March 3rd, 1989 My Worst Day

 In the late 80's I was doing a pretty good job of fending off the Demon. I had some bad nights and some unconscious ones. I had preferred the later. I still could not believe that the colonel was still giving me so much hell. I will go back and bring up some of my really bad dreams and re-post them to give you an idea of how things were going. I mentioned my brother, Cornbread, before, but let me introduce him to you  all. He was a great guy. We always had each other's back. You know the saying that dynamite comes in small packages, well. that is Bread. His real name is Charles Herbert Riley, II. And do not call him junior. Chaz, Bubba, Bubba Chaz, but he will always be Cornbread, to me. We were as close as any brother could be. We have even shared the same woman. At the same time. He was a 70's rocker, long hair, guitar picking, pot smoking , coke snorting rascal. He was a hell of a friend. Through the years he was constantly totaling cars and raising hell. I was always right  there beside him. While he was in OKC he was cruising on a KZ1000 when a pick-up truck pulled out in front of him. He broadsided the truck and he landed about 75 feet past the collision. My friend from the Air Force, Henry Steele, was working at the hospital where he was transported. My parents flew out there and Henry took good care of them. Cornbread had split his skull in several places, staying in a coma for 11 days. He did wake up and was brought back to Bama when he was able. He had to start taking Dilantin, a seizure medication, and he hated it. Made him feel useless.. Bread recovered from that mishap and we went back to doing what we knew best, partying. We were the baddest Foosball team around. Everyone tried to beat us. We were unbelievable. I played back and he played front. He had a lightning fast pull shot that nobody could block. A hell of a mean toe shot, too. He got a few dollars from the wreck in OKC and bought him a GMC Sierra Classic. One beautiful truck. On the night of his birthday, the day Elvis died, in 1988, he dropped me off at my house and he was supposed to head to his place. Instead, he ended up in the ER with a broke neck. No paralysis, thank God. He did have to wear a halo for 12 weeks. It did not slow him down, though. We built cabinets with the both of us eating Tylox and he still wearing his halo. We were something to behold. 'Dain Bramage' became his new nickname. I'm sure he was battling demons of his own but I never asked. I never told him about killing the colonel, either. Life was good as long as we were stoned. Which was the majority of the time. Then I received a call from the Baptist Memorial Hospital's ER department. Chaz had been involved in an automobile accident. I told my Mom, "Let's go check on Bubba, he's had another wreck." She was eerily quiet. Hell, this was routine for him. No big deal. Mom did not say a word on the way to the hospital. Just before we turned in the parking lot Mom looked at me and said "This does not feel right." I tried to reassure her but she sat down in the chair in the ER waiting room and did not move or say a word. I could look straight down the hall and see the cubicle he was in. I saw an awful lot of feet. When someone would come out I could see that they had him in MAST trousers. I do not think they use them anymore but what they would do is like a pair of pants that you pumped air into to keep the blood in the upper extremities. Military Anti-Shock Trousers. When I saw those I thought, oh shit. This is bad. My two brothers and my sister had arrived and we were waiting on Dad. He was at work about 25 miles away. They worked on him for about 45 minutes before the doctor and a couple nurses came out and said that they did all they could do. How sorry they were for our loss. My Mom sat back down and did not move. She was in shock. My sister started crying. The doctor started to walk off and I said, "Hang on a sec, Are you telling me that my brother is dead? I never heard what was said for the next half hour. I went berserk. I busted all the glass out of every door and window in that place with my bare hands. I was pulling up chairs that were bolted down to the floor and slinging them through the coke machines. I went ape shit. The last thing I remember of that day was being surrounded by uniformed officers and holding me down to give me an injection. It was over. Cornbread, Bubba, Chaz, Charles, was never to be seen, again.   theblogmeister