When my brother died, I screamed everywhere. I screamed in my car, my house, anywhere I could and for up to an hour at a time. I read the memoir, “Once More we Saw Stars,” and felt a companionship to the writer as he described his screaming sessions after he lost his two year old daughter.

I came home to visit NC a year after Randall’s death and found myself sitting in front of the hotel parking lot where he overdosed. I took in the sights and smells that he may have last taken in and it was tragic. The hotel was trashy, sad, old, and run-down. I find it highly unlikely that overdoses didn’t happen monthly at this particular inn.

My brother died less than ten minutes from the house I rented for a year. Had I not just moved to North Dakota, I would have felt an insurmountable pile of guilt far greater than what I currently feel.

Only a few months ago did I find out what drugs were in Randall’s system when he passed. He died from a type of fentanyal (an opioid) and eutylone (a stimulant).

An autopsy report that was sent to me by email also stated that a hotel worker found Randall face down on the bed with one sock off and his phone on the floor beside his bare foot. I was beyond grateful for the news. On the one hand, I relived his death again, it was painful. On the other hand, I had closure in how he arrived at his final moment.

He fell on the bed, not in a shower, not somewhere that might cause some sort of bruising to his body.

He died on a bed where pillows caught his fall.

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