I STOLE A BODY FROM THE MORTUARY TO SAVE MY BROTHER

I want to confess everything today. I am tired of carrying this secret alone. I am tired of pretending that I am strong, when inside I am shaking every day. What I did was wrong. It was dangerous. It was shameful. But I did it out of love, fear, and pure desperation.

My brother was dying.
He was only 27, and the doctors said his organs were shutting down. Every day he became thinner, weaker, quieter. I watched him cough blood. I watched him sleep like someone who was already halfway gone. I felt useless, like a shadow standing next to his bed, waiting for death to win.

One night, an old woman from our street came to our house. She told my mother that my brother was not dying from any sickness — that someone had tied him spiritually. She said only a certain ritual could break the rope. She told us to go to a sangoma who “fixes people who have been taken spiritually.”

We were desperate, so we went.

The sangoma looked at my brother once and said something that made my blood freeze.
He said, “This boy has one foot in this world and one foot in the next. If you want him back, you must bring me a fresh body. Only then can his spirit be pulled back.”

I told him I couldn’t do such a thing.
But he looked me straight in the eyes and said, “If you don’t, bury your brother this week.”

For two days I tried to ignore those words, but every time I looked at my brother lying there, I felt like the walls were closing in. My mother kept crying. My little sister prayed until she fell asleep. Inside me, something broke. I decided I would do anything — even the unthinkable — to save him.

On a Friday night, I went to the mortuary.
The air was cold. The smell was thick. I had never felt fear like that before. My hands were shaking so much that I almost dropped the keys I had borrowed from a friend who worked there. I walked past rows of bodies, each covered with white sheets. Some still had tags on their toes. Some looked peaceful. Some looked like they had died fighting.

I found a young man who had passed away just a few hours earlier.
I didn’t know his name.
I didn’t know his story.
I only knew that he didn’t deserve this last disrespect from me.

I whispered “I’m sorry” as I lifted him.
I still remember how heavy he felt.
I still remember his cold skin touching mine.

I put him in the back of my car, covered him, and drove straight to the sangoma.

When we arrived, candles were already burning. The sangoma started the ritual immediately. He made me stand in the corner and not look at certain things. I heard the chanting, the splashing of liquids, the dragging sounds. I tried not to cry, but tears kept falling. I kept thinking about the man whose body I took, wondering if his family was looking for him already.

After almost two hours, the sangoma finished.
He said, “Go home. Your brother will wake up before sunrise.”

I didn’t believe him — but I went home anyway.

At exactly four in the morning, my brother opened his eyes.
He sat up like someone who had just come back from a long, dark place. My mother screamed with joy. My sister cried and thanked God. My brother looked around, confused but alive. Alive.

Everyone celebrated.
But inside me… something died.

I saved my brother, yes, but I stole a family’s closure. I took a body that was not mine. I helped in a ritual I did not understand. And to this day, I still dream about that young man’s face. Sometimes I see him standing at the foot of my bed. Sometimes I hear him breathing behind me in the dark.

My brother is alive, healthy, and strong today.
But I am the one who never healed.

I don’t know if I did the right thing or the worst thing.
All I know is that love can make you cross lines you never thought you would ever touch.

I sometimes feel like someone very cold touches me on my feet asking me to go tell his family where I had taken him. It's almost like the person is begging me to give his family closure. 

The person is always telling me that his mother is now sick since his corpse went missing. I always wake up from the nightmare shaking and wet. I'd like to believe that it's not only a dream since I see marks of dirt on the same spot where I dream the person would be standing when scratching my feet.