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Brother's memory always with Wayne

INDIANAPOLIS — Reggie Wayne stares blankly into his locker.

He is visiting with his brother again. It happens a lot these days, since that cold September night when he first heard he had lost Rashad in a traffic accident.

The Indianapolis receiver stares at the photo held in place by a Colts horseshoe, the one of Rashad looking confident in dark glasses, posing next to his dilapidated teal Ford Mustang. Sometimes, it makes Wayne laugh to remember his brother's fascination with those jalopies.

Not today, though. Today he is lost in prayer as he stares at the picture, the one he decided would always be with him, since the day he and his oldest brother cleaned out Rashad's apartment in New Orleans.

"Every morning, every time before I go to bed, at halftime, I talk to him," Wayne says later.

From the locker next to him, receiver Aaron Moorehead is watching Wayne. Sometimes, Moorehead lets his teammate come out of it on his own. Sometimes, when he sees tears welling in Wayne's eyes, he reaches over to reassure him with a hand on the back.

"I'm here with you, bro," Moorehead tells him. "I'm here."

Rashad is supposed to be here to bounce up and down and celebrate all of his little brother's on-field accomplishments. His first Pro Bowl selection. His first Super Bowl. This is exactly what they had talked about before the season. They are supposed to be living this together.

Instead, Wayne, 28, is mourning his brother the only way he knows how, through football and prayer.

"There's not much time that goes by that I don't think about him," Wayne said. "I think about him all the time. I wish that he could be here, sharing what I'm sharing."

There was no time to warn Reggie. At about the time he was playing the Jacksonville Jaguars, making four catches for 82 yards, his family already was grieving Rashad. It wasn't until after the Sept. 24 game that Reggie was told about his brother, a delivery driver whose truck went off the road in Kenner, La., and crashed into a highway guardrail that day. He was 32.

Wayne went home to New Orleans for the funeral. A small group of Colts players and staff also made the trip, including quarterback Peyton Manning, coach Tony Dungy, team owner Jim Irsay and defensive lineman Gary Brackett, who had lost his mother, brother and father in a 16-month span.

Former teammates from around the NFL attended, such as Edgerrin James, who was also Wayne's teammate at the University of Miami.

"You're at the bottom of the barrel and whenever you see your teammates show up when you're at your worst, it lifts you up," Wayne said.

"Whenever you play this game of football, it's more than just friends, more than just teammates. It's more like family. It was good to see the rest of my family."

He spent several days in New Orleans, grieving with his relatives, but he was consumed with pain. His mother and brother told him to go back to Indianapolis, to get back to his team and try to get "something else on your mind."

The team would be facing the New York Jets on Sunday, but he was in no state to play. So, he did what he has done his entire life. He asked Rashad for guidance.

"Mentally, I really wasn't all there. Once again, I prayed and I felt he would want me to play," Wayne said.

His teammates approached him cautiously.

"The most important thing in handling death or tragedy is really to keep

everything as normal as possible," rackett said.

"Already, guys going through the tragedy think they have a bull's-eye on them. ... If anybody acts a little not-normal, your confidence is shattered. It was important for everybody to act normal, laugh and joke as much as possible, continue the normal routine."

Dungy spoke with Wayne every day on the phone. When he saw Wayne back in Indianapolis, Dungy, who had lost his youngest son to suicide just nine months earlier, hugged him like his own.

"The thing I told Reggie is, you have to enjoy the memories of the time that you had and know that the thing they'd want you to do is to continue on with excellence," Dungy said. "That's the only bit of advice I could share with him."

Wayne played that Sunday, a week after his brother died. He caught four passes for 74 yards, including a 41-yarder that helped lead a Colts comeback.

He played again the next week. Then the next. One foot in front of the other, until what he had done was better than most receivers in the NFL.

He earned his first Pro Bowl selection, just as he and Rashad had planned.

Before the AFC Championship Game against New England, he reached out to his brother again.

"Make it interesting," he asked of his brother.

By halftime, the Colts were down 21-3. Their offense was nowhere to be found. In the locker room, as the thundering crowd at the RCA Dome was reduced to a whisper, Wayne spoke to his brother again.

"I just felt like he set all that up, just to make it interesting," Wayne said.

The Colts scored 14 unanswered points to start the second half and 17 more in the fourth quarter to defeat New England 38-34. They were going to the Super Bowl, just as the Wayne brothers had planned it.

Afterward, Wayne prayed and cried and celebrated.

"I did want to do big things this year for my brother," Wayne said. "In some form or fashion, I feel he's helped pave the way for me and for this team."

Carlos Frias writes for The Palm Beach Post.