Stopwatch Children

In The Moment

In The Moment

Smokin' up, blazing on the side of the highway.

As the smoke leaves my mouth in a cloud, I think of my mother. How she is at home wondering when I will walk through her door and how long I will stay.

I think of my little sister, another puff like a chimney. I see her playing with her dolls and I wonder if she still likes them or is she too grown up for that? I try to remember as I flick the butt and open the car door.

I try to remember what my house used to feel like before all this; before the smoking, screaming, hitting, and crying. It may be mostly gone now but it has left us all withered husks.

I reach inside and try to find the boy who had the courage to stand in front of his mother and little sister, take their beatings for them and yet still his own not letting a noise out. I try to find that kid back before my world went to hell.

If it happened again I'm almost certain it would be different. There would be no heroic little boy to stand and take a beating worse than his own for the ones he claims he loves. He died when I found a way to stop my pain. He died the moment I sparked up that blunt in my room those so many years ago.

He died when that thing walked in half drunk screaming my name.

He died the day I let him hit my little sister.

That strong brave little boy I used to be. I think about my mother and my sister and wonder if they will ever forgive me for letting that happen. Then I remember; for the first time the day I last saw my little sister before she stopped looking at me, and stopped being in the same room as me. Before that thing hit her and I see a very sad little girl asking her brother to get the scary man away.

But he was too lost to his own pain- his own mind and demons to let her be innocent any more. So young he let his family die.

I look up and see the headlights too late and my body is crushed. I think of my mother and little sister and how I will get to finally see them again.