It was always the rush that was the best part:

That feeling of surreal realities as they brushed past my consciouness, tempting me further into a smoke-filled oblivion.

I never wanted to leave.

That smoke, that thin veil that hid the darkness of my situation, was so enticing and sweet.

It hid me from the nightmares that had become my life and the demons who had become my friends.

And when it was there with me, when that feeling of absolute peace loved me, the world was a kind and hopeful place where everything was okay.

The bad was replaced with good and I could smile with the same light I had used when I was a child.

I didn't have to worry, didn't have to hurt.

All the hurt was gone with puffs of light smoke that left my longing lips.

But when it was angry, when that feeling of peace had foresaken me and abandoned me like so many others had done before, then the world was my grave and I was standing on the edge.

My body was racked day and night with cravings, with pain, with a sense of hoplessness and finality that I would not wish upon anyone.

It was pain that made all the emotional pain I had felt in my life seem meaningless.

And the only thing that could make it go away was that beautiful, sweet, enticing smoke;

That veil that hid all the nightmares and demons and replaced them with visions of sweet dreams.

But I lay there in my forced prison and let the pain wash over me because what I didn't realize -

What I couldn't realize - 

Was that the smoke was a poison. The smoke is a poison.

It is a venom, a toxin that once flowed through my own blood and replaced every bit of me that wanted to live with smoke until there was nothing left inside.

And then it would leave, like a parasite, until I wasted away, still dreaming of the sweet taste of false promises.

I thought sometimes that I was dying,

And other times, I wished that I would die.

Sometimes I almost did and then I was brought back to face the music of what I had done.

And yes, I still long for the sweet kiss of the smoke,

For the enticing false promises that were whispered in my subconscious of a world where no one had ever touched me, ever yelled at me, ever hit me.

But I am never allowed to reenter those surreal realities, those poisoned dreams that sing to me a siren's song of nothing.

I can never go back.