Like nothing in this world

I could not for the life of me understand why my brother would not quit his addiction to heroine.
I thought he was selfish and heartless for not wanting to change for himself...for me.
I begged him so many times and he broke so many of his promises...to me.
It killed me to see him finish away and see all the scars and marks that his life choices left on him.
My brother was beautiful, he had beautiful skin and broad shoulders, he became a skeleton and I watched him, helpless.
I could not understand why he did not fight hard enough to get better, to not be controlled by his cravings and to instead desire more out of life than being in and out of prison every few months over petty crimes to support his habit.
He didn't want it enough and this always broke my heart.

I once sat down with him and asked him what smoking Nyaope felt like.
He gave me an answer I will never forget, he said "Sis, it's like nothing in this world" and he smiled.
His answer made me understand him so much more clearly. I wanted so hard to be angry at him for being so selfish because I still needed him but I couldn't because I understood that I could never give him the life that he needed, so this was his escape of choice. I was the selfish one.
This world that surrounds him is a small community called Rietspruit that doesn't have a shop, no ambition, barely a functional clinic and the kids have sex with each other for fun.
Cows and dogs get along just fine and men drink to comfort themselves from unemployment and lack. In this world that he is in, he has no mother and has never met his father.
He longs to be loved unconditionally. He misses his sister, me, because I live far, far away from him.
I remind him of his mother and she loved him deeply. He misses her love.
He feels alone, hungry, unloved and of no use to society.
Society sometimes reminds him of this and he believes her.

When he smokes, there he is happy, there he is out of the present world and there is no pain.
It is still.
I looked into the casket and saw how perfect he looked and I could not help but remember his words.
He was finally in the other world he so desperately longed for.
My mind struggled to see him as dead because he looked so beautiful.
He is my late mother's last child, Banele.
It means that they are sufficient, enough, complete.
Rest.