Without You

It's been over 2 weeks since we were told that you are gone. It's been the hardest 2 weeks of my entire life. Every single day has felt like an awful nightmare, a blur that I'm somehow living in. My chest hurts constantly, tears flow randomly and at times, I have to tell myself to breathe. You were my best friend, my human diary, my protector, my big brother. I can't understand how this happened to you, or why. All I know is it's my own personal mission to find it out.
I have brief moments of clarity. Very brief. Where I know what you would want me to do, and how you want me to do it. You want me to be the same person you've always loved, and go forth with raising my family. You want me, to be me. You know that's easier said than done, Bub. It took me many, many years to be able to be in a good place after Dad passed. And with you, that's going to be so much harder. We spoke just about every day, about how you want this tattoo or that tattoo and how the twins told a complete stranger that I lost them in the store once. Those conversations were everything to me. Everything. You were everything to me. When I thought about my family and holidays, it was always, you, me, Casey and the girls. Always.
 I didn't just lose you. I lost me. So much of me was you. You were always in my head. If I hadn't talked to you yet that day, I wondered how your day at work went, how your practice went or if you had been getting enough sleep or eating enough. I worried about you constantly. There were several other times when I would call you and couldn't get a hold of you, so I would call and call until you picked up. If you didn't pick up, I would check the local news to be sure you weren't in an accident or anything. I would have never thought that scenario would actually happen one day. This time it was your apartment building plastered on the top of the screen, "Male body found in wooded area behind Southport Crossing." And I knew. I knew, dear brother, that you were gone. I hoped and hoped that maybe my gut feeling was wrong. That you had overslept and ignored your alarms and that's why your manager said you weren't at work. But shots fired? You gone? Never.
This entire thing is so surreal. You were kind. You were gentle. You were the Uncle who buys your nieces toys for Christmas that year we were too broke to. You were the Uncle that spent hours playing blocks and dolls with no complaints. You were the brother who talked with me until 3am because I had a panic attack. You were the brother who stuck up for me, even if I was wrong. You were the guy who volunteered your time to coach kids and share something with them that you loved. You were all of that and more. I'm broken, hallow, shattered into a million pieces and counting. I'm less of me, without you.
I'm not only mad of what they took from me. I'm mad of what they took from the girls. Mad that you won't get to see them go off to their first dances, hit their first home runs, open any more presents on Christmas, graduate, get married and their children. They would have had the best Uncle ever, because they already did. Someone took you away from them, and them, from you.
I don't know how to do this, Bub. I'm trying, but I need you here. I keep having breakdowns that I don't know how to get through. I have to move forward, I have to keep living. But I'd be lying if I said that it wasn't the hardest battle of my life. I have to be with my kids, but right now, I want to be with you. I'm thinking of you always.  Love Sis