Chapter Twenty-Five
Having the day off should be a treat, but it’s anything but.
I feel even more drained than usual. My muscles ache from the unnecessarily long run I took this morning, and my thoughts are threatening to strangle me.
I’ve tried to nap, but each time I do, I wake in a panic, my brother’s screams filling my mind and crushing my soul repeatedly.
He’s doing better, I try to remind myself, but the voice in the back of my head moves to the forefront with a megaphone in hand, shouting, “No thanks to you!”
Truly, it is “no thanks” to me.
Sure, I offer to send him money for his physical therapy and anything else he needs, but he wouldn’t even be in this situation if it weren’t for me, and he refuses my money anyhow.
He’s successful all on his own, but I still wish he’d take something from me like I took everything from him.
But nothing I give him could ever compare to what my reckless thrill-seeking cost him.
Worse yet, I don’t think I’d even be here if it weren’t for rugby.
Or at least, not without the guys who introduced me to the sport.
When Carlos made me move here to follow our dreams of playing football professionally, I thought I could do it. Really, I had tried. I didn’t want my scholarship to go to waste, but everything I did felt like a disservice to him, and it dragged me down to the very pits of hell.
I haven’t considered ending my life in a really long time, but the closer we get to this fundraiser, the more my mind takes me to that horrible headspace I was in when I first moved here.
If it hadn’t been for the group of guys playing rugby that day in the park, looking for an extra player and willing to teach me, I wouldn’t be where I am today.
Hell, I probably wouldn’t be anywhere but six feet under.
I’m thankful every day that I’m not, but my chest still aches from the thought of everything Carlos has had stolen from him.
And it's all because of me.