Keith Stephen Newberg... That's my older brother, my best friend, my protector, my guiding hand... that's only a few things that he was to me, not to mention how he touched the lives of everyone else that he met along the way.

As far back as I can remember, and that's a long, long time, Keith was always joking and laughing, bringing a smile to anyone's face that he came in contact with.  He was always there when I needed him, no matter what he was doing, no matter who he was with.  If I needed him, all I had to do was call and he came running.  He was 6 years older than me and my mother used to tell me that when I was born he used to tell everyone when they went out anywhere, "This is my baby sister" and "Be careful, don't hurt her." He was only 6 and already the overprotective big brother that he always was!

I remember being 4 years old, watching him get ready to go to school, watching him get on the school bus in front of our house, and him being so excited about going.  He loved learning new things.  He was always so smart. 

We kind of grew apart as he hit his teen years, but he was still very protective of me, I can remember him asking me one day "you're not doing drugs or anything are you?" and I didn't lie to him. Oh no, he always knew when I was lying. No matter the situation. So I told him the truth, yea, I was smoking pot and drinking every once in a while, that was when I was 14, he was 20. He told me that it was fine as long as I wasn't doing anything harder.  I remember he specifically said, "I swear if I find out you're doing acid or X I'll kick your ass, and I'm not playing."  Even though he had done every drug under the sun, he didn't want me going down the same road.  One of our friends, Speedy, told my brother one day that we smoked a blunt together and Keith snapped!

That same year, he had a daughter, my niece, Chloe Illana Newberg.  She was so beautiful. She passed away the day after she was born.  She was premature and her lungs were underdeveloped.  This killed a part of all of us, but no where near as much as it hurt Keith's heart.  Throughout the whole pregnancy, he always wanted to know so much about babies and couldn't wait for her to be here, he wanted to play with her and to teach her how to do everything.  He was heartbroken.

You see, I had only seen my brother cry 4 times, ever.  The first time was when my kitten had gotten hit by a car and died when I was about 7, he cried because I was hurt.  This was the second and the hardest he had ever cried.  The 3rd and 4th are later in this story.

By the time I was 17 and he was 23, I had already done my fair share of screwing up, I was on probation for felony offenses and had dropped out of school, but got my G.E.D. and was working full time Wal-Mart.  We hadn't seen much of each other or talked much in about a year.  He called me one day when I was working and told me he needed me to pick him up, that it was important.  His girlfriend and him had gotten in a huge fight.  I left work and when I called the phone back, his girlfriend answered the phone.  She told me that he was crazy and that they had been up all night doing coke and drinking and said if he didn't leave she was going to hit him...