I got use to hearing the same things from everyone “I’m here for you always.” “I’m so sorry Emma” “You’re so strong.” The same stuff over and over and over again. The funny thing was all these people didn’t truly mean what the said to me. They wouldn’t always be there for me and I definitely knew that I couldn’t just go up to them and ask to simply talk. It was all an act, an act that I always saw once someone would die. I would always wonder to myself why it would take somebody to die for people to at least try to be nice for a day. Right about now you might be wondering people would be telling me sorry and all that other extra nonsense, well it was because I lost the only older brother figure I had in my life, a kid I’ve always been with since I was little, in a flash. My friend had committed suicide. Suicide is the one way that you can never truly know why someone would do it unless they left a note, but in this case he didn’t. I was left with endless possible ending in my head, endless last thoughts that he might’ve had, and endless signs that I should’ve seen while he was still alive.

My friend was an older brother to me and he was truly a one of a kind person, with a one of a kind smile. He had the type of smile that could light up anybody's world even on their darkest days. It really crushed my whole family, especially my dad. I usually went to counseling and the session I went to after my friend had passed I mostly spent being silent or just nodding my head. I couldn’t talk about it, I didn’t want to, I still didn’t even believe he was gone, even after the funeral, and I definitely didn’t want to believe it. I grew numb to it, very numb. Whenever people would talk to me and say they were sorry I would just get annoyed or even mad sometimes depending on who said it. After his death, I finally realized the logic behind everyone except the real and the rare. No one really cares until it’s to late, no one truly wants to help until you're in your last moments or at your lowest purely so they could say they tried to help you, or that they knew the person. It’s crazy, I realized that people wanted to try to be sad, people wanted to be “depressed” or have “anxiety” in our generation today, but all those people really don’t actually know what it’s like to have that at all. It bothered me more than I believe it should’ve. It really did, and I was always so close to snapping on everyone who would lie just for social media and for their look to everyone else. My generation is obsessed with wanting sympathy and constantly wanting someone to feel bad for them. It bothers me because unlike everyone else I do not want sympathy at all. I just want to deal with this on my own, I was one who didn’t need sympathy, nor wanted it like everyone else seemed to want.

It got tiring, and it got tiring very fast. Mentally I was drained, physically I was drained, and overall emotionally drained. It hurt me so much to see people who barely talked to my friend, finally start to care about him and say all these nice things about him after he was gone. I would always wonder why? Why would it take someone to die for numerous people to start saying nice things about him, why didn’t they ever tell him the stuff they were posting on social media for their followers to see to his face? It truly awestruck me, people thought they weren’t being selfish but they were. They even knew they didn’t care about him that much, or even to ask me how I’m doing until he committed suicide. It will forever stand unclear to me as why that was the case. It shouldn’t take a young person to die for people to reach out. I’m no saint either, I know it wasn’t my fault as to why he may have done it, but when he did reach out to me we would just always say how he would be all right and that he’d get through it. It messed with me, all the not knowing why or what didn’t I do enough of messed with me. I knew there wasn’t anything I could do, but I always wished there was something I could do. It won’t ever be the same, his smile will forever stay in the back of my mind, as well as the memories that came along with his smiles. I wish before he did it, he would’ve remembered all his good times in life, because I find myself thinking that there would be a lot more good memories than he thought. I knew it was hard for him, I know it’s always easier to think of the bad memories or bad things that have happened in his life.

With all those thoughts over powering my head, I often would sit for hours stuck in the moments. I often create slideshows of all our memories in my mind to try to create a smile. I only try to think of the good in him because there was so much good. Sometimes thinking about the joy he’d brought in my life just ends up making me more sad because I just want him to be here so we could’ve created more memories, because I know they would be unforgettable.

So, why was I tired of it all? I was just tired of all the fake ones. The people who made up memories to post about, tired of the people who acted like they really knew him but didn’t know him at all. That is the reason I was sick of it and sick of the ones that use death as a way to get attention. It was pathetic to me, and almost made me sick, and filled me with anger. I knew I couldn’t think about that stuff or even let it get to me because he wouldn’t want that of me. After his funeral I decided it was going to be my time, my time to use him as motivation in life. Use his death as a way to keep going when I feel like I can not anymore. He was the reason, the reason my whole perspective on life and the people in this world was forever changed. I was going to live on for him, and motivate everyone else all because my friend made me open up my eyes. He changed me, he left a permanent mark on me, one that I was never going to forget, and one I wouldn’t let anyone else forget.