Dimensions Of The Heart

Thirteen Years

Once upon a moonlit night, a mischievous soul sent a devious, but blinding sunny smile, holding a jar of Emperor's Smile, and chugging it down before him; this boy was free spirited and wild with sharp and soft edges.
 
The righteous young boy stood watching him, the rule breaker, the young righteous cultivator was stunned, captivated; ensnared by such wild and liveliness; untamed and uncaged.
 
It was their very first meeting, but not their last.
 
And unbeknownst to either of the young boys,  feelings stirred deep within them, the slow budding of a flower, as it slowly-so slowly flourished petal by petal with each time of their company together, with only each other. 
 
They were drawn closer in one way and then-ripped apart.
 
Innocence was stomped on.
Tragedies unfurled, hearts were broken.
A soul became lost in the midst of chaos, and rose back up in the darkness. 
 
The two men, no longer young boys with innocence since it was long since stamped out,
 They would meet and squabble, finding each other across distances, only to break away further, creating a deeper divide than before; so much misunderstandings now in the way, those once innocent feelings chipped away in one while the other buried them-to afraid to voice them.
 
Then it was too little, and too late. 
Another life had been claimed, though different now-the same life the world had fought with in battles and later fought against, loss and mistakes entangled; the soul of a man that committed his own sacrifices, taking him to his death, while the other would grieve alone for the spark of life in his life that had sputtered out and gone silent. 
 
It was a waiting game then, of hoping and praying, of silent and endless pleas always asking the same thing, for the same person.
 
Days would pass to be weeks, weeks passed turned to months, months became years.
 
Through those long, lingering years, season change, coming and going,  since time stopped for no one. 
 
Thirteen years to a man can be an eternity, eons even, when times moves on while you try to hold to hold onto something, anything-so that he can hold onto the person he loved, and lost-another man, who had never known that
 There was someone that cared so deeply and devotedly despite the world's protest, someone who loved him with every desperate fiber of his entire being.
 
And then, something happened.
 
A miracle? You could say that. A youthful, righteous, and kind man waited thirteen years but from this moment on, he no longer had to wait, to wonder about the soul of the man he cherished in his heart. 
 
It was here. He was here. Now. In front of him, closer than ever before.
 
His face had changed, but the soul was the same, the glint in other man's eyes still familiar as the eyes from the past, so long ago; such brightness and mischief-determination. 
 
He tightened his grasp on the other man's wrist, unwilling to ever let go again. 
 
He had the entire world before him, his own brand of sun, a star captured in his grip-shining with so much life, no longer dead and gone, no longer silent.
 
He had his own star and he would never let him  dim or fade, never again. His world, his everything.
 
He would follow until the ends of the earth, and even after, for as long as he could keep this man by his side.
He would never let go. 
Never Again.