Bless you, R

Before I got married, I used to hang out at this bar all the time. I would go there to eat, to drink and to talk. The bartender was/is a very good friend of mine. Those were some awesome days. There were days I would hang out at the bar drinking dunkin donuts coffee with my friend S who is the bartender and talk about basically crap. I met R there. R looked like a typical character out of the Sopranos. He was in the mid 40s and he was Italian. He would violently hug me and kiss me on my cheek every time he saw me. He was nice but certainly had a dark side to him. When I met him the first time about 3 years ago he had just gotten some facial surgery done. Apparently, one day when he was walking out on his driveway he slipped and fell face down. His cheekbones were shattered after his fall and he had reconstruction surgery. As a result of this long ongoing process and rehab, he became depressed and was put on anti depressants. With time his face began to heal. I met him a number of times at the bar and also realized that he had a problem with his alcohol. His depression was making him an alcoholic. After a few drinks, he would be very pleasant and we would talk for hours about politics, religion and race. He was a born catholic but held the church in contempt for a lot of reasons. So S, R and me would talk for hours and then go home. Over the course of time, I stopped going there as often as I used to. Eight months ago while I was there, our man turned up and was pretty down. He had just been diagnosed with colon cancer. Here was a man who was in the mid 40s. His wife had left him a few years ago, his business partner had duped him and he had no family. I tried to psychoanalyze him and at that time I inferred that he was a good man who was fucked by the ways of the world. He trusted too much, felt let down, became bitter and depressed.
S the bartender told me yesterday- S by the way has never drank in his life. S told R that he had a choice. Fight the cancer by leading a healthy life and by not drinking and smoking. R tried but kept coming back to the bar, was drunk out of his brains, was taking painkillers and supposedly snorting other illicit substances to ward away the pain. R went through chemo and basically the insurance company decided to stop paying for the chemo as they felt that the damage was too much. The last time I met R was 3 months ago and he was sitting on the barstool, having food and sipping some wine. He had lost 30 pounds through his chemo and he was going down but he was continuing to abuse his body, as he knew his time was running out.
Yesterday, I was at the bar after 2 months and they told me that R was found dead on his couch 2 weeks ago. No friends, no family. He was alone and probably suffered till the last minute.
Bless his unfortunate soul. He will be remembered by me though for his sincere hug and kiss every time he saw me. And you know what? This is exactly how I thought his life would end.