One Saturday morning in late summer of 2019, I saw on my Facebook account a number of missed calls. I did not check my page regularly, and in taking a closer look I saw a written message that will forever be etched in my mind, “Christian died this morning.”
My heart began racing. Christian, my older brother, my only brother, was gone. The message came from one of his former roommates and by the time I read it, it was already a week old.
Christian was a bright star. He had lived and worked in Europe for the past 17 years and ended up in London. Loved by many, he led a big and colorful life. His brilliance inspired those who knew him.
I ran to tell my partner Erica about the message and began sobbing. I then made the most difficult call of my life. I had to tell my mother her son had died.
My brother also suffered from an addiction to alcohol and drugs. Unlike our parents, who both recovered from alcoholism, he never found a pathway out. He held impressive jobs, traveled the world, but also crashed and hit some very low bottoms. Addictive behaviors strained and even burned through friendships and family relationships. A few years ago, he was assaulted, sustaining a traumatic brain injury. All this took its toll. By the end he was a shell of the man he used to be.
The song No More We looks back on our childhood together and the summers spent at our grandparent’s farm in Tennessee. Experiencing the wonder of the world through the eyes of two young brothers before there was even a hint of the adult troubles that lay ahead of us. It’s saying goodbye to the brother I loved so much. We shared all these important and exhilarating memories. Now that he’s gone, I alone carry those memories. And in that sense, there is no more we.
David Haerle, November 2020