My good friend Adam died this week. He was 38. Cancer? No. Car accident? No. Heart attack? No. Murder? Nope. No, Adam drank himself to death. He died from his alcoholism.

Yep. But first he dove into a coma and an unresponsive state on a bus stop bench on a busy Los Angeles boulevard. He never even made it to a hospital and went straight to the morgue. My heartbreak is immeasurable. To his really close friends unfathomable. The anguish carried by his closest living relative, his grandmother, is unimaginable.

But Adam’s death is a reminder of the cold hard truth: Alcoholics and addicts are told that if they keep using or drinking they will end up in one of three places: a jail, an institution such as a hospital or insane asylum…or a casket. The journey there can vary in length, route, and quality. And no matter what— it will happen. Hands down. Guaranteed.

Adam was a hard rock musician and looked the part. Actually he looked more like Jesus. He even had the gentle softness and quiet grace that we imagine Jesus himself would show. How profoundly ironic that that outer calm was not covering an inner peace — at all. And you’d never guess that very very loud music was his passion. As he celebrated his first year of sobriety a few months ago, he got a dream job at the Amoeba music store in the heart of Hollywood, a mecca for afficionados of that magical spectrum of sound called music. Life was grand. With a Sound of Music soundtrack….literally.

A far cry from Adam’s pain, much from losing his mother and sister within six months of each other several years ago. It may have been the heartache that pushed Adam to his drinking limits. And there were none.

I am no expert, but what happened to Adam comes right out of an addiction textbook. His return to drinking it appears began in March on a trip to Las Vegas. No joke… not kidding. Addicts and alcoholics are actually encouraged to avoid unnecessary travel to that city and any trip that has you getting ever-so-close to an unlocked mini-bar.

In Vegas, he told the folks he was helping with a music video (who were unaware that he was even an alcoholic…let alone a recovering one) , that he was going to have “just one drink”. By morning Adam was found on a couch in the hotel lobby unresponsive and was taken by ambulance to the hospital. A momentous end to the video shoot trip. “Just one drink.” Its one of the mantras in Alcoholics Anonymous. You can’t even have one drink. At. All. Since that day, save one week at a detox that he paid with his very last dollar in cash, Adam never stopped drinking.

And it doesn’t matter if you are a drug addict or a drunk. One drink. One hit, one toke and its —straight to the craps table of life. And eventually no job, no money and an even faster trajectory to those three aforementioned endpoints. With each relapse, the addiction gets worse.

Relapse is certainly rough and Adam knew it, having been trapped in that cycle for probably twenty years. During the recent relapse he told us he was “only drinking wine and not the hard stuff”…again: textbook AA. A doctor, who I would like to chase down with a baseball bat or a camera crew, upped Adam’s Attivan prescription to 2 mg pills back in April. And a hospital or doctor may have just a few weeks back… prescribed him Xanax. All disastrous and almost murderous mini-events for a chronic alcoholic.

His years of drinking were punctuated with many comas, a perpetually bleeding esophagus, head bumps and near death experiences, as well as a horrific car accident that he miraculously lived through….and G d knows what else to cause such sadness for his grandmother and those who cared so much about him.

His first full year of sobriety was something to behold. Like a rebirth. He looked incredibly healthy longtime friends told me. Adam became a bright light and the light in his face was palpable and the immense joy of having a job, money, some regained trust and independence and the ability to walk into his favorite Ash music instrument store was downright giddy. In fact a friend of ours and I waiting for him outside the store felt he would never leave the store. And yes, in additional fact, with fawning and treasuring, even caressing guitars and whatnot….he stayed until they closed the place!

But there was an even greater joy Adam was experiencing….a simply beautiful one that makes his loss even deeper and more devastating. In his very first 365 consecutive day year of clarity and serenity, Adam became incredibly close to the son of an ex girlfriend. A son that in fact could have been his own. Anyone who would see them together wouldn’t think otherwise. And they even looked alike. Though Adam’s beard made it impossible to really compare. When together, they were inseparable.

Hayden who I think is eight years old seemed to become very attached to Adam and I believe even occasionally called him “Dad”. They spoke often on the phone. Adam would sleep over the night before he would babysit him for his mother. And for Adam’s friends, not a day or social get together would escape a Hayden story or a look at a Hayden picture on his phone.

Several times he canceled plans with me for…you guessed it…Hayden Duty including a trip to Disneyland. The loss for this child who I believe has no father in his life is so unfair and ….I fear will be staggering and i weep as I type this sentence. I haven’t even met Hayden though Ive heard his excited voice over Adam’s cellphone many times.

Like a fading candle, Adam did indeed try to stop drinking valiantly. Just a few weeks ago he made an effort to re-join the group therapy counseling program where he and I met in February of last year….. but, sadly, he didn’t show up the next day. My texts to him the last several weeks went unanswered. He slowly slipped away.

What a prince of a man Adam was. His grandmother says he never cursed, never raised a hand or his voice to anyone. She nicknamed him “Jesus” too.

There must be good that grows from the ashes of his life. We must insist and make him more than a memory. So I’ve made a promise to myself and a pact with a couple of Adam’s childhood friends who all went to high school with Adam and incidentally, Leo DiCaprio, ….to look out for his grandma Maryann and dear Hayden. We will take turns and once a month…or more…do something for them. At the minimum, a phone call. Ice cream, Disneyland, or more. Why would we not?

Its the least we could do for our Adam, the hard rock musician with a soft jelly inside who now leaves us in heartbreak…but with some incredibly valuable life lessons in recovery….and love. Rest in Peace, sweet Adam……