My one week has passed in San Francisco, and I’m back to New York today. Time really flew by quickly, and I feel like I really didn’t do that much.

In March of last year when I came home for two weeks and flew back to New York, I felt miserable. I was scared about my brother’s future and how he was going to cope with his problems and life overall, I was scared about my mom’s health and the stress she felt around my brother, and I was scared about my family in general being in such a sad, negative place and seeming to be unable to get out of it. Now, a year later, Ed is gone, and each of my parents is struggling to cope in his and her own way. The stress of worrying about my brother’s future is gone because he is gone, but now there’s a different type of stress that looms – thinking about my mother’s ability to cope without him and retain her health, and my dad’s ability to stay healthy and not be so negative and irritable. When we become negative and saddened, we are at more risk to fall ill.

My biggest fear used to be that I’d lose my brother in the way that I did. Now, it’s that I could lose my parents because of how weak and vulnerable they are, especially my mom. And then I think about the same things I used to think about with Ed – how I’d cope knowing he wouldn’t be here the rest of my life to see big potential events happen for me – engagement, marriage, pregnancy, children, buying homes. I think about that now in the context of my parents, and I’m scared. I don’t sit here and obsess about it, but it’s a fear in the back of my mind that they won’t be here when any of those things happen. I don’t have a schedule for any of those things, and none of those thing seem very close to happening. Sometimes, it’s like you are waiting for something to happen, but you have no idea what will happen and when. That really sucks.

It’s interesting how we all cope with pain in our own ways and choose (or not choose) to show it. Ever since my good friend from college got diagnosed with a rare form of lymphoma last August, every time I’ve spoken with her, it’s been hard to detect any true fear or pain on her end, yet I know she is scared and worrying every day. I have no idea what it is like to think that I could possibly die of an illness. I still struggle to understand what Ed felt like in his own despairing, lonely flesh and blood existence.

Human beings are such strange creatures. We live our lives every day going through different motions and habits, trying to achieve certain things that are tangible or not tangible. Yet in doing that, we all have different adversities and demons we grapple with that may make achieving any of those things even more difficult than for another person not facing the same set of issues. I sit on the bus or train and walk by thousands of people every single day. We pass each other, exchange a glance across a subway car, bump into each other in a rush. We have everyday conversations – “Hi! How are you?” Fine, thanks! How was your weekend? Did you do anything fun?” Yet we have no idea what each others’ feelings or pains or demons are. Sometimes, that must feel really alienating and lonely. We’re in this big world full of billions of people surrounding us every day, but if no one really understands you, it’s like this big sun-lit world is just a small, dark hole with just you in it.

I went in to work at my company’s office here in San Francisco, in the “up and coming” Design Destrict that is borderline Portrero Hill where tech startups are signing leases, and where homeless men peeing while smiling at you as you are walking to a food truck is completely normal. A colleague whose sister lives in my parents’ neighborhood was nice enough to offer me a ride home afterwards. As we were exchanging notes on overprotective parents, he asked if I had any siblings. “Yeah, I have an older brother,” I said. He’s dead, but you don’t have to know that, the voice in my head said silently.

It’s such a normal, everyday question to be asked if you have any brothers and sisters. No one thinks anything of it. I freely ask people all the time if they have siblings. But now that Ed isn’t here, I really hate the question. It’s like I have to pretend that everything is normal, that yes, I do have an older brother, and of course he’s around! No one wants to know if you have any family drama, or if your sibling died in some freak accident, or if he committed suicide. How do you go about telling people about your sibling who is no longer living anymore, anyway? If you never talked much about your siblings before, why would you suddenly start just because they are dead?

I still have a couple of friends I haven’t told. Part of me thinks they wouldn’t really care – we weren’t that close to begin with. I don’t really care to share the information because it would just cause me needless anguish, and they don’t gain anything from it, anyway. I don’t want any more pain.