A Living Ghost

I had a dream about my brother last night. I want to write that his ghost visited me in my subconscious state but I don't consciously believe that. Although, if you dig deeper you might find that I do.

He was still alive, still an addict. A slideshow of what would have been his future was presented to me, had he not been snatched up only 23 years into his life. He walked up to me, his body skinny enough to silently advertise that the drugs still meant more to him than his own health, but not too far gone to look like an obvious heroin addict. He was still young, a man of no more than 25. I was helping him walk down a hallway and into a bathroom to help him get cleaned up. His bodily neglect apparent, but still able to help himself into the shower. I left the room as I did not want to see my brother naked, nor did I really want to see the effects the drugs have had on his body.

Dream me knew he had been trying to get over his struggle with heroin, and outside of his death 7 years ago (something that my dream forgot to include), he was doing ok. He was still young, and alive, and when you're alive there is always a chance to get better.

He left the house after a few days and my life continued as normal. Nick just might be alright, dream me thought. This time he has a chance.

The next time he showed up at my door he was worse off. His eyes bloodshot and swollen and he sometimes relied on a chair or a wall to help prop him up, but not too bad off for someone 30 years old and still battling demons that echo inside a syringe. I led him to the shower, this time I had to help peel his clothes off of him. There was feces and urine inside his pants and what first looked like black grease, but upon closer inspection was dried blood. I asked him if he was ok to undress himself past his underwear since I REALLY didn't want to see my own brother naked. He said he could manage so I left him alone. He stayed for a couple of days, talking about getting clean, for real this time, and then left with a heartfelt "thank you" hug.

The next time he didn't show up my door. I had to go and pluck him from the shit hole of a house he was in. Did he live there? I don't think so. Did any of the people I walked over live there? Doubt it. Were those people even alive or did I just traverse through corpses to find my little brother? Either way, it was time to get Nick back to my house and in the shower- my dream's reset button for my brother's fight against heroin. This time he could barely stand on his own, I gave him a cane to help keep himself upright.

In real life, when he was only 16 years old and I was 20, he had demanded my mom get him a cane when he was being fitted for a suit for my first wedding. He was the only one who got one but he was ready to fight tooth and nail to get it back then. In my dream the cane made an appearance but it was no longer a funny joke or the result of a strong willed tennagers whimiscle expression of indivuduality.

I helped him into the bathroom and had to fetch scissors in order to cut him out of his clothing. It had long since become a solid mass of excrement, vomit, and blood. The fabric stood on it's own, more like cardboard than cloth. I had to cut off his underwear, too. I didn't want to see my brother naked but he was too weak to work the clothing off himself. He was covered in sores, some of them infected from laying around in his own blood, shit, and piss. He said he could wash himself, thank god because the last thing I want to do is have to bathe my brother with my own hands. He went to the doctor and got on antibiotics for his infections and once again left my house looking and feeling better.

The next time I fetched him was from the hospital emergency room. He had overdosed, but unlike reality where he's been dead for 7 years now, he survived. His eyes were swollen, like ripe fruit stuck in sunken caverns inside his skull. There was dried pus that had seeped from his eyes and dried over into pale yellow flakes running down his cheeks. He weighed nothing, and I knew this because I had to carry him as he could barely walk. I took him back to my house and washed his worn and abused body, not caring that I had to scrub caked on excrement from his groin. He was alive, my little brother was still alive, I would do anything to help see him better.

I would go find him and bring him back to my house over and over again, the circumstance were always the same, even though the drug dens or hospitals changed each time. Every trip to get him dissolved into the scene helping him down the hallway and into the bathroom, each time is only a couple of years apart but his body aged in decades. By the time he's in his 40s, he's unable to walk on his own and looks like an animated corpse, kept moving only by supernatural forces. Every visit to my house he cleans up, or tries to. I have to wash him. Wash the trails of crust off his eyes. I have to scrub his infected arms, his body sores, his own waste off of his own ass. I have to wash him like I did my kids when they were babies. Helpless, weak infants.

He's always in better shape after a few days in my care, getting plenty of good food, rest, and no drugs. He always talks about going clean, this time he really means it.

Each visit he becomes more death than man.

He thanks me every time. He's pleasant, appreciative, and doesn't steal from me. He doesn't lie or argue. He cleans up and goes on his way.

This was a courtesy that either my brother or my brain provided me. I was shown the pattern that his life probably would have taken had he not overdosed at such a young age. My life would have been pulling him out of absolute hell holes in between the hospitals and jail, or worse, prison. It would have been an emotional, physical, psychological, and financial burden- one I would gladly had accepted if I had known there was a possibility he would get clean and live at least a few years sober and happy.

He was telling me to let that notion go. The message was clear- that's not what would have happened. He spared me the harsh reality of what loving a junkie long term is really like. He spared me the cruel reality that is being the loved one of someone struggling with a losing battle against addiction.

Throughout my dream he was my brother, my little brother, as he had once been. In real life the drugs warp the person into something else, it carves them into a different creature- one that steals, lies, and will break you down. In my dream he was allowed to be himself, to be human, yet still have this addiction. He was able to leave out one of the most ugly truths; the addict is not the person you know, it's just their body doing the will of the drug and their insatiable need for it.

My brother didn't die again in my dream. I eventually got the point. I knew before I woke up what the purpose of all of it was. He was letting me know that he didn't lose out on his life, he was spared decades of suffering, and so were we in a way. We don't have to worry if he's dead or alive, we don't have to worry about disease, incarceration, or what the addict in him might have done to us. He got to die a tragic character, but one that was spared a lifetime of addiction that would result in no resolution. No peace.

He showed me that his 4 years of struggle and eventual death was nothing compared to the life he would have wasted had he never gotten free from heroin.

Do I really believe that my brother visited me in a dream in order to let me experience this? No, I think it was my brain's way of helping me cope. But if you look deeper into my soul, you might find a different answer. You will find that I do believe.