Day 45/27 - "He knew"

Sunday, 7 January 2007 - Day 45/27 - "He knew"

He knew he was going to die. He knew that heroin was what he was looking for his whole life and he would never be able to separate from it. He knew each time he pushed the needle into his collapsing veins that sooner or later his organs, his body, his life would all fail him. One by one they would leave him until the only thing that remained was the last bit of breath he blew from his body, that and the damage of heroin.

I can remember him like I saw him yesterday. It was a sight that most people should never get to see, especially not his parents. He was lying there, wild eyes, yellowish face, sunken eyes. I had never seen anybody like this before. He was delusional, most of the times he didn’t know where he was – but he kept saying “Sorry!” Sorry for the things he has done, sorry for letting it all go this far, sorry for dying.

He knew he was going to die. He wrote in his diary prior to his death that he knew he wasn’t going to live a long life. He told me on several occasions how he couldn’t stand the withdrawal and would rather keep on taking the drugs than face it. I think he knew his body wouldn’t be able to take much more.

I visited him in hospital that day. I looked at him lying there. We weren’t the best of friends but he was always good to me. He stood up for me, protected me – we spend a lot of time together. And there I was hours after taking heroin myself helplessly staring at him, unable to protect him.

In the midst of my emotionless staring I thought to myself I don’t want to end up like this. I don’t want to put my parents through this, this stress, this pain, this uncertainty. I don’t want to die, but I don’t know how to stop. I thought to myself if there was a switch I could flip to make it all go away I would have done it a long time ago. But even with him lying there, staring death in the face neither of us could switch it off. The first chance either of us got we would have gone to find heroin.

But he never made it that far. His funeral was a week after that day. I entered the church with not much recollection of how much heroin I took just moments before. My eyes were dim and my pupils were hardly visible. I sat down and nodded off occasionally as the heroin spread through my body, listening to the story of his life.

A story of a boy that lost his life at such a young age. Heroin only had him in its clutches for 10 months, 7 of those he was on heroin, but during that time he used 10 times as much as me. Thinking back at the times we took heroin together I realize that each time we took it was minutes closer to his death – to mine... He knew that heroin was what he was looking for his whole life and he knew most of all he would never be able to separate from it. He knew he was going to die!

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