Sitting in her classroom between classes, Carol is bone tired, worn down by work and worry and late nights. "I just wanted one day when he wasn't throwing up blood," she says, weeping. "One day when I didn't come home to a sick husband."

She can't remember a single time when he slept through the night. It was always the same, waking up in the dark and seeing her big husband crying.

"He cried a lot toward the end because of the pain," she says. "And he hated being sick. He wanted to do more for me and the kids. He cried a lot about not being able to see his boys grow up and take care of me."

Carol is bitter that all the adulation and support Garrick received as an athlete at BYU evaporated when he was beset with troubles. No one was there when he was sick, she says. Some family members kept Garrick and his drug problems at a distance, but David and their younger brother Richard remained devoted. David was a modern-day Theo to Garrick's Van Gogh, making car payments for Craig, paying much of the expense for his rehab programs, giving him medical care.

"I'll do anything to get you better," he would tell Craig.

Garrick was also close to his mother, Janet, and was devastated by her death in 1998. That seemed to sober him and bring new resolve to get his life in order.

"He struggled, but he was always trying to come out of it," says Traci. "He would say, 'I'm going to beat this.' "

Says Carol, "He was always going to get better."

During the last couple of years, Garrick was unable to take aspirin, much less Percodan, because his stomach couldn't handle solids.

Before he even reached his 40th birthday, Garrick had the insides of an 80-year-old man, doctors told Carol. The most immediate concern was the tumor in his stomach — he nearly bled to death in March from vomiting so much blood and had to be hospitalized — but even if he had survived the stomach surgery, there were many other serious problems that awaited medical attention. Garrick's surgeon, who was unavailable for comment, told Carol that her husband's myriad health problems were attributable to steroid use.

Garrick underwent surgery on Aug. 29 and the procedure went well, but he seemed to fear the worst. The night before he died, he took Carol in his arms and told her, "Carol, I'm going to die. You have no idea how much I love you and appreciate you taking care of me. No one would've put up with this. Thank you for my beautiful boys."

David showed up earlier that same day and found his brother was restless with pain. He had warned doctors before surgery that they wouldn't be able to control Craig's post-operative pain "except with what would be a lethal dose for the rest of us." Garrick was given more pain medication, and he was able to relax and rest. The brothers watched a football game on TV, and then David left to allow Garrick to sleep.