The Death of a Superhero
“Life is something that many take for granted.” That saying is something people don’t pay attention to. Many times you need some kind of push in order to realize life isn’t guaranteed. I know this because I have one brother when I should have two. On May 13, 2002 my eldest brother, Yanny, committed suicide in NYC, where I grew up. It was the worst day of my life.
July, 2000
Yanny was my superhero. Superheros are primarily fictional characters that you just hear stories about. It felt the same way with my brother. He was my half brother, on my father’s side, and didn’t live in the United States. When I was younger, however, I heard stories about him and saw pictures of him. When I was 10 years old my family, finally, decided to take a vacation to Nicaragua, my father’s home country. In Nicaragua I met all the cousins, the grandparents, and the aunts and uncles. With all these people I now knew, I still wasn’t happy that I had not met my brother. Four days after I arrived in Nicaragua I finally met him. It wasn’t the most traditional meeting nor was it emotional, but it was funny. It was very early in the morning when I was awoken to a calm voice saying “levantate ”. As I opened my eyes, a blurry figure appeared before me. My vision cleared and I saw the person I had waited to see my whole life; I saw Yanny. He had a smile on his face. He had a smooth, long, face with very light skin. He was 6’4’’, just like Superman but he wasn’t as muscular. His body silhouetted with the ceiling light and gave him an angelistic glow. When I saw him I didn’t say “Hi”, I didn’t cry and hug him, I just fell back asleep on his lap. As I drifted asleep I dreamt; I dreamt about growing up with Yanny, him coming to my baseball games, defending me when I got in trouble. When I awoke, I realized that they were fake memories, things I had wished happened while I was growing up but never happened. Now that we were a complete family, however, I was going to make those fake memories to real ones; I was determined to fill the hole in my life.
The two week vacation in Nicaragua was up and we were getting packed to leave. I was very upset because that meant saying goodbye to my brother. I didn’t want to leave him now that I knew him. I pleaded with my mother to stay in Nicaragua but she didn’t budge. I couldn’t understand why we were just going to leave him. My mother then said words that made me very happy, “Yanny is coming to live with us.” “Victory!”, I thought. I ran around, laughed, and went to tell my brother Ahmed the good news. That night we all celebrated and I couldn’t wait to go back home.
Yanny spent two years in the United States before he died. We had become very close in that short amount of time. He only stayed at our house for a couple of months after arriving. He was 22 years old and didn’t want a curfew, or rules set by my parents. He went to live with my uncle to be free from rules and that’s where the problems began. While with my uncle, Yanny started to drink. Every day he would drink until he fell asleep. When he was with me though, he wouldn’t drink. That’s how I knew that he cared about me. There were those little things that showed me that I was his brother and an important part of his life. He began to change though. His face was no longer happy, smooth, and that glow had faded. He became dark, kept to himself, and never talked to anyone about his true feelings. I was only 12 at the time; I was mature for my age but in retrospect I couldn’t have expected a 22 year-old man to think a 12 year old boy could understand what he was going through. This was the beginning of the superhero’s downfall.
May 11, 2002
After September 11, 2001, NYC was shaken and rattled. Everyone was on their toes about terrorism and bombs. Yanny came over for dinner. I was very excited, as always, to see my brother. My mother sent me on an errand to the store to buy some groceries. I asked Yanny to come with me. As we left my apartment and waited for the elevator I asked him, “How are you doing?”
“Not too good”, he answered.
“Well what’s wrong?” The words that came next will haunt me till the day I die, or get Alzheimer’s.
“I’m thinking about killing myself.”
As a 12 year-old this answer was something that I didn’t take seriously and laughed at. We both laughed, actually, and went to buy the groceries.
In every comic book, in every movie, the superhero always needs help. Sometimes it’s from another superhero; other times by someone without powers, the last person you’d expect to be of any use. There was my chance to save the superhero and I blew it. Some would say that it was too much for a twelve year old to handle. Is that really the point though? He told me what he was going to do and I shrugged it off. All my life I look up to those who save lives, but when it was my turn to step to the plate, I chickened out.
May 13, 2002
This is the dreadful day that I will always remember, step by step, word for word, action for action. I arrived from school at about 4:30 along with my father, who had just gotten off from work. As my father was changing into more comfortable clothing, the phone rang. I ran to pick it up. “Hello?” My uncle responded in a hysterical voice.
“OMAR!? YANNY’S DEAD!”
My heart stopped and I calmly responded, “No he’s not, I saw him two days ago.”
“YES YES! YANNY KILLED HIMSELF! HE’S DEAD!”
I dropped to the floor and began to cry. Gasping for air, I crawled to my father as he screamed, “WHAT’S WRONG?” He took the phone and I passed out. That is about two minutes of that day that I don’t remember. When my father shook me awake he said, “Get ready we’re going to Tio Miguel’s. Call your mother.”
I got up and called my mother, almost choking for air as I did it. “Mommy, ‘gasp’ Yanny ‘gasp’ killed ‘gasp’ himself ‘gasp’. Dad ‘gasp’ and ‘gasp’ I ‘gasp’ are ‘gasp’ going ‘gasp’ to ‘gasp’ Tio ‘gasp’ Miguel’s.”
My dad and I left soon after that. The sky was crying for its loss. The rain poured on my head as the thunder angrily roared in the heavens. My superhero was gone and the sky knew. When the first raindrop hit my face, as I left home, that’s when I knew it was real. I cried along with the sky until I reached the car. I wasn’t alone with my feelings and that calmed me down a bit. The sky followed me all the way to my brother’s house. My father got out of the car and told me to lock the door and stay in the car. I nodded emotionless, because I knew the sky would be with me. Minutes, that seemed like seconds went by. My father returned, opened my door and sobbed in my arms. It was the first and only time I saw my father cry. “He’s dead. I can’t believe it. My baby is dead.” I could do nothing but take what should have been my father’s role and gave him a shoulder to cry on.
When my brother, Ahmed and mother arrived, we all went inside the house. Yanny’s body was inside a room, and the police would not let us enter. When the police were done with their investigation, they carried out Yanny’s body in a black bag. I could see the shape of his limp body dangle from the bottom of the bag. I never thought I would see my brother dragged off to the morgue. In fact, there were many things I thought I’d never see. I never thought I’d see my mother in pain, and my father and my brother cry for the first time. Superheros don’t do that; they make people happy, they strive to help others and that’s what I thought my brother was. You see, the death of the superhero didn’t come about because he wasn’t living, but because he cause so much pain to the people, I thought, he loved and cared for the most. The hardest thing to do out of all this was to realize he wasn’t the superhero I thought he was and he wasn’t the man I thought he was, it was all just fake.
I took both deaths pretty hard and to this day I’m not entirely over it. He fades from my memory a little each day. There is one thing I realized from this whole experience. I will be a superhero one day. I will love my family, I will raise my children and I will live until life says my job as a superhero is over. I will never quit and selfishly escape my duties as a superhero. I will never be like my brother.
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