The Price of Play

An Original Story by Marcya.

Dean Riley was very close to his younger sister Ericka, or Rica as everyone called her. And he made sure I knew that when I started dating him in our first year at the Manhattan School of Arts.

When Dean introduced me to Rica I was very surprised, not just by the physical resemblance, but in the way they acted as well. They were both really tall for their age, with brown-blonde hair and blue eyes. They were both charming, funny, witty and smart. And as I later found out, they both loved music and art.

Dean was a really good artist, drawing and painting everywhere and on anything. Rica loved singing and was really good at it from what I’d heard. And although Rica was 2 years younger than Dean they spent a lot of time with each other and had something more than a brother-sister bond.

After that first meeting Rica and I became good friends. She often came on double dates with Dean and me, bringing a different guy every time, of course. She and I used to laugh at how Dean used to grind his teeth and clench his hands every time a guy would put his arm around Rica.

Pretty soon the school year ended, Dean and I had been going steady for nearly a year. Rica was in her Senior year of high school. And life was great.

Then at a party we met this guy, Daniel. And he and Dean hit off really well and became fast friends. After the party Dean started hanging out with Daniel a lot. And when ever he was around anyone else he would get really grumpy. Slowly he started getting distant, not really talking to anyone, staying by himself for ages at a time, and hanging out with Daniel more and more. He didn’t care about college or drawing or Rica or me or anything!

Rica confronted him one day, asking him why he wasn’t spending time with anyone, and why was he always with Daniel.

“I don’t like that Daniel guy, Dean,” she sobbed. “And I don’t like what your doing! I don’t know what you’re doing right now, but I don’t like it!!”

He blew up at her, saying all sorts of hurting words, like how it wasn’t Rica’s problem what he did and he could be friends with who ever he wanted and she shouldn’t butt into his life. Rica shouted back some choice words and then stormed out.

One night when Dean was out the phone rang really late. It was Rica. Her voice sounded tired, sad, angry and fed-up all at the same time.

“They got him, Tanya.” She sighed

“Who got who?” I asked.

“The police…. They got Dean… for drugs,” she replied.

I was speechless, “D… Dr… Drugs?” I stuttered.

“Yeah… and that Daniel guy as well.”

When Dean came out of rehab, he promised everyone he wouldn’t do it again. He started studying and drawing and painting and spending time with Rica and his other friends and me. And then a month later it all started again, his mom found him this time and sent him to rehab again. In those 2 years, our last 2 years of college. Dean went in and out of rehab 7 times, every time coming back and saying he wouldn’t do it again and then falling back a month later.

Finally at the end of my 3rd year, just before the exams, he snapped, falling all the way down to rock bottom and hitting hard. He went crazy in rehab that time, worse than ever. One day we got a call from the rehab management, Dean was fighting with the medico’s and had a fall and was in a coma. When we went to the hospital the doctor said that he wasn’t stable and they weren’t sure he would make it. Rica was devastated, she stayed at the hospital day and night, never leaving Dean’s side, no matter what anyone said, she didn’t care about anything, but staying by Dean.

After nearly a month in a coma, Dean came out, he became stable and then woke up. Crying he told his mother and Rica and me what happened, ending with “ I want to stop but I don’t know how, I was only playing around, please help me! I don’t want it to end this way.”

His mom got the money and put him in the best rehab that money could pay for. When he came out that time it stuck, the first few months were hell, but we got through. And Dean went back and finished college.

In her 2nd year of college Rica started dating Chris, my younger brother. And a year later Dean proposed to me, we got married 2 years after that, 4 years, 2 years after Dean finished college. I finished college Dean was clean for 3 years now. Rica was my maid of honor and Chris was Dean’s best man.

3 years after we got married our son Ryan was born, and Chris and Rica got engaged. Dean was now clean for 6 years. Two years later Rica and Chris got married, Dean, now clean for 8 years, gave a short toast at the wedding, and spent ages perfecting a picture for their new apartment. 

When I woke up one morning I found Dean slumped in the bathroom and no amount of shaking would wake him up. The autopsy they took said ‘Heroin Overdose’. Dean was clean for nearly 11 years when he died. He only did heroin for 2 years and he paid a very big price for it. The funeral was huge, and all Dean’s family and friends came. Rica, then heavily pregnant sang a song, a slow, sad song, that she wrote herself.

Now a year later, Ryan is 6 and Rheann, our daughter is 2, Rica had a baby girl and named her Delaney. Dean isn’t her to see his son play Little League, he didn’t see his first home run. He didn’t hear his daughter’s first words or his neice’s laugh. A laugh that reminds me of him every time I hear it. He wont be here when his daughter starts ballet, he wont see her first recital. He wont see his kids graduate. All because of a stupid mistake he mad 12 years ago…. All because he was just ‘playing around’ If you ask me the price of play is too big.

End