My brother died a day before my 17th birthday.

This year will be my first Christmas without him and that thought's really been fucking me up lately. It was only a few months ago that it happened, but whenever "family" events like this come up, it feels like it was just yesterday that my whole world lost its meaning.

My brother's name was...

His name was...

I can't really bring myself to write it anymore. My hands get too shaky, my eyes get too watery. It takes me hours to stop my own goddamn sobbing.

Oliver.

Oliver, Oliver, Oliver.

Olly, Olls, Eyebrows, Dipshit, Big Head Baby.

It's stupid, but anything that reminds me of him throws me off guard.

Whenever I see pictures of him, it feels unreal. Like he was just an imaginary friend I made up for my own comfort. And when I pass by his room, I can still hear him singing or plucking at guitar strings. I still see him smile and wave at me, excited to show me the song lyrics that he's been working on all day. "Toni, you're home!" he'd say every time he saw me. His voice was unreal. Soft and sunny like his whole life's purpose was to alleviate everyone's troubles. He'd bound up to me and squeeze every ounce of stress from my body. If I hold my arms out, I can feel his steady heartbeat on my chest.

His pulse was always at a steady 65. The only reason I know is because he would ask me to check it whenever everything around him seemed to be crashing and burning.

I miss the way his head tucked under my chin. The way he clung onto me like I was his personal superhero. The way his anxious pulse slowed to a calm sigh when he spoke to me.

I'm the only one who misses him.

Mom acts like it didn't happen, Teddy's hardly said his first words, and Dad...Dad refuses to "dwell on the past." Honestly, I've never seen him happier. He sees this as some sort of opportunity to "start over and replenish the Gotō Family Name." I don't give a shit about our family name. I just want my brother back.

Dad cleaned out Oliver's room to make space for guests who stay over.

His ocean cologne pillows smell like Dad's expensive detergent now. All four walls of his typically over-decorated room are white and bland. Everything that meant anything to Oliver is rotting in our basement. Like he was nothing.

The only thing I have left of him is the orange pill bottle he used to...

God.

I hate this fucking bottle.

Everyone that sees me offers half-assed condolences, usually telling me to focus on loving Teddy.

I already love Teddy. I don't need some self-absorbed assholes to tell me to love him more. Teddy's my little brother the same way Oliver was my little brother. I don't play favorites — I don't believe in that — so why can't these pricks understand that loss is hard to just pick yourself up from like a bad fall? I can't move on like Dad and everyone else wants me to.

And honestly, when I look at Teddy, all I can do is cry now. I've never cried this much in my life, it's awful.

Hopelessness, I think.

That's what it is. It's like a mantra that plagues my already overactive brain.

"It's your fault."

"You should've never gone to that party."

"He'd still be here if you came home earlier."

"You failed him."

"You failed your brother."

It's not my fault. At least, that's what I would imagine any sane therapist would say to me, but...it's really hard not to blame myself for being powerless. I'm not used to that. And I hate that.

Antoine Gotō is a failure of a big brother.

There's nothing I can do to change that.