at him.

they wished he had loved them more than anything in the world.

they wondered if he knew that they, for the rest of their lives, would constantly be chasing their own dragon.