Illusions of grandeur

An old friend came to visit me this morning. We talked about relationships, work issues, political and society stuff. As you can already imagine the conversation was getting downhill, so we opened an old high school album to cheer up by recalling the past.

There are us, the whole class in our uniforms with our teacher, mr Gamper in the middle, all tall and serious in his suit and tie. Although I can tell now he was a communist he never told us out straight in case we judged him with our inexperienced minds. I can see me and my friend in the picture, you can see the difference if you see us now, all beardy and stuff. At the corner I can see Nikki, the prettiest girl of the class, I used to be in love with her but of course never told her anything. She got pregnant in college and forced to marry that guy, who might have been cool, but was no husband/father material and got addicted to alcohol and other staff and started beating Nikki and the kid all the time. Next to the teacher are the class bullies, James, Rick and Mick. They used to prank everyone with no exceptions, and the girls seemed to like their style. Mick and James made up their minds later, got to a university and got a job at an insurance company. Rick on the other hand, got really deep into gambling and he ended up owning a lot of money to lenders. I do not know if he got out of it yet.

For every person there is a story to tell. Especially for this skinny guy, Sergey, who was the most unnoticed guy in the whole school, there where even some teachers who didn't know he existed. This one, just a year before graduation, brought his life upside down . He got really obsessed with body building and started working out. I don't know if there was anyone behind this but suddenly he started taking these protein shakes and nutrition amplifiers and he worked out like his life depended on it. In just four months we could all see the difference, not just on is body but on the way he talked and think. His whole life warped around a gym and a mirror. He looked up to guys with huge muscles who posed on  magazines.

We move on to the next photos on the album, there are several from random school plays and some with the guys we used to hang out then, some in random clubs, some in the park. There is one from a basketball play. I see a lot of familiar faces in the court but I cannot tell their names, it has been several years, but on the bench there is a guy I recognize, Sergey. It's been some time that his has been ''fit'' but I guess he weren't that functional so the coach let him out. By that time he got several pounds, still that's the only thing he thinks of, day and night, working out, taking the supplements, and rest so the muscles will get the proper growth. Of course rhe didin't have any friends, the only guys he socialized with were the guys from the gym.

The next one was from the graduation party that took place in a huge beach club. It's really weird I forgot that night, for it was really shocking. Sergey has been working out for about a year and he became a real musculine guy, all eyes were on him. Although he has changed his appearance, the guys from school were teasing him for being a wuss and soft and all that things. Sergey wasn't the type of guy that would get involved in fights no matter what, and got really sad that no matter what he did noone would ever respect him. So he took a bottle of vodka and got wasted with that. He was all laughing and dancing and singing not giving a damn about everyone. At about 4 o'clock he said he'd lay on the sand to catch his breath. He seemed really tired. At first we thought that he just fell asleep out of exhaustion, but when some got near to wake him up we all came to realize the fact that Sergey was no more.

The doctor said that it was due to heart failure, caused by the combination of alcohol and anabolics. Me and my friend became sad remembering that. We talked about it for a little. There was no chance Sergey wouldn't know what would happen to him after what he did. It will never stop troubling me, how a man of discipline and devotion gave up so easily.