CHAPTER SEVEN

I woke to the sound of Mom puttering in the kitchen above me. I showered and dressed quickly, then joined her. I don’t remember if I went up to Doug’s room right away. Maybe to take him some toast. His stomach was supposed to be mostly empty, to increase the drugs’ absorbtion into the bloodstream, but with a little toast to reduce the chance of vomiting.

One by one, the rest of the group gathered. There wasn’t much to say. The atmosphere was like in the movies, right before the big bank heist: each member of the team going over his or her mental check-list one last time.

The handbook advises that, to limit legal liability, the smallest number of people possible actually be in the room during the event. Douglas had chosen David and Brad. David to monitor his physical condition in case of complications, and Brad to help spiritually, through his connection with Baba.

Mom told Douglas she wanted to be there, but he convinced her she was needed to handle unexpected phone calls and visitors, and should wait downstairs with Diane and me. That relieved her of a duty she felt, but neither of them wanted her to perform.

Before beginning, Doug met briefly with each of us individually. No melodrama, just some final loving words that he asked we keep to ourselves. And I will.

Mom was last. Then she joined us in the kitchen to prepare the recommended beverage – a large mug of hot tea, with lots of honey to mask the pills’ bitterness. She handed it to Brad. Diane gave David the powder. And the two of them headed for Doug’s room.

They put the tea and powder by the bedside for Douglas to mix. Again, for legal reasons it was important that he do the rest by himself. Brad put on a tape of Indian devotional music which he’d brought at Doug’s request, then sat by him crosslegged on the bed in meditation.

Just after 10:30, Doug stirred the last of the powder into the tea. And then he looked over at Dave and said: “I expect to be at Gawler’s Funeral Home by noon.”.

He took a test sip, and pulled back from the bitterness. He asked David to get him some mints to take the taste out of his mouth. David hustled downstairs and jogged off to a nearby drugstore, and Doug downed the rest of the cocktail.

At this point, the handbook outlines a number of possibile scenarios. All involve unconsciousness in somewhere from 20-30 minutes, followed by a 50/50 chance of vomiting or convulsions, with death likely by the 45 minute range.

Convulsions are worrisome mostly from their emotional impact on those attending. Vomiting is the biggest medical danger, because it can result in just enough drugs being absorbed to cause a coma, but not death.

This is the trickiest scenario, almost certain to lead to investigation. The handbook recommends that if this appears to be the outcome, someone in the group must be willing to use a pillow to smother the comatose person. Not a pleasant prospect, but lots better than facing charges, or repeating the entire ordeal.

What happened with Doug, though, wasn’t in the handbook. He’d no sooner put down the empty mug when he lapsed into unconsciousness. According to Brad, it took less than 30 seconds. Brad continued his meditation and prayer another 30 seconds or so when he felt what he described as a jolt push past his left shoulder, towards the window. Before David got back with the mints, less than 5 minutes, Doug was gone. He wasn’t just dead. He’d reached escape velocity in record time.

Brad told David what I just told you. They checked Doug’s pulse, put a mirror up under his nose – nothing. They checked again. Same result.

David came downstairs to get the rest of us. We couldn’t believe it. Nothing we’d read had prepared us for this possibility.

Back upstairs, with everyone in the room, Brad told the story again, we checked Doug’s pulse and breath again, We were positive we were missing something. But we were stumped. We didn’t know what else to do.

And that’s how I came to volunteer to commit the bizarre act of smothering my dead brother with a pillow. That’ll stay with you.

We waited a few more minutes, then while someone scrubbed the hell out of that mug, Mom got a hold of Doug’s doctor. She told him Doug had passed away. Could he come by to fill out a death certificate so we could have the body taken to the funeral home?

She hung up the phone and returned to Doug’s bedside, where she sat, just like this (motionless) until the doctor arrived.
He showed no hint of suspicion. He was only slightly perplexed that Doug, who he’d last seen two days earlier, had apparently suffered a cardiac arrest.

He filled out the death certificate, and called the funeral home to verify it. And Doug, delayed only by our disbelief, made it to Gawler’s by 12:15.

As the day wore on it began to set in that something quietly extraordinary had just taken place. In the absence of self, in the presence of unconditional love, an act of grace had occured. Through our commitment to Doug and his to us, he’d made the leap. To what? None of us could know. But he’d definitely leaped, with such force and passion that we were left much more with a sense of wonder than of loss.

That night, alone again in the blackness of the basement, I felt an odd sensation. Of light. Real light, like sunlight. I wasn’t dreaming, I was completely alert. Eyes wide open in the darkness, but overcome with this sensation that a torrent of warm, golden light was flooding into the house. And then I remembered last night’s prayer: “Baba, please help Douglas. Baba, please bring peace to this house.”
Baba, it appeared, was two for two.

First thing Monday morning, Doug’s body was cremated , completing his perfect crime. No corpus, no habeus.

As for my relationship with Baba. I never became a follower, although I do still talk to Him occasionally. Mostly on airplanes during severe turbulence.
So far, so good.

And as for Doug, I’ve never felt even a moment’s regret about helping him. Though I did have one unexpected emotion afterward. I know this sounds strange, but for a while, I felt jealous. My whole life Doug had been a step ahead of me. And then at the moment of death, he pitches the perfect game.

But then I kind of got it; he had to be a step ahead. He had a lot less time to get where he was going.

Me, I’ve made my share of epic wrong turns. But when you think about it, it’s mostly the bad decisions we make that change our lives. Good ones just get you home safely.
It took Doug an attempted suicide to alter the course of his life. He got lucky that time. But later on, that same fearlessness turned the tragedy of his death into a masterpiece.
Right up there with Neil Armstrong. Maybe better. Doug didn’t have to come back.

How cool is that? To experience life moving towards the peak. To walk on the moon and keep going. That’s a death worth living for.